The Trip to Brazil (Unabridged)

Note: This was written over two days, the first half written while I was on the plane flight to Brasilia.

What did you get when combine two New York Port Authority cops, one New York Port Authority chief, two police investigators, one irate Homeland Security supervisor, two Homeland Security workers, two feet of snow, five hours on the tarmac, one refueling stop, two planes, one inedible 1:30 AM dinner, and five hours of sleep?
Answer: My first day traveling to Brazil, of course.

Since I’ve finally woken up, the batteries of my CD player have run out, and I have an hour to burn before we get to Sao Paulo (well, I think we’re ending up in Sao Paulo, but currently that’s up for debate), I’ll give you the details..

It seems quite ironic that the most exciting and eventful day of my entire trip could quite possibly have come before I got to Brazil. We ended up flying out from JFK airport on the day that New Jersey finally decided to get serious about winter, and a northeaster swept in and deposited about two feet of snow in about a twelve hour period.
The weather and driving was certainly not good- ever major airport in the Washington D.C./Newark/New York area was closed except for JFK. I had unsuccessfully tried to get to church in the morning, only to give up after getting stuck three times in about half a mile. On the whole, I think I set an all time record by getting about two miles to the gallon throughout the course of the morning. Oh well, I guess today was not the day to save the ozone.

I got on the busy and my group arrived at JFK without incident and got our luggage, and checked in.

Everything was going quite smoothly. I should have been suspicious.

Being the industrious person I am, I decided to go through the security checkpoint and get myself situated before finding something to eat, and this is where things started getting interesting.

No, unlike previous trips, I was not stopped, questioned, searched. I did not have my luggage searched or have homeland security employees looking suspiciously at me as a would-be terrorist. Instead, I put my baggage through the scanner- laptop, laptop case, duffel bag, and coat and wallet together.

When I get to the other side of the checkpoint, out comes my laptop, my laptop case, and my duffel bag. I put my shoes back on, repack my laptop, grab my duffel bag, and right around the time I begin to worry about my last bin, it comes through. I put on my coat, gather my luggage, and begin walk away, when I pat my back pocket and realize that my wallet isn’t there. I return and talk to the Homeland Security supervisor, who, after asking me four times whether I stuck the wallet in my coat, my duffel, my laptop case, other jeans pockets, etc. etc. etc. (although how my wallet could have possibly made it into my close laptop case or duffel is beyond me), begins to search.

I’m starting to get worried and annoyed. He obviously isn’t happy that he has to search for me and I’m obviously unhappy that in the five or so seconds that I took my eyes of the bin to walk through the security checkpoint, that my wallet disappeared. After about 15 minutes of searching, the wallet turns up- on the other side of the security checkpoint and in a separate bin.

The supervisor breathes a sigh of relief, hands me the wallet, and asks me to check to see if anything is missing. I open my wallet- credit cards, ID are all intact. Phew. That’s when I find out that all my money for food and expenses (where ATM machines and credit cards are not as prevalent) has disappeared.

I again return to the supervisor, who is absolutely thrilled (and a wee bit skeptical) to hear that my money is gone. He shrugs his shoulders and tells me that I can go to the pay phone, call the Port Authority. I thank him for his time and he responds with an eye roll.

Irate and worried, I walk over to the waiting area, deposit my remaining luggage with friends, borrow some change (since of course I am now flat broke), and, after three tries, manage to get the Port Authority, which decides to send a police officer to the scene.

All right, take a deep breath, relax, rest your eyes, go surf your favorite web site for a few minutes, get a glass of water- if you’ve made it this far, you deserve a medal. Plus, I want your full attention, because this is when things get interesting.

Don’t worry. Go ahead. My story will still be here when you get back.

The Port Authority police officer comes over and the previously uncooperative “what are you doing complaining about stolen property at my checkpoint” supervisor, who we shall call Ramon (primarily because that’s his name), becomes considerably more polite and friendly.

In contrast to his homeland security counterpart, the police officer is friendly and sympathetic. I answer a barrage of questions, explain in exacting detail what happened, how much money I lost, etc. etc. He writes my name and address and decides that he should call the Chief of Port Authority police in that area, since thefts at security points tend to be taken seriously.

{Okay, quick aside- I just checked the in flight map, and no, we are not landing at our original destination, we are actually landing in Brasilia, which is about an hour by plane from Sao Paulo, I believe. This probably has something with running out of fuel after idling on the tarmac for five hours, but more on that later). (Quick aside to the aside- I was actually correct…we ended up on the tarmac in Brasilia, so we could refuel- which added an extra hour or so to our flight.)

So the police chief comes over, and asks me the same series of questions. He too talks to the supervisor, who, (poor guy), is now looking very stressed and a bit beat down. The police officer who first arrives informs me that this is likely all the can do except file a police report, since it’s unlikely that the investigators will come down unless there have been a series of incidents at this checkpoint.

Sure enough, about fifteen minutes later, the investigators (who yes, look like they came straight from a crime show) and ask me the same series of questions. By now, it’s looking like a metro police convention down there, with two metro police officers (who informs me that this checkpoint has an awful reputation for thefts), one police chief, two police investigators, two TSA homeland security advisors, and a few TSA/Homeland security officers thrown in for good measure.

They finish, I leave, and we finally get on the plane, which rolls on the runway at 7:30 PM, and stays there for five and a quarter hours.

No, that’s not an exaggeration. Five and a quarter hours. With no explanation.

Finally, around 12:45, we lift up off Kennedy’s only operating runway, and are served dinner (which has been sitting in heating units since 7:00PM) and it was easily the worst dinner I have ever eaten, (which, at that point, I didn’t really care about, my last full meal had been 13 hours before, and I would have been satisfied with mud if they had heated it up and given me a spoon).

After the aforesaid refueling stop, (caused by idling on the tarmac for five hours), we arrive in the airport around 1:30PM, having missed our connecting flight by about 3 hours. We end up getting bused to a different airport which puts us on a five o’clock flight to Porto Alegre. We crash in our hotel, eat dinner around 10:30 in the evening, and finally get to sleep.

And that’s it, that’s my story. No, money is not a problem- people have been forcing money upon me, and if I accepted all the Brazilian (and American) twenties that people have been trying to give me, I might be able to turn a tidy profit by the end of trip. That being said, I guess it will be a good spiritual discipline to rely on others for my daily bread.

All right, that’s enough for now. I’ll give you an update on the first day of the assembly later!