Well, it could have been worse, I guess. Awaking early after a fitful night of half-sleep, I rolled out of bed while it was still dark. All the packing had been completed the night before, but I wanted to try to send an e-mail message in the morning to all the people on my list, and had some other errands to run, so I wanted to get a very early start. After months of planning and preparation, I still had too many things to accomplish at the last minute.

I wolfed down some oatmeal and tea and drove over to Lucky’s to drop off some film I hoped to get developed before I left. But they couldn’t guarantee one-hour service, so I drove over to Wolf Camera—same story. It seems they need to warm up the machines, and most people don’t need film developed first thing in the morning. Evidently I’m not most people, but I guess I should have known. Fortunately, my third option, Payless, paid off.

Then, off to Gabriela’s with the boxes of work I needed her to nursemaid for me during my trip. Time was getting short. I had one hour to catch the bus. Back to Payless—the film was ready. I sped home, grabbed my bags, locked the front door, and began the journey.

It was only a couple of blocks to the bus stop, and as I trudged through my neighborhood, it seemed fitting somehow that I was initiating a journey which will take me around the globe by strolling out of my front door to a bus stop—much better than being dropped off at the airport.

My scheme played out as planned. I made the two bus connections, the train whisked me up to the station nearest the airport, and the shuttle bus dropped me off right in front of the International terminal. So far, so good.

But there was no one behind the counter at Aeroflot, and for a second the nightmare scenario of a canceled flight flashed before me. Fortunately, the departure display behind the counter showed the flight leaving on schedule, so I regained my equilibrium and decided to grab some food while I waited.

Later on there was still no one there, so I bought a couple of items I still needed at one of the airport shops, and by that time a line had formed in front of the counter. Sure enough, the check in had begun, and when I arrived at the head of the line, found that all my documents were in order. I survived my first real bonehead mishap when I accidentally left my return tickets behind at the security counter, but the agent there brought them over to me before I had left for the gate. Great, David, I thought, lose your tickets before you even leave San Francisco!

They weren’t sure which gate my plane was going to depart from, so I just loitered around the general area where it was expected. Since I knew I had plenty of time, I decided to try to connect to the Net from a pay phone. My attempts at home had been fruitless—some sort of problem with the long list of e-mail addresses, I guessed, and at first I had no luck at the airport either. But after paring down my list, and repeated attempts, I managed to send my message.

The departure display showed that my flight was now delayed by two hours. A bad sign, since my connection in Moscow would be down to a single hour, and that gave me little chance of clearing customs and making it from the international terminal to the domestic one. Ah well, it gave me more time to try calling Vilma again, but I just got the answering machine. Drat!

Then, to my surprise, they announced the boarding of my flight. It was a little later than the scheduled departure time, but well short of the time posted on the display. Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, I grabbed my bags and hustled on board. I settled into my seat—right behind the bulkhead, I swear I must be jinxed—and waited for the plane to pull away from the gate. It finally did, some 45 minutes later.

I had been prepared for almost anything from Aeroflot. During the course of my research for the trip I had read many wild stories about the Russian national airline, and I had no idea what to expect, other than that the IL-96s like the one that I was in were the newest planes in their fleet. And mine did look pretty spanking new on the outside, but the interior was not quite so pristine. A 20 year-old Greyhound bus would rival it for comfort and style, and this was “business class.” I don’t really know what things were like back in steerage with the economy passengers, but as far as I could tell, we got a linen table cloth on our fold-down trays and free juice, and they got none of that and seats that were even narrower than ours, which was hard for my compacted gluteals to imagine.

Still, the pilot managed to get the rattling heap up into the air, and we headed for our first stop in Seattle. They fed us a fairly decent meal of cold cuts, shrimp, salad and carrot cake, and I gathered that, as a business class passenger, I could have had my fill of all the Stoly I could slam down. But I’ve read that drinking alcohol on these long flights only exacerbates the effects of jet-lag, and I knew the eleven hour time difference was going to be disruptive enough on my body clock as it was. So I landed sober in Seattle an hour and a half later, where we were herded off the plane so that the cabin crew could rummage through our bags and remove some more screws from the seats and overhead bins.

While visiting the men’s room in the transit lounge I found myself urinating next to an elderly Russian gentleman wearing a red star medal over his chest (perhaps a veteran of the Great Patriotic War?). He had finished his business and was trying to discover the secret flush mechanism on the strange Amerikansky plumbing contraption in front of him. Being a savvy and well-traveled airport commode connoisseur, I recognized the infrared sensor on the valve in front of me, and as I pinched off my last drop, I stepped back to watch the miracle of the automatic flush mechanism erupt before me.

I had hoped my example would clue the old gentleman in, but he continued to grope and probe the pipes in front of him in the vain hope of finding the button, which would release the torrent—and him. But there was no button. Another man to his left stepped back and the automatic flush worked its magic. Still, the old man couldn’t quite grasp the idea. I suppose I could have just placed a helpful hand on his shoulder and motioned him back, but I wasn’t really sure if that would violate some sort of Russian urinal etiquette, so I reluctantly turned to the sink to wash my hands.

As I dried them and began leaving the men’s room, I saw the old man finally give up in frustration and turn away, unaware that the damn bourgeois thing was finally flushing behind him. I thought to myself, no wonder we waxed these guys in the cold war.

When we reboarded, the passengers joining us in Seattle filled the plane to capacity, and we took off over an hour late just as dusk fell over Puget Sound. They served us another cold meal, which I declined, while my fellow business class comrades proceeded to get drunk and rowdy. Oh boy, a party! So much for getting some sleep, what with thirty Russian drunks bellowing like oxen all around me. Ah well, I sure saved a bundle on these tickets, don’t you know.

After about six hours of this, just to liven things up a bit, they showed us a Popeye cartoon dubbed in Russian (with the original English dialogue echoing in the background), followed by an ancient black and white Russian film, which promptly put everyone to sleep. Great, I mumbled to myself, now that the drunks have settled down, they start playing a Russian soundtrack at high volume. My circadian clock was spinning wildly.

We landed at Sheremetevo 2 airport sometime in the late afternoon, having misplaced a day somewhere over Greenland. I deplaned, made it unscathed past customs and to the money exchange, and headed for the hordes of taxi drivers who descended on me like locusts. I needed to get to the Sheremetevo 1 domestic airport, which was about fifteen minutes away. But the first English speaking driver wanted $35 for the trip, which I thought was laughable. Subsequent rip-off artists pared it down to $20 before they gave up on me, and I headed away from the feeding frenzy to the bus stop out beyond the parking lot.

There the number 515 bus was waiting just as the Lonely Planet guide said it would be, and for a mere 90 cents it deposited me fifteen minutes later in front of Sheremetevo 1. My triumph was short-lived though, as I managed to arrive at the ticket agent’s counter only to discover that they had released my seat. I had missed my connection to St. Petersburg.

The woman behind the glass partition seemed profoundly unmoved by my plight, and my queries about subsequent flights were met only with shrugs and the suggestion that I talk to the administration across the lobby of the terminal. Little did I know that I was about to descend into Russian bureaucratic hell. Fools rush in…

The administrator’s booth was identical to the ticket agent’s, with a solid (probably bullet-proof) glass partition, breached only by 8" x 3" slot at about my navel height through which I was forced to bend down and shout, and then cock my head to in hopes hearing some part of the mumbled reply. I played that fun game for a few minutes until it became clear that the administrator cared even less about getting me to St. Petersburg than the ticket agent did.

At this point I considered my options. I could find a hotel for the night nearby—at about $200 for the night—and try again to get to St. Petersburg in the morning. But I feared I’d meet the same wall of indifference the next day. Or I could just blow off St. Petersburg and spend a couple of extra days in Moscow. Aside from the wasted expense of the prepaid tours and accommodations, I’d lose a chance to see one of the great cities of the world, plus the Hermitage, which I was loath to miss.

So I decided to call my agent in Seattle in hopes that she might be able to work some travel agent magic from halfway around the world. But first I had to try to contact the home-stay hosts in St. Petersburg, so that they wouldn’t head out to the airport to pick me up.

Well, there were no direct dial phones in the terminal; all telecommunications had to be arranged through the official telephone troll behind yet another glass partition. Using sign language and my fractured Russian I managed to convey my intentions, and she took the number and directed me to a booth from where I was to place the call. From the tones the phone made, I discerned that no one was answering on the other end, so I headed back to the glass wall to try for the call to America.

And I got through on the first try! And was promptly put on hold! And my three minutes expired and I was cut off!

So I slumped back to plead with the booth troll, paid another $10 and tried again. This time I got the agent’s voice mail. This worldwide telecommunications stuff was rapidly losing its charm. But I figured I had no choice but to try again, and this time I got through and spoke to my agent, who suggested I call the Moscow representative at her home number. Which I then did, but got no answer.

Now, I knew that traveling alone to Russia and Central Asia was bound to include some unforeseen mishaps and difficulties, but I was rapidly using up my allotment of the emergency backup patience that I had factored into my plans. And this was still the first day. The chances of getting to St. Petersburg were looking bleak. And the prospects for the rest of the trip seemed pretty grim, too.

I decided to give up on the phone and drag my bags back over to the ticket agent’s glass redoubt. When I arrived there I saw that venetian blinds had been dawn down across the window, but that a small crowd had gathered in front of the still open slot, and that several of them were hunched over, peering through it. I joined them in peering through the slot and could see a different agent than before, shuffling papers and occasionally glancing idly at a computer terminal to her side. At times the sullen mutes on the outside shoved bills at her, and after a long wait, she would intermittently disgorge a ticket. But the blinds stayed down. She may have been forced by the constraints of her job to respond minimally to the vermin on the other side of the glass wall, but she sure as hell didn’t have to look at them.

When I finally made it to the slot, I shoved my ticket at her, and bending over, heard her hiss something in Russian at me which I figured probably wasn’t heartfelt wishes for a pleasant trip. Wham! The slot slammed shut, and I and the remaining supplicants outside the glass booth were cut off. Having no other real choice, I stayed there staring dumbly at the slot in hopes the booth troll would reopen it and free me from this purgatory. The mere fact that she hadn’t just shoved the ticket back at me with a sneer gave me some hope. And sure enough, after about five minutes the slot slid open again and she bellowed at me to hand over one dollar. Which I did immediately. And soon she spat a new ticket at me, which gave me permission to board the eleven o’clock flight to St. Petersburg. The last flight out. Why the first agent I had talked to didn’t just do this is a mystery to me, but I guess it’s not in their job description to be helpful.

In any case, the flight went without incident, and upon landing I found a phone that accepted a regular VISA card and proceeded to dial my home-stay family. It being just past midnight, they were more than a little surprised to hear from me, but suggested I call Katya, the local rep for my travel agent. I reached Katya, who suggested I take a taxi into town and meet her at her office, from where she would escort me to the home stay.

I discovered that the local “Mafia” runs the taxi concession and that a twenty-minute trip into town would run me $55. Pretty much exhausted by then, but really having no other option, I gave up and got in, and was deposited at the agent’s office, where Katya was waiting. Five minutes later I was at the home-stay apartment, and five minutes after that, I was in bed trying to sleep. But my body clock was telling me to wake up.

Then I heard the mosquito whining around my head…