#36 - Beyond the smoke curtain

Stanford University Campus

This is sneaker traveller's survival story - how to survive from a natural disaster.

It was spring 2010 and I intended to stay at Palo Alto California only for a couple of days - a quick workshop and then back to home, sweet home. Weather was nice, so I enjoyed early jogging at the Stanford campus area prior to working days. I love the beauty of Stanford parks, historic buildings, as well as academic atmosphere. Especially the monument listing the numerous Stanford Olympic medallists and world record holders impress me very much.

Stanford Olympians

It was 14^th of April 2010 and the last travel day was supposed to start when I woke up early in the morning. My phone indicated unusual amount of missed calls and new messages; mostly something about potential flight problems. That did not bother me too much, because I was heading back to home that evening. The hassle started when I entered the office. All the European colleagues were on the phone trying to confirm their flights. That’s when I realized that something serious has happened. The volcano called Eyjafjallajökul had erupted in Island and the ash cloud was threatening transatlantic flights. The hassle continued the whole working day, but nothing helped. I was stuck to California. Only Mr K. was lucky enough to be rescheduled to an earlier flight via Germany. However, the luck was temporary and the next morning he was back in California, because the flight returned back to San Francisco one hour after departure.

The weekend was approaching and I had already seen Palo Alto. I booked a hotel at the Fisherman’s Wharf, drove there through the beautiful highway number 1 and started enjoying my first visit to the San Francisco. The weekend was hectic, but I enjoyed a lot. I was driving, running, and walking all day long to see all the major attractions. With such an intensity I managed to see in a weekend as much as normal tourist sees in a week, for example Golden Gate Bridge, Golden gate park, Pier 39, Alcatraz, as well as the huge re redwood forest at the Muir woods. Also the dining options satisfied me. I must admit that San Francisco is one of the nicest tourist cities to visit. I look forward getting there again.

Muir Woods had bigger trees than
forests in Tampere

Favorite area for relaxed jogging

On my way to Alcatraz. Almost like a boat trip to Viikinsaari in Tampere.

The weekend was gone and it was time to make tactical thinking. In order to improve our changes to get back to business in Finland, I and my boss Mr P. decided to take a flight to New York. Our travel agent booked us a nice hotel in New York. I was able to look at the at Times Square straight from my window. Together with Mr P. and Ms L. we enjoyed the atmosphere of Manhattan for a couple of days, for example the stunning Broadway musical Jersey boys. One of my daily routines was jogging at Central park.

New York Times Square

Jersey Boys stuff

I was especially happy to finally get my iPad from the 5^th Avenue Apple Store. I had been unsuccessfully chasing the brand new gadget in two Palo Alto Apple Stores, as well as in two San Francisco Apple stores.

iPad among first ones in the world

All that sounds like a dream vacation. However, the trip was not all about relaxing tourism. It was actually very stressful and exhausting. Every late evening and every early morning I made my routine call to the travel agency in order to ask for the potential flights back to Finland. My shortest waiting time for those daily calls was 70 minutes, thus shortening every night about three hours. Persistency was finally rewarded when I was one of the first ones flying back to Finland after the situation normalized. Thinking afterwards it felt like an unnecessary panic. I should have enjoyed the tourist days and wait for someone to call me back to Finland. I was really exhausted, but happy when I returned back to home.

Sunny bridge leading to Golden Gate Bridge

Lessons learnt:

Don’t worry, be happy.

Take it easy - There are things that you simply cannot impact anyway.

#35 - Permilles and Line dancing

Go Mavericks

After arriving to our hotel at Dallas we were hit by the tight training course schedule. The brave volunteers headed right away to the American Airlines Center, the home of Dallas Stars NHL team and Dallas Mavericks NBA team. This time the ice was covered with a parquet floor and Mavericks was playing. I was impressed with the skills of Dirk Nowitski, as well as Steve Nash who was very quick but seemed so tiny (only 6 ft 3 in, 191 cm) compared to other players. That was the best basketball event I have ever seen and at the time of writing it was the only one, as well. The arena, show and the atmosphere were really exciting.

Our training was arranged at a hotel next to the golf course, so I enjoyed my early morning jogging in the putting greens before the golf players woke up. Also the lunches at a terrace next to golf course made a deep impact to me. Especially the lunch discussion about the very tight drunk driving limits in USA, especially in Texas.  US colleagues were complaining their tight laws. The limit of 0.1 means that you cannot drink almost any alcohol if you drive, they protested. They were also envy about the loose limit 0.5 in Finland. I was a bit confused after the lunch discussion, because I had always thought that the drunk-driving laws in the USA are looser than the Finnish ones. However, later on I realized that we Finns spoke about permilles while the Americans spoke about percents. You should know that in this subject matter it plays a big difference. Anyway, do not drive if you drink is the best rule in my opinion.

Cowboys on a ride

The course was very educative. We were even practising local line dancing at Billy Bob’s Texas, the world’s largest Honky Tonk. Unfortunately I have kept the line dancing skills latent, because I have not had an opportunity to shine with the skill during the last two decades.

Anyways, even if the trip was educative, I was a bit disappointed that I did not see any of the Ewings out there, no sight of JR, Bobby, Jock or Miss Ellie.

Lessons learnt:

There is always time to have fun.

The triangle of Dallas, Billy Bob's Texas and our hotel

#34 - Finnish tango

On air - Finnish tango in the sky

Couple of weeks after the most famous 9/11 date I was flying to Dallas USA with a group of Finnish colleagues. On our first flight to Chicago I followed different kinds of people, as well as different ways of travelling. Some people skipped the airline meal and started sleeping as soon as the flight departs, some people enjoyed meal with wine, some people enjoyed watching movies, and some people listened to their favourable music with their noise cancelling headphones. All that was regular, but on the other hand, that was the first time I heard an airline passenger singing Finnish tango with high volume in the middle of the flight. After a couple of beers and cognacs every Finn becomes a tango singer. Mr. K got a lot of audience with his singing. I felt so lucky to sit in front of the singer. Even the non-Finnish passengers far away from the singer seemed to note the talent, so tens of passengers were following the singer. Despite the success, Mr K. did not pursue professional singer career after the trip.

At the Chicago airport the US airport security control was heavy duty due to the recent 9/11 hits. Despite of that, I managed to fool the system by walking through the metal detection gate with a mobile phone in my pocket. I realized to have some hidden talent, a positive sign for future job opportunities. However, our tango singer, Mr. K. was less talented fooling the US airport security system. The officers were trying to arrest the noisy singer, but luckily a group of colleagues managed to change the mind of the officers.

Lessons learnt:

Quality matters (not only quantity or volume).