Umm

Port Authority Area

No way this is gonna work. 17:55pm alongside Port Authority in Newark Liberty Express shuttle bus. We're pulling away. I'm supposed to be checking in now at Continental thirty minutes ago. Says we'll arrive at 6:33pm. Gives me an hour. Could still work, if on schedule.

Got disoriented nauseous around bus when my luggage wasn't materializing. Luckily another woman also was waiting & worrying. Turned out our stuff was on the other side in the middle compartment. I was the last one to leave the bus after a 2-minute ambulance standoff after a 10-minute post-Lincoln Tunnel block-the-box jam up. Rat in a box downstairs. Escalator upstairs remembering what woman said about Airport Shuttles second floor. Information booth in basement unoccupied & disabled. Upstairs no word at all about Newark Express on legend. Up the steps to the information booth. Guy says walk out to 8th Ave, make a left and pick up the shuttle between the buildings. Turn around, race back across space and apologize to a cute 18yo asking for 50 cents. Down the steps, pedestrian-dodging, get to first set of front doors and I'm barrelling toward it rolling luggage & overstuffed backpack & this frumpy squat canker sore of a woman sees me and opens the door and Because I won't and soared thro the open door She says Thanks A Lot to which I reply No problem, Anytime.

Down 8th. Around corner. Cross street. Bus there. Peruvian kid runs at me , asks me where amidst two other white folks who apparently haven't replied to his question, Confused. He points to C, the third bay, swings it open, kicks existing luggage forward grabs my suitcase and slings it in. Ahh the others now understand what he's asking.

"Pay you?"

Inside, he points.

Up the steps I go against the back of a woman with a parking meter ticket maker slung over her shoulder in a dark blue coat. She backs into me.

"You have to pay," she says.

"I know, that's why I'm here."

I hand her $20, she gives me $5 back, separates a pink receipt in half with her fingers, hands me a slip and doesn't use probable credit card reader.

I walk to the back unoccupied part of the Blue Seat Bus and settle in and frenetically calculate how much I'm gonna miss this flight by tonight as she goads the stragglers to hurry up or she's not letting them on.

I can't fucking believe this is happening to me. We haven't moved 100 yards in the last 4 minutes. How are they gonna make it to EWR 16 miles away in 45?

My plane departs in 95 minutes.

Bus to NYC 3:44pm Departure

Driver has politely further complicated the matter by asking if I need a transfer in New York to Newark. Do I? Quick said no. Faster to get on the Newark Liberty Express directly to the airport than waiting to catch another reliable Greyhound bus to take me to the Newark bus station where then I'd have to get an Air Train shuttle to EWR.

"New York Port Authority Next Stop"

1st Leg Fucked

Can't do anything but sit put, wait. My bus came and went. I was standing here, got dropped off at 2:35. Bus sitting here in lane 4 has "Jackson" on its nameplate and its lane sign says Baltimore and Washington. Full of Asians. Nothing on the loudspeaker. Lane 3 pulls in, loudspeaker declares Philly, Camden. Lane 4 leaves. It's 2:39pm. Lane 3 leaves. It's 2:41pm. My bus doesn't leave until 2:50. So I wait until 3:00pm. Woman with the lip blister behind the counter frowns, asks how long I been standing out there. That bus left. She called it, she said. Didn't I see it?
"Yea I saw it, Jackson, Mississippi.".
Turns out my only option now is Port Authority in Midtown Manhattan.
That bus will be here shortly and should get in before 5, she said, 30 minutes ago.
Yet on the same spot I stand on the platform.
I'm gonna have to take the Newark Liberty Express over to EWR from Port Authority, another 45 minutes upon arrival.
This is cutting it too close.
I'm gonna get stuck in New York tonight.

3:35pm

Money 14 April

So he was telling the truth after all. What sounded like an arcane and complicated requirement to simply exchange money got confirmed a few moments ago when I was reading

Fresh Cash 14 April

Read last night before I hit the hay near 1am that fresh cash only accepted at money exchange stations. Bills over a buck've gotta be year 2000+ issue, meaning I gotta get to a bank and withdraw dough with special requests.

But is that smart? And how much?

Also says here don't walk around with a wad of cash, making the logistical implementation of currency exchange a complete blast.

Travelers cheques an option? How widely accepted?

Research required. Can't do anything today anyway, accidentally left wallet at home.

And how much cash withdraw or assign to cheques? I only got liquid $850 to play around with until I arrive that Friday morning - everything above that is a credit card withdrawl

Greyhound on Foot 15 April

Walked over to the Greyhound bus station just about nextdoor to the office here where I work in Mt. Laurel on this entirely pleasant early afternoon. Cut across the street out front after walking up to the quiet dead-end two-lane crumbling asphalt "road". No sidewalk on our side. Service center, some sidewalk over there. Cross, get on it. Follow paved access lot behind next building along, see bus station in distance behind barbed wire fence, gulley and big bus customer parking lot, so, can't get there direct from here. Continue walking east along the fence around the back of the building. Get shoved back out front along the road where I began because the back lot ended against a rig and a cinderblock walls. Little sidewalk there, keep walking, head back around back to the fence, walk over a patch of grass and around another rig and a partially sheltered Mexican kid sitting under an awning smoking a cig in the doorway of a warehouse where he waits and answers the phone. I stop and study a concrete drainage gulch where the fence isn't with grass

Legs Planned 15 April

+A) getting to work in the morning.
+B) leaving car at work
+C) walking over to Greyhound bus station nextdoor or getting a ride from work buddy

Progress Thursday 16 April

Greyhound today.

Forget about the VIP says Jake just now on Skype

Ten dollars extra bag Greyhound I'm gonna have to drag around.

Nobody ever got back to me on the VIP Almaty service anyway.

Cleared out digital cam and digital vid.

Did laundry.

Sunday Morning

Talking to Jake on Skype text chat for better than an hour this morning. He's having second thoughts. He's sick of ham & cheese. Olga cooked a great chicken dinner yesterday, tho.

Needs his bag. Does he? I dunno. Told him since he's been over there his shop hours have gone to shit and I haven't been able to get in there, nobody has. Closed after 3 yesterday. Open today, Sunday, as usual? No.

Gave him his cousin Joanie's number to let me in. Called her. Answered on second ring. Who's this? Oh yea, how are you doing. She's at an Arts & Crafts festival. Sounded like it was gonna be impossible for her to do, regardless of how accommodating I made my availability anytime today, whenever.

Two o'clock? Perfect.

Throws a wrench in the center of the sushi lunch routine, but we'll survive. Pick it up over there on our way headed up to Scranton.

Get A

Flag!

Writing Untensil

Bring a pen. Forms galore to fill out on various flight inbound. Don't get stuck in the air immersed in inexplicable languages spoken by inattentive air stewards with empty declaration forms spread across your dropdown tray. You did this I dunno how many times. Bumming a pencil off the elderly Russian woman sitting next to you en route to Minsk was an unforgettable lesson in humility. Glad you helped her complete the form, tho

Mandatory Items

Friday obtain passport copy from US Embassy

Get address.

Transcribe addresses onto paper & bring with

Download MOD & MOI move ripper onto Lenovo

No VIP

From Jake got a Skype message while I was away from my laptop last night saying no need for VIP treatment at Almaty airport, just go in, hang a left, go up to the booth, fill out the form , take it up to the customs counter and you're done in 10 or 15 minutes, that easy.

Alrighty then ...

They didn't get back to me anyway, the airport VIP services reps.

Just Walk Over: Bus Transport to EWR

Got a one-way ticket gonna take me to Newark Station and get on the Air Train link (or whatever it's called) to whisk me the few thousand feet to EWR airport, exit into correct Terminal and check bags.

Pick up my ticket tomorrow. Greyhound. Literally next door to my office. Penciled calendar time into schedule to take a walk around over there at work tomorrow to explore and see if I can use any shortcuts that Wednesday afternoon. Maybe have coworker drive me over, since I'll have luggage. Maybe walk if it's a nice day.

Bought the ticket online after midnight, fewer than the 7 days advertised as advance. Print out e-ticket receipt. Present photo ID and charge card used to purchase and voila, I get my ticket.

Total cost: $16 one-way "7-day advance" purchase
Total time: 1 hour 25 mins
Departure: 2:50pm
Arrival: 4:15pm

Continental flight to Manchester leaves 7:30pm.
Means I gotta be there around 5:30 to 6:00.
And there's no way it's going to take nearly two hours to travel a few thousand feet.

Cost of the Air Train could be as little as a buck-fifty considering the short distance? Nah, $5.50, just checked.

Confirmed: Greyhound station immediately along Newark Penn Station but better yet: I remember it. What was I doing wandering around there, and with whom? Was a woman. Who tho? I was hungover and dehydrated - what was I waiting there for? Was that with Jess? Maybe? I know it was there alongside the station it was the last time I ever saw her sitting there in her had-to-be late-'80s maroon Chevy Blazer.

Regardless, That Leg Done!

Unstable Yanna

Contact's now been switched off between Yanna and me. Call her when I get there if I need her. She apologized for being offensive. Didn't mention the wedding. Said not a word of appreciation for the three tubes of Victoria's Secret hand lotion I bought for her over at the Moorestown Mall at lunch.
What prompted this?
She's sick to her stomach over her unemployed American boyfriend in the Bronx and how she makes bad choice.

Apartment Update

Lodging breakthro! Yanna says to me she's sick in the stomach from too much food, doesn't have anything to do with her current difficult boyfriend situation with that actor twentysomething unemployed waiter-type creature in the Bronx. Assured me, O it's not him and the fact she's gonna earn all the money and support him but she loves him ...

Anyway turns out I got thro to her, explained I needed guarantees the wireless Internet was absolutely functioning properly in these Almaty apartments she so generously demonstrated yesterday.

"Take a hotel. It's more reliable. These aren't that nice anyway."

Eureka! Thank goodness. A breakthro.

Hotel search once again here we come ...

Lodging Blackout

I'm sitting here wondering why neither of these women is getting back to me in any sense of timeliness on these 5 days I'm flying homeless over there, no hotel, nothing - despite the fact intense negotiations yesterday ended without resolution on one hotel and options for various apartments.

What gives?

Easy: nobody ever comes and visits and they're so miserable that they can't even summon the energy to express reliable gestures of accommodation - a thinly veiled Go Fuck Yourself with a half-cocked smirk.

C

I get told at work by Olga today that she reserved a single room at the Shera Hotel for the weekend and she and Jake are staying there after their wedding because it's nice and new and they got a great rate and they did this long ago.

Well, would've been nice to hear about this before now, flailing around for the last week or so, chasing hotel vacancy phantoms in Almaty.

She bites my face off when I start asking questions about the location of the hotel and where'd this come from and whatever the hell's going on because now I'm being disrespectful and ruining her wedding day and disgracing her courtesies.

Quick I look up the Shera. Of course you can't find where it is, where's Furmanov Street, what neighborhood? She's crying about its great location. I simmer her down by encouraging her to elaborate about their Internet access.

I tell her thanks for the help and let her know I can afford to stay in any hotel in the city, including the Intercontinental and the Hyatt and the new Holiday Inn. Now she's in solemn reverent awe.

I continue to move forward to close this out: I'm at work and too busy to deal with this shit. Offer her my credit card to reserve the room, but she sheepishly admits she doesn't know how credit cards work, never used one. I patiently explain. I give her the numbers, expiration date, security code and full name. Too much. She says she's just going to fork over cash for the first night because she believes I'm nervous about her use of my credit card. I insist she please put two nights on it. Her Internet is flaky and I catch all her Skype message cascading in simultaneously some twenty minutes late. I write back, she's offline. I go into a meeting, come out and again she's gone. All day like this with her and with Yuliya, who's pasting Almaty apartment links offering photos and reasonable rates and I'm interested in the wireless Internet and she thinks her Guys said it comes with wi-fi. But I gotta act now, move fast as this room at this rate ain't gonna last long! Yea okay. I'm so panicked! Don't do this to me! Stop!
Right.

B

I was told today at work in the morning that Olga is an acquaintance of the administrator of the Hotel Shera. She's got a great rate. And a ten percent discount on the room. She and Jake are staying there on their wedding night, they reserved the room long ago. Single, for the weekend. Let her know if I want a double for an extra 33 bucks a night if I need extra room for girlfriends.

The Hotel Shera. That's right. Remember that one? Why didn't I pursue it? Where it located? Strange place. How come I haven't seen it surface over the last few days? New hotel. Take on the "Sheraton" name. Colorful flags out front. Where's it been? Where'd it go?

It wasn't available, that's why. Wasn't coming up on any search on any reservation aggregator vacancy search anyplace. Nothing.

A

It's tightening up a little bit, this trip - but not by much. An ordinary traveler probably would've cancelled by now because of the overwhelming stench of bullshit emanating off of every proposed business transaction forboding itinerary calamity.