Boston, Frankfurt, Bangalore

Chilly morning departure. Some tears at the front door, waiting for the taxi. Isabel says she won't be sad and that she will take care of mommy and Lee-Lee. Lee cries huge tears as he has begun to recognize my bags and what they have come to symbolize.

My cab driver sparks a discussion of globalism, and of capitalism in China. He is from the Congo. That his life is hard is an understatement.

I see neighbors in the airport. They are heading to D.C. to take a night away from the boys, and they are relieved that we sold the house to a couple who plan to restore it.

One clonazepam before boarding and a phone call home.

















I am dissuaded from taking pictures on the tarmac at Logan and am more than a little put off by this until I remember that the initial flights from September 11 were dispatched from here. So much for Boston, which is, as much as I can recall, the same as when we left it: frozen, with dirty boulders of clumped snow spread wide across the runways.

The stewardess, while I was sleeping, refilled my water bottle and left next to my pile of books, a hand-drawn map to the farthest end of the light-filled terminals from where the international flights come and go and I use this little map to get to the Blue Line bus terminal. Though technically accurate, the map proves to be somewhat more confusing than just following the signs.


At Houlihan’s in the terminal by the E Gates, I order a stout and watch Roy Williams and Carolina pummel Arizona, then watch golf at the bar (thinking of Isabel and Lee, and Hari or Jack at the club). Read (Cheever and “War Trash”) and eat. I do have an image of all three of them in whites, sun-burned and tired from humping bags of clubs up and down Finley all day on an August Saturday. Or the three of them lined up like a cadre of revolutionaries driving range balls halfway from here to Sunday in rapid-fire succession. A nice thought. I will carry this with me to sleep.

Somewhat ironic to begin reading Ha Jin in Boston since he teaches here at Brandeis and is a frequent reader at AGNI events. Am making good, solid headway with “War Trash”, in between prepping ops review materials and making session plans for my trip to Germantown.

No cell coverage in Frankfurt (and T-Mobile Hotspots are all mysteriously down) so call Lia from a payphone. She cannot hear me (the connection is awful and wavers in and out) and we have an awkward series of “I love you’s” interspersed with pauses, then finally, “You’re breaking up.” At the gate, I sleep for maybe two hours solid before waking disoriented and even more tired than before.

Eight hours and five minutes from Frankfurt to Bangalore. I take some cold medicine and have a gin and tonic. I sleep for maybe three hours, read for maybe two, stare off into space for the remainder. Landing in Bangalore after midnight, and the airport is chaos. Customs and baggage are a swift series of fits and starts and when we are through being processed I step into the night air to a swarm of cab drivers and hotel shuttles. My driver, Anish, meets me with a colleague and I am given a cell phone to use while I am here. The night is cool and the air is clean though punctuated with the sharp smell of tobacco, and the endless honking of automobiles. The activity here is daunting and I am not prepared for the “awake-ness” of it all.

Anish swings us through downtown Bangalore which seems to be asleep compared to the activity at the airport and I see only stray dogs in the streets, circling and scratching themselves under Banyan trees.