From LHR to MEX

Before going to Heathrow airport, i had only heard bad things about it - monstrously big, impossible to navigate, baggage gets lost or something stolen out of it etc. The only complaint i had with Heathrow was that everything was terribly expensive. It felt like the airport was designed only for 1st class travelers, according to the selection of boutiques and prices within. Eating my dried overpriced sandwich made me feel sorry for the money i had spent.


Fancy shoe-shop in Heathrow airport

The security search was very intimate. Not only are the queues to the security gates arranged so that you have an audiene of hundreds of passangers observing you taking off your shoes, belts, jackets etc, but security guys also pat and probe you with great care and seriousness.

Would that surprise anybody, if i´d say that i narrowly missed my flight again? This time i had planned carefully, that i have about 15 minutes before my gate closes. I did however forget a small little insignificant detail of my gate locating in another building and a bus transfer i had to take to get there.

12 hour flight to Mexico City was surprisingly ok. I had some twitchy German couple sitting next to me and the husband seemed to have a very weak bladder. Needless to say, i was really glad that my seat was by the window.

At this point i want to take a moment and thank my lovely thoughtful husband for buying me for this trip a special eyecover for sleeping in the plane. It does make me look like a scary bug-eyed freak, but it was also so very convenient and all-around uber-cool. Thanks, sweetie.

Up to now, i thought that most time-consuming and slowest airport that i know is Marrakech Menara in Morocco, but Mexico City´s Juarez airport wins hands down! I spent there close to 2,5 hours, just standing in the colossal queue leading to the passport checks. I like the Twist of Fate they employ at the end of all that waiting: after you get your bagagge but before you can exit the airport, you have to press a button of a particular machine that determines randomly who´s luggage gets searched and who´s not. If you get a green light, you´re free to go, but if one is unfortunate enough to get the red light .. , then i would´ve been subject to much scorn and maybe even fines due to all those forbidden snacks i smuggled into the country (you´re supposed to declare all food items in your bag).

I was supposed to call my host David as soon as i landed, but it turned out that my Estonian mobile didn´t work in Mexico. I didn´t want to pay many hundreds for tourist-taxi, so i decided to find my way to his home by metro (crazy cheap ticket - about 1,8 EEK!). By that time it was about 9 pm. After some searching i found the metro station and somehow i managed to end up in exactly those metro wagons where mostly men where. "White chicken" would describe my state most accurately. But all the whistling and staring apart, the guys were super friendly and helpful pointing me to the right direction and so on. By the time i got to David´s place, he was already very worried and glad to finally hear from me.

My host David