Captain Cautious Strikes Again

In my thirty two years on this earth I have never missed a flight. Some of my stellar record in this area is undoubtedly due to luck, but I'm also certain that my ultra conservative travel time estimation tendencies have played a large role in my success.

How conservative am I in my estimations of travel time? Well if an airline says that they open check in three hours prior to departure, I'm aiming to be at the airport 3 and a half hours prior to departure. If the staff at my hotel estimate the taxi ride to the airport will take 30 minutes, I'm booking the taxi for an hour before I want to arrive at the airport.

It actually takes a very pessimistic outlook to maintain this conservative attitude to travel. While other travellers happily book airport taxis based on reassuring local advice, I am constantly imagining unreliable drivers who fail to show up, random break downs and inexplicable episodes of pre-dawn gridlock. As a general rule, I usually allow an additional 30 minutes for each imagined obstacle to travel.

Sure, this usually means I end up with several hours to kill at the airport. But with a kindle in my carry on bag and a steaming cup of chai always readily available, extra time at the airport is no great hardship.

Some travelers book early morning taxi rides to allow for maximum sleep in time - but not Captain Cautious here. This was how I found myself standing in the pre-dawn stillness out the front of my hotel in Varkala at 5 am one morning.

My flight, from the nearby Trivandrum airport to Mumbai, was scheduled for 8 am which meant that Air India Express would close the check in at 7 am. I was aiming to be at the airport no later than 6:30 am. In peak hour it took an hour and a half to get from Varkala to Trivandrum. The hotel staff assured me that in the early hours of the morning nothing short of the return of Krishna himself would cause the trip to take more than an hour. But I would not be swayed and insisted on booking the taxi for 5.

When my alarm went off at 4:15 that morning, I did start to reconsider my ultra conservative tendencies. But when my driver still hadn't arrived by 5:15 I was very glad I had allowed the extra time. We ended up heading off from Varkala at 5:30 and I was still very confident about making the flight.

"You see," I thought smugly to myself, "Everyone pays you out for being so cautious, but if their airport taxi had been 30 minutes late, they would be right up a certain creek without a paddle. You, however, will probably still have 30 minutes leeway at the check in".

We made good time to Trivandrum and pulled up at the domestic terminal at 6:30 am. I took my time zipping up the straps on my pack and hauling it onto a trolley before I strolled up to the Air India Express counter and handed over my printed ticket.

"Your flight doesn't leave from this airport" the nice lady said. To which I intelligently replied, "I'm sorry...What?!" The rising panic engulfing my body was amplifying my heartbeat and she had to repeat herself three times before the news sunk in. My flight was leaving from the international airport not the domestic airport.

I rechecked the paper in my hand and there was no mention of international airport on the ticket. The ticket simply stated that my flight was leaving from Trivandrum and as Trivandrum and Mumbai are cities in the same country I had stupidly assumed the flight would leave from the domestic airport. I would have loved to discuss the accuracy of the Air India Express ticketing system with their staff, but as the check in for my flight was closing in 25 minutes, and I was still at the wrong airport, I elected to save my suggestions for a later day.

My driver had left as soon as I had got out of the car and a quick glance confirmed that there were no taxis to be seen in the vicinity of the domestic terminal. The only vehicle in view was an auto rickshaw, so I ran over and asked how long it would take to get to the international airport. The driver said "maximum 30 minutes" but when I told him that my flight was closing in 25 minutes he shouted "150 rupees - GET IN!". I got the sense he hadn't been lying about how close I was to missing my flight when he motored off when I was still only half in the rickshaw.

Thirty seconds into our journey we hit a queue at the exit gate of the domestic terminal car park. My driver shouted something at the official in charge and we were soon waved through and shooting off towards the international terminal.

For those of you unfamiliar with auto rickshaws, the motor has a similar power to weight ratio to that of a ride on lawn mower. This means that at their maximum speed, of about 50 km/h, the auto rickshaw offers its passengers a bone jarring ride. Knowing my situation the driver had really put the pedal to the metal and I suspected our 65km/h speed might actually get me to my flight, even if I was missing a few fillings when I arrived.

I was philosophical as we rocketed past early morning walkers and local traders setting up their stalls. One of the advantages of my Captain Cautious attitude to travel is that I always know I have done everything in my power to ensure a smooth journey. If I missed my flight this time, at least it was through no fault of my own. Fifteen minutes before the check in on my flight closed, I was resigned to the fact that the situation was completely in the hands of the gods. I said a quick prayer to Ganesha, the remover of obstacles, and settled back to see what happened.

It seemed as though Ganesha wasn't as open to the last minute pleas of foreign travelers as I'd hoped he would be. Just after I finished my prayer to the elephant headed deity, our motor coughed... spluttered... and died. Well, I thought, the gods have spoken. I'm just not supposed to get on this plane.

My driver, whose body language suggested he viewed the failure of his vehicle in this harried mission as a bitter judgement from above on his very soul, was not ready to give up. Fortunately for me, he channelled his bitter disappointment into a manic determination to get me another ride. This was how I found myself, less than two minutes after my rickshaw ground to a halt, throwing my pack into the boot of a car whilst simultaneously thrusting 50 rupees into the hand of my original driver as he shouted "GO! GO!".

Ten minutes before my flight was due to close, the complete absurdity of the situation began to set in. I was in the back seat of a modern white sedan whose occupants, I assumed, had been heading off to work for the day when a crazed rickshaw driver had jumped in front of their car forcing them to stop. Just when I was sure that Ganesha had completely deserted me, he had instead given me the best gift that any traveller can ever hope to receive... The kindness of strangers. I spent the entire 5 minutes of our breakneck journey thanking the driver and his friend and apologising for taking them out of their way - but they would have none of it. "You are a guest in our country" was their only response to my ramblings.

We had barely come to a stop at the international terminal, when the friend jumped out of the passenger seat and ran off to get a trolley for my pack. The driver insisted on lifting my pack onto the trolley for me and tried to give back the couple of hundred rupee notes I had thrust into his hand, but I took off towards the check in counter before he could succeed.

Catching my breath as I watched my pack disappear down the luggage conveyor belt, I had time to glance at the clock above the check in desk. Even with the late taxi driver, the airport mix-up and the break down of an auto rickshaw I had made it with 3 minutes to spare.

Captain Cautious strikes again!

Graffiti and guard towers

I must admit that by the time I boarded the bus for the short trip from East Jerusalem to Bethlehem I had been influenced by the frequent travel warnings about the West Bank that had been flooding my inbox for the past few weeks.

My recent experiences in Syria taught me that DFAT's travel advisories are often based on limited information from events that occurred more than three weeks earlier and are generally ridiculously over cautious. I know that travel advisories have to warn of worst possible scenarios. But given that the advice for pretty much every country in the world now includes the phrase "possible threat of terrorist attack", DFAT may want to consider changing the name of their website from 'Smart Traveller' to 'Scared Traveller'.

That said when the phrase "possible threat of terrorist attack" is mentioned in reference to the West Bank, you do tend to take it more seriously than when it is mentioned in the travel advice for Tasmania. In the end, I decided that the best course of action was just to go there and suss out the situation for myself. If I got to Bethlehem and felt uncomfortable I could just do what most other travelers do and treat it as a day trip. If I felt OK in Bethlehem I could use it as a base to explore the West Bank for a few days.

As it turned out the word that best describes how I felt in Bethlehem was not scared, but rather welcomed.

The constant low level tension that I had felt in Jerusalem melted away in the face of the warm hospitality constantly on display from the local Palestinians. When I was trying to find the main bus station in Jerusalem, four different individuals pretended they didn't hear me, looked straight through me and did not break stride in their haste to avoid offering assistance. When I was trying to find the Shepherds' Fields just outside of Bethlehem, I was offered assistance from eight different individuals including a Palestinian army officer who took it upon himself to stop several passing cars to ask the drivers for directions!

Due to the fact that most people visit Bethlehem as part of a day trip from Jerusalem, there was plenty of room at the inn when I booked into the Bethlehem Star Hotel. The fact that I only saw one other guest in the five floor hotel during my stay made me wonder how the place stays open - but I suspect they might be fully booked around the end of December each year.

Bethlehem itself is a lovely town perched atop a rocky hill and has a skyline filled, as you would expect, with church spires. What you may not expect is that the most beautiful church in town is not the one that marks the (supposed) location of the birth of Jesus Christ. Indeed to enter the Church of the Nativity you don't amble under gilded arches, but rather duck through a small stone doorway. Once inside, stairs behind the alter lead you underground to the Grotto of the Nativity. The Grotto is a small cramped chapel and if it wasn't for the steady stream of tourists I would have had no idea of the location's significance. I think I probably would have felt more spiritually moved in a local stable. I mean would it kill them to throw some hay on the Grotto floor to get visitors in the mood?

Highlight #2467 for my travels so far was seeing the amazing graffiti on the much hated security wall just outside of Bethlehem. The enormous concrete structure that the Israelis built to separate Israel from the West Bank is completely illegal and is also a blatant land grab as it encroaches significantly on Palestinian lands. On the Israeli side the high grey walls are almost completely bare. But on the Palestinian side the wall has become a gallery for local artists and activists to creatively express their rage. The works vary from detailed stencil graffiti to rough spray painted slogans, but the message conveyed is the same. I love the way that the Palestinians have used an intrusive object, placed on their lands to imprison them, into a billboard to showcase their dissent.

I spent a large portion of my time in the West Bank riding in shared taxis as I visited Ramallah, Nablus and Jericho. As we barreled over rocky hilltops and sped through olive groves I kept my eye open for the Israeli settlements I had heard so much about. Before I arrived in the West Bank, I had wondered how I would be able to tell the difference between a regular Palestinian town and an Israeli settlement. I needn't have worried as the Israeli settlements stuck out like a mariachi band at a meditation retreat.

The Israeli settlements that I saw all looked like stepford housing developments with hundreds of identical townhouses huddled together on a hilltop. The main difference between an Israeli settlement and the standard Meriton horror that you see in most Australian capital cities is that the Israeli settlements also have structures that look like air traffic control towers in the middle of them for security purposes. If you somehow failed to notice the walled compound look, the dramatic improvement in the condition of the roads leading up to the settlements would also be a pretty good giveaway that you were not approaching a regular Palestinian town.

I found Jericho to be far more biblically atmospheric than Bethlehem. The Mount of Temptation, just outside of Jericho, is supposed to mark the location where the Devil appeared to tempt Jesus after he had fasted for 40 days and 40 nights in the Judean desert. The view from the mount stretches across the hazy desert to the Dead Sea. It is a stunningly barren landscape. Given that I was close to delirious with heat stroke after spending just 40 minutes on the mount (and that Jesus probably didn't get the cable car to the top like I did) - I can understand why he thought he saw the Devil up there. My temptation did not take the form of Lucifer, but rather an icy pole and a cold bottle of water. And, unlike Jesus, I was too weak to resist.

After nine hectic days, my time in Israel came to an end. I had only one more hurdle to overcome before I could head off on my own pilgrimage to Florida... Israeli airport security.

I won't detail all the components that made up the most frustrating five hours of my life, but I will say this... emptying the contents of a pack that took more than a day to zip up - and then getting uppity when the lowly backpacker takes more than twenty minutes to repack it - is not a way to make friends. The Israeli security staff were bloody lucky that I managed to make my flight. Because if they think they have a problem with the Palestinians - it would have been nothing compared to the rage that I would have rained down on them had their ineptitude kept me from a Harry Potter conference that I had been waiting two years to attend.

Come with me please...

When I boarded my flight from Istanbul to Tel Aviv on Sunday, I knew there was a pretty good chance that that the Israeli immigration officials I would shortly meet were not going to love me. It turned out I was only partially correct on that front. They didn't really take the time to get to know me - but they did not love the stamps in my passport.

For those of you unfamiliar with travel in the middle east - let me enlighten you about the visa situation with Israel. Many arabic countries in the region are not very happy with Israel (they actually don't recognise that the state of Israel has the right to exist) and will not allow you to enter their country if you have visited Israel. Countries that fall into this category include Iran, Iraq, Lebanon & Syria.

This means that travellers planning to visit Israel and any of the countries listed above must travel to Israel last, as I am. The trouble is that the ill feeling between the countries listed above and Israel is mutual. Though the Israeli government does not have a blanket policy of denying entry to travellers who, for arguments sake, have visited Syria - they have been known to deny travellers entry to Israel for this reason.

Given the fact that I spent two weeks in Syria, two weeks in Lebanon and then a further four weeks in Syria earlier this year - I was expecting to get questioned and knew that there was a very real possibility that I would not be allowed into Israel. Following the notion that good luck is when opportunity meets preparation, I spent much of the short flight from Turkey preparing my answers for the Israeli immigration officials. I memorised the dates I had visited countries and planned a fictional itinerary for my time in Israel that did not include any visits to the West Bank.

I was quite calm as I left the plane, but when a young man was detained as we entered the terminal I couldn't stop a scene that I had recently read in the autobiography "Son of Hamas" from bursting forward into my consciousness. The Palestinian author was detained for questioning by the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) for months on end. To encourage him to talk, the IDF made him crouch on a tiny chair day in, day out with his hands tied behind his back. The author was not allowed to sleep, move, talk or do anything at all except for 5 minutes a day when he was permitted to leave the chair to eat and use the bathroom.

Eventually the moment of truth came as I handed my passport over to a young woman at the immigration counter. That was when the questions started:

"You were in Syria?"
"Yes."

Long pause....

"You were in Lebanon?"
"Yes."

Long pause....

The questioning continued as I was asked what my occupation is and had to explain how I was funding my travels. After more questioning about how long I was planning to stay in Israel there was another very long pause...Then I heard the blessed stamping sound and was handed my passport and a slip of paper as my interrogator said 'Welcome to Israel'.

I was in! Yay! I was still grinning like a fool when I handed my passport to the official at the next gate in front of the baggage claim area. He handed my passport to another female immigration official nearby - who then proceded to utter the phrase I least wanted to hear:

"Come with me please."

I then had to sit on the naughty chair just off to the side of the baggage claim area with the other undesirables. This really was cruel and unusual punishment as while we waited to discover our fate we got to watch all the other travellers casually breezing through the checkpoint before confidently heading off to claim their bags. Lucky bastards.

The woman sitting next to me did not inspire a great deal of confidence. Rivers of mascara trickled down her face as she sobbed quietly. The woman tried to talk to me, but she didn't speak English and I was relieved as I didn't think talking to others (who could be caught up in God only knows what trouble) was a very good idea in my situation. I understood the situation was out of my control and was determined to remain calmly detatched - unless I saw any tiny chairs in which case I had given myself full permission to collapse into the foetal position.

After 10 minutes the officer beckoned me over to a quiet corner of the baggage claim area for round two of questioning. She was far more skilled than my earlier interrogator and was soon trying to trip me up by presenting slightly inaccurate versions of my travels for me to confirm. Two could play at this game - I matched her friendly tone as I calmly corrected her version of events several times. I was repeatedly asked the same questions, including:

"Did you meet friends there?"
"You travelled there alone?"
"You visited Syria?"
"For what purpose?"
"You visited Lebanon?"
"For what purpose?"

After 20 minutes of this she switched to questions about the bigger picture:

"Do you have a particular interest in the middle east?"
"Yes. It is a fascinating part of the world."

"So you could travel anywhere in the world this year (I had explained my year off work with the deferred salary scheme) and you chose, of your own freewill, to travel to Syria?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
"I enjoy learning about other cultures and seeing Roman ruins. That does not mean I agree with the political stance of their government"
"I understand. We need to collect your bags now so that we can search them."

Once I collected my pack I followed the official through an unmarked door into a baggage search room with a few undesirables I has not seen earlier. A (different) woman was sobbing hysterically and I couldn't help thinking, once I established that there were no tiny chairs in the vicinity, that she was overeating a bit to having her bags searched and tested for traces of explosives.

After my big pack and daypack were x-rayed, I heard the dreaded phrase "Come with me please" again and I was lead to a separate room with a new female officer. I was not looking forward to the rubber glove treatment - but fortunately I just had to walk through a metal detector (something that I would become very accustomed to during my time in Jerusalem).

Finally, 45 minutes after I first handed my passport over to the lady at the counter, I was free to go. I had to restrain myself from sprinting as I headed out into the arrivals terminal. It was only when the shuttle bus I boarded pulled out from the kerb that I began to relax...I had made it...I was in...Welcome to Israel.