Holy Week

I don’t know exactly how many miles I flew, but I have just realised that, since the beginning of March only, I already took sixteen flights and was in nine different countries… from the ancient Istanbul to the modern New York, from the snowy Helsinki to the warm Cartagena, from the small and calm Ohrid to the big and hectic Madrid, I have visited many different cities in a very short period of time, and it has some consequences: recently arrived from almost one week in the Americas and the last two nights in planes, I feel tired and sleepy… yet, I have been trying to postpone the sleeping time while anticipating the full adaptation to Central European Time and it seems to be working. It seems… Yesterday I was for more or less twelve hours in New York and I used the opportunity to spend time with one friend who I haven’t seen for many years; we had a nice brunch in the Village, strolled around Chelsea and almost up to the Broadway, but as it was raining, we could not really enjoy the walk much. These twelve hours were enough to catch up with this friend’s life, to confirm that I really like New York and to find out that the Euro-Dollar exchange rates makes everything in New York look very cheap! Which is kind of a new feeling but, for a change, nice. I should go back there soon! This stop-over in New York also allowed me to verify some improvements made at JFK airport or, maybe, that I have been developing prejudices about American airports that help keeping my expectations very low… In one hand, the immigration procedures upon arrival, considering that I was arriving from Colombia, weren’t as unpleasant as I feared and, in the other, the self-check-in terminals installed by American Airlines for all its European flights make a huge contribution to ease the departure procedures, which is of course very welcome. This week of long flights also allowed me to read a lot and, today, when I came home, I was happy to realise that my most recent order from Amazon had arrived and, therefore, I spent the whole day listening to Chris Bathgate’s last independent, sombre album: A Cork Tale Wake. Sounding a bit like a sober Ryan Adams, might seem like missing the point, but the truth is that Bathgate’s tight lyricism and beautiful ballads are the perfect companion for a day under the sign of jet-lag and the beginning of a whole week without travelling. Guess that is why it is known as the “holy week”… Good night!