37 Hours to Rome

Originally Posted on Christopher's Mister Elsewhere blog.

Have you ever imagined your plane exploding during take off?

In the dark of your closed eyes you see the wings outside the window swallowed in flame, just before the fuselage erupts into hunks of mangled metal. You lean back in your seat against the flight attendant's advice, your body rattling and humming along with your seat, and, as the wheels finally lift off the ground, your vision completes itself: burning tumbleweeds of shrapnel screech to uneven halts at various points along the runway.

I know from years of conversation with veteran flyers that this is unusual only in its detail. Maybe my morbid creativity was the byproduct of sleep deprivation. I'd been either on the move or only semi-comfortable since 5:00am. My flight left LAX at 7:00pm.

I woke up at 5:00am, scrambled to collect my pre-packed baggage, hailed an Uber, and brushed my teeth. I brushed as thoroughly as possible. This was the last time my teeth would feel clean for who-knows-how-long.

My Uber driver took me to Old Town Transit Center (San Diego, CA). Her name was Ingrid. She asked me only two questions, which I appreciated. "Where are you going?" "Los Angeles." (It was a white lie.) "For work?" "Yes." (Another white lie.)

The Amtrak ride to Union Station in downtown Los Angeles took about 2.5 hours. The highlights included getting to use my GlocalMe global wi-fi hotspot for the first time (it worked perfectly – more on this later) while I worked for 2 hours, and having my first Jimmy Dean sausage sandwich in 5 or more years from Amtrak's cafeteria car. (The sandwich was wimpy and limp.)

Union Station, Los Angeles by Dietmar Rabich via Wikimedia Commons

At Union Station I once again ordered an Uber and waited on the station's west side. Mankyoo was a notable driver with an impeccable car: a brand new Toyota Avalon hybrid with an aftermarket JBL sound system. He played trip-hop sounding "beats to study to" from his second phone. Mankyoo dropped me off at Sameday Testing's location adjacent the Staples Center in DTLA.

I was there to get a rapid antigen test. I'd actually had one done the day before at the Sameday Testing location in Pacific Beach, San Diego, but had become confused whether the required timeframe was 48 or 72 hours after filling out the EU Digital Passenger Locator Form. I feared having a "timed-out" test upon arrival in Rome, and envisioned authorities forcing me into a mandatory 5-day quarantine at my own expense. I thought of the tours and other events I'd booked, my itinerary dashed to bits, and I made an appointment at the Staples Center.

The most notable thing about my antigen swab was the onsite MD, whose name was Ariella I believe. She was very chipper and offered me some Fearless Tape strips for my mask when she noticed my glasses fogging up. These little adhesive strips force the breath from your nose out the sides of your mask instead of up and toward your glasses, eliminating fogging issues.

20 minutes later I was back at Union Station, exiting Olvaja's Kia Sorrento. I proceeded to walk all the way across Union Station to the bus terminal on the east side. I got onto the FlyAway bus, a shuttle service that goes directly to LAX.

I was dropped at the international departures terminal, but had trouble finding Iberia, the Spanish airline that would be moving me across the United States, Pacific Ocean, and Western Europe to the middle of the Italian peninsula. The woman at the information kiosk asked me when my flight left. "7:00pm." "Well, it's 11:00am. Airlines don't usually even begin checking bags until three and a half hours before the flight."

I decided to buy a sandwich from Earl of Sandwich. The staff were really nice, but the sandwich was lame and limp.

I sat in a hard barstool and a metal table for the next four hours working on my laptop. I got up once to play Pokemon Go, and once to use the restroom, where I ended up lingering to take a photo. (I'm now under the impression that LAX's restrooms are impeccably clean.)

I looked in the bottom right of my computer screen: 3:00pm. I wandered through the check-in lanes. Iberia was there. I gave them my special Covid document for passage through Spain. They issued me legitimate boarding passes. I folded my paper ones that I printed at home and put them in my laptop bag's back pocket.

The first leg of my flight left from gate 148A at LAX. I was seated in the middle row of an Iberia airbus, on the right aisle. The only other occupant in the middle row was seated at the left aisle. I was impressed by the comfort of the seat on the flight, and slightly dazzled by the in-flight meal of rice, chicken, salad, a bread roll, and a brownie.

I read for about 3 hours at the beginning of the flight, mowing through parts of Middlemarch and The Mirror and the Lamp. I then proceeded to pass out and wake up at random to turbulence warnings 4 or 5 times over the next 6 hours. The flight was something of the Twilight Zone, a strange fever dream filled with shadows and confusion. At last we landed in Madrid.

The wait at Adolfo Suárez Madrid–Barajas Airport was short, and by the time I'd moved through customs and had a bottle of water, my flight was only a few minutes away from boarding. I knocked out three more chapter of Middlemarch on the flight to Rome.

Once in Rome, I realized I'd been in transit for 37 hours. How was I still even awake?

I moved freely through the airport. Strangely, I was not once asked about or stopped for my vaccination card or my antigen test results. It's good that I got the tests done, but it was odd being able to enter this foreign country halfway across the world without any enforcement of a strongly stated position on their government websites. I've wondered since if I walked through the airport in a roundabout way and accidentally evaded a checkpoint.

From Rome–Fiumicino International Airport I took the train to Roma Termini railway station in the heart of the city. From there I walked about twenty minutes to my hostel. The hostel–Free Hostels Roma–was pleasant enough. The room I was placed in has four "nests," not unlike the capsule-hotels of Japan. Your nest has a sliding door and can lock, and you also are given your own lockable cubby that can hold a large amount of items. The hostel occupants were primarily 20-something-year-olds from across Europe, as far as I could tell on a first impression.

An older man, presumably the owner or his friend, asked me where in the US I was from. When I told him "San Diego" his eyes widened and he asked me if I was rich. I laughed.

After checking in I had my first meal in Rome, at 320 gradi, a lowkey restaurant only a block from my hostel. I had egg noodles with bolognese, a margherita pizza, and a decaf espresso. The pasta was remarkably good. While chewing the noodles I could feel the soreness of my jaw from the pack of gum I chewed on the flight. The pizza was good as well, but a little more run-of-the-mill.

As I was leaving, an intense downpour started. I ran under an awning, which was helping for a bit until the wind picked up. At that point, the rain was being blown sideways beneath the awning, soaking my pants. I ran, skipping over puddles through the rain and almost falling into a small river running down the street my hostel was on.

Once inside, I showered, brushed my teeth, changed, and sat down to do some work. The hostel's wifi connection is really good, which was a huge relief, even though I have the global wifi hotspot. The hotspot will come in handy as a backup, and it works perfectly here in Italy!