Update from Zurich!

It is August 31 and I am currently sitting in the waiting area for my terminal at “Flughafen Zuirch” (the Zurich Airport) and feeling pretty worldly-wise for using my “Visit Oslo” pen in Switzerland en route to Italy. Ah, the perks of traveling.

Zurich’s airport is slightly overwhelming — I got off the plane and went through security, an airport train, customs, and then a bit of a hike to get to my current seat in the waiting area. They’ve got it set up so that all passengers for gates 50-60 (or so) are corralled in one waiting area and when their flight is ready to board, you’re supposed to head downstairs to the actual gate. Thankfully, my layover is long enough that I had no problem getting all the way across the airport. The plan was to email Mom and Dad now and let them now I had made it safely to Zurich, however the internet is not free… guess that means people will have to wait to find out if I make it to Florence in one piece.

It was still dark when my flight landed in Zurich, but it’s lightening up now. I can see mountains a little way off, though they’re probably just considered hills (since none are very big).

On the flight here, I was moved from my original seat at the request of a dad traveling with two young kids). Weird story: the seat assignment on my ticket put me next to the dad and separated him from one of his kids. I switched with the kid so that their family could sit together (a no-brainer, in my mind). However the dad decided once I sat down that he was entitled to all four seats in the middle of the plane so that his kids could stretch out and sleep. While that’s fine, I would think that one would then purchase all four seats rather than try to kick someone else out of their rightful seat. But clearly that’s thinking things through too much. So he asked one of the flight attendants if I could switch to a different seat (which I was a little confused about, but if it got me farther away from the crazy, I was willing to go). Thankfully there was a window seat open one row back. I ended up next to a very talkative man on his way to a conference. He wanted to know anything and everything about me (while I was only willing to share a little) and then told me all about himself. Apparently he does bio-medical research at the University of Chicago. I ended up turning my seat’s TV on just to avoid more talking! But that turned out well, since I watched “Brave” and “Hysteria” (which was really quite funny).