We discovered, after checking in in Amsterdam, that we were priority customers. As a result, it took about 20 minutes to check our luggage and get through security at Schipol Airport and considerably longer at Charles de Gaulle because, after all, the French will be French. Then, it was onto a big wide body Airbus jet to Antananarivo, or Tana for short. We were in the section behind first class and in front of economy. There was a curtain behind us. We were in economy premium which has two fewer seats per row, large televisions on the back of each seat, foot rests, cloth pillows without the shitty paper cover and noise reduction headphones. Oh yes, we also had a window seat with excellent views of the Aegean coast line and Sahara Desert.
And then, at 11:10 p.m., we arrived. Of course, we were among the first off the plane and squeezed onto the one bus available to take us to the gate. The immigration area included four booths for the officers, three of them filled. The lady who took the entrance paper I'd filled out barely looked at my passport. In fact, not long enough to tell me that I needed a visa. We followed the throng to another larger booth filled with three visa officers. A fourth sat on a counter just outside the booth. Our passports were taken, scanned into a computer stamped with writing that covered an entire page and signed by the guy sitting on the counter.
We picked up our luggage off an old style conveyer belt, the kind that most people won't ever have seen. The belt comes in from the outside, proceeds along a wall and then turns back behind the wall. Obviously, they get very little traffic through this airport in a day. And yes, For the first time in three trips, my bag did not get lost, perhaps because it was given a priority sticker.
A youngish woman was selling phones and SIM cards just inside the immigration area. I was given a price of 30 euros for 5 gigs of data and then another 20 for an hour of calling time anywhere in the world. Not wanting to complicate matters, we took what she suggested. When she went to change the SIM card in my phone, we discovered that it needed a number to unlock it. Now where had I put that? Not in the notebook I'd purchased for the trip. I was pretty sure telus had emailed me the number so I had to change back to the old SIM card to access the phone. Then I discovered it wasn't in with the emails. After considerable consternation on my part and concern on Nicola's, I remembered that I'd been texted the number. Out with the old card, in with the new and voila, it worked. Now, it was 12:50.
We passed through the doors that separate us from the rest of Tana and were greeted by hundreds of dark faces, looking at us beseechingly, like we might require some service of them that would involve payment. Lucky for a few, we did, because among the 20 or so signs held up to us, not one had Nicola or Ramsey on it. A particularly aggressive young man in a yellow vest insisted on taking my cart which I allowed him to do with the proviso that he would direct us to an ATM. The first was just for VISA, the second would only take Nicola's Royal Bank card. We decided to phone the hotel because, after all, we had a working phone. The lady seemed to indicate that getting a driver to us would be very difficult so I suggested we take a taxi. She seemed quite excited about this so I asked her how much it would cost. She said between 50 and 60,000, Aviarys, 23 Canadian. Amongst our entourage was a middle aged guy wearing a red vest with taxi emblazoned across it. He only needed to hear the mention of a taxi and he was all over that. "60,000," he said. "Alright," I replied. With that we left the airport to a very empty parking lot and four small taxis parked close by. We squeezed into the back and were off.
One street light greeted us on our departure and that was about it. We drove through darkness past tin shelters, some with signs painted on the outside, none with as light on and not a soul in sight. It was really pretty spooky. We passed a larger building with a neon sign advertising construction and then a bar with a few patrons. When our taxi started climb a hill, we knew we were almost there.
Our hotel is a converted, many storied colonial style home. We're on the lower level with a patio, two chairs, and a divan. Very nice.
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