David Frodsham

The airline industry is not used to the new security regulations. One of those seemingly-infinite British Airways announcements has the old message asking people to put their large wheelie bags in sideways in the overhead locker, to allow space for others. But as we are now restricted to a single bag little larger than a toaster, there’s enough room on board the 747 for anything and everything, even the odd kitchen sink. The announcement “If you have two bags, please put one under the seat in front of you” must be a wind-up.

There is still the odd poor soul wandering around the airport with his passport, ticket and wallet in a see-through plastic bag. It reminds me of France at the start of the Single Market in 1992. One of the many changes then was for France to give up its yellow headlights, which had been on all cars since the 2nd World War, as part of an EU product standardization drive. Unfortunately no-one told the determined British tourist who, with a whimsical view of France involving bicycles, baguettes and berets illuminated by yellow headlights, continued to paint his headlights yellow well into the late 90s, when the French decided they’d had enough and started issuing on-the-spot fines for cars with yellow headlights. Similarly in today’s world, I wonder whether we will still see the passport-in-a-plastic-bag phenomenon in 5 years’ time. It’s perhaps not fair to imply that the English have a monopoly of being feckless tourists, as I have been asked at times by French visitors in London “mais, ou est le brouillard?” (where is the fog?), and never been completely convinced that they were joking.

The search for liquids, gels, lighters and other newly-banned substances at Heathrow is still not effective, evidenced by a passenger at the gate meekly handing over his lighter just before boarding, saying he’d “forgotten” he had it. The current measures may be excessive, but it would be nice if they were at least universally enforced, or perhaps enforceable.

Washington is the first stop on my Round The World tour, through the USA, Japan, China and South Africa. It’s a total of 31,500 miles of flying and by the time I land in Washington, I’ve done just 11.6%. The longest sector is Hong Kong to Johannesburg (6,634 miles) and the shortest at just 74 miles is Hong Kong to Guangzhou, or Canton as it used to be called. I’m away 22 days less 4 hours, so my average speed during this trip will be almost exactly 60 mph. Pre-South Africa my average speed is over 85 mph, which seems right as that is work-time. I will have lost a day by going the wrong way over the International Date Line, and according to Einstein’s concept of personal time, I will be very slightly older (or younger, I’m not quite sure) than I would have been had I stayed at home.

I’ve spent so long with Barry’s patient and professional help planning this trip, that I’m convinced nothing can go wrong. I’m wrong: in fact it starts to go awry as soon as I land. Both the place I am staying and the meeting I’ve come for are in the Ritz Carlton, but it becomes clear that there are three Ritz Carltons in DC, and I’m not staying in the right one. Having ironed that out, and with the meeting successfully accomplished, it’s off to Dulles airport for the next leg. There I have to check in my bag, because I’m carrying toothpaste, a newly banned substance (I can’t help thinking: what are all these others with their wheelie bags doing about cleaning their teeth?). After saying goodbye to my bag (I hate checking bags in), I’m told that the flight to Chicago is delayed, so that I will miss my connection to San Jose. I can reroute, but my bags will not arrive until the next day. After some gnashing of teeth and a promise that the check-in clerk will be sent off to re-education camp (I have after all just finished a book on Mao, and it’s given me the idea) American Airlines send off a team to interrupt my bag in the bowels of the airport, and reticket it on my new route via Dallas Fort Worth to San Jose. They claim success; time will tell.

Dallas is a seriously big airport. I have a gate change from C2 to D28, which involves a 15 minute train ride. Heathrow may be proud of being the World’s Biggest Airport, but in order to stay the right side of the truth, they have had to add the word “International” before “Airport”. Dulles feels like Heathrow spread over a space not much smaller than Surrey and is apparently the airport with the most passengers and flights in the world. Perhaps one day that prize will be earned by Shanghai or Beijing, but today it’s the republican-voting oil tycoons of Texas who are in the top slot. It’s also hot, which makes a change from Washington, where it was unseasonably cool and raining.

Next stop: Silicon Valley.