Fancy Flights

Behind every toilet on the plane were two strips of red tape that read "EVEDENCE: DO NOT TAMPER."

I flew from Washington, D.C.to Rwanda on Ethiopian Air, the aid-worker special. There were more seats empty than full, and most of us had a row to ourselves. I was surrounded by over two dozen Seventh Day Adventist missionaries on their way to build an orphanage it Ethopia. They were exceedingly friendly and blessed me often when I told them I was going to Rwanda. Service on the flight was excellent and the food was good. All movies stopped playing about 30 minutes before they ended. Just before we landed in Addis Ababa the movies finally started playing all the way though, and passengers frantically flipped back and forth on their personal TV screens to see the ending of all the movies they had watched on the 16-hour flight.

In Addis Ababa I had one hour to make the change to my flight for Kigali, Rwanda. I made the flight, but my bag did not. There was a long line at the lost-luggage office. A lot of people were missing bags, but no one seemed terribly alarmed. I went back to the airport the following day to see if the bag had arrived. The attendant was every bit as surprised as I was relieved when I found it. She said bags usually take 2 or 3 days to arrive, and often take more than a week.

So now I'm in Kigali. I have clean underwear and socks, and I have my malaria pills. Life is good.
My hotel has 24-hour electricity, but only has running water in the afternoon. In the morning they bring me a plastic jug of warm water for bathing.