Flying with Dan Quayle

привет, my friend!

My first post from Moscow -- finally!

During a visit to Brazil in the early nineties, former American VP Dan Quayle thanked the Brazilian government for its hospitality during his stay in Buenos Aires. In case your knowledge of world geography is as limited as Quayle's, Buenos Aires is the capital of Argentina, Brazil's archrival. The Brazilian spokesperson was quick on his feet, and took revenge by calling him Daniel Quayle, hence playing on the assumption that Dan is short for Daniel (it's actually short for Danforth).

This how my story begins... Livia dropped at JFK yesterday. No traffic at the Licoln Tunnel or in the city, but as soon as we got to Queens, the sh-t hit the fan -- I mean, only the fans that were not affected by ConEd's blackout. We hit traffic on 495 and Van Wyck, and got to the airport 90 minutes before the flight departed. Check-in was a breeze, as Delta had a special terminal for Business class.

Saying goodbye to Livia was terrible, and I won't get into many details otherwise my tears may short circuit my laptop.

Anyway, I had just sat on the plane and was playing with all the toys from Business class, when this Russian guy sat next to me. Next to us, a Canadian (eh!) was telling a Chinese gentleman that he was a professional hockey player. Then suddenly the Russian guy who was sitting next tome interrupted their conversation to tell the Canadian (eh!) that Russia is much better than Canada, that Russians only play in Canada for the money, that NHL sucks, etc. Pretty funny...

After badgering the Canadian (eh!), the Russian guy starting chatting with me. In spite of hockey hooliganism, he turned out to be really nice: told me he currently lives in Cincinnatti, has 2 kids, etc. I then told him I worked for Colgate, and not surprisingly he asked me if Colgate belonged to P&G, that he knew a lot of people from P&G, and yada-yada-yada.

A couple of minutes into our conversation, I told him I was from Brazil. He then told me he had a very good friend who went to Brazil for Carnival, and loved it! His friend actually called him from a cell phone down in Buenos Aires, during the Carnival parade. Had I known his name, I could have pulled a Danforth Quayle on him. One of those moments we will always regreat not making fun of someone...

The remainder of the flight was uneventful, my arrival to Moscow was easy and I was met by the company driver. I am right now at the hotel, and will start exploring town in five minutes.

пока!