Business trip

Many of you reading this will not know that in addition to being a business analyst, I am also an aspiring writer.

On a recent business trip, I began writing a log of my journey, as it turned out to be not as straightforward as I would have liked. I had intended to publish the log here, as I imagine a lot of you would be able to relate to it.

However, the log turned into a story of sorts. I ended up weaving elements of my inbound flights to Dresden and my return trip, as well as a walk I took around the city. Most of what you are about to read is true. I hope you can tell which part is fiction!

Kind regards,

Declan Chellar

18.10 – I am on a business trip to Dresden via Munich and things are already off to a poor start. My flight to Munich is due to take off but we have not even boarded yet. People are getting restless, shifting in the queue and glancing over at the Lufthansa ground staff. The staff member announces that boarding will being at 18:30. This is due to snow storms in Munich which delayed the departure of the inbound flight. We eventually board, like so much livestock, and the plane pushes back from the gate sixty-five minutes late. Many passengers believe they will miss their connecting flight, including me. I don’t see the point in worrying. It is what it is. Either I will miss my connection or I will not. There is nothing I can do about it. The Lufthansa staff are very friendly and inform us that the snow storm has affected all flights at Munich and the likelihood is that all connecting flights are also delayed.

20.30 – I estimate that we must be over the Alps by now. Somewhere below me, someone has laid a blank of cotton-wool clouds across the mountains, but it is a poor job – the jagged peaks will have ripped through the downy fabric, desperate to resume their futile quest to touch the sky. I can only imagine this is so. I wish I could see the Alps, but I cannot because it is dark. It is what it is.

Memo to self: next time you want to see the Alps, fly by day.

21.35 – We land in Munich. A bus is waiting to take the passengers to the terminal. For one passenger, a car is waiting at the plane. Either he has fantastic travel insurance or friends in high places. Another passenger scowls at the car. I imagine he is wondering why he is not getting such preferential treatment. He asks whether he is also allowed to get in the car and is informed that he must take the bus. It boggles my mind why he would even ask. He boards the bus and starts berating the cabin crew for the delay. It is clear that he blames them for the weather and Lufthansa’s policy of ensuring the safety of their passengers by de-icing their aircraft before allowing them to fly. The senior flight attendant explains (yet again) that the snow storm has affected the whole airport, but out of courtesy says ‘sorry’.

“Sorry no!” snaps the passenger.

It seems that you can get past middle age and still behave like a petulant child when things don’t go your way. The other passengers around him shake their heads, including me. I cannot abide discourtesy, even though I am sometimes guilty of it myself.

21.55 – I am in the terminal building, checking to see whether the gate for my flight to Dresden has been changed. I check the departures board three times. My flight is not there. I run to the gate anyway, but it’s as dead as a roller-disco. The snow storm has affected the whole airport, but not flight 1076, which has departed without me. It is what it is.

22.05 – I start queuing at the Lufthansa customer service desk. The line is long. It is what it is. The desks are fully staffed and the staff are clearly getting through the people as smartly as they can. A woman behind me grumbles that the line is not moving fast enough. Because she is the only person who has to be somewhere. I don’t fancy my chances of getting out of Munich tonight – there wasn’t another flight to Dresden on the departures board. Still, I expect to be able to make my appointment in plenty of time if I get an early flight in the morning. The passengers queuing all seem polite. No tantrums witnessed at the desks.

22.35 – I get to the customer service desk. Lufthansa know what they are doing. I am given a new boarding pass for a morning flight, taxi vouchers and a booking for the night at a Park Inn (I know, but all I want are clean sheets and a shower). The man behind the desk is friendly and courteous, helped probably by the lack of passenger hissy fits. I need not worry about my luggage, he informs me, as it will be transferred to Dresden. Oh, dear. It’s been a long day and I am ripening. I will want to change and shave in the morning before my appointment. I won’t have time to go my Dresden hotel first. He informs me that I can collect my bag, but it might take an hour, although he tells me to check with the baggage tracking desk after twenty minutes. I resign myself to the wait. It is what it is.

22.45 – I’m at the baggage carousel. I send a text message to my business contact explaining that in the morning I should be collected at the airport, rather than the hotel. The stopover in Munich is an inconvenience, but nothing more. My plans are still on track.

23.10 – I’m at the baggage tracking desk. The man checks my docket and informs me that if my suitcase isn’t out by 23.30, then it has already been processed for transfer to Dresden.

23.15 – I’m at the baggage carousel. No bag.

23.29 – I’m at the baggage carousel. A video advertisement for Lufthansa informs me that I will never forget my first flight out of Munich. You think?

23.30 – I resign myself to having to put on the same clothes in the morning and I proceed to the taxi rank.

23.35 – I’m in a taxi heading to the Park Inn. There is snow and ice everywhere, including the motorway. Top speed: 140 KPH. A hair-raising moment as we approach traffic slowed by a pair of snow ploughs. The driver brakes a lot later than I would have and has to change lane in order not to hit the car in front.

Memo to self: no tip.

00.05 – Finally arrive at the Park Inn. Considering “Munich” airport is 40 Km from Munich, you could say the Park Inn is an airport hotel. There is a long queue to check in. It is what it is. Oddly, several people who were ahead of me in the line for customer service at the airport arrive after me at the hotel.

00.20 – As soon as I open the door to the room I can immediately smell that it is a smoking room. I am not a smoker, but I am too tired to go back to reception to request another room.  It is what it is.

00.40 – I finally hit the sack.

00.45 – I am still not asleep.

01.00 – I am still awake.

01.30 – Hello.

02.10 – I must have fallen asleep, because I have just woken up.

02.35 – I must have fallen asleep again.

06.00 – The alarm goes off only a moment later, it seems. Instead of an intrusive sound I have chosen “Praan” by Garry Schyman as the alarm tone and it wakes me with a gentle nudge. My brain begs to be allowed to go back to sleep, but it is what it is. I switch off the alarm and get up straight away. I perform my ablutions, put on my clothes (including a very ripe shirt that was clean about twenty hours ago) and head down to reception. The taxi is waiting for me. The driver smiles, which is nice to see at such a miserable hour on a freezing morning. I appreciate the gesture.

07.00 – I arrive back at Munich airport. I pass an American girl with two huge suitcases berating two young, Dutch men. They are all trying to board a shuttle bus that only has two seats left. She complains that she had been there first. They respond that they had been there first. She asks them where they had been waiting and they inform her that they had been waiting inside (in other words, not at the bus stop). The young men board the bus, seemingly finding it humorous to inform the bus driver loudly that the girl hates them now but they don’t care because they will never see her again. I resent them on the girl’s behalf and she resigns herself to another half-hour wait in the snow. It is what it is. I offer the girl my hat, as it is snowing heavily and her head is uncovered. She laughs but declines. I am glad to at least have made her smile.

I walk inside the terminal and write a postcard to my parents to let them know their son is thinking of them. The mandatory slow shuffle through security goes without incident and I am pleased to find that I don’t have to take off my shoes. I imagine it is because the latest terrorist trend is to set fire to their thighs, rather than their shoes. Airport security is mostly a reactive PR stunt that always lags behind terrorist trends. I am slightly surprised nobody is asked to show their thighs. Mine are quite impressive, so I would not object strongly. A security guard politely asks to go through my hand luggage, as there are too many cables and objects to clearly make out the contents. A moment later I am cleared to go.

07.25 – Munich airport has an impressive array of shops, all luxury brands, interestingly. Hugo Boss, Ermenegildo Zegna, Rolex and so forth. It is clearly a place designed not to get you somewhere, but to make you spend money while you are getting somewhere. The ripeness of my shirt is irritating me now, and I feel pity for the person who will have to sit beside me.

Memo to self: carry clean T-shirt when flying at night in case of forced stopovers.

I want to buy myself a plain, cotton T-shirt but the only T-shirts to be found have the vulgar logos of some ball-chasing sport emblazoned across them. I pass Hugo Boss and spot a 50% discount sign in the far corner. I have plenty of shirts. I don’t need another, but it’s better to spend €50 on a shirt I don’t need than €20 on a shirt I don’t want. The sales assistant is pleasant and helpful and a few minutes later I walk out wearing a fresh, plum-red shirt. My malodorous long-sleeved T now stuffed at the bottom of my bag.

A combination of boredom and a long hours of hard work over recent weeks leads to a minor shopping spree: the shirt, a new watch (commemorating the one-hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the birth of Hugo Junkers, the German aircraft engineer), some travel speakers for my iPod, some Jean-Paul Gaultier scent – a gift for my wife. I don’t tend to wear scent myself. I just like to smell clean, not scented.

I select an eatery and go for a smoked salmon roll and a glass of orange juice – €10. I plan to sleep on the plane, so no coffee for me. As I eat my breakfast, I realise that I am sitting right opposite the Lufthansa customer service desk. I had not recognized the area from the night before.

08.00 – I am sitting at the departure gate. I start writing this log. A member of ground staff pages me. There is some confusion about the number of bags I have checked in. I explain that there is only one bag, which probably appears twice in their system because it was scheduled the night before for automatic routing to Dresden. Clarity reigns.

08.45 – We board a bus and are driven to an outlying area where a small propeller plane awaits us. Boarding is quick. As we sit awaiting take off, there are scraping sounds from the roof. Someone is clearing the ice from the fuselage. A large machine approaches and sprays the plane with pink de-icer. It makes pretty patterns in the snow.

09.15 – Take off. I fall asleep. The sound of the captain announcing preparations to land wakes me. I look out the window at a fairytale vision of quaint, snow-draped villages. I love the snow and I smile as I wish I could take a sleigh ride through the countryside and I am no longer looking at the scenery, but at images in my mind’s eye.

10.45 – The bump of wheels on the ground shakes me from my reveries and not long after I find myself standing in the rather small and very quiet Dresden International Airport. A man is waiting, holding a card with my name misspelled. It is what it is. I approach him and tell him who I am. He asks for identification. Under the circumstances, I expect as much. I show him my passport and he asks me to follow him. A blue Mercedes is waiting outside. This man is the driver. He places my luggage in the boot and I get in the back. The driver hands me a small Samsonite bag. I open it. As I expect, it is the hardware I said I would require. I verify that it is in good working order and place it back in the bag.  On the drive into the city I am mentally going through the task at hand, paying no attention at all to the world outside until I see a sign for an “erotic car wash”. I wonder what an erotic car wash consists of and whether owning a car is mandatory. Shortly after, I see my first dog in Germany. I am delighted that it is a German Shepherd.

11.15 – I ask the driver to drop me off outside the Military Museum on Königsbrücker Strasse and tell him to take my suitcase to the hotel. I proceed into the centre of Dresden on the number 8 tram with the Samsonite hanging from my shoulder. The tram passes through the north side of the city, the part mostly damaged by the incendiary bombing and inferno that took place on February 13^th 1945. I observe that today is February 13^th. Many of the buildings on the outskirts are tall and beautiful, but empty and derelict. I get off the tram earlier than I need to, having decided a short walk would be pleasant. I stop for a moment and observe the cold, communist era structures that replaced what must have been the beautiful buildings destroyed in this city that had been considered so safe from allied bombings that it had no air defenses in 1945. I have plenty of time before my appointment, so I stop for a few minutes on Albertplatz to admire a pair of fountains. On one side of the street, the fountain is adorned with elaborate green, metal (bronze?) sculptures of a battle between mythical sea creatures. Mermen, fish, merhorses tear at each other’s metal flesh and scream silent anguish. I walk full circle round the fountain, admiring the vision and workmanship before crossing the road. Its companion also has a watery theme, but this time it is a peaceful one, although just as intricate as the other. It is a lake scene, again with mythical creatures, but here the faces are placid and serene and the scene is one of peace. Full of admiration for sculptors whose names I do not know, I make my way down to the river Elbe.

11.45 – The “historical” city lies across the river from me. I imagine it is so called because more buildings survived the conflagration than in the city north of the river. Not untouched, however; many of the monumental buildings are black, coated still with the smoke of February 1945, I presume. I cross the Augustusbrücke.

11.55 – It is time for my appointment and I walk along the river front on Terrassenufer and then down the steps and along Münzgasse. The first restaurant I notice is a Spanish tapas place and I smile to myself. My appointment is standing at an outdoor coffee stand, as I was told he always is at midday. I reach into the Samsonite as I approach him. He sees me. We are strangers to each other but still he recognises – not who I am – he recognises what I am. He has been unaware of this appointment. Well, unaware that it would take place on this day, at this time, in this place. But he has been expecting this appointment for some time now, men like him usually expect men like me to show up some day, at some time, in some place. He shows no fear; his expression is rather one of relief. I have seen this expression many times before on the faces of men who were tired of living in fear. He is almost grateful to see me. I slide my hand into the Samsonite and wrap it gently around the pistol grip. I fire from inside the bag and I place two bullets into the centre of his chest, directly to the heart. He is dead now, but his brain has not realised it yet. I place another bullet into his forehead. His brain understands now.

The pistol is silenced and hidden. I have not even broken stride and the meeting is over. I imagine that even my appointment saw the elegant simplicity of it before he died. I hear shouting and screaming behind me and I stroll away. I go for a walk through the old city, admiring the soaring Frauenkirche, the tall, pastel coloured houses and charming store fronts. I stop for a cup of coffee and leave the Samsonite on a seat beside me. A moment later a stranger passes by, picks up the bag and walks away.

I glance down and spot a drop of blood on my jacket. I will have to get rid of it. Burn it probably. I cannot risk having my appointment’s DNA and my DNA on the same garment. It’s a Versace, what a waste, but it is what it is.

Memo to self: wear cheaper clothes to business meetings.