By Michael McCarthy

On a recent trip to Asia I found myself needing to fly from Bangkok to Kathmandu.  It soon became evident there were only two ways to get between these cities, either Thai International or Royal Nepal Air. Brief inquiries narrowed my choices.  Evidently Royal Nepal enjoyed the use of two airplanes, one of which occasionally flew and the other was used for parts.  They had a nice website, but when you moved your cursor around the site, nothing happened.  I soon found that Thai International’s site wasn’t much better.  I was able to get right down to the point of buying a ticket when the site froze up.  It took a week to discover the obvious; the flights were sold out.   

So I found myself about to get on a plane to fly to the other side with no guarantee that I would get closer than a thousand miles of my destination.  My only option was to fly to Delhi followed by a bus ride through northern India, an option I did not wish to contemplate.  I contacted travel agencies and surfed travel chat sites, and to my great relief I found there was actually a third way to get to Nepal from Thailand.  It involved a catch, of course. 

Charlie Connection, a travel agency in Bangkok, informed me there was an obscure airline named Biman Air that flew to Kathmandu once a week but with an overnight stop in the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka along the way.  What better adventure than stopping for a day in a place as obscure as Bangladesh, which gets more typhoons and floods than tourists?  I bought the ticket right away. 

Bangkok’s new Suvarnabhumi airport rivals Hong Kong’s for sleek design and sheer size.  You could get lost in there for days and no one would ever find you.  With a layover of several hours I casually strolled the building, noting airlines from all over the world.  I spotted a counter for Vladivostok Air, and a gaggle of stewardesses from Turkish Airlines, and hundreds of colorfully dressed African women grimly stood guard over a vast mountain of giant black duffle bags.  There were airlines from companies flying to countries I had never heard of, but no Biman Air.   

Eventually I gave up and went to the Information counter, where I was informed that Biman Air was situated in Row U.  I walked a mile back to Row U, but there was no sign of Biman.  Completely exhausted from 30 hours of non-stop travel, I lay down on a row of seats and waited.  After all, it was a small airline and probably couldn’t afford to rent a booth.  Sure enough, several hours later a small electronic sign eventually appeared (albeit in Row W) and a man in a uniform magically appeared behind the counter.  

“Mr. Michael?” he inquired. “Hello,” I responded heartily, “you know who I am then? That’s certainly good news.” 

“Yes, only four passenger today here,” smiled the counterman.  “Your boarding pass ready now.  Small delay only.” 

“Eh?” I inquired, taking the boarding pass.  “A delay?” 

“No problem, only few hour.  You check in same time as before, maybe we leave same time.” 

So at the original departure time I walked several miles to a departure lounge and checked in.  It was an interesting crowd, my first glimpse of Islamic Asia. Lots of hand baggage consisting of cheap pink plastic bags, the kind you get at discount markets, and big cardboard boxes tied with rope.  Facial hair was much in abundance, as was exotic headgear, and strange languages largely devoid of consonants. 

The plane, as I could clearly see from the boarding area, was parked on the tarmac.  We sat and waited, in the stoic Asian fashion, like condemned prisoners awaiting our fate.  I surmised the airline was trying to scrounge enough money to buy some fuel.  As the clock passed midnight, the aircrew finally sauntered by and not half an hour later we passengers were permitted to board.  Even though it had presumably been cleaned in its 12-hour layover, old food wrappers were still stuffed down the seat pockets, there were crumbs on the seats and the lime green carpet matched the 1970’s floral pattern in which the seats were decorated, presumably from the era when the plane had been built.  There was an overwhelming reek of curry in the air, which blended well with the stink of jet fuel wafting from the tarmac.  Perhaps they’ve left the fuel cap off, I thought. 

We landed with only a couple of bad bounces at General Zia airport at 2 a.m.  I stumbled down the hallway, looking into office windows for some indication of what to do but at this hour everything was locked tight, including the washrooms.  Eventually I found a counter marked Transit, where I encountered a large crowd of my passengers demanding attention.  There were angry German men with close-cropped haircuts and three-day stubble shouting loudly, and at least 40 Japanese all wearing the same green hats and all grimly holding their places at the counter, all mutely waving their tickets.   

It appeared there was no hotel and no shuttle to it.  No wait, wait, there WAS a hotel, somewhere in Dhaka, and indeed a shuttle bus to it, but you needed to have a transit visa.  This visa was $20, cash only, either in Bangadeshi takkas or U.S. dollars, but this particular official apparently did not issue such visas.  That was done elsewhere. “

But I’ve tried the bloody ATM, mate!” exploded an angry Aussie next to me, “and it’s bloody well broken.  They all are.” 

This display of anger and logic did not faze the official in the slightest. “People who have not visa can stay overnight in lounge,” he said.   

Looking over at the “lounge,” I observed hard plastic chairs and no carpeting.  I wanted to sleep so badly I had to lean on the counter to stay upright.  The time now read 1.45 a.m. so I butted in. 

“Look, I have a ticket here that promises me a transfer, a hotel and breakfast, and it says my transit visa has been paid,” I cried.  “Look, it’s written right here on these papers.” 

But the official was already turning away to deal with a hysterical Japanese lady, sobbing pitifully at the far side of the counter. 

“Wait, OK,” I boomed out. “OK, I’ll buy a visa.”

“You wait,” he said.  I waited.  He handed me a chit, a big red plastic token, the kind you get at Las Vegas if you bet the farm and Grandma’s knickers.  I waited some more.  Another official eventually showed up in a nifty uniform, younger but in a bad mood.  He beckoned me brusquely to follow him to the Immigration Department.  This was down a vast hall, and at the end were two soldiers in a counter, both asleep with their heads on the counter.  It was 2.30 in the morning, and they must have been very tired.  So was I. 

A brief conversation followed, with apparently unsatisfactory results for my colonel turned on his heel and we headed for the Money Exchange counter, which was also, inexplicably, still open.  A brief flurry of negotiations with negative results, for my guard signaled to me and we marched off across the vast hall again, with the colonel rattling doorknobs and banging on windows of darkened offices, as if some official would somehow appear at this time of night, but much to my surprise and delight a light went on in one, and a shaggy head slowly appeared in the window. 

I noticed that this particular official had been sleeping on a mat on the floor.  Upon production of my passport, he filled out the transit visa, indicated where I could sign, and held out his hand for the fee.  I offered a credit card.  He shook his head.  I offered Thai baht, and nice crisp new Canadian currency, but I might as well have handed him Monopoly scrip.  I rooted though all my pockets and - lo and behold! –  a $20 US bill was in my sock. It was now 3.00 a.m. 

Armed with my transit visa, we headed back to wake up Sleepy and Dopey and fill in more forms.  Things went well until I had write where I was staying in Bangladesh.  I had no idea what hotel had been booked.  Despite repeated requests, this had remained a mystery since the day I had purchased the tickets. 

“Chit?” said Sleepy.  “You have token?” 

On my big red plastic token stuffed in my pocket, in faded black ink, was scrawled the words Skylink Hotel.  Sleepy pulled out a stamp larger than a pickaxe, and gave my visa an almighty whack, and pointed to the door.  It was now 3.15 a.m.  

I started to walk towards the exit, but a firm hand on my shoulder held me back.  In a minute another official appeared, who guided me outside to the taxi zone, where it was so hot and humid my glasses immediately fogged up.  We waited.  My official went to look for the shuttle.  I waited some more.  An ancient, decrepit bus finally wheezed into view, a 1950’s era 12-seater school bus that looked as if it had survived several skirmishes, with several soldiers hanging out the windows.  I noted that all the soldiers in the bus were holding hands, like a gay bar near closing time.  It was 4.00 a.m. 

With a smashing of gears and a steady hand on the horn we bashed our way through an obstacle course of potholes to the illustrious Skylink, whose dingy lobby was illuminated by a 25-watt bulb and a TV was turned to a loud Bollywood spectacle where a fascinated an audience of six hairy men, all smoking heavily, turned to stare at me as I entered.  I handed my chit to man behind the desk. 

“What?” he said, confused. “Passport?”   

I was in a filthy hotel lost somewhere in a strange city, my luggage was stuck on a plane that might never fly again, my onward tickets had been seized at the Transit Counter, I had no Bangladeshi currency in my pocket, and I was going to hand over to my passport to complete stranger?  I thought not.  I read out the numbers and the clerk wrote them down in pencil on a scrap of crumpled paper he found in his pocket.  I was handed over to a busboy who led me to a tiny elevator reeking of cigarette smoke. The room itself reeked so badly I might as well have been sleeping in an ashtray with a roof on it.  Despite the incredible heat and stench, all the windows were locked tight.   

“Air conditioner?” I asked, pointing to a large white box in one of the windows. The busboy stacked my pillows into a pile, jumped up on them to reach the box, and starting whacking at various knobs in a pathetic attempt to pretend that the machine worked.  I noticed a large fan on the ceiling, a huge apparatus the size of a cargo plane propeller, and a panel of a dozen or so buttons on the wall, and started stabbing at them in the vague hope that one might function.  With a deep-throated roar, the fan leaped into life like an angry tiger emerging from its den.  Evidently there was only one speed, stuck at take off velocity, and soon we were airborne with clouds of smoke, cigarette butts and dust swirling through the air in a sandstorm.  

As a courtesy the busboy handed me an old worn plastic Pepsi bottle full of Bangladeshi tap water, and a half package of mouthwash gel, pre-wrinkled and pre-torn for ease of opening.  By this time (it was now 4.30) I had to pee even more than I had to sleep.  Next to the bed was another door that I took to be the bathroom.  I opened the door, and there was a man standing there with a big smile on his face.  

“Who is this?” I inquired of my busboy.

 “Cleaner,” he replied. “A cleaner?” I inquired.  “This room hasn’t been cleaned since the day it was built and you are cleaning it NOW?” 

I sat on the edge of the bed and waited, which is when I noticed there were no sheets.  Instead a thick wool blanket, the itchy kind shed by ill-tempered sheep, had been tossed onto a thin wooden plank.  I soon discovered that I needed it, for the hurricane blowing through the room was so strong I was freezing.  The cleaner and the busboy finally left and I wrapped myself in wool.  It was 5 a.m. and I was very tired. 

In the midst of a very deep sleep, like the darkness of George Bush’s brain, the phone rang.   I didn’t have an air conditioner, sheets, TV or any running water but evidently my room had a phone.  I smashed my shins in the dark trying to find it.  A voice on the other end made a declaration: “Breakfast.”  I had been asleep for 3 hours. 

After half an hour trying to shave from a Pepsi bottle I stumbled down to the dining room and found this announcement regarding breakfast had meant that food was being served immediately, for on the table remained three cold slices of half-toasted white bread and a jam jar full of flies. A dozen men sat at a long table in their nightshirts, sipping tea.  As one they turned to look at me in disbelief.  They sat there, the twelve hairy statues, frozen into immobility as I hungrily devoured my cold toast and a small banana that I found on the floor and peeled.  When I was done they all jumped up and left to tell family and friends at the amazing spectacle they had just experienced.   

I wandered down to the lobby, hoping perhaps to flag a rickshaw, where a scowling soldier with a rifle angrily directed me back inside.  Evidently, along with everything else, I was now a hostage.  By my reckoning, I needed to be at the airport within hour.  Remembering an old trick, I took out my camera, pointing to it in the universal “will you take my picture” gesture.  It was dark inside the lobby, so we went outside.  In no time the guard and I were best friends, he taking my photo and my taking his, and both of us taking turns taking photos of the large crowd of awestruck rickshaw drivers that quickly assembled. 

I was attempting to negotiate with one, using a $5 Canadian bill, when the hotel bus reappeared in a giant cloud of black smoke. I waved goodbye to all my new buddies, and it was only a five-minute tootle to the airport.  I buttonholed an official who took down my name and went through the door marked transit, looking for my tickets.  I waited, looking at my watch.  Suddenly all the Biman Air passengers who had the misfortune of sleeping on the lounge floor overnight appeared, all of them in a mood fit to kill, shouting rude things in several languages.  I was swept under by the wave of anger, buried in a crowd of unwashed bodies, doomed to miss my plane, when the magic words were suddenly spoken. “Token?” inquired the Biman official.  “Who has chit?” 

I brandished my big red plastic token with a flourish, grabbed my ticket and made a mad rush for the plane, which still reeked of curry. Just as we were about to take off, a late arriving passenger was seated right next to me.  With a light scruffy beard, dark complexion and a rag tied around his head like an old-fashioned cartoon of a man with a severe toothache, the young man was the epitome of a country rube. The instant he sat down he started to cough. A stewardess came by and gestured to the Goatherd (for so I had named him) to do up his seatbelt.  He had no grasp of the concept, and fought off her bravely as she put her hand in his lap.  Another steward was summoned and Goatboy was wrestled into submission, whereupon he started to cough so violently that the tips of his lungs emerged from his throat, a bright pink creature from another dimension.   

The Goatherd unwrapped his head cloth and stuck it into his mouth, emitting horrible gurgling sounds like a TB patient in his death throes, bringing up large gobs of a strange fluid.  I wiped various bits of slime off me and tried to lean as far in the other direction as my seatbelt would allow. There was a loud roar like someone had opened an emergency exit. Looking around frantically I saw an elderly lady in a sari sitting on the toilet, conveniently located mere inches from my head, tucking the end of her sari down her trousers. We made eye contact and smiled. 

Upon landing with only a few bounces and an alarming skid we all shuffled off the craft, Goatboy following close behind me, wheezing and hacking like Bob Dylan playing harmonica.  Reaching the tarmac I got down on my knees and kissed the ground.  At the top of the steps Goatboy drew an almighty hork and tossed a greenie the size of a banana slug onto the tarmac, where it landed next to me and glistened and grew like the baby alien in the film, crying out piteously for its mother.  Watching it slither off in the direction of the terminal, I idly wondered how it would make its way past Immigration without paying $20 for a transit visa.  It was only upon arrival at the baggage carousel that I discovered that Biman Air had lost my luggage. 

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