It’s alive…..

After a brief wait for delivery of the last bits, Frank is up and about and is pretty damn good so far.

The patient has arrived

Exciting times in the summer singlespeed project as the source bike is identified and brought home. An all-points plea at work brought lots of feedback from the bike boys and one back garden with three surplus machines in need of help.

Entering a brave new world

The new age is upon me. I sit with a beautifully clean and new tablet, propped up in it’s sleek protective cover, typing away on a flat- screen keyboard. The iPad has landed, more by luck than judgement, despite a lot of wondering if I could or should. On the basis of usefulness whilst travelling, document handling on the move and a more professional presentation medium to business meetings, the company bought a couple and I found myself on the receiving end. So, better make the most of it.

First test will be later this week when I spend a couple of days in Italy. Early preparations are good, but time will tell. A first few thoughts are worth recording now.

Battery life – seems huge compared to my laptop, and even against my iPhone given the amount of usage the iPad could get
Charger – a single one shared with the iPhone will cut down on bag clutter and weight, just need to find the highest power one I have and use that for shortest charge cycles
Apps – loads of them but still trying to figure out the ideal combination
Data – or more properly, what, where and how? I have some docs on cloud services (box.net, Evernote and google docs are currently being experimented with) but without the 3G service, these are only available with a wifi connection. I will also sync some docs but according to the app in use, different methods apply – shared folders in Docs to Go or Stanza, iTunes for others or mapped network drives for still others. It will doubtless settle down to a useful and easy combination but for now there are just too many options
Wifi – I made a point of selecting a hotel with free wireless, just to be sure of connection to the outside world and the possibility of getting to BBC’s iPlayer if the local TV is that bad

More to come after the trip and I’m sure some evolution of the travelling process, but for now I’m just looking forward to not lugging the laptop around and to a machine that switches on in less than five minutes – oh bliss.

Flying through the Magic Kingdom

Just back from the Gulf tour and wanted to share what a strange place Riyadh is. Any that have visited may recognise some parts.

The hotel schedule runs by prayer times – supper on the garden terrace was after Isha prayers, which are early evening, but you need a local newspaper to tell you when that is with any precision – but then time is an approximate science in Riyadh.

The city is quite intimidating in the evening – after supper I went outside for a walk – all the youth are now adopting western dress styles so assemble as boisterous groups in hoodies outside the shopping mall exit (just like Ealing really) alongside dozens of women in black abayyas waiting for their drivers to take them away. The traffic is very heavy, the whole place is very noisy and it is all in Arabic script, there is no spoken English around and very few other westerners to be seen so there is little to hold onto as a cultural reference point – it all leaves you feeling very isolated. So, back to the hotel and BBC Prime, old episodes of Waking the Dead, a great improvement on what was there twelve years ago on my last visit.

Then there is the airport – again minimum signage in English and a less than obvious route through the procedure. They don’t tell you which desk to check in at , and separate you from the desks by glass panels and a security scanner. So peer at the screens behind the desks and see if you can spot a BMI logo anywhere – or follow someone else speaking English and guess they are on the same flight, have done it before and know the plan…. Through a security scan and then get confused by a young chap pointing at my holdall and saying “chicken bag?” then the other on and “carry bag?” – Ah, check-in bag…..at the fifth attempt. Carry on and there is no obvious way to passport control, which it turns out is back through the security check the wrong way and behind the big desk and panel that was there as you arrived at the terminal.

Passport control and security are pretty easy (so long as your paperwork is in order….not and you could be explaining for ages). And then into departures – I got through easily and so had over two hours to wait in the noisiest departure area I have ever known. Not people, not music – a waterfall…..a thirty foot jet rising from the ground floor through beyond the level of the first floor balcony where departures is and falling back with such a roar it almost blots out the announcements. And all very ornately if not very subtly decorated.

The fountain at Riyadh King Khaled International Airport

The whole thing is set in what looks like a great big bowl. I would have slept a bit (it was gone midnight by now) but the noise and the bustle of a delayed flight to Mumbai kept me awake. Then the fun of the call to the flight – the Mumbai passengers were all milling around the gate and then at some pre-arranged signal there was a giant scrum as more than three hundred people raced and jostled and climbed over each other in front of the door. No obvious purpose or progress for five minutes until they emerged in the neatest single file line along the window wall of the terminal building. Order wad returned and they processed onto the plane in perfectly directed form.

Would we do the same when out turn came? Almost, but without the manic scrum, a little more refined, but no less hurrying to be early in the queue to get on and a symbolic step towards the first gin and tonic for a while.

Then an illustration of improvised airport security at it’s best – on the jetway to the aircraft door is a long table and a dozen security guards lined up to rummage through your carry-on bags. I walk down the table in the cramped passageway, and see a guard halfway down with an empty space in front of him, a cursory fumble and then I’m off, jostling past this knot of people being searched. I get to the end of the table and the last man is also free, he calls me over to inspect my bag, and I tell him I was already done earlier. A shrug and he waves me aboard. Looking back over my shoulder he could have had no idea if I really had because it was impossible to see down the passage beyond the first few people.

The BMI service is good, a decent seat even in economy, friendly service and the drinks trolley shot out almost as soon as we got airborne. Some of the guys must have been in country for a while, as a dewy look greeted their first beer or scotch.

Saudi is a weird place, but much like the other countries of the region, it has a habit of getting under your skin. In spite of the odd things that happen, I’m sure I’ll be back there soon.