I am not often shocked, but on the way home from Abu Dhabi I was magically bumped up to Business Class on my Emirates flight to Delhi. Approaching the attendant at the gate ready to board, I was preparing myself for a 3-hour journey in economy seat 61D. When the airline employee scanned my ticket, a “conflict error” message flashed on the screen. He immediately issued a new business class ticket, moving me to seat 9A. I was stunned. I had a private compartment and a full bed! What a nice gift from either the Emirate desk agent or the flight gods.
I want to travel to India and my connection went through Delhi so it doesn’t count on my life list, but I got to experience it a bit in my 3+ hours in the airport. It is the world’s most populous nation and many commentators and academics think it will play a leading role this century. I need to convince my wife to go during one of our breaks as it is close to Tashkent and a cheaper holiday. My brother lived in Bangalore for two years and I regret not visiting him during one of our spring breaks while we were in Japan. One of the major challenges for the country is air pollution. I could see the brown haze on our morning flight.
Our family had a nice weekend together as I recovered from an overnight flight. I came to school on the Friday in the afternoon. We celebrated my son Oliver’s 19th birthday by going out to dinner at the Cheese Factory (Сированя in Russian). It is part of the Novikov restaurants, owned by Russian restauranteur, Arkady Novikov who has ties to the Kremlin. They make fresh cheese right on the site and the food and drinks are delicious. Oliver is in the midst of IB final exams, so we had a relaxed night out.
Saturday night Oliver and I went to pick up Nadia who was with her girlfriends at the karaoke bar, Baritone. We ended up singing a lot of Bon Jovi! He has several classic sing-along arena rock anthems (Living on a Prayer, You Give Love a Bad Name) that are perfect for karaoke. We had a great time! Sunday night I took Obi for a walk downtown and I am surprised at how drastically the cityscape is changing with the Tashkent City Development.
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