On Sunday evening I flew to Paris for a conference. Since air travel is SOOOOOO much nicer in uniform, and since I was actually on a drill weekend, I decided to wear my soldier suit for the trip over.
Now waiting in the security line at Philadelphia airport. My oversize slightly overweight checked bag was not a problem. (If you know there is a regulation against travel in uniform, just let me enjoy my ignorance.) As I always do I booked an aisle seat as far back in the plane as I could. As I got ready to board a very old extended range Boeing 757, the ground crew said there were only 50 passengers--I had three seats to myself. A whole row---AAAHHHH!!!
But the plane was delayed for 45 minutes while they tried to fix a leak in the 40-year-old toilet. We arrived late for Paris and I had to catch a train for Brussels that left 15 minutes after I got my bag. I made the train, but was still in uniform. No problem, I'll change in the bathroom. I went into the bathroom when I got on the train. The floor was sticky. I checked another car. Blue water on the floor.
When I got to Brussels, I met a colleague who was going with me for a site visit for an event in December. She said we had to go right away, I did not have time to change.We got the facility, a beautiful meeting hall for 1200 people called The Square. I took my camera (with a long lens) out of my pack and took pictures of the place we would set up a display. Then the representative from The Square took us down to the actual meeting hall. When we walked through the door to the lobby, there were a dozen dark-skinned men staring at me. A couple of them were holding signage with Arabic symbols. It turns out they were setting up for a meeting of the Iranian exile community in Europe the next day--in the main hall of The Square.
So I am standing in uniform with a camera in my hand looking at a bunch of Iranians getting ready for a party.
I decided I had seen enough of the meeting hall. We went upstairs to talk about plans for December.
