Flight home

Our flight is at 6:15 a in the morning. Our travel agent has arranged for a water taxi to pick us up at 4:15a. Right around 4a, we get a call from the front desk informing us that our taxi is waiting. We go down and are met by the attendant. He leads us to a passageway that leads directly from the hotel to the canal, where the taxi is waiting.

It is a 30 minute ride to the airport and affords us a view of the Venice skyline while she sleeps. This experience of getting to an airport by water taxi is exhilirating, and I tell wife how lucky we are to have savored it. As the cabbie drops us off, I tip him and give him a thumbs up "Go Italy!" sign. Italy are to play France later on that night in the World Cup football final.

At the airport, there is a long line that moves slowly. Finally we are checked in and a little after 6:30a on our way out of Italy.

At Amsterdam, we head to our connection. Everyone at the gate seems to be going through a special screening. I hand the agent our boarding passes; he types something into his laptop and then waves us over to another agent.

This agent is a Pakistani and he assumes we are coming from New Delhi, India. When I correct him, he seems to be astonished that we visited Italy. More mundane questions are hurled at us and dutifully answered. He then walks over to his supervisor and returns to tell us all is fine and that we can go ahead and board.

It is a long journey home and by 5:30p we are back home in San Jose, California.