The First Leg

I'm writing this from Dubai airport – not directly, mind you; if there is free wi-fi here I can't make it work – but offline while drinking a chai latte (cost: 19 of whatever the local currency in Dubai is; I think I saw AED somewhere) and waiting for my flight to London.

So far I've learned one thing about international flights after my first one: thirteen and a quarters hours is a long time to be on a plane. Even more so when you're one of those people who struggles to sleep under the best of circumstances (quiet place, comfortable bed, no people moving around) let alone on a moving object a few thousand meters in the air, surrounding by people, sitting mostly upright and at the mercy of the elements, which from time to time tend to make you bounce around like a jumping jack with little to no warning.

Needless to say I'm feeling somewhat sleep deprived. And I've got a ways to go yet; it's another seven and a half hours to London. But I've also learned that they do look after you on international flights - on Emirates anyway; I haven't actually flown outside of Australia with anyone else) - the food is good and the entertainment options more than generous, i.e. dozens of recent movies (including Snowpiercer, which hasn't even been on the big screen most places) as well as classics, all kinds of different tv shows, and a ridiculous amount of music encompassing a staggering number of genres. So far I've listened to the new Elbow album, Simon's & Garfunkel's Bridge over Troubled Water and the 1997 Broadway cast recording of Chicago¹.

I'm not usually that enthusiastic about watching movies on small screens with the sound through headphones³, but I had to distract myself somehow, so I ended up picking the film adaptation of Need for Speed, which I knew precious little about beyond starring Aaron Paul (of Breaking Bad fame), having little to no plot (being based on a car racing game; quelle surprise) and including some very expensive cars. Oh, and I knew it didn't do very well at the box office. So, it seemed like a good choice under the circumstances: something I probably wasn't going to watch anywhere else, but would not be so awful as to be incapable of entertaining me. As such, it was much as I expected. The script was terrible, the performances shallow (almost certainly down to direction, or lack thereof) and the concept itself almost painfully inane - but it had some very nice cars doing ridiculous things, and all down with only a bare minimum of CGI. And it distracted me effectively.

Dubai airport is huge - and, since I'm sticking with Emirates for the next leg, I've only seen one of the terminals. There's a more diverse range of people here than anywhere I've been before - whether or not it will hold that record will remain to be seen - and it's actually very hard not to stop and stare at a lot of the clothing, or turn around when hearing someone speak in a language I'm completely unfamiliar with,

Anytime to think about finding my way to the gate where I'll board the truly enormous A380 which will carry me on to the next destination.

¹Which reminded me how much I like that show, how awesome it was when it was done a few years back as the 24-hour show², and how annoyed I am that it doesn't get done more often. This is mostly because of weird rights demands. Fingers crossed one day they'll become more sensible about that and someone here can put it on. I'd like to be in it, of course.
²Where a bunch of people get together and, in 24 hours, cast and mount a full production of a show. It is as insane as it sounds, but an amazing challenge and a whole bunch of fun.  
³Yeah, I'm a pedant that way. I go to the movies a lot, and have a reasonable home theatre set up.