Having been dropped by Sharon at the Gautrain I made my way down the escalator and having not used my Gautrain Gold card in a while, I figured I'd better recharge it at the self service machines. Initially the machine refused to read my card, but after numerous attempts it informed me that I had R100 left. So a recharge was indeed called for. But search as I may, I could find no option for this on the screen. So eventually I resigned myself to now join the not inconsiderable line to speak to a human operator. After a lengthy wait for the single operator on duty at Sandton station (really, one kiosk for what is arguably the busiest station?) I was informed that my card was deactivated and hence the R100 credit was lost, and that if I'd like to travel, I'd have to buy a new card for R13 with the appropriate travel credit loaded. Upon inquiring why I could not simply load the travel credit on to my old card, I was confronted with a blank stare.
Eventually getting to ORT, I bored my Etihad flight to Abu Dhabi, which proved to be a pleasant enough experience. Reasonable food, alcohol with dinner (surprise, surprise) and a good entertainment system.
However, Abu Dhabi airport proved to be quite similar to the old Cairo airport. Enough said. They are however building extensively, on what appears to be new terminal buildings, so in the future one expects this to improve.
After Abu Dhabi it was onto an Alitalia flight heading to Milan, which proved to be a decline in onboard service, after the bar that had been set by Etihad.
Arriving late in Milan, we finally disembarked to glorious blue skies, fluffy white clouds and 29deg.
As I had been to Milan before and seen the sights, my only objectives was to get a local SIM card. So a walk to the main train station was undertaken and the local cell operator shop found. However, all of this proved to be for nought, as they had run out of SIM cards and the delivery guy had not showed, even though he was supposed to have come two days ago. Sounds like Africa. Not surprising that Greece is in the state it's in, if this is the work ethic of the southern European countries!?!
By now sleep deprivation had set in, so the wisest course of action was to get a good nights sleep. Which was partially achieved until the rubbish collection guy decided that four o'clock was a good time to do his rounds.
From the photo one can see that the rubbish collection guy did his best, but it's a pity they can't do anything about the graffiti.
No comments:
Post a Comment