I apologize for the underlying anger in this and
the end of the last post. I was not happy to have my vacation disturbed and my
schedule so hectically reconfigured. But, this is a possibility with my job,
and I must get used to it and always be ready for it. Hopefully I won’t have
such short notice in the future, but one never knows…
I got to Incheon Airport with not as much time to spare as
I thought I would have. I had shopped around, trying to buy a few things I would
need if I was screwed over in Krasnoyarsk, and by the time I was in the
check-in line, I was one of the last people. Once again, I was cutting things close,
but the friendly Koreans made sure I wouldn’t be late. I did get screwed over
by the Aeroflot website, whose seat assignment diagram for my flight had the
wrong type of aircraft. I picked 12F, which, on this diagram of a narrow-body,
was a roomy exit-row. But then, when I boarded the flight, it was an Airbus
wide-body, and 12F put me in the middle of the middle sections of seats. And
this for a 9-hour flight, when I had my chance to pick! Oy vey!
The plane took awhile to board, and for a long
time, right up until they almost closed the doors, it looked like I would have
an empty seat next me. But no, it was just a straggler. There were no empty seats
on this flight. It seemed that there were a lot of French people on this
flight, and sure enough, a lot of them were connecting on the same Air France
flight to Paris in Moscow. I stayed in my seat and managed to watch five movies
during the flight, unable to sleep. I figured I’d sleep on the red-eye to
Krasnoyarsk and then I would have plenty of time on the 20 hour train. I had
booked a sleeper cabin.
After we landed in Moscow, I headed to passport
control, and for the first time, I had to wait in a line at the non-Russian
passport lanes. And they were all moving ridiculously slowly. Apparently this is
what happens when you fly here from Asia. Flying from the other direction only
gets a flight full of Russians. Each person was taking up to 5 minutes to go
through. I hoped that wouldn’t be the case for me, with my multiple entry visa
and my work permit proving I’ve been around here a bit. Sure enough, when I finally
got to the counter, I went through in under a minute. I wish there was a
separate line there for multiple-entry labor visa holders. But that’s probably
too much to ask. There was a separate line for Business Class passengers,
prompting me to wish I had asked for an upgrade to business class and tried to
redeem Delta miles for it.
I retrieved my bag and went to check in for the
next flight. I asked the lady at the counter if there were any openings in
Business Class (I really want that upgrade), and she promptly told me no, like
she knew for this particular flight that there weren’t any without even having
to check. How rude! It turns out half of Business Class would be empty on this
flight. Where’s my Gold Medallion status when I need it???!!
Just because my bad luck had still not run out,
the flight was delayed for an hour. This would guarantee that I wouldn’t have
time to get my stuff in Krasnoyarsk. I was livid. I tried to sleep on the
flight, but it was difficult. I arrived back in Krasnoyarsk and made a beeline
to a taxi driver. To the train station we went. I arrived there with plenty of
time to at least get my boarding pass for the train and get all settled
properly, and I knew that, had my flight actually been on time, I would have
had time to get all my stuff…
When I opened my door to my cabin, there was a
family with a little girl sleeping in there. Oh shit, I didn’t want to disturb
them. I tried to be quiet and hopped up onto the top bunk that I had booked for
myself. That’s when I finally got to sleep. And sleep I did.
The family with the little girl left soon after
and was replaced by a father and son. Hours later, they left, and a man named
Victor, who worked for the railway company, took their place. By this time it
was the late evening. Victor really wanted to talk to someone, so he invited me
to share some beers with him, I begrudgingly accepted, despite my still-bad
mood. We worked through our language barrier and were able to learn a lot about
each other. Then, I insisted to him that I should sleep, and he decided he should sleep too. I heard him talking on his phone later to his sister and he
mentioned excitedly how he had met Kyle from America. At least I know when I’m
in a bad mood I can still make a positive impression.
When we finally got to Ust-Kut, I was supposed to
meet up with another employee at the station, and we would go to the field
together. From the station, we went to the Ust-Kut Hotel, where he said we
would stay for a few hours. I thought this meant we would get a room for a few
hours and get some real rest, but no, we just waited outside the hotel for our
ride. Despite it being mid-July and not being all that far north compared to
what I’m used to, it was a bit nippy this morning. I had not packed any warm
clothes for my trip to Asia, and thus had nothing warm with me. I figured I’d last
until the end of August without the need of warm clothing… except for this
morning. Eventually a lady arrived in a Toyota Prado and took us to the company’s
base, which is in the city, a difference from Vankor, where the base is in the
middle of the oilfield. A lot less convenient. At the base, they gave me new
PPE, because my normal PPE from Vankor could not get to Krasnoyarsk in time for
me to retrieve it. It was nice to have fresh new stuff, but I’m not sure what I’ll
do at the end of this shift, when I can get my old PPE back in Krasnoyarsk.
We got back in the Prado to drive to the village
of Markovye, from which we would take a helicopter to the field. It turned out
to be a 3 hour drive from Ust-Kut on a wild and bumpy dirt road to get to
Markovye. Why they wouldn’t just have the helicopters from Ust-Kut to the field
and circumvent the driving process was bewildering to me. I’ve never had such
an intense drive in my life. The lady didn’t slow down whenever hitting crazy
potholes or dips in the road. My body hadn’t felt good for the past couple days
and now she was jarring it around like crazy. The area was actually quite
scenic, though. We were in the middle of a dense forest with low mountains on
either side. Not unlike many drives I’ve taken in Idaho, except for a much
wilder road (and Idaho has bigger mountains). This drive proved the Devil
does indeed drive a Prado. We reached Markovye, and it turned out we once again
would have to wait multiple hours for other rig crew members to arrive at the “heliport”
for us to go. It’s always a diverse and rag-tag-looking bunch that shows up to
go to the rigs, and this one, because it was for such a remote location, was
even more so.
After an hour on the helicopter, we reached
Dulisma Field, and then we had to hop in the standard big-wheeled Kamaz bus to the
individual rigs. Of course, once I got on the bus, there were no seats left, so I
had to stand in the back, and this was not the kind of ride you want to stand
on. I was thrown way off balance several times and luckily the walls and
luggage where there to break my fall…
I reached my rig, and I got off alone, the other employee
having gone to a different rig. I said smell ya later. Looked at my kingdom, I
was finally there…. I wait, this isn’t Bel-Air. 50 hours of travel later, I am
in Dulisma. Oy!
Again, sorry I’m so angry. 2 weeks after the fact, I’m
doing much better. And now that I’ve finally finished my vacation documentation, the blog
will probably be on hiatus for the next month. But if you feel so inclined,
please do check back every now and then. You might be surprised….
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