I won a pair of round-trip tickets on Qatar Airways at a silent auction benefiting Citizen Schools. (This item also included 2 nights stay at a 5-star hotel in Chennai, but that's not really relevant to this trip.) The details said that this was redeemable for any destination Qatar Airways flew, excepting Australia and a few other fine details. The origin was limited to a small handful of US airports, including JFK and ORD, but excluding BOS. This cost $1200.
My husband worked with a Qatar Airways rep to redeem this certificate for actual plane tickets to the Maldives. The process itself was simple enough: a few emails were exchanged, and boom, done. Unfortunately, the certificate only covered the fares for the flights, not the taxes. It was here that I finally understood why my colleagues despise the YQ/YR surcharge. For 2 travelers, the taxes and fees added up to another $1000.
Notice, now, that we have to somehow get from BOS to JFK. Thanks to Google Flights, we were able to find some reasonably timed flights on Delta Airlines that didn't involve sitting around in the airport twiddling our thumbs for too long. We waited a bit too long to book this part of our travel, so we were out yet another $1000.
For those of you following along at home, our round-trip from BOS to MLE totaled roughly $3200.
Delta's flight from BOS to JFK was straightforward enough. The $25 fee for the first piece of checked luggage was annoying, but that's the way the airline industry has gone, so meh. Getting from the domestic terminal to the international terminal at JFK was pretty straightforward too. We had a bit of a wait to board the plane for our next leg, but with Kindles, it passed reasonably quickly.
JFK to DOH (Doha International Airport, Doha, Qatar) was a rather long flight. The listed duration on our tickets is 12 hours and 20 minutes. I successfully slept for 9 of the 12 hours, so it didn't seem too long. I'm pretty sure I missed a few meals or snacks, but that didn't particularly bother me.
With a roughly 6 hour layover in DOH, my husband and I grabbed a meal at a decent Italian restaurant, wandered around the terminal, took a bunch of photos of the Bear Lamp and the animatronic dinosaur, and drank a huge quantity of Moroccan mint tea at a tea and sweets cafe. I regretted the mint tea on the flight afterward, where the caffeine disrupted my sleep, and the liquid surged sickeningly in my stomach before demanding, urgently and repeatedly, to be purged.
For our final leg, we were pleasantly surprised to have been upgraded to business class. It was pretty damn swank. We had enormous couch-like seats that reclined to more or less horizontal. The dinner menu looked delicious, and was complimentary, so we stuffed ourselves some more. There was also complimentary wine. I found myself growing more and more uncomfortable as the flight progressed. Near as I could figure, the slight angle of the seats off the direction of travel (they were pointed a bit away from the center aisle) made me extremely motion sick. Those 5 hours were some of the most luxurious yet sickening flying hours I'd ever spent.
Finally, we arrived at MLE, Male's Ibrahim Nasir International Airport. I was ready to collapse or vomit. It was shockingly hot and humid after the frigid air conditioning of basically everything leading up to arrival. We weren't given a moment to rest, however, as we were almost immediately greeted by our fishing guide.
Getting to MLE took a total of 28 hours, including the taxi from our house.
Stay tuned for more adventures!
2014-10-27
Honestly Maldives, Part 1: Summary
My husband and I decided to visit the Maldives. Looking on Google Image Search, I found photos of beautiful beaches, small islands, clear waters, and adorable little cabanas built right on top of the water. I was excited.
Getting there was an endeavor. We flew Qatar Airlines, with a several-hour-long layover in Doha, Qatar. We spent the time pleasantly, dining and sipping tea. To our surprise, we were upgraded to business class on our final leg to Male's Ibrahim Nasir International Airport (MLE). It was pretty posh.
Arriving, we were greeted by Mr. Latheef, with whom we reserved a 4-day all-inclusive fishing adventure. He led us to the domestic "terminal" at MLE, and flew with us to Maamigili's tiny airport. Then, we took a boat to Nilandhoo, on the Faafu atoll.
The fishing was tough for me. My husband enjoyed himself, but I was pretty seasick. It was hot and sunny, and there wasn't a whole lot to do, especially in the mornings when we were mostly trolling. In the afternoons, we fished for our meals, and that was more fun. The bottom-fishing was also much easier than casting, which was very tiring.
After our fishing adventure, we went to Mathiveri on the Ari atoll. We stayed for over a week at the Mathiveri Inn. It's located immediately next to the mosque, so we were blasted with prayers via loudspeakers 5 times a day, every day. The food was not as good as at the guesthouse on Nilandhoo, and the service was laughable at best. Toward the end of our trip, we got sick of it, and moved over to Casa Mia, a resort located on the same island.
The snorkeling was lovely. There are reefs basically everywhere, and we were able to see many colorful fish, and beautiful, intricate corals. One of the days, we went on a manta expedition. The first place we went to, there was a single manta, and about 20 visitors in their bright orange life jackets and snorkels, chasing the poor manta. We moved on to a second location, where we found another single manta in the distance, but didn't get a chance to get close. We eventually gave up looking for manta, and just went to a nearby reef for snorkeling. It was gorgeous. My husband saw a sea turtle (alas, I did not).
We took a beginner scuba diving class at Casa Mia. The dive instructor took us out into the shallows by the harbor, teaching us some basics like how to recover the breathing thing, and how to clear our masks. Then we went deeper into the harbor and dove to about 10 meters. I was terrified, and spent a good 10 minutes worrying about my equipment and being completely overwhelmed by nerves. After a while, I managed to loosen up and actually look around. Turns out, it's quite beautiful down there. I did clutch my instructor's arm the entirety of the dive, but I succeeded in not flipping the hell out, and even had a reasonably good time. My husband took to it like a fish to water, that brat.
On the way back to Male, we took a sea plane. It was pretty amazing. The entire travel back from Mathiveri to home took about 39 hours, which was a different kind of amazing. Stumbling home, we crashed at 8:30pm and slept for 11 hours. Melatonin is wonderful.
Getting there was an endeavor. We flew Qatar Airlines, with a several-hour-long layover in Doha, Qatar. We spent the time pleasantly, dining and sipping tea. To our surprise, we were upgraded to business class on our final leg to Male's Ibrahim Nasir International Airport (MLE). It was pretty posh.
Arriving, we were greeted by Mr. Latheef, with whom we reserved a 4-day all-inclusive fishing adventure. He led us to the domestic "terminal" at MLE, and flew with us to Maamigili's tiny airport. Then, we took a boat to Nilandhoo, on the Faafu atoll.
The fishing was tough for me. My husband enjoyed himself, but I was pretty seasick. It was hot and sunny, and there wasn't a whole lot to do, especially in the mornings when we were mostly trolling. In the afternoons, we fished for our meals, and that was more fun. The bottom-fishing was also much easier than casting, which was very tiring.
After our fishing adventure, we went to Mathiveri on the Ari atoll. We stayed for over a week at the Mathiveri Inn. It's located immediately next to the mosque, so we were blasted with prayers via loudspeakers 5 times a day, every day. The food was not as good as at the guesthouse on Nilandhoo, and the service was laughable at best. Toward the end of our trip, we got sick of it, and moved over to Casa Mia, a resort located on the same island.
The snorkeling was lovely. There are reefs basically everywhere, and we were able to see many colorful fish, and beautiful, intricate corals. One of the days, we went on a manta expedition. The first place we went to, there was a single manta, and about 20 visitors in their bright orange life jackets and snorkels, chasing the poor manta. We moved on to a second location, where we found another single manta in the distance, but didn't get a chance to get close. We eventually gave up looking for manta, and just went to a nearby reef for snorkeling. It was gorgeous. My husband saw a sea turtle (alas, I did not).
We took a beginner scuba diving class at Casa Mia. The dive instructor took us out into the shallows by the harbor, teaching us some basics like how to recover the breathing thing, and how to clear our masks. Then we went deeper into the harbor and dove to about 10 meters. I was terrified, and spent a good 10 minutes worrying about my equipment and being completely overwhelmed by nerves. After a while, I managed to loosen up and actually look around. Turns out, it's quite beautiful down there. I did clutch my instructor's arm the entirety of the dive, but I succeeded in not flipping the hell out, and even had a reasonably good time. My husband took to it like a fish to water, that brat.
On the way back to Male, we took a sea plane. It was pretty amazing. The entire travel back from Mathiveri to home took about 39 hours, which was a different kind of amazing. Stumbling home, we crashed at 8:30pm and slept for 11 hours. Melatonin is wonderful.
2012-06-18
Cat-astrophe
My cat got sick. At first, he was reluctant to eat. A week later, it progressed to vomiting. I caught him in the act after cleaning up two previous vomit piles, and later that day that he was very reluctant to socialize. He is a snuggler and a food vacuum, so this was very worrisome for me. A friend convinced me to take him to an animal ER immediately, so off we went.
After taking his vitals, drawing a blood sample, and doing an x-ray, I decided to take him home. Poor Tig was freaking out a little, shedding all over the exam room and jumping every time someone touched him unexpectedly. He was more energetic than I'd seen him in days though, so it seemed like he might have been improving. I had instructions to withhold food and water overnight, and isolate him from the other cats.
In the morning, I checked to make sure he hadn't vomited overnight. Since he had been okay, I followed the instructions to feed him a little bit of bland food. He licked the serving spoon, and might have eaten some from the bowl, but in the time it took me to cap the remainder in the can and come back, he had already started to vomit again. So I took him back to the ER.
The out-patient care already failed once, so I let them board him for up to two days. They monitored him, trying to feed him sporadically, but he refused all food. He had no bowel movements, either the night before or the night at the hospital, but since he hadn't eaten anything in at least that long, the doctor was not too concerned. He was peeing normally, since he had been hooked up to IV fluids. This morning, they did an ultrasound of his abdominal region, verifying that there were no obstructions in his gut. The blood work from Saturday also came back fine, ruling out serious kidney and liver diseases.
He's being treated for inflammation of the pancreas currently, as the remaining most likely candidate that's making him sick like this. There's another blood work out to verify if it is pancreatitis. There's not much they can do for him if it really is pancreatitis, only supporting him through the illness with medication to stimulate his appetite, relieve nausea, and promote healthy bowel movements.
I hope my poor kitty gets better and can come home soon.
2012-03-06
Park Place
We decided on a name for our house. It is still in renovation. We're still crammed into four little rooms on the first floor, but we have storage now in the barn and in the basement, so we've gotten ourselves settled a little more comfortably. I'm looking forward to the end of spring, when we'll hopefully have the second floor finished. Fingers crossed. :)
2011-08-31
Moving, but not grooving
We moved to our new house over the weekend. Everything is crammed haphazardly into the four rooms on the first floor. The hurricane meant we didn't want to risk storing things in the barn, lest they become soaked and damaged. The basement floor was not poured yet either so that storage was also off-limits.
Life is going to be exciting for a while, until we figure out where everything goes. In the meantime, the cats are getting into everything. They seem fairly excited by this, if their energetic little romp at 3am was any indication. I'm hoping we get everything sorted out soon, so that I can go back to getting real sleep, instead of having to wrestle with cats on the bed all night long.
2011-07-18
Mercy
I saw a sad thing today. In front of the tire of a parked car, a sparrow was lying on its back, fluttering its wings and kicking its feet. Though it struggled mightily, it was unable to right itself. I noticed that its head seemed to be stuck twisted around to one side, and its tail was mangled at the base.
J tried to flip it over onto its feet, hoping that this would give it a sporting chance at survival, but it was unable to retain its balance. Each time he tried, it toppled immediately onto its back again. J stepped on its head and ended its pain. I watched through its spastic final burst of motion, watched as the blood oozed and bubbled from its head, and stayed with it until it lay still.
May you find safer travels in the next life, little sparrow.
2011-07-05
TEDxBoston and Adventures
TedxBoston happened recently. I missed the first session, sat in for the live simulcast for the second, and streamed it from my laptop for the third. There were some really interesting and exciting talks... and some not so thrilling talks... but all in all, I'm really glad I participated.
Prior to the talk, my husband and I went on the Coral Reef Adventure at the New England Aquarium. It was a walking tour of the Aquarium's corals, and the guide told us about how to distinguish live coral from dead (it's harder than it sounds), the types of coral, and everything about corals that an untrained layperson could possibly want to know.
Prior to the talk, my husband and I went on the Coral Reef Adventure at the New England Aquarium. It was a walking tour of the Aquarium's corals, and the guide told us about how to distinguish live coral from dead (it's harder than it sounds), the types of coral, and everything about corals that an untrained layperson could possibly want to know.
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