Slept a little better but not enough… I think it’s the pillows… or perhaps it’s
the excitement of another long layover in Barcelona on my way home…. but no
matter, I just went through my routine and finished packing my bag.
In this hotel they have a rather nice feature
that makes the free internet connection only available from the hotel lobby so I
went down to catch up on my e-mail and have some breakfast (I treated myself to
a couple of extra peas this morning).
Pavel was driving me to the airport and he is
one of the 10-15% of the population of Latvia that lives above the breadline and
he picked me up at noon in his nice shiny new Range Rover. I mention this
only because it is so shocking to realise that so many people live in such
poverty and the only alternative they have is massive debt which even led to
their president asking them all recently to stop spending money so he could
control their over-heated economy!
But someone had said to me yesterday that the
people didn’t look happy here and as Pavel and I took a detour so I could see
(in passing) some of Riga’s tourist attractions (the old town, St. Peter’s
Basilica etc.) what I actually saw was just how little most of the people had.
And it made me thankful again for what I do have and for how I live.
Now I am in in seat 4A, dangerously close to
a woman who must have sampled every product in the perfume section of Duty Free,
napping on and off and looking forward to getting to Barcelona so I can catch up
on qualifying for the Canadian GP!!!!
Then it’s just a hop and a skip to
Alicante….. and my real life!
God bless,
Ken
<><
