Category: travel

Alt Hotel

I wanted to mention again how much I loved the hotel I stayed in Montreal. The room was very spacious and exceptionally well-designed, with a comfortable desk and an additional table, and just plenty of room. Also, they actually didn’t change the towels if you don’t drop them on the floor! Most hotels say they won’t, but end up changing anyway. And I loved the gym.

The only thing I didn’t like was the absence of a normal (not continental) breakfast. At the conference venue, we had fruits(yay!) and pastries, and that was it. I do not mind such breakfast occasionally, but not for the whole week. Unfortunately, although the hotel front desk could make you a cappuccino any time, day or night, or any other caffeinated drinks, the food was just yogurt, eggs, bagels, and croissants.

Exceptionally good croissants, but I wanted some real food :). The breakfast place across the street, although open at 7 AM, didn’t have the kitchen start until 9 AM, so once again – great pastries, but that’s it.

By Thursday, I was ready to walk to a place which potentially had breakfast food, about a 20-25 minute walk from the hotel, but then I remembered that the Women’s breakfast was scheduled for this morning, which I had to attend. I hoped that they would serve something else than at the conference breakfast, but alas!

I gave this hotel the 5-star review, but I was extatic to return to our office breakfasts this week!

Beautiful People

During the conference, I had a chance to catch up with some people whom I do not see very often, and I also met several new amazing people. I was really impressed with the students and recent graduates. All of them were so enthusiastic, so eager to learn new things, ready to participate in all discussions, to volunteer! Truly amazing!

These students from Kenya are so sharp! And so fun to hang out with 🙂

A picture from Women’s Breakfast

Montreal At Dusk

I didn’t see enough of Montreal, but here are some pictures taken on the way back to the hotel from one of many dinners :). I love how the city looks in the twilight.

Montreal

When I started planning my trip to Montreal, I notified my old friend from Ottawa that I would be in Canada, and she graciously suggested that she come to Montreal to see me. We used to visit each other often, but later things changed, and the last time I saw her in person was in 2016. I planned on coming a day before the start of the conference so that we could have the whole day for ourselves, but later I learned about the Postgres Extensions Day, a day before the opening, so the organizer convinced me to attend. As I mentioned yesterday, I attended for a half-day, and at about noon, my friend messaged me that she had arrived, so I left the event.

We had an amazing time catching up. Since my friend shares my thrust to culture, we could not just “walk around.” After lunch, we went to see the Notre Dame Basilica, and then Chateau Ramezay – a former governor residence, and currently a history museum.

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Pre- conference: Postgres Extensions Day

I didn’t plan to attend, but was convinced by the organizer, and didn’t regret!

First Day In Montreal

The only way to be on time with American Airlines is to take the first morning flight on Sunday! I am saying it for the second time within the past two months! Also, that was the only way to get to the airport from my house in 35 minutes!

Hotel Alt in Montreal:

The conference didn’t even start yet, and I already had so many interesting conversations, and learned about so many additional events which will happen during this week! I regret that I didn’t check all of them out earlier and didn’t sign up for some of the activities. My excuse is that the last couple of months were all bloody fights, and making sure the conference would be a great event, regardless of these fights. I hope that next year will be better, though! At least now I know what to expect and will look for the opportunities.

The Most Unusual Way To Enter The US

Everyone tells horror stories about long lines and long questioning at the border, for both visitors and US citizens, so I was ready for the worst. My flight was somehow delayed for 1 hour and 40 minutes. I am saying “somehow” because there was absolutely no reason. Boarding started on time. Since I was in Group 1, I sat down, opened a Kindle book and didn’t pay attention to anything. I heard “Boarding completed,” and this announcement was made ten minutes before scheduled departure. I am not sure what happened next, because there were no more announcements, and I was still reading a book. Then, it was “Boarding completed” again, and I looked at the screen and saw that the arrival time had been changed to an hour later than it should have been. And we didn’t gain the lost time during the flight; in fact, we were delayed for forty more minutes!

But then, when we left the aircraft, we were immediately “pre-sorted” for the citizens and visitors, but both lines were moving without stopping, and in five minutes, everyone was in the arrival hall. There were several border control officers, and one of them was outside her booth with a camera placed on a tripod. I approached, and she took my picture, and asked what I am bringing back, but it was absolutely “as usual.” Then I stepped into the booth and saw that there was no officer there. I stopped, puzzled, and another officer turned to me and told me: You can exit!

I am not sure whether my readers had a chance to register “what’s wrong with that picture,” so I am saying it explicitly: nobody looked at my passport! Yes, I get it—this passport has more electronics than my Apple Watch, and there is a passenger’s manifest on the aircraft—but still!!!

Regatta

For some magical reason, there were zero people in line at Regatta – and it was not just a weekend, it was May Day! I am just grateful for the opportunity 🙂

A Very Brief Visit to Helsinki

No, I am not flying Business Class all the time; it’s just that I had a total of 14 upgrades because of my Finnair Platinum, and I can only use them on the Finnair flights, not on the partner’s flights. And also, there are fewer and fewer direct flights from Chicago, so I am flying on the partnering airlines most of the time. For this super-short visit, I used six of these forteen upgrades to fly Business Class on the way there, and Economy Premium on the way back. One benefit of Platinum at ORD was that I could go to the LOT Business Lounge (otherwise, the Quatar Airlines Lounge is absolutely horrible).

My gate was right next to the longe, so i could see the aircraft
Business class dinner
At breakfast, I asked why they are not serving Finnish yogurts, and the flight attendant told me a horror story about how they are required to remove all the food from the aircraft when they arrive to the US< and how they have to throw away a lot of food.

As usual, I started with sleeping for ten hours straight to compensate not just for the flight (I could sleep fine, since it was all horizontal), but for the previous weeks of anxiety.

And then, there were three days of biking :). It was rather intense, because I still didn’t bike much in Chicago this spring – it was too cold. It might be not much warmer in Helsinki, but I could not say no to Boris, so I just did.

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Last Wednesday

Keeping going through the last week. I hosted two conference attendees, plus Anna for one of the nights. My first houseguest, B., was a conference speaker from Madagascar. She is an absolutely outstanding woman, and I want ot tell more about her in the near future. That was her first time coming to the US, and she had a 22-hour long journey with two connections. I told her I would meet her at ORD, because it is very difficult to navigate this airport even when you are an experienced traveler.

Her flight arrival time was 7:30 AM, and I took the L-train there, because everything runs relatively normally on a weekday morning, so it was a 4 AM wake-up, leaving the house at 5:30. The airport was as quiet as it could possibly be, and we saw each other right away. I took her to the office where we left her luggage, and then to the Architectural tour, because Wednesday was the only opportunity for her to see something!

One of the conference attendees took the same boat tour with us, and then we went to the Art Institute. I didn’t plan to be at work on that day, but one of the customers kept having issues, and I was the only person who could fix them. I asked Igor to take over my Chicago guide responsibilities, and rushed to the office to save the world. My second houseguest, L. was arriving at 4 PM, and we calculated that with the luggage and the passport control, she would be at my house by 6 PM, so I had plenty of time. But then I was stuck with saving the world, and her flight arrived earlier, and by some miracle, her luggage came out very fast as well.

With all that, she waited for us for twenty minutes! At least, the weather was warm on Wednesday, and she just sat on her luggage in the sun reading a book. Nobody wanted to go out for dinner, so I made a quick meal and went to bed.

The next day, the actual work had begun.