The alarm goes off an 5:00 am. It is dark. It is still night. Because we showered and packed the night before, we have very little left to do. The hotel had pre-arranged the taxi to the airport. The cost - 250 pesos. We meet the taxi at the hotel entrance at 5:30 am. It takes about a half hour to 40 minutes to reach the airport. The taxi flies. There is no traffic. It is still dark when we arrive at the airport.
Departures are handled on the second floor. We proceed quickly through the short line to check-in. The restaurant/cafe is open. There are few small souvenir shops also open. But about half are still closed. There is no duty-free in this airport. There appears to be no cambio - money exchange. So we buy a couple of packages of organic coffee and a small jaguar mask to use up the last of our pesos. We are short one peso. Just one. The shopkeeper lets it pass.
The plane - to our astonishment - is going to be taking off early. They are rushing to get us through security. We take off ten minutes early.
Naturally, we arrive early to Houston. No lines at customs. We have nearly three hours to wait for our flight to LaGuardia. There is an earlier flight but I had thought there may not be enough time for the connection. We eat some breakfast and then wait.
Our flight to LaGuardia arrives on-time. But my bag is not on the baggage carousel. Only Ross's. The baggage claim area at LaGuardia is only a few feet from the entrance to the building. There is no one checking the baggage tickets to make sure passengers are taking the right bags. Anyone could walk off with a bag and be out the door in seconds. It is alarming but it is common at all three NYC airports: No one checks the baggage claim tickets.
We go to the United baggage claim office. They say my bag is here but arrived on the earlier flight. It is at the carousel at the other end of the terminal. We run over to the other baggage area. My bag is there along with several unclaimed bags. No one is guarding them. I take mine.
We run out to catch the bus to Grand Central. It is $12 one way per person. We wait only about 10 minutes before the bus arrives. And we arrive at Grand Central only 15 minutes later. No traffic; no hassles.
We have missed the Metro North train by only a few minutes. The next train departs in about 45 minutes. We have enough time to grab something to eat in the food court on the lower level. By about 7:00 pm on a Sunday night, many of the concession stands are already cleaning up and ready to close. We find some sandwiches to eat and settle down to eat.
As I sit there, I am aware of how dirty the floors, how unclean the tables are and how many homeless persons seem to have claimed their spot for the evening in the food court area. This was startling contrast to the regions we had just visited in Mexico: the public areas were spotless. Most Americans would have a hard time wrapping their heads around this observation. They believe the opposite - that any place in the U.S. is cleaner than any place in Mexico. How untrue.
The floors were gleaming at the bus stations and airports in Mexico; the sidewalks were always being washed down by the shop owners or residents; large bottles of hand sanitizers were prominent at the entrance to most restaurants, hotels and public restrooms.
Not here. The floors at LaGuardia wore a coat of grime, thick from years of neglect; the sidewalks of New York collected wrappers and other debris along their edges; and the bathrooms in Grand Central were a place to endure - not an example of cleanliness. Welcome home.
