Alon's Blog

I’m flying transatlantic again, this time direct from San Francisco to Amsterdam and then to Tel Aviv (after a 12 hour layover). I’m sorry about the lack of updates, there was quite a lot going on, but I just didn’t have the stamina to post.

So, today I’m flying to Israel to visit family and friends. I’m bringing two suitcases, one huge and one small. The huge suitcase is full of boardgames, while the other includes some clothes. I’m also carrying a backpack full of electronic equipment (laptop, hard drive, two phones, three iPods, etc.).

On the Internet, I was assigned a really bad seat on the back of the plane, but I could change it to an aisle seat somewhere in the middle of the plane. However, at the airport I asked the check-in agent for a better seat (given my Platinum status) and was reassigned to seat 11B. Though not as good as my favorite 11E seat, it’s not that bad. It’s a center seat in the smaller front cabin.

A few days ago I have landed back in the US after a 10-day visit to Israel. It was really strange to be flying “back” but away from my friends and family and the home I’ve lived in since I was a child. Because both places are “home” to me, but it doesn’t feel like I’m going “back”, no matter what the immigration officer said.

When I arrived in Israel two weeks ago, I immediately felt at home, even though I haven’t been there for half a year. My house, my room, all stayed the same as if I have never left. I was surprised how quickly I have adjusted to the 10-hour jet lag and to being at home. The first weekend was spent mostly playing my suitcase-full of board games. The weekdays were mostly spent at the Technion, meeting old friends and research colleagues, though I didn’t do any new research. In the second Friday, we hosted a mini boardgame party in our house, and the next day I went to my brother’s house in the center.

In between all that, I managed to review 12 papers, do some family tech support, and realize that my backup HD is officially dead (I’ve placed an order for a new one).

Some information about my flights: On the EWR-TLV (Newark – Tel Aviv) leg, I was in a fully booked brand new 777-200, with personal touch-screens and on-demand video, much better than the channel-based entertainment personal system on the 767. Therefore, I was surprised to see that channel-based system on the 777-200 on the way back. Luckily, I had an encapsulated entertainment system called “a book”, that’s even allowed during takeoff and landing. The next leg (EWR-SFO) was on a brand new 737-800. The plane was so new that they didn’t install the entertainment system yet — not even audio or public TVs. On the plus side, the plane was almost empty and I took over a whole row in the back of the plane, and lied does while using my paper-based entertainment system.

Now I’m back at Stanford, trying to do some new research.