Int'l Travel Update: Summer 2024
Notes on travelling from Norway to Austria, Switzerland, and Italy
Dear readers,
I apologise for the radio silence—nothing ‘bad’ has happened, and the week-long hiatus was due to a combination of private and work-related travel.
Right now, I’m at the airport in Florence, Italy, and I shall briefly sketch my week in terms of the title of this posting.
On Monday, I brought my daughters to their grandparents in Vienna, Austria. They’ll stay there for the summer, and while I spent some 24 hours in my hometown (?), much has changed.
The travel—we flew in via Copenhagen, Denmark—was unspectacular, if highly ‘interesting’: no mandates any more, but you’d still see a handful of travellers wearing FFP2/N95 masks. Then there’s the issue of seemingly all flights being extra-crowded, or perhaps that’s what they tell people anyways.
Be that as it may, once one ventures beyond the newly ‘re-furbished’ areas of Vienna, the place is rapidly looking bad. Those newly ‘re-furbished’ areas are, of course, in line with the ‘15-minute city’ idea, which means few parking spots, many trees (which is good), and all these trappings. The only new small businesses appear to be run by recent immigrants, they all sell essentially junk, and there’s apparently no new crafts/professions (as in: individually-owned/operated) opening up. Very soon, apart from large chains, cities will return to being non-production places once more.
To illustrate the madness, I’m attaching a picture I took of the ‘skies’ above Vienna on Tuesday.
I then travelled, by overnight train, to Zurich, Switzerland, for the first part of my professional, or work-related, trip. All went well, and it was kinda nice to be back for a day: I met many old friends and then moved on to Prato, Italy, for an academic conference.
The more the entire WHO-declared, so-called ‘Pandemic™’ recedes in time, the less compelling these meetings are. You see, everyone complains about the mandates and everything else, but eventually these chats reach the point where people shrug and say, ‘well, what can you do’.
As I type this waiting for my return flight, via Amsterdam, I’m pondering the consequences. Copenhagen and Florence airports are renovating/expanding, most people are glued to their devices, and our brave new cashless world is arriving soon.
It’s all so odd, esp. as my card didn’t work in Switzerland and here at the airport. Since it’s impossible to pay cash, what can I do? It’s all super-odd.
Oh, lest I forgot, two nights ago, I was chatting about all of these things with an elderly colleague from the UK, and after a few minutes he quipped:
Oh, it’s all so depressing, isn’t it?!
We soon switched topics to something essentially meaningless.
And thus passes what once used to a nice, even if not perfect, civilisation: we’re going rapidly into that night, and who knows what nightmares are awaiting us we’ve yet to ponder.
"Oh, it’s all so depressing, isn’t it?!"
For an englishman, especially an elderly one, that is a rather strong emotional outburst, if I remember my cultural studies.
On a positive note, James O'Keefe among others are exposing Disney's racist hiring/promotion/casting parctices, something which is SOP all over corporate USAmerica.
And illegal. Very illegal. Do not be surprised if the combination of incoming class action suits, dropping viewership, dropping revenue, lowered quality (Boeing, f.e. since you're flying, is leading the way in showing what DEIESG-hiring leads to) and so on is what causes a real course-change, first in the US and then over here.
Corporations will lick whatever dictator and -ism that lets them profit, but one that causes losses and turns customers off (permanently in many cases)? No chance. No matter the incumbent in the White House either.
Presumably, it would be possible for nationalist parties/movements in Europe to cause a similar effect here.
Depressing indeed, but in Spain and most places in the UK they still prefer cash.We keep getting scary suggestions thrown at us by mainstream media, alternative media and the crazy WEF but I think a lot of people are just ignoring all this stuff nowadays...Is it slowly just creeping in, under our noses, or are people, in reality, just saying NO with their actions....?