Trip to Chicago

After working for the office for 10 years, I was finally sent on a paid trip to attend a out-of-state conference. I left New York on Sunday morning to spend an overnight in Chicago. Other attendees who could afford spending more time in Chicago actually arrived either on Friday night or Saturday. I was on a tight budget, both financially and time wise, and therefore chose to arrive in Chicago on Sunday afternoon.

I haven't travelled much since my trip to England and Belgium last year. If my memory serves me well, services from that other airline was quite well. So, it was a bit disappointing to find that agents from this airline were rather discourteous. One agent at the counter did not even give me a greeting and, when I presented my eticket, asked harshly and with an accusatory tone why I did not use the self-service kiosk. Aren't agents supposed to be there to help? If we passengers all use the kiosk and be able to handle everything ourselves, wouldn't they be out of their jobs? Perhaps I was wrong and that there were a lot of airline agent openings waiting to be filled? Not!

Well, I didn't care much for the agents and their attitudes. I told myself that I would not need to deal with them again, probably ever, in my life after this. So, I got on with my life.

The airline workers may be somewhat unprofessional, but at least the flight was on time.




A bird's eye's view.




That's if the bird can fly at 30,000 feet.





Flying over Lake Michigan?

Another bird's eye view.

Before I left New York, I downloaded the map of Chicago and its subway plan from the Internet. I was planning to take the Blue Line from O'Hara International Airport to Jackson and then switch to the Red Line and get off at State and Grand to walk about two blocks to the hotel. It would be a rather inexpensive way to travel. But as the miltary saying goes, even the best laid plan would not survive the first shot. So, somewhere along the Blue Line, the public announcement system informed us that due to subway construction, the Blue Line will terminate in the middle of a "no man's land" and we were instructed to get off the train and out of the subway system to a shuttle bus. Terrific! One would have thought that the shuttle bus would run all the way to the end of the route, right? No, the shuttle bus would only take us over a few subway stop. At another "no man's land," we were told that we needed to get off the bus and back onto the subway system. I finally got to Jackson but was informed by another announcement that the Red Line train would not stop at State and Grand due to construction. I went over to a conductor in a glass booth and asked how I could get to State and Grand and was informed that I would need to get off the subway there and walk a block over to Dearborn Street to take a number 22 bus. Like a good trooper, I followed the instructions only to find myself waiting for over 15 minutes for the number 22 bus. That was the last straw, I checked my Chicago map and asked a couple also waiting of the bus if State and Grand was far away. I was told that the intersection was about 8 blocks up north. Eight blocks is nothing to a city dweller like me. Since the weather was very pleasant, I decided to hike up the eight blocks.

That part of the city was strangely quite on this late Sunday afternoon. The sky was clear and blue, and the temp. was not too high. It was a nice enough to hike and the view of the river and the buildings around was beautiful.

Compare to NYC, Chicago or at least the part of town that I was at, was much cleaner.

Chicago has some very interesting architecture and I really wish that I could stay a bit longer and have a more extensive tour of the city.

Like many modern international cities, culture is an important part of Chciago. I wish I had time to visit the museums.

A room with a view. View from hotel room: Sunset over Chicago.

Rise and shine: view from hotel room on the next morning at 7 AM. Time to check out and head to the conference.

Late evening, after the conference: Goodbye Chicago.