What a world

Safe in Kuwait! Two long flights ... Boston to Heathrow (a chance to drink tepid tea in a smokey cafe), then Heathrow to Kuwait. On the flight from London, seats on either side held a Canadian man who had been born in Kuwait to Lebanese Christian parents, and a Palestinian woman who was married to a Kuwaiti who had been born in Basra. The Canadian was 23 and extremely idealistic, seeing justice as the route to peace in the Middle East. The Palestinian was 37 and figured fighting was the natural order of things. For her people it has been. The 14-hour flights plus three-hour layover in London bludgeon the mind into stupor.