Caged in the Virgin Express 31.5.06

This blog is in the margin of e-urban. And it deals with marginal events. Europe-wide urban professionalisation entails so many marginal events that it seems hopeless to summarise them all. I am concentrating on travelling, the endless travelling, that we do. Travelling makes us meet ourselves. At conferences, workshops, meetings, excursions. But also in lonely and tired hotel rooms, at gas stations and on airports.

Within a few hours, I will board a Virgin Express plane from Brussels to Barcelona. For a net return-price of € 99,- (all included, some 200,-) we are invited to squeeze our material body between our own seat and the one before us. Like the Eurolines Bus that I took to Budapest, it supposes passengers with exceptionally short legs. For an extra € 18,-, one can buy some more room. No food or drinks are served on board. Plenty time to meet oneself in a caged position.

I think, I will not be able to forget the Caged Virgin, book by Ayaan Hirsi Ali, caged as I will be in the Virgin Express.

Update on 02-06-2006 by Huib

To be honest to Virgin Express: No, there were drinks, served with a gentle smile, no too expensive either (the coffee). And, as I had no people seated next to me, there was even space for the legs. This mall progress of civilisation is perhaps due to the fact that Virgin Express is now a company owned by SN Brussels Airlines: A.k.a: the former Belgian flag carrier Sabena, which was so shamefully parasited upon by SwissAir. Which, in its turn, fell under mismanagement charges afterwards.

More read about the Caged Virgin: My At Home in Europe and A Legal Alien in New York blogs.

If you read Dutch, even more on: De Lage Landen