Half way to Hawaii

by Torben Sonntag

  Over the next hour, I inform her about the events of the last few days and our plans for next week. Although I really trust her, my gut feeling tells me to be careful. To get clarity on Christine's role in this game, I mention the name of the hotel I booked in Shanghai. If I find Andrews looking for me there tomorrow, I’ll know that Christine can’t be trusted.

  On the way back to Lahaina, I take a detour to Wailuku where I visit an Internet cafe in order to create new email addresses for Steve and me. I actually think we may be taking this hiding game a bit too far, but Steve insists.

  The next few days will show just how well informed Andrews really is.

  Chapter 8

  The next morning I, as Steve Schneider, step onto a Hawaiian Airlines jet and fly from Kahului to Honolulu. After a nineteen-minute flight, I reach the Honolulu International Airport and make my way to the international terminal.

  There, I also check in as Steve Schneider on a Korean Air flight to Seoul. The second the lady slips the passport through the digital reader, Steve Schneider has officially left the US. If Andrews actually does have access to this data, in a few minutes he’ll know exactly which airplane I’m on.

  It's amazing how easy you can travel with foreign passports. I've used my brother’s German Rail Pass and even flew with his ID; my brother has, in turn, once registered his car using my ID. We always felt safe, given we’re related. However, Steve and I are just like brothers as well.

  As long as you have a passport in hand, no one seems to care how similar the photo looks to the holder.

  The jumbo jet from Korean Air is at gate B33. I sit down at the adjacent gate B34 and observe my fellow passengers at B33.

  I purposely booked this flight through a travel agent in Paia and not on the Internet. I also deliberately paid by credit card and not cash. The Swiss told one of Andrews’ men at the beach they had not seen Steve for a few days, but met him yesterday at the travel agency, telling them he was about to leave for Shanghai.

  You can’t leave more tracks than I just did.

  Honolulu and Shanghai are not connected by a direct flight. I’ll stop over in Seoul, but you could also travel via Japan. Depending on when Andrews is able to find out what flight I’m on, one of his men will either be on my plane or somebody will be waiting for Steve in Shanghai.

  My flight is called and the passengers are politely asked to board the aircraft in the order of their seat numbers. So far, no one draws my attention. Fifteen minutes later, most of the travelers have disappeared into the gangway, and wait there a few minutes longer before finally stepping onto the plane.

  The chairs in the waiting room in gate B33 are almost all empty and the ground staff picks up the microphone for the last call for the flight to Seoul.

  I remain seated and watch. A family rushes up to the counter and searches frantically for their boarding passes. Shortly thereafter, the gentleman working for Korean Air takes the microphone and makes the second "final announcement."

  I don’t move.

  The ground staff recounts the boarding pass slips and compares the results with the passenger list. This is followed by the third "last call." Usually two to three “really last” calls would follow after this, where the names of the missing passengers are announced before the plane actually starts off without them. No need to have the name "Steve Schneider" blared throughout the airport, so I get up and go to the gate. No one is waiting in the gangway anymore and the door of the Boeing 747 gets closed right behind me.

  It makes little sense for a tracker to board a plane before his target, so I'm pretty confident no one’s following me yet. On the one hand, this calms me down; at least no one can poison me on the plane or cause me any other harm. On the other hand, all my efforts are in vain if Andrews isn’t actually trying to follow Steve.

  The plane is not fully booked and the three-seat row I’m in only has one other passenger. I can’t stretch out and sleep on the seats, but at least I have more legroom and a whole lot of space.

  The man in the aisle seat is probably an American businessman. He’s in his fifties and has combed the gray remains of his hair jauntily over his nearly bald head. I always feel sorry for businessmen traveling in economy class; their employer sends them around the world, but they aren’t important enough for business class. He probably bought his cheap-looking suit on sale at Wal-Mart, which makes his appearance even sadder. Just as sad, if he’d cut his hair short, and be traveling in jeans and a shirt, he might actually look better.

  Shortly after takeoff, a flight attendant serves us drinks. I order a white wine and my neighbor goes for a tomato juice. The pilot welcomes us aboard the Boeing 747; the flight time is ten hours and twenty minutes and we are asked to enjoy the flight.

  I decide to do just that, and recline my seat into the sleeping position, if you can call it that in economy class. Eyes already closed and a sip of cold white wine in my mouth, I enjoy the flight.

  Shortly thereafter, I’m looking for the headphones in my pack to plug into the in-flight entertainment. Every seat has its own screen and a choice of forty films, eighty TV series and at least one million video games. As I click my way through the selections, I wonder how pretty women get to where they’re going. It's amazing: I travel quite a bit, but neither on the plane nor in the train have I ever had an attractive, female seatmate. Typically it’s quite the opposite; I have to share my seat row with ugly people, their body mass often not only occupying their own, but a considerable part of mine as well. Humans I want absolutely no contact with.

  Of course, even ugly people can be interesting characters and even good conversationalists. Nevertheless, as they say, "you talk with your eyes!" Everyone (at least every man) in the world would rather be talking to a pretty woman than a fat man. Aside from that, I like to have some peace and quiet when I travel, and don’t want to waste time small talking with someone I'll probably never see again in my life.

  Unfortunately, most travelers have a different attitude on these issues and constantly try to draw me into a meaningless conversation. The most effective defenses are headphones in the ears and eyes on the screen.

  Less than ten hours later, the jumbo jet sets gently down in Seoul, without me having exchanged a single word with the cheap American businessman. Mission accomplished!

  Once off the plane, I stay in the security area of the airport. So, officially, I have not yet entered South Korea either under Steve’s or my name. In a restaurant, I eat something interesting and buy a travel guidebook for Shanghai. Since I've never been there, it’s certainly helpful to get an idea of what the city has to offer.

  An hour later, I move on to the next gate. Again, I’m the last person to get on the plane. On the aircraft, I browse through my new guidebook.

  Shanghai has nineteen million inhabitants. Wow! My hometown Kiel doesn’t even have a quarter million. I'm more of a small-town guy and like it quiet. Actually, you can’t call Kiel a small town; by definition, a city with more than one hundred thousand inhabitants in Germany is considered a major city. But Kiel is divided by a Fjord and I spend most of my time on the west bank. Everything is within walking distance of my house. Whether I want to go to the harbor, drink a beer or have dinner, I'm everywhere in less than ten minutes. Even my bike stays mostly at home, because I consider the time required for locking and unlocking it too long. I leave crowds, dirty sidewalks and crowded streets to other people.

  Hamburg is a very relaxed metropolis, which is, by definition, a city of more than a million people. I like Hamburg and am there quite often. But when I see that it takes people there a half-hour train ride to get into the city, to visit a friend, to go to work or wherever, then I must confess, my life is too valuable for such a waste of time. Suppose the average Hamburger spends an hour a day in traffic or on the train: that makes 365 hours per year. In 50 years that's 18,250 hours - almost two years!

  My grandfather is now 93 years old. Luckily he doesn’t live in any metropolis; otherwise he would have
spent four years of his life in traffic.

  Nineteen million people! This Shanghai exceeds my hometown population by eighty times and is four times as large as the entire Ruhr area. I guess it’s only fair that Asians get older than Europeans; with the space they live in, they spend way more time in traffic than we do.

  The Port of Shanghai is considered one the busiest in the world and is, depending on how you count, as big as five to ten normal port facilities. Not exactly encouraging, if you’re trying to track a particular freighter whose name and shipping company you don’t even know. Maybe it's good that I didn’t know these numbers before, otherwise I might not have come here. Given the incredible size of the city, my project is now even more hopeless than it was before. I definitely need Mark Andrews' help; if he’s not looking for Steve, I don’t know how to get ahead in Shanghai.

  Shanghai is a special economic zone, but still a part of communist China. You need a visa in China. I didn’t have enough time to apply for one for myself, but in his capacity as a pilot with Singapore Airlines, Steve’s got visas for pretty much any Asian country.

  In Hawaii, I found it almost funny to check in with Steve's passport, but now I'm nervous. I've never been to China before and don’t know how strict the immigration check will be. In case the immigration officer gets skeptical and checks me more thoroughly, he might even possibly find my real passport. If that happens, it’s certainly going to get unpleasant.

  When it’s my turn, the official looks at my face and asks for the reason for my visit to Shanghai.

  "My buddy, whose passport I’m trying to get into your country with, was kidnapped back in Hawaii and should have been be killed, possibly by arms dealers. I’m trying to set a trap for the head of this criminal operation here in this beautiful city of yours, to find out what’s really going on."

  No… I ‘m not gonna say this.

  "Vacation," I state. "I used to come here on business trips before and never had time to enjoy China. I want to take the time now to visit Shanghai in peace and take in everything the city has to offer.” It never hurts to brown-nose an immigration officer a little.

  The guy stares at me, but he’s obviously as interested in small talk as I am on an airplane. He leafs through the passport looking for a free page for his stamp. No easy task in a pilot’s passport. Flipping through the pages, he takes a look at the visa, but either a pilot gets controlled only loosely or, even in China, it’s sufficient just to have a passport, no matter whose it is.

  Relieved, I take the stamped passport and continue my way out of the airport. But my anxiety doesn’t decrease; on the contrary, now it’s getting really exciting.

  The baggage claim has nothing to offer me, since I'm traveling without luggage. I’m not even carrying a backpack. So I leave the security area as quickly as possible.

  As expected, a driver of the hotel I booked is waiting for me in the lobby, holding a sign with Steve's name above his head. He doesn’t yet know that he came to the airport for nothing today.

  I seat myself in a small café, where I have a good view of both of the security area exits and the exit from the terminal. For a tall, blonde European, it’s not easy to not stand out of the crowd of dark-haired and rather small Asians. In a weak effort to conceal myself, I put on a hat. I took an American newspaper with me from the first flight, and now hide myself behind it.

  Let's see if Andrews walks into my first trap. I'm trying to get an overview of the bustle: people running from right to left and left to right, or standing around waiting for somebody. I focus on the latter. It doesn’t take long before an Asian with a small scar under his eye fits my manhunt parameters. He’s more interested in his surroundings than in the people leaving the security area. That's strange: if you’re picking someone up, you’d typically be looking where you’re expecting the friend to arrive and not searching around the area the whole time. I focus in on him and memorize every little detail. If I want to follow him, I have to be able to recognize him from a distance in a crowd.

  After five minutes, I feel quite well prepared. Suddenly he stands up. The driver of my hotel is still in place, getting visibly bored. The eye with the scar goes directly to the driver. Just before he reaches him, he casually greets a man his same age, who has just arrived.

  Damn, that was probably nothing. I have to do another quick search, otherwise the hotel driver will realize he’s been waiting for nothing and leave. Then my whole trip will have been for nothing.

  My entire plan is based on the assumption that I’ll get observed from here. One of Andrews’ men must be here to see if Steve has arrived and follow him out the terminal. I want to turn the tables and follow Andrews’ man. But for that to happen, he has to be here and I have to see him first.

  The driver gets increasingly impatient, constantly checking his watch, and he finally pulls out his cell phone. He has no desire to wait anymore; my time is running out. The driver makes a short call, puts the phone pack in his pocket and sticks the sign with Steve’s name under his arm. Damn, he’s leaving and I can’t find any other suspect. When the driver turns around and moves towards the exit, I get nervous and put away the newspaper.

  At this moment, I notice a man who also gets hectic. Dressed in gray clothes, he’s leaning against the wall of the terminal. I probably didn’t notice him before, because the gray wall has virtually swallowed him in. Immediately I sit down again and watch him. He follows the driver out and pulls out his cell phone. I follow at a safe distance. In front of the terminal, the driver gets into a dark Mercedes with tinted windows and, seconds later, disappears in heavy traffic.

  Mr. Gray remains clueless, still on the phone. Bingo, that's my man. He’s definitely not picking anybody up at the airport. After the phone call, he looks around one last time, and then follows the signs for the maglev into the city.

  At the maglev station, I hastily buy a ticket and try not to lose sight of Mr. Gray. Thankfully, most Asians either wear normal street clothes or a black suit. This makes it relatively easy to find the man with the gray suit in the crowd.

  When the train arrives, I'm surprised. I had completely forgotten that a German Transrapid connects the airport to the exhibition center of Shanghai. That's strange; in elementary school, we visited the Transrapid test track in Germany. Even then, I was fascinated by the technology, and I never understood why the Transrapid was never built in Germany. Almost thirty years later, I’m at the other end of the world and am about to enter this masterpiece of German engineering.

  Is this good or bad? Designed in Germany and certainly subsidized by European taxpayers' money, the German inhabitants will never benefit from this technique. But here in Asia, thousands of people use this train every day. Somehow sad, but on the other hand, it would be sad if the Transrapid would not have been built anywhere. A bit of a dilemma. But before I can think about this double-edged sword any more, the doors open and the masses crowd into the train.

  I drift with the flow as well as possible into the Transrapid and simultaneously try not to get too close to Mr. Gray without losing sight of him. Not an easy task in the bustle here. I manage to sit on a railing. This way I’m not towering over the Asians, but can straighten up to keep an overview. Mr. Gray is standing about thirty feet away from me. Very good. During the trip, he can barely move, so I can keep my head down.

  The Transrapid accelerates quickly, similar to a subway; only a subway can’t keep accelerating for very long - a problem the maglev certainly doesn’t have. On the contrary, the train steadily catapults itself to an incredible 267 mph, as the display on the ceiling reveals. During our elementary school tour in the test center, the technician said a Transrapid could theoretically also drive straight up; the magnetic field is strong enough to do that.

  I’m amazed by this memory that must have been hidden in some far corner of my brain. I haven’t thought about the visit to the test track for almost thirty years and now - bang - small details like this are suddenly coming back to me. Feelin
g pretty impressed with myself, the train brakes again.

  An information board tells the travelers that we’ve covered the eighteen miles between the airport and exhibition center in exactly seven minutes and eighteen seconds. In that time, we maintained the top speed of 267 mph for only fifty seconds. But there is still room for improvement: apparently the Transrapid is capable of a maximum speed of 340 mph. It's amazing how smooth the ride is at that speed. This is the advantage of having no direct contact with rails.

  What happens if the Transrapid passes over a small animal? If a rat managed to make its way between the train and the road, would the air pressure crush it? Or is the magnetic field so strong that the rat would be left with a few screws loose in the head? Or would the animal walk away scot-free apart from a strange new hairstyle?

  What if my credit or debit card fell to the ground; would all the data be deleted?

  Just before the station, I shake free of my thoughts, scared by how much I got distracted by my own mind. Gently stretching my head, I look around for Mr. Gray.