Merkel takes the bus home from Italy

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/19/world/europe/19iht-merkel.html?src=mv&ref=world

For Merkel, Trip Becomes an Odyssey


Angela Merkel sure knows how to take things in stride.

When the plane carrying the German chancellor and her entourage of advisers, security personnel and journalists was diverted after takeoff from San Francisco on Thursday night, little did Mrs. Merkel know she would not be arriving on German soil until early Sunday afternoon.

Instead of a flight across the Atlantic that should have lasted about 12 hours, it ended up being an odyssey for the German leader.

It all began last Monday, when Mrs. Merkel arrived in the United States for a four-day visit that included a nuclear weapons summit meeting chaired by President Barack Obama, a visit to Hollywood and the award of an honorary degree at Stanford University.

But as soon as the government’s official aircraft — the Konrad Adenauer, an old East German Airbus — left California, the crew members got news that much of Europe’s northern airspace had been closed. They decided to land in Grand Forks, North Dakota, and change course.

Approaching the Continent, the crew looped south toward the Iberian Peninsula, with Lisbon as the next stop. Mrs. Merkel seemed nonplussed. “Lisbon is very nice,” she said.

-snip-

On Saturday morning, the entourage sped across Lisbon to the airport. There, the Konrad Adenauer took them to Rome — but no farther. And Mrs. Merkel was due to attend a big election rally in North-Rhine Westphalia, Germany’s most populous state, where her coalition of conservatives and Free Democrats are fighting tooth and nail to stay in power after this crucial regional election on May 9.

Somehow, despite the disruption of her official timetables and for someone who is a stickler for punctuality, Mrs. Merkel was almost philosophical. “We’ll take things as they come,” she said in Rome.

-snip-

It was decided to take Mrs. Merkel, by car, up north to Bozen, the capital of South Tirol. The security staff managed to acquire bulletproof cars and drivers — but not Mrs. Merkel’s long-serving driver, who died Sunday after a serious illness. Mrs. Merkel was very upset over the death, said Ronald Pofalla, chief of staff at the Chancellery.

At a steady speed of 90 kilometers, or 56 miles, an hour, the entourage reached Bozen, a picturesque town surrounded by mountains, at 10 p.m. local time, and settled down for the night.

It was clear by then that Mrs. Merkel could not possibly travel to Krakow to attend the funeral of President Lech Kacszynski. She spoke to Radek Sikorski, the Polish foreign minister, apologizing for her absence.

-snip-

On Sunday morning, German airspace was still closed. A bus took Mrs. Merkel and her staff to the German border, and from there they set out on an 850-kilometer drive to Berlin.

“We had a very pleasant time,” she told reporters. “And now we will all be very happy to return home, to Berlin.”

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going with the flow and not complaining about what is.

good on her.

Two things I always wondered might help:

1) World leaders actually interacting with THE WORLD and its people rather than getting so much filtered through so many people's agendas

2) World leaders in orbit, looking at THE WORLD as the beautiful, fragile oasis it is, without lines drawn on, but as a whole entity. And world leaders looking away from the world to see just how far it is to the next bus stop.

And that she stayed away from the back seat where all the bad boys hang out and pass the bottle around.

helps when nature does her thing. What's the point of anger when you can't do a damn thing about the situation. Good for Merkel.