Travel Blog

On Aragon Avenue last night the concert outside the reopened Colombian consulate ended about the same time as Gary Shteyngart's reading at Books & Books. (Guess which one I was at?)

I took my place in line in front of the machine outside the parking garage. After a short wait, I inserted my ticket and was told to pay $3. For the first time, the machine refused to ingest my money. The woman behind me offered to take my three ones and pay with her credit card.

I took the elevator to the 7th floor, the highest I had ever been in that garage. Almost immediately, I took my place in another line. Unlike the one in front of the machine, this one barely moved. I caught up on email and Facebook posts.

Forty-five minutes later, I arrived at the exit. A woman stood at the gate, taking people's tickets and putting them into a machine to open the gate. After she inserted mine, she said, "You owe one dollar" The earlier machine had said "3", but - of course - I had just spent another 45 minutes in the garage. But not parking in the garage. I refused to pay, and wondered if the dozens of drivers in front of me had also fused too pay, thus causing the delay. Without argument, the woman walked around her booth and opened the gate.

Driving home I thought it a charming gesture of the consulate to hold a reopening concert.