BAGHDAD ADVENTURE—DAY 2: HEADING TO BAGHDAD IN SERGEI’S HOUSE—CONTINUED

I’ve learned that in Europe one of the most popular pastimes is plane spotting. I was a skeptic until I witnessed a definite strong showing at different points around the Maastricht airfield. People had come—one young man we met was from Belgium—to gawk at and to photograph our "ride." When we are driven around to the opposite side of the ariport runway, we pass a fellow perched high atop a stepladder awaiting the arrival of the Russian aircraft. I learn that because of the loudness of the engines the plane is normally now allowed to land at most European airports. Even at Maastricht, which is situated in the middle of artichoke fields, it can land only with special permission.

For the plane spotters, this is a rare treat to capture our aircraft for their photo albums. There is a crowd of about ten people trapped behind a chain link fence when we arrive at the other side of the runway. When the plane lands we hear the high-pitched scream of the engines, which grow louder when it taxis toward us along the apron, it’s huge floppy wings hanging down like arms almost too heavy to hold up.

The crew door opens high up on the side of the plane. Then a ladder is lowered to the ground by the loadmaster, a man named Fyodor, who looks remarkably like Robin Williams. The huge rear cargo doors swing open to the sides.

The interior color scheme in the Ilyushin II-76 is dark gray punctuated on the instrument panels with 1950s turquoise green. The Russian instruments are oversized, like many things Russian—like the aircraft itself, for instance. There is a preponderance of long handled toggle switches—mostly on the walls behind the flight crew who are crowded into the cockpit, pilot, co-pilot and flight engineer in three front seats with two electricians sitting directly behind them who flip the toggles every few minutes. None of them speaks a single word of English so my communication with them is all by hand signs, eye movement and shrugs of the shoulders—much the same way, I notice, they communicate among themselves.

The aircraft seems to be more of a family affair than anything. I get the feeling that all of the crew, like Sergei, makes the Ilyushin home. By the way, this particular aircraft is, among plane spotters, a rather famous one. It is one of two fitted out with a padded cargo bay where the Russian cosmonauts practiced weightlessness—you know, where the pilot puts the plane into a steep dive and the passengers in the rear experience a few minutes of floating. Kind of cool, I think, but not possible for us to try it what with the 80 skids of cargo we’re carrying.

Fyodor offers we three passengers, mattresses which John and Randy place in strategic areas on top of the cargo. Fyodor, himself, has his spot at the front of the cargo bay above a stack of huge new tires for the plane. He shows me a place between the cargo and a wall where I stuff my mattress in a "U" shape. From there I can jump up to photograph from the bombardier’s window and the flight deck. Following a short stay on the flight deck, I climb back down the ladder to the cargo bay. The others are already asleep and it takes only a few minutes airborne before I am lulled to sleep as well—the most comfortable ride I’ve ever had on a plane. None of that trying to get as prone as possible in even a business class seat; this is flying flat on a bed—strictly first class!

It is several hours before I am awakened by the sound of Fyodor heating a cup of tea in the microwave a few feet above my head. I join him for a cup as well before heading up to Sergei’s for a middle-of-the-night landing at the Athens airport. It is a beautiful, surreal experience, seeing the shadow of the Acropolis framed against the lights of the sleeping city. Then the colored runway lights coming closer and blurring past just a few feet beneath me.

I couldn’t pay for a ride this wonderful, I think to myself. Some things on God’s good earth are so fantastic, that they blur the line between the material and the spiritual worlds—this short moment, beyond time, is one of them for me.