* * * * * Flag of Switzerland Upon suffering a couple of boring nights of Islamic culture, we blasted out of Bahrain on 25 th August 1987, for Zürich, Switzerland. It was a beautifully clear summer’s morning, allowing me to engage in my favorite pastime as a pilot: “sightseeing.” I marveled at the familiar deserts of northern Saudi Arabia. Remembering with a shudder at how I had sweated and humped those deserts piloting a 737; back in ’85 and ’86. Then came the Gulf of Aqaba, followed by the Sinai Peninsula (where Moses and the children of Israel wandered for forty years), and the Gulf of Suez. Upon sweeping past Alexandria, Egypt, where the Nile ends its journey, we struck out across the Mediterranean for Italy. After flying...