I leave Frankfurt this morning and I will be happy to say goodbye.  I did not see much of the city but what I did see was not special.  The service in the restaurants and bars was so bad that when I had to eat by myself I just bought something in a supermarket.  I usually don’t mind eating out on my own but then I usually don’t have to wait more than an hour to be served food.

I was attending a conference and the venue was not great.  It was unbearably hot.  There was no air conditioning, very few windows that opened, and it was about 36 C outside.   The first day was the hottest and it is very hard to listen to talks or to even speak to people when all you can think about is the heat and how you need to cool down.

Last impressions also count.  It was difficult to check out of the hotel and the taxi ride to the airport made me fear for me life.  When the driver arrived he complained at length about the construction as if it was somehow my fault that there were roadworks.  I can handle grumpy but I could do without road rage.  He got so angry on the way to the airport that he banged his fists off the dashboard, beeped his horn, and started to chase the car that had overtaken him incorrectly.  He nearly crashed on a bend on the way into the airport because he kept impatiently changing lanes and accelerating wildly.

I hope it’s a while before I need to come back to this city.