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Bangor, Maine Tuesday 7/12/05
TSOCK Goes First Class

Yesterday, ace pilot Ron Maines flew the little Cessna that had been our home for 15 memorable hours back across America to its generous owner, Lynch Butler, in Siloam Springs, Arkansas. Ron's 7.5-hour flight in the Spirit of Charles Kean (TSOCK) was uneventful, as the little airplane purred beautifully all the way back to its hangar.

But Charles Kean’s spirit remains in Bangor, Maine, where I have spent the last two nights. Charles was a generous man, and he seems to bring out that quality in others when I tell his story to the people of Bangor. My waitress at breakfast yesterday was probably 68 years old, single, and supplementing her social security income by waiting on tables. When she heard of my disappointment at not being able to rent a car (why bring a driver's license when you are flying around the world in a small plane?), she offered me hers... because of what I was doing for AIDS orphans! I declined gracefully, but she insisted on paying for my breakfast herself! (I snuck out after leaving her a huge tip.) Later, when I went downtown to repair my watch – broken during an in-flight emergency – my taxi driver could not break a hundred dollar bill for my fare. (Ron and I were planning to fly to places that did not accept credit cards, and at $2 a liter for 300 gallons of AV gas, we were forced to carry a lot of cash.) She decided that she would just add it to my next fare when I called for the return trip! I had to shop for clothes for my extended stay in Kenya, and the young sales clerk thanked me for what Rotarians are doing in Kenya for innocent victims of the AIDS tsunami sweeping the world. My taxi driver then delivered me to Applebee's for the only recommended-salad restaurant in town, where the manager insisted I have a dessert on the house after I gave her one of Jon Hoghaug's printed business cards that tells the TSOCK story. While dropping me back at my hotel, the same taxi driver insisted that she only wanted to charge me $20 for my three trips (totaling $30). I declined her very generous offer.

Today, Tuesday, I am flying overnight to Nairobi, thanks to the very efficient and generous folks at Laura's Travel Service, who immediately jumped on my changing circumstances and within minutes arranged a very complicated itinerary halfway around the world and back. I've always wanted to fly first class (thank you, Lynda Schauf), and now, when I press the call button, something wonderful is bound to happen! (Over New York several nights ago at two in the morning, I kidded with Ron by pushing an imaginary call button requesting more pretzels in TSOCK...) I am still heading east into the dawn, but without anything like the adventure I have so recently experienced!

Thank you, Charles Kean, for introducing me to so many generous and wonderful people!

David Maupin

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