Word: orientating
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...East used to be the domain of the reckless adventurer or the traveler who could afford the money and leisure for a two-month cruise. Now Tokyo, Bangkok and Hong Kong are as accessible as Paris, Rome or London. Ten thousand tourists a week pour into the Orient, and many, traveling economy class, pay as little as $1,500 round trip...
...gallant: "What can it be that you want ... a tooth out of the Caliph's jaw, a jewel from Queen Victoria's crown, a giant's autograph, or something equally fantastic which would mean putting on my armor at once and setting out for the Orient?" Into such hyperbolic reveries crept the unaffected but affecting confession: "I was in love with none and am now with one." He was absurdly jealous and the two had their tiffs...
...French President and a special envoy of the Sultan of Turkey were on the flag-bedecked platform at Paris' Care de I'Est when the Orient Express chugged proudly off on its maiden trip to Constantinople in 1883. On that first trip, the 2,000-odd miles took six days and six hours, what with all the border ceremonies and crowds along the track.* The seats had velvet covers topped by Brussels lace, and lush damask .curtains hung from the windows; the fittings were of solid oak and mahogany; on the outside of every car was a coat...
Spies & Vanishing Briefcases. For decades the Orient Express served as grist for the mills of novelists (e.g., Agatha Christie, Graham Greene, Eric Ambler), who conjured up (a) fur-wrapped beauties from Hungary in conspiratorial conversation with spies in the corridor, (b) muffled sobs in the next compartment, or (c) vanishing briefcases. The only things that ever really vanished were the good service and the passengers. By the 1920s most of the lush old cars had been replaced with stern steel models, and the porters wore drab brown, offering special attention only when the palm was well greased with hard currency...
Last week the coldly practical railroad experts of Europe, meeting in Leningrad, were agreed: the old Orient Express no longer paid its way, must therefore be eliminated. Now anyone who wanted to spend two days traveling to Istanbul would have to endure the slicker, upstart Simplon-Orient Express, which swings south through Switzerland into Italy and then on across Yugoslavia, delivering its passengers efficiently enough but without the luxury their grandfathers had known...