I’m on my way to Baku for a roundtable with NGOs on professional training in the Caucasus and have to do my usual stopover in Istanbul. I’m sitting in the lobby of the transit area and it’s here that I, for the first time ever, have a real and direct encounter with swine flu…

I am not exactly a frequent flyer but I have been flying a lot internationally these last 2 years or so. This time is the first I am instructed to fill in a “health card” while on the plane while being informed that I am legally obliged to fill in all personal information as requested and that I will not be allowed to leave the plane at my destination if I fail to do so. Duh.

When disembarking at Istanbul, I’m greeted by a troupe of 5 stern-looking airport employees all wearing mouth masks. So do seemingly all other employees of the airport as I later notice.

While I am never bothered much about the pandemic, something is ostensibly changing over here. It doesn’t feel too good when you suddenly have to deal with people who look like some kind of under-paid surgeons at an improvised bush hospital.

But, then, as I think, most urban Asians should be quite used to the site of the white masks for years, shouldn’t they?