Travel Day!

Just to warn you...this is a bit long...

To begin with, the day started early. I am not really a morning person (that may be an understatement…), so getting up at six isn’t really a thrill to me. I had finished my packing at like 11:30 the night before, so I didn’t really have to worry about anything related to that. By the time I had rolled out of bed and showered, my dad had wrestled the luggage into the car. Jack and I tried to weigh the luggage the night before by weighing him first and then having him lift the luggage up so we could see how much they weighed together. The fact that I couldn’t even lift it myself should have been a clue to the fact that I was way overpacked, but our round about calculations led us to belive that my biggest suitcase was a little over fifty pounds, which is the limit for most airlines. The fact that I was down to two checked suitcases was enough of a struggle, so I figured that a few pounds over could be argued. Stupidly, I had assumed I was allowed to have three suitcases checked and didn’t find out until Monday that Delta only allowed two. It was $150 for the extra bag, so I consolidated. Badly.

But to get back to my last morning in the US, I finally got my stuff together, and said goodbye to the household as they left one by one (the dogs seemed very upset, I think that they knew that I was leaving). Mom and I drove to O’Hare, and proceeded to struggle to get my baggage to the check in counter (another clue to the true weight of my luggage!). Eventually we just gave in and got a cart to push around, because even the duffle bag was too heavy for us to drag around. The airport is pretty long, and usually really crowded, which is why we left the house at seven for my 11:30 flight. But today for some reason it was deserted. Perhaps everyone was voting (don’t worry, I sent my absentee ballot in!), I’m not too sure. When we got to the Delta counter, we found out that not only wasn’t my luggage under fifty pounds, it wasn’t even close to fifty pounds. It was eight-five, which was a three hundred overage charge. My mom and I then rolled the annoying suitcase over to a relatively secluded area and proceeded to stuff my duffle bag with some of the excess weight, while Mom put some of the other stuff in the cart to take back to the car (including one of two gigantic wine bottles I was trying to bring along…that may have contributed to the weight…maybe). I didn’t think we took too much out, but we brought it back to the counter and the lady reweighed it. Somehow we had cut it down to sixty-five pounds, which astonished me. Mom paid the extra charge for that because it was only $150, instead of the $300. The lady also gave my duffle bag a disapproving look, and made me measure it against the standard size chart. It was a little bit bigger, but I think she felt bad for me for the first luggage thing so she told me it was ok, and let me go. At this point, it was eight thirty, and my flight wasn’t until 11:30, so we decided to kill time. We kept the cart and wheeled my backpack and duffle bag back to the car so Mom could put the excess items back in the car. We wheeled ourselves over to the Hilton attached to the airport to get a cup of coffee. Time passed quickly and before we knew it, it was time for me to go through security. The lady at the security area took an interest in us, and told me to keep the cart to push my duffle bag around. She also measured my duffle and told me that it was a little too big, but again, she’d let me go through instead of making me check it. For which I again was grateful, because I didn’t want to pay for the extra fee. Security went by quickly, and the terminal was short, so I got to my gate quickly. Which didn’t help too much when they switched it to the other side of the terminal because of an equipment change. Apparently there weren’t a lot of people on our flight, so they downgraded to a smaller plane. Normally I wouldn’t be too thrilled, since smaller planes and I rarely mix well, but I was tired and I ended up sleeping through the whole thing. The only thing that really stunk was the fact that I had to walk down stairs with my ridiculously heavy duffle bag to the plane and have them stash it under the plane for the flight (I wasn’t the only one. There just wasn’t a lot of overhead space for bags). But as soon as I got into my window seat, I bunched my coat up, and closed my eyes. The next thing I knew, we were in New York.

The limited time between flights meant I couldn’t explore, but I did buy a cup of soup at a deli in my terminal. I also checked the Departure screens to see if there was a Delta flight to Amsterdam since I had been told by several people that my Uncle Steven was flying there today. I found one and wandered over, but I didn’t even know what airline he was taking so I didn’t look too hard and wandered back to my gate so I could call Becky before I left, like I had promised. The flight boarded right on time, and it appeared to have a tour group of some sort heading to Cairo also, so it was a pretty packed flight. The biggest issue came when some guy brought his cat in carrier case onto the flight. It obviously didn’t fit underneath the seat in front of him. From what I gathered, he had assume it would. I’m not sure why , it was a pretty big carrier. There were a few people that were allergic to the car in the vicinity, so they all began to raise a ruckus regarding the cat. An hour after our original departure time, we were still on the ground and the cat man was leaving the flight. He was only a few rows in front of me, so I heard everyone complaining, but I think the gist of the story was the carrier didn’t fit anywhere. It was just too big. Which doesn’t make any sense as to how he got through security or anything but, it didn’t matter too much anymore since he just got his bags off the plane and left. We left pretty soon after that. The flight itself was uneventful and I spent most of it dozing off. There wasn’t really a solid period of time where I was sleeping, but I did get a few naps in so I felt relatively rested.

The landing was smooth and soon enough we were walking down stairs to our buses to take us to the terminal. If you’ve never had to do this before, it’s an interesting experience, only because Americans tend not to expect it. There was a tour group with us that seemed slightly confused by the process. I got my Visa, through customs and found my luggage rather quickly, and took about twice that time to find the person that was suppose to drive me to the school. It was mostly my fault, I didn’t see his sign, so I wandered around for a while before figuring it out. Mohammed greeted me in perfect English, and we went to his car. He is the director’s son and basically the principle of the school (though he had a different name for it. But in the description, it was pretty much the same). It took a little bit og time to maneuver my stuff into his car, but once we were ready to go, Mohammed BACKED over the curb surrounding the parking lot. The fact that the parking lot was jammed packed had a bit to do with it, but I wasn’t really expecting that move at all. Driving here is absolutely crazy. I think most traffic laws are just suggestions for them, no one actually follows it at all. People were driving over white lines, in between cars….on a three lane road, there had to have been at least five lanes of traffic. The driving is extremely erratic, and people do numerous other things while driving, or just drift over in their lanes. People honk their horns for variety of reasons…and they do it constantly. It is a very loud traffic area and dangerous…Yet people seem to dart out of nowhere to cross traffic. Also, instead of waiting for a break in traffic to turn, cars turn into oncoming traffic and just hope that those cars get out of the way. Its an organized chaos, as everyone else seems to understand the right of way rules…though from my perspective, it just seems as though whoever is approaching needs to redirect their route. Mohammed took me to the school and I got to see Erin, my friend who secured this gig for me, and Boni the head of my department. She took me to my apartment after introducing me to my roommate Lisa, and we stopped at the store on the way to pick up some bread, water and other food I may need for the time being. We went into the apartment and settled a bit, and then she left and I took a shower and fell asleep. I was woken up by odd noises outside my window which I have now been told are completely normal and I will get use to. To which I say, ummm right. Erin and her roommate Wendy took me to dinner with them and a few of the other teachers, which was nice, but now I have to unpack.

Its been a LONG day.

Miss you all!!