flights

For the past 39 hours i have not slept. For about 23 of these hours i have been on planes. And for the past 11 hours i have not eaten, save for my dinner of earl grey tea, brewed at a coffee-temperature of 92 degrees, with 5 mini cartons of milk and 2 sugars.

It has, quite frankly, been a complete roller coaster of emotions, too. For a start, i get homesickness – bad. An hour into my first flight, to Sydney, I already found myself a teary mess cursing even the thought of leaving my beloved family. It basically follows a pattern – during the day, the sun is bright, people are awake and ‘living’, and i think “bring it on! I can’t wait to do this – why was i such a mess last night?”. But then comes night and in the dark quiet i have serious doubts and can’t understand just why i would ever want to come here, and even more importantly, why the heck did i leave in the first place?

Basically my flight out of Brisbane went fine (after they cancelled my original one and moved me to a later flight). And even though i felt slightly harried, getting through Sydney and onto my flight to San Francisco was fine too. San Fransisco though... I basically had 50 minutes to get off the plane (thankfully i was at the front), get through customs (i forgot to fill in the blasted white form, holding me up another 15mins or so), get my luggage off the baggage collection wheel, take my bag through customs, re-check-in my baggage, and then struggle along to the fabled Gate 85.

And then the flight was full (i only found out later that in fact i could  have made it on, they just mispronounced my name as “Steven”) and so, much to my distress, i was shuffled to the next flight. I managed to get on this one right at the very last minute. The lady escorted me up with about 30secs to finishing boarding and held me there while they checked if a Mrs P Smith was in seat 39H. Thank god she wasn’t, and i took my seat next to an old Hispanic man who snorted and grumbled the whole flight, and made horrible slurping sounds whilst drinking his several cans of coke (a cola).

So, because i had to catch a later plane, i touched down in Chicago literally 2 minutes before my next plane for Hartford left. Obviously I had to rule out catching it, but i wasn’t worried and was finally feeling a little more ‘on top of it’. I surmised that it would take 20 minutes to get off the plane, by which time i could ask the service counter when the next flight to Hartford was (assuming it would be an hour away). It turned out that that had been the last flight to Hartford and there wouldn’t be another until 8am the next morning.

Now, i can tell you, i was pretty hysterical. Not in the mad raving lunatic way, but in the child-like “burst into tears so fitful that you’re gasping for breath and shuddering slightly”. I thought it especially touching that not one person looked my way (the place was virtually crowded). And so the long conversations with my Australian counterparts began, as we worked out what to do.
Presently, i am sitting in a very soft, warm, king-size bed in a Hilton Embassy Suite with two TVs (yet unused) and 5 pillows, among other things. Sounds cozy, huh? Yes, well, it only took me 3 hours to get here, from when i arrived in Chicago at 7.30pm. Honestly i am lucky i did get here. There were long yellow taxis, metallic limos, and hulking F250-truck shuttle buses everywhere. Lucky i didn’t get run over. And no-one follows traffic lights (heaven forbid!). I was just lucky i met an Indian man who was sure i was from Sydney and just wouldn’t hear it when i said i was from Brisbane. “You my Sydney girl, huh?” The important thing was that he actually gave me clear instructions on how to get to my hotel shuttle bus and was very nice.

So. Seeing as it’s almost midnight and i intend to get up in 5-or-so hours, and i havn’t slept in almost 40 hours, i’ll say Ni Night now. Despite my fairly upsetting breakdowns earlier, rest assured i am feeling quite calm and good now.

Much love for all at home,
Elise