Goodness, I made it. All the way across half the U.S. and the ocean to find my way into a dense concentration of humanity. Wow, it's surreal. As I walk the streets, I still can't quite believe I'm actually here. But I'm getting ahead of myself, let's start at the very beginning (a very good place to start. When you read, you begin with 'A', 'B', 'C'. When you sing, you begin with 'do', 're', 'mi'.).
Alrighty, the very beginning is when my mom and I drove to my grandparents house in Kenosha, Wisconsin to spend the night on Thursday. We had a lovely visit, and I enjoyed having some quality time to chat with the grandparents before leaving. On Friday, grandma made a "send-off" lunch biscuits and gravy with all the fixins (scrambled eggs, sausage). Her biscuits are some of the best ever. Seriously, biscuits and gravy are my favorite breakfast item. After eating, mom and I took off for Chicago just an hour and fifteen minutes south.
Once we got the international terminal (the same one we used on the high school Spain/france trip), I went to the check-in counter and got my ticket all the while looking for orange tags on people's luggage. You see, my program provided us all with very distinctive stickers to put on our luggage so we could identify each other. Very helpful! I met a guy in the program already just by standing in line! Both of my bags made the weight limit at 19.4 and 19.5 kg. When I return I'm totally using Grandma's suggestion of wearing multiple layers to save room in the suitcases. After check-in, Mom didn't want to leave until after 6PM so we went to the food court, got some snacks (well, a salad meal for her. I had a raspberry sorbet sipper thingy) and talked for awhile. I told her I was more nervous than excited-- mostly because I didn't know anyone. At least with Truman I had an idea about life, but I knew almost nothing for this trip. But really, I figured others were in my position. Six o'clock finally rolled around, and it was time for mom to go. She asked me how I wanted to do it, and I said we should just say good-bye and I would get in the line for security and she'd leave right after that. We kissed, hugged, and said good-bye, mom offering reassurance as I waved and backed away. I didn't trust myself to speak; my voice would break tears had already welled up in my eyes. I turned around, set my tongue between my teeth, and stepped off with what I hoped was a resolute stride. After security, I looked back. Just as I had asked, she was gone.
(Even as I write this, the emotions are still more fresh than I'd like. I'd be hard pressed to explain away the moisture now filling my eyes.)
With that I had the confidence to keep walking to my gate. I neared and knew many of my fellow Missouri-London Programers would be there, so I took a seat next to people who looked my age. We got to talking and waited the hour and a half to board the plane. Take off was around 8:50PM for a flight time of 7 hours and 10 minutes arriving at about 4AM CST. I hoped I could get some sleep and mentally remembered where in my carry-on I had put my OTC sleeping pills. The flight crew passed out orange juice before we took off and came by with drinks shortly afterward along with some strange snacks called Taka Taks. Megan definitely wouldn't like them, and even I could barely take the Indian spices on those things. Hot! But I got 'em down anyway because I didn't know if we were getting supper. (Perhaps I should explain that we were flying with Air India-- the flight consisted of college kids and Indian families). We did get supper! I hadn't eaten since lunch at 1PM and it was then about 9:45PM.
Hm, that was the most interesting supper. I laughed aloud when one of the options was chicken curry (mom makes it at home-- her's is better than the airline's--which she wondered if they would serve). The rice was odd tasting, and there was this weird carrot cream stuff. The role and butter were good though! I closely watched an older Indian lady to see what to do, especially with the strange white glob sitting in my coffee cup. It turned out to be unsweetened, unflavored yogurt. Two years in a Sodexho cafeteria will teach you something though, so I took my sugar packet and sweetened the tart white glob thinking perhaps breakfast would be better. It was, with some fruit and a small croissant. Overall, I wasn't impressed with the food quality. American Airlines did a much better job three years ago.
Wow, I just couldn't find a comfortable position though. I blew up my inflatable neck pillow which helped a bit, but I probably got 2-3ish hours of intermittent sleep. The puzzle couple next to me didn't go to the bathroom the entire trip! On the flight I felt calm. The trip was going to work out, I didn't know how, but it would. As I would find out, that, perhaps, was the calm before a short storm.
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