And what an interesting time it was.
Nekol and I were out the door on the 23rd by 6:45 and heading to the tube which put us on the train itself by 6:50. Now, both Nekol and I were managing two suitcases and carrying bags as well. My suitcases were two seperate bags that I rolled along while Nekol's were attached...and quite a hassle.
We got to Lambeth North station and preceeded to go down the stairs. I took my bags down one at a time, climbing up and down the 20 steps before helping Nekol with one of her bags. Hers were quite heavier than mine, surprisingly. We got onto the Bakerloo line without an issue and sat down, on our suitcases, and waited till the Piccadilly stop. We sat and chatted, hoping that we would miss the morning traffic mess in Piccadilly Station that tends to happen during rush hour...rush hour on the tube is not a fun thing by any means.
We hopped off the train at Piccadilly and proceeded towards our Line exit. Now there are two separate stairs we had to deal with here and the first one we got down without a problem. We were making great time and were really excited. Nekol's bags were still being an absolute hassle but we were high spirited as we headed to the second set of stairs.
Taking one set of bags down the stairs at a time so as not to kill ourselves, Nekol lucked out and a nice gentlemen took one of her bags down the stairs for her. Happily surprised, I continued on my way down the stairs and then it happened...disaster struck.
I heard a gasp and I turned around, at the foot of the stairs, and looked up to see Nekol halfway down the stairs on her hands and knees, clutching the railing. There were a couple of people not two steps in front of her heading up the stairs. She lucked out in catching herself or else she would have tumbled right into the unsuspecting people. Apparently, with the gravity and weight of her bag, Nekol upended herself and fell a few stairs. The man ran up the stairs, and get this, apologized to Nekol. It's not like -he- pushed her down the stairs or willed her to fall and yet he apologized.
Nekol was fine, in one piece, and not bleeding, so she told the man it was alright, thanked him for his help, and we continued to the Piccadilly platform where we sat and waited for a few minutes. Nekol surveyed where she had hit the stairs and hoped that the bruises would turn out well. I told her to tell me as soon as they started to form and I'd take photos of her war wounds.
The train came and we shoved Nekol's bags onto the train before I got on. We settled down and looked at our watches, we were on the train in less than 20 minutes. So at 7:18, we looked at each other and sighed softly, resting on our bags, and just chatting the entire way to the terminal. It was a nice easy ride and we were able to see the outlaying areas of London in the early icy, sunrise. Heathrow is out in Zone 6 and so by the time we got to the the airport we were seeing multiple quiet suburbias that looked much like the ones we had read about in our books in Writing Contemporary Britain.
As we were leaving zone 3, a couple got on the car through the door I was sitting next to and proceeded to stay standing right next to me. Here is where I got to have some fun just looking at them, covertly of course. The man was very wealthily dressed, everything of his designer, even the bags he carried. She was the same way but compared quite differently from him for she was at least twenty years his junior, he being near fifty. I though, well, maybe a daughter? Till I realized their wedding rings matched perfectly and she smiled at him lovingly and called him "dahling" in a very thick Russian accent while he called her "my dear" in a posh British accent. Mail order Russian bride? Maybe...but they were the sweetest thing I ever saw.
They stayed on the train until we reached Heathrow. I got off easily enough and another man helped Nekol off the train. This was probably a little self serving because Nekol was blocking the door and people needed to get on and off the train. I laughed and stood still till she was with me and we headed off to departures.
Btw, European airports have nasty little silver things that you have to shove your luggage threw which are not cool at all especially if your luggage are strapped together like Nekol's was. I had to kick mine through because it was so big. After fighting with, and winning, against the silver barriers we walked to the elevators and headed to Departures.
After getting off at the wrong level, we finally found Departures and were a little stunned at the mass amount of people we saw. The shear amount of people traveling right before Christmas is a little staggering, you always hear the numbers on t.v. but until you travel through an international airport like Heathrow, you never fully understand. Apparently AirFrance had some major delays and had to cancel some flights, which meant a lot of people were there from previous days for them.
Passing through the AirFrance crowd, we found the line for Continental Airlines and waited patiently. We were in Heathrow, a little before 8 am, and had nothing to worry about time wise. We just kind of hung around, chatting and laughing in line, while everyone else looked rather grumpy. We finally got up to the checking counters, after 30 minutes of fun waiting, and the man I talked with was really nice and flirty. He asked me what my favorite color was (my shirt and luggage being the same shade of pink) and I bashfully told him pink. He asked me if I was a doctor, weird and then asked me where I was heading and why. After a short chat, he weighed my bag, told me it was a rather heavy bag and I laughed and told him it was three months worth of clothes. He smiled at me and gave me my ticket and sent me on my way. I waited for Nekol and we headed towards security checks. Nekol proceeded to tell me what the weight limit was and that her bag had exceeded that number but her man had just told her to have a merry christmas and my eyes widened. My bag had been over the limit but all the man had said was, "That's a heavy bag." We thanked our lucky stars.
Security was hurried and rushed but neither of us were pulled aside, thankfully. Once we were collected and fully dressed again, we headed into Departures and went to find a screen.
See, in Europe they don't designate a gate when you sign in, they designate a gate about thirty minutes before the gate opens and not a moment beforehand. So everyone stands around these screens like lemmings or the second coming...seriously. Once the gate is announced, everyone moves in one direction towards that gate. It's a little creepy. Anyways, we became lemmings for a few moments until we realized our flight didn't depart till about 11:15 and so we had more than enough time to sit around...approximately an hour and a half by now.
We parked ourselves down at a Starbucks and I ordered us a couple of frappucinos and we relaxed for a long while. Unfortunately a t.v. was playing the news and there were several reports of transportation issues: Delta plane sliding off the tarmac because of ice, RyanAir plane overshooting the runway in Jamaica, a coach crashing into a ditch and killing two women, and many other events. So we stopped watching soon after that. We then tag teamed a British Store in the airport, one person going to shop while the other stayed with the bags. Nekol bought a couple of things for friends and I got two stuffed bears for a surrogate niece and nephew.
It was past 10:45 and still our gate had not been designated. I was a little worried because there had been terrible fog around 9:30 and I was hoping that wasn't delaying the plane. Nekol and I sat at Starbucks a while longer and I stared at the screen that would designate our gate. I was starting to get antsy, there was no way we were missing Christmas with our families. Skyping on Christmas is not acceptable unless we had planned to stay in England for Christmas...and that was not the case.
Finally, our gate appeared and Nekol and I made our way to the gate, only to sit down for another thirty minutes. We met up with Ashley and just sort of chatted and talked for a while. We were tired and bored by the time our plane started boarding. Nekol and I found our seats on one side of the plane and Ashley found hers on the other side of the plane. We quickly called places for our luggage in the overhead compartment and settled ourselves down. Now ready for the routine, we quickly pulled out our headphones and attached them to the seats and began sliding through what movies we wanted to watch. It was going to be ten hours of plane riding so we decided to watch as many movies as possible.
The next ten hours passed agonizingly slow. We were antsy and wanted to land but we continued watching movies we had never seen before. I napped for a while and Nekol continued watching. We reveled in being given drinks and snacks for free unlike European airlines (partly the reason why it costs so much to fly in America). And finally...finally...we were touching down in America.
Nekol and I looked out excitedly as we touched down in Texas. We were thoroughly excited, until we exited the plane and realized just how much humidity we had been missing living over in England. I was in short sleeve shirt, cardigan, and jeans and I felt like I desperately needed shorts. We headed towards customs where we had to answer a million questions, hand in forms and passports, claim bags, and do all sorts of stuff until we could finally walk out into the greeting area.
I quickly found my Mom and hugged her tight.
I never really understood Love Actually, the beginning and ending, until that moment in time. I was so happy to just hug and hold my Mom. I cried a little. Nekol's parents weren't there yet and so Mom was the first one to hug Nekol after she landed on American ground. We took a couple of pictures to show how exhausted albeit excited we were. Nekol's parents finally came and we hugged each other, soon to see each other at school in two weeks.
My Mom and I walked to her car, where we loaded my bags. and I nestled into the passenger seat and asked her if we could go to Gringo's for some TexMex. My mom promptly agreed and we headed to the restaurant where I had a ton of TexMex and started to fall asleep, purely exhausted.
Once home, I pulled my bags into the house, greeted my younger sister, and headed to bed...too exhausted to even be truly celebratory to be home.
But we're home. We're back.
And we miss it so much.
If anyone ever has the chance to study abroad, jump at it, don't hesitate, don't pause, just jump at it and go...you will change forever, you will grow as a human being, and you will remember it for the rest of your life.
<3,
Dre
1 comment:
Post a Comment