What a Christmas Day!
What a great way to leave, my last day in Australia on
Christmas Day. It may seem sad,
especially to Tess, but I am happy to report the gifts from Santa have helped
lessen the blow, well at least for her.
There were times during the day, seeing everyone laughing and sharing
jokes and it tugged my heart strings. I
was going to miss this. I would be lying
if I said I didn’t. But there are bigger
things waiting for me out there and I will find new friends and know that I
have these life-long friends with me forever, no matter what and this picks me
up when I need it. It always will.
We didn’t end up going to bed till 2.30am and I wanted to
leave for the airport at 11am. I figured
that I could sleep on the plane and I had finished my packing the day before,
so I was all set. Besides Shelly
everyone slept till 10am, and I think this was a good thing as it didn’t give
the girl’s time to dwell on my departure.
The neighbours came over at 11am just as we were loading the car with my
bags to say goodbye which was sweet and with kisses and hugs we were packed
into the car and off to the airport. It
was Boxing Day, so the car park was full.
Well the one multi-layered one and after getting to the 5th
level and not being able to find a park, we headed back down and parked
outside. This all took an extra 20
minutes and by the time we got into the terminal I was inside the 2 hour
check-in. There was only one couple in
front of me at the counters and then it was my turn. The monster was 22.5kg and my second smaller
bag was 12.2kg so I am glad that I did date change my Malaysia ticket and
bought the Emirates ticket as I would have been up for 1320AUD excess baggage. THAT is just a rip Malaysia Airlines. I had prepaid the extra bag but it wasn’t
showing in the system. So he checked
both my bags in and gave me my boarding pass and told me I had to head over to
the Sales Desk. So we headed there and
20 minutes later the payment was sorted and I was all set to go. . I
was so focussed on my second bag talking to the check-in dude that I forgot to
ask about my window seat. It was Shelly
that reminded me about the window seat, so I went back to check-in for the
second time to ask about it and a different agent helped me and said there were
no more windows left. When I enquired
about the secret squirrel seats that airlines usually keep, he smiled and said
the flight was full. When I asked about
paying for a window seat (which I could have done 3 days ago for 25AUD) he
smiled and turned his computer screen around to show me there was only one seat
left (a middle) and that he was the supervisor and there were none to be
had. I even asked for an aisle, as I was
in a row of 4 in the middle and it was still no, well I said you would know to
him (nicely) we laughed and I left with my shitty middle seat. Little did I know that this was going to be
the least of my worries of the morning.
Now was the difficult part, the part that I had been dreading,
and that was to say goodbye to my Elkins.
Tess had started to cry and we aren’t just talking crocodile tears, she
was really crying her little heart out.
Zoe was brave and it was really sweet that she was trying to console
Tessie. There were watery eyes as I
hugged Shane, a massive strong hug from Zoe, tears flowed when I hugged my BEST
FRIEND in the whole wide world and then there was my little sobbing
Tessie. What can you say to a 5 year old
that is asking you why you have to go, telling you to stay. All I could do was give her a BIG hug, tell
her I will always be thinking of her, love her and that I will be back
someday. Shelly asked if we wanted to go
for a drink but for me and for Tess’s sake I think it was best that we just
parted there and then. Beside the face
that it was 12.20pm and I still had security and customs to get through, I
wanted to change some of the USD 100 notes I was given into smaller notes at
Travelex and to get a drink before boarding.
So with a final wave as the lift doors closed I was now on my own and I
could do nothing but let my tears fall.
For the friends I am leaving, the life I am leaving and into the
uncertain future. I found a bench away
from everything, composed myself, packed away my jacket and then made my way to
security and immigration.
I had filled in my departure card while I was at the
check-in desk, so I was feeling okay, had stopped my tears as I headed down the
escalators to security when I saw that there were 2 staff standing at the
entrance and they were standing next to a set of scales. It is funny what you can notice in a split
second and I just hoped that I would make it through without getting my bags
weighed as I knew for a fact that I was over the 7kg allowance and then
realising that there was a third staff member catching the people that tried to
slink through the first 2 when they were attending other passengers (which was
going to be my play). As it worked out
everyone had to have their bags weighed and I just had a dread in the pit of my
stomach. So inevitably I was stopped and
asked to out my rolly bag on the scales and it was 9.9kg. She looked at me, I looked at her and she
told me I had too much. I said my jacket
was in there, so she said take that out, so I unzipped my bag and then she
noticed my backpack on my back. She said
she couldn’t let me though and that I would have to head back to the check-in
counters and speak to them about what I could do. Just when I had composed myself, this just
tipped me back over and as I made my way to the lift to take me back to the
check-in counters for the 3rd time I was an emotional wreck. It may sound a little OTT (over the top) but
it is a sad moment that I am happy to savour, I think you need to cleanse
yourself, know and accept that you are making a massive move, a decision that
has changed my life-but at the end of the day, these people are just doing
their job, they don’t know my background (and probably don’t care) and I know I
must look like a complete loser. At this
point all that hasn’t really sunk in and as I stood back in line and after
telling yet another check-in agent my issue, I was referred to the supervisor
and as I made my way down to the end of the counter and rehashed the story
again I just lost it. I was sobbing like
some crazy woman, so much so that I couldn’t keep talking, and I was trying to
say it was ridiculous the way I was crying, but I couldn’t get the words out
and it made me sound more manic. The guy
came around to my side of the counter, rubbed my back and told me I had to
check in one of my 3 hand pieces, it would be for free and asked if I needed
help. I was finally able to take some
deep breathes, apologize, told him I would be happy to pay (which was waved off)
and then I took out the valuables from my rolly bag, swapped some things out of
my backpack and was then directed to a check-in agent to check in my 3rd
bag to a weight of 12.1kg. This in turn
made my backpack on my back heavier, but the supervisor signed off on the
bottom of my boarding pass that I was allowed to take a heavy piece of hand
luggage and with a watery smile, a sincere thankyou and a wave I was back on my
way again.
The same ‘scale’ lady saw me coming again and I think she
was just happy that I didn’t have the rolly bag with me, she looked at my
boarding pass and didn’t even bother to weigh my backpack but after throwing it
on the scales when I was upstairs it was just as well, even though I had the
‘ok’ on my boarding pass the backpack weighed 12.1kg and it was a relief that I
was finally through the check and I wasn’t even at security. I had the fore thought to take off all my
bangles when I was checking in, so I just had my laptop to pull out, pass
through the scanner and into immigration.
There weren’t too many people here and I was at the counter in no
time. Last time I passed through here in
August the customs guy had to refer me with a problem with my passport. I only remembered that fact as I stood there,
and waited and waited. This can’t be
good and when I saw a supervisor looking guy come to our booth, I knew that
things weren’t going to be plain sailing through here again. Talk about a drama on my last departure from
the country. So I was escorted away to a
counter located at the end of immigration and told to take a seat as they
checked over my passport and he placed a call.
Thank goodness there was no TV crew and that I featured on border
control-now that would have just topped off the morning!!! I sat there for 20 minutes until I heard my
flight being called to start the boarding process, so I mentioned it to the
border guy and he made another phone call, spoke to some-one and then handed my
passport back. I asked him what the
problem was and seriously he could have been speaking another language, what he
said made no sense, as his mind was already onto the next task and wasn’t
paying any attention.
As the flight had only just been called there was still a
line up at the gate, so I had to abandon the drink and the currency conversion
I had wanted to do and I just joined the queue.
So this is why people, you need the 2 hours prior to allow for ‘snafu’
time. And to top off the whole drama, I
was sitting on a Boeing 747 with a seating configuration of 3x4x3 and I was in
the 4 seats of that in a BLOODY middle seat.
Now if that doesn’t top off the start of a 34 hour day I don’t know what
does. The upside was that I had a small
child, well a 10 year old to one side and I had a small Asian guy to the other,
so I had what could be possibly a really bad seat turned into an okay
seat. I guess things could have been
worse. So after dealing with a check-in
guy, a sales desk chick, another check-in guy, a scales chick, a supervisor guy
and a border control dude they all worked (for or against) to finally get me to
my seat and finally on my way. As I sat
in my chair I received a last minute text message from Shelly and the girls and
the tears that I thought I had controlled tried one last time to escape as we
made our way down the runway and the last time I would see my homeland for an
unknown amount of time. It was weird not
being next to a window or to even be able to see out of one, but maybe this was
a blessing in disguise as I HATE crying in public and being in the middle of
the aircraft gave me no privacy to shed any last tears.
The flight was uneventful and I have to say not bad. A lot of people bag Qantas, refuse to fly
them blah, blah, blah blah but I have always found their European flights/staff
more than acceptable. Maybe after all
those years in the travel industry with clients telling me how much they hate
them that I now have a low expectation when I fly them and I am always
pleasantly surprised. The flight was a
little hot if I was to complain about something and I’m not just talking about
when we were on the ground, the whole flight I had to fan myself every now and
then to get some air moving (and I want no cracks about menopause thank-you). I slept for a few hours watched a few movies
and then after 7 hours and 20 minutes we came into land at Singapore
International at 7.10pm. Being in the
very last row of the plane, in the middle seat, it was lucky that I was in no
rush to catch my next flight. My
Emirates flight wasn’t until 1.20am-so I had 6 hours to collect my baggage,
hope that the Emirates check-in counters would be open, off load my bags-see
how badly I was going to get hit going through the whole stressful check-in
procedure with Emirates and then be able to pass back through immigration and
kill time airside. It would have been a
pain if I couldn’t check-in, as I would have to stay curb side where the
facilities are not as good as the other side.
So after checking my emails at one of the 500 free terminals on my way
to immigration, I collected my 3 bags weighing 46.8kg on my free trolley and
headed out of customs. I must say I had
no idea on what terminal I had arrived into and no idea on which terminal I
needed to get to. Once you are through
customs there are plenty of arrival TV’s that let you know where you are, but I
had no idea which way I had to go from there.
I found an information brochure rack that had booklets on Changi
International, so I flipped to the terminal pages that showed me that Emirates
depart from Terminal 1 and for the first time out of my last 10 visits I was
arriving into Terminal 1 and departing from the same one. Woo hoo!!
So I just needed to make my way up to the departure level, find the
Emirates counter and with my biggest smile, hope on a wing and a prayer that
they would be nice to me with all the luggage that I have.
Lucky for me, Emirates had flights to Australia and an
earlier flight to London and the counters were open. It did say on my ticket that check-in for my
flight was 2 hours before, but I just wanted to get rid of my bags and the
worry of not knowing how I would be processed at check-in. The counters were open so I thought I would
try my luck and with no-one in line I was called to the business class
check-in. So the monster was thrown on
the scales and hadn’t changed weight-22.2kg and before I was asked to pop on my
second bag I was asked to show my ticket leaving the UK as I had booked a one
way ticket in. I did have
this-somewhere. As I had to re-organise
my bag in Brisbane, I was not sure where I had popped my documents to be able
to show him. So I looked like a right ol
arse flicking in and out of my rolly, my handbag and my small backpack looking
for my document wallet. So much for
trying to keep a low profile with my luggage!
Anyway I found the e-ticket and was able to them pop on my 2nd
bag and it was 13kg giving me a grand total of 35.5kg where I was allowed 30kg
on Emirates. So this is where the crunch
was to come, would they let me through or would I be charged. Well he looked at me and said that I was over
my luggage restriction, to which I just smiled and nodded and he said that
there was going to be a charge of 78AUD per kilo. I just kept smiling and said well I would
just have to pay it as I had no choice here making it a total of 472AUD of
excess baggage and I am not sure what then transpired, it must have been my
attitude as he looked over his shoulder and then said listen I’ll just pop 3
kilos on there for you! Maybe my luck
was starting to change, so instead of paying nearly 500AUD I was only going to
pay 238AUD. What a relief. There were no questions on my hand luggage,
so with my rolly bag still on the trolley and my small backpack on my back
(they can’t see it properly there) I headed to yet another sales desk to make yet
another payment for my excess baggage.
But I was done, literally unscathed and I now wouldn’t have to see my
bags till London.
My time at Changi seems to always pass quickly. After passing through immigration, which I
think is the easiest in all of the airports I have visited and part of that is
the random security checks they do, unlike all the other airports that make
every single person pass through they don’t do that here and part of that is
that process is done at the gates. Once
through I found the information counter to get my free Wi-Fi password to find
out that they have now changed the process of their Wi-Fi-ing and you now don’t
need to show your passport and you can now connect without a password. Brilliant.
So armed with this I made a visit to ‘my’ BK (Burger King) ordered ‘my’
usual (12 drumettes and a passionfruit Iced Tea) and killed a few hours there
reading and making notes and thinking about the details for London and just how
busy I was going to be the first week. I
moved on after a few hours and found a lounge area where I re-arranged my bags
back to the way they were in Brisbane and then it was time to make my way to
the gate at midnight when the shops started to close. I made sure that I stayed away from the
Pandora shop this visit, so it was a relief to see that closing on my way
past. That shop is just trouble with a
capital T.
The flight from Singapore to Dubai was full but I did
have a window, so that is the best it will ever get on a full flight. I was the first one to arrive in my row and
after trying to put on my seatbelt and finding that I needed an extension belt;
this was a good thing to lessen the embarrassment of having people in my row
and then asking. Certainly the width of
the seats on the Emirates plane, the 777-300 was not as generous as the Qantas
flight with a seating configuration of 3x4x3-we were all set for an on time
departure and the 7 hour and 6013km flight to Dubai. I had been on the road since 11am that
morning and by the time we took off I had been on the road for 13 hours and I
was asleep before we had even taken off.
I missed the cart round of drinks, but I somehow never miss the food
cart and woke up for a 5am dinner service a movie and with the time difference
we arrived into Dubai at 4.40am.
Upon arrival in Dubai we had the longest walk to get us
from the plane to our new gates. Whether
you were connecting or stopping we all had to trudge the distance and we
divided up at the end with those with boarding passes to go through
security. The laptops etc…. didn’t have
to come out of our baggage here but I did have to take off my bangles again and
realised this is the first trip where I haven’t worn my Ethiopian bangles and I
can’t anymore use the excuse that they don’t come off…. That was a good line
and always got me through without having to de-jewel. Once I finally made it to the gates it was so
busy. All the shops were open at 5am,
there were hundreds of people everywhere and I had to walk another 300m to find
the departure TV screens to find out and orientate myself on where my next
departure gate would be. I had 2 hours
to kill here, so I found a waiting lounge next to one of the departure gates that
had no people and paid a solid 2 hours of solitaire listening to my IPod. I also noticed for the first time, my feet
were so swollen. I have never had swollen
feet from travelling before and they looked like they belonged to the elephant
woman, to some-one else, they didn’t look like my feet at all. So as I sat there I kept them moving up, down
and all around to keep the blood circulating.
They didn’t hurt, they just felt tight.
I didn’t even bother to enter any of the shops and after my 12 drumettes
in Singapore and breakfast on the plane I wasn’t that hungry. A tip for Dubai International is that the
ladies toilets always seem to be so busy.
The line ups are out the doors and I checked 3 locations. If you can wait, wait till you get to your
departure gate as each one has their own set of toilets and you are pretty much
guaranteed to not have to wait.
The flight from Dubai to my final destination, London,
was operated by the mighty A380. This
plane is phenomenal. As you walk down
the air-bridge and look up, you can just see the top of this massive manmade
structure. It is the size of a small
house and it really makes you wonder how this thing ever takes off. The Airbus
A380 is a double-deck, wide-body,
four-engine jet airliner and it is the world's largest
passenger airliner and, due to its size, many airports have had to upgrade
their facilities to properly accommodate it.
The A380 made its first flight on 27 April 2005 and began commercial
service in October 2007 with Singapore Airlines. The A380-800's cabin has 478 square metres of
floor space; 49% more floor space than the next-largest airliner, the Boeing
747-400 with 321
square metres, and provides seating for 525 people in a typical three-class configuration or up to 853 people in
all-economy class configurations. The A380-800 has a
design range of 15,400 kilometres, which is sufficient
to fly from New York to Hong Kong, and a cruising speed of Mach 0.85
(about 900 km/h at cruising altitude). As
of November 2012 there had been
262 firm orders for the A380, of which 92 have been delivered. The largest order, for 90 aircraft, was from Emirates.
I was in the last row again (this never worries me) and with another 7
hours in front of me and 5504km it was a great feeling I was on the last
stretch. It felt like I had left
Australia a week ago!!!! Apparently they
offered Wi-Fi on the plane and I could connect to the network (it was free) but
it wouldn’t let me on to the internet.
Oh well I didn’t really need any access I was just jumping on for the novelty
of it. This was a day flight and after
the last 2 flights I had done at night I tried to stay awake by watching 2
movies, getting fed lunch and finally closing my eyes for an hour before the
plane was prepared for landing, finally into the UK. As we flew in through the English mist you
could see that the fields were full of water, apparently this was one of the wettest
years the UK has had and it looked like it.
We arrived on time into London Heathrow at 11.30am. It’s all well getting 525 people on a plane,
but getting them all off is a mission and took a fair amount of time, but again
I didn’t have anyone picking me up so I was in no rush and being in the last
row of the plane, it was just as well.
There weren’t too many people at immigration and with the line moving it
only took me 10 minutes to get to my officer.
This entry was probably the most I had been questioned but I guess with
this being around the 7th time in the last 12 months I have visited
I guess it is worthy of a few questions.
The upside of taking a long time to get off the flight is that the bags
were out by the time we got to the carousel.
Mine were one of the first out and with a free trolley and the green
channel I was out and on my way to catch the Heathrow Express. I had changed my London accommodation and I
was now staying walking distance from where the Heathrow Express terminates at
Paddington Station. I figured that the
less trains and moving around I had to do with my luggage the better and it
proved to me more difficult than I had anticipated. To catch the Tube from Heathrow costs 5GBP
and takes around 1 hour and 10 minutes and without looking at the map I am assuming
I would have to change somewhere along the line. The Heathrow Express is 19GBP and takes 15
minutes on 1 train to Paddington. For me
that is money well spent and there was a ticket guy at entrance selling them
but there is also a counter further in if you don’t see one. So with ticket in hand there is only so far
that the luggage trolley will go before reaching the train platform, so it was
now time for me to don the monster and pack up all my bags so that I could walk
with them all. It was good in theory and
worked…sort of. I just had a small issue
of getting the gym bag on the wheelie bag with the small backpack on my
front. If I take off the small backpack
to pick the gym bag, I then have to hold the wheelie bag to put on my small
backpack and I can’t do this with one arm.
Okay, so my technique needs a little work and maybe I should have had a
practice run at home before I left, but either way I will be able to manage-it
just may not look very pretty-awkward.
Which is exactly how I must have looked as I had a group of 3 American
guys ask if I needed help for when the train pulls in and I replied thanks, but
if I bought it all I need to manage it all-but I can tell you when the train pulled
in I actually did okay-awkward but okay.
I arrived into Paddington Station at 1pm and I knew where
I needed to head, I always check this information before arriving anywhere and
when I orientated myself I was on my way to the hotel which was apparently 400m
from the station. Well with 60kg of
luggage it felt like it was further than that, but I arrived safely and was
able to check straight into my room as I had paid an extra 10GBP to have an
early check-in and I am so glad that I did.
I was officially knackered. One
of the reception ladies asked if I need help with my bags, but again I declined
and I made 2 trips to get everything down the one flight of stairs to my room
for the night. This was the first time I
had stayed in this hotel as I normally stay at their sister property in
Westminster, but with its location, for me this was a winner and being in a
twin room was a lot bigger than the ones I have had previously. It was perfect as I had to go through all my
bags to get enough clothes to last me for the next 10 days as I would be
leaving everything except my wheelie bag in storage as I traverse the country
during my stay.
It was nice to be in my room by 1.30pm. It is a windowless room, you have to pay more
for a window, so it is a little disconcerting to what time of the actual day it
is. I had to get some sleep, just for a
few hours and I woke at 4pm with a knocking at the door with the previous
guests looking for a lost cord that wasn’t there. It was a blessing in disguise to wake me up,
so I got up and went to the local chicken shop for an early dinner, came back
to the room, packed my wheelie bag for the next 10 days. It was a little hard as I was heading to
Brighton tomorrow for the wedding so I needed proper shoes and a dress and
makeup to the following day I would be back to London for the night and then on
a train the following day heading to the country side of Scotland with a
different requirement of clothes. So
without being a pain to the reception staff when I come back tomorrow and
making it easier for me as well I organised a small tote bag that I could ask
for tomorrow to do a swap of items and clothes and then recheck that in when I
leave on Sunday. I am not just a pretty
face you know! After sending off a
messages to Kate, KWT and the Addletons to let them know I had arrived, the
lights were off at 6pm and I woke at 10pm in a panic because I looked at my
watch that said 10 and I immediately thought it was 10am the next morning and
had a crazy second that I had missed my train at 9am. But it was still the same day, it was 10pm
and I closed my eyes and fell into a fitful and well-earned sleep, even with my
elephant feet.
Welcome back to the UK!!!
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