Leaving on a Jet Plane

I am going to do my best to recount my trip over several posts. The past week has been so full of activity that I will try to remember everything. It will be easier to keep up with things as I go along now.

Wednesday the 16th, Tie (my new step aunt and just all around soul mate) and I left Richmond to embark on our trip. We spent about 2 hours in the Richmond airport, just chilling and eating. Flew into Charlotte and had about 40 minutes to get to our next gate and recheck our baggage and catch our flight to Los Angeles. That was roughly a 9 hour flight. It was supposed to be 7, but due to bad storms in New Mexico and Colorado we had to detour and fly through Wyoming and Utah instead. It was a shame our flight was so late, because I wanted to look out the window and actually see the ground below. What's the point of a window seat at night? I shockingly was able to sleep on the plane, which is super rare for me. Anyhow, we got to L.A. at 8pm their time, so 11:00 Richmond time. LAX= worst airport I have ever been too. There was no signage or any clue as to where you are supposed to go after you pick up your luggage. We wandered around lost for quite a little bit, before figuring out that we needed to take a shuttle to the International terminal. We had an amazingly wonderful shuttle driver though and he dropped us right where we needed to be. Except you go inside and everything is opposite of the signs from outside. We finally took care of all our checking in and security checks, etc. Now we had about 4 hours to kill in the airport. I immediately put on my pajamas and we got some food. Hung around our terminal with a bunch of people heading to Sydney, so we contemplated sneaking on that flight instead! No celebrity sightings. :-(

I don't mind flying, but 21 hours on a plane is a hell of a long time. Completely missed Thursday because we were in the air the entire time. Thankfully each seat has its own personal television thing. I watched the Proposal, Star Trek and Wolverine, even though I've seen them all. Watched an episode of the Office, 2 Big Bang Theory's and How I Met Your Mother. Then I discovered the create your own jukebox feature and had fun with that. Eventually passed out with Damien Rice in my ear. The food was fantastic the entire ride. For airplane food I was extremely impressed. I also drank more orange juice on that flight than I have in the last 3 months.

Tie and I had a blast goofing off and being silly on the plane. You have to find ways to entertain yourself. I seriously regretted my pajamas when I went to the bathroom because there was an extremely cute guy sitting in the aisle by them. Oh well, I'll never see him again.

We landed at the Taiwan International Airport around 9 a.m. Friday morning.(so 9 pm Thursday night stateside) We were there for about and hour and a half. Then in the air again for 2 hours. Finally we landed in Kuala Lumpur around 1pm. I was so happy to be off of planes. Our luggage was in the last group unloaded and man they were slow getting it out. Oy! My dad was there to greet us, followed by Niesh! It was a goofy reunion, but nice to see familiar faces! Walked out to the car and was immediately assaulted by humidity... not my friend.

At least we had arrived!!!