Somewhere Between Here and There

Traveling abroad is a pretty unique thing, to say the least. I think what is even more interesting is that there is really no way to know how you're going to react to the idea of being away from home for 5 months. I think even if some psychologists somewhere did a study to understand the behavior of travelers, we still wouldn't really have a clear idea of what's really like until you do it.

It's a really hard thing to explain. So I won't. I'll just say that as soon as my mom pulled away from dropping me at my friend's apartment and I walked up the stairs to where I would be spending my last night in the States, I did quite a bit of crying. Sad, happy, excited, or maybe just so much emotion it all cancelled out into numbness. So much numbness that I had to cry about it. I don't really know. Like I said, hard to explain.

The same thing happened on the drive to the airport. But as soon as I walked through the doors of the Indianapolis Airport, I was dry-eyed and nearly out of my mind with excitement. I don't think I've ever felt more ready for anything in my whole life. Not to say I wasn't nervous or anything. I was just very ready for whatever was ahead of me, including the things that made me nervous.

Such as my bag weight. For those of you biting your nails since my last post (and it's been about 5 minutes since I posted it, so I'm sure all of your nails are still intact), here is the final weigh in:

Success! From the check-in counter I grab a quick breakfast from the food court and relaxed before heading through security, which took about 5 minutes. 

(Indianapolis Food Court)

I waited for about two hours for my plane to board (which flew by unbelievably quickly thanks to my Nintendo DS). The plane to Chicago took off on time with no problems. It was supposed to be an hour flight but it felt more like 20 minutes. It seemed that as soon as we hit 30,000ft, we began our decent. 

I scored a window seat and got a good hot of Indiana and a little bit of Lake Michigan:

Once at the O'Hare Airport, I was immediately greeted by an extreme increase in population. Just in the walk from one terminal to another I probably saw 200 people or more. Since I had an additional 3 hours to kill I decided to get some exercise and walked an equivalent of a few city blocks. I was highly entertained by the airport, despite the huge crowds of people.

 (Shots of the moving walkway light show between terminals)

(A picture of an advertisement for Chicago's museum. A guy I lovingly christened the Wifi-o-sarus.)

After walking around for a good half hour, I picked up an Auntie Anne's soft pretzel out of sheer tradition's sake (I thought of you, Mom!) and walked around some more. Realizing the pretzel only made me hungrier, I made a healthier decision and got a chicken salad wrap and cup of fruit.

Finally, I boarded the second plane. Behold my second window seat! After about an hour and a half of flying (this flight ended up being about 4 1/2 hours total), I looked out my window to see we were beginning to cross the Rockies, something I had been looking forward to doing. I've never been any farther (further?) west than the Rockies, so I took full advantage. I've included just a fraction of the pictures I took while flying:

It was really a perfect day, flying-wise. I have never had such luck with flights. Everything was on time. Everything went smoothly. And by this point, it was late afternoon, so with a clear sky and setting sun, I got some excellent pictures of my home country. I think it's a good thing I saw a different side (literarily) of the US before leaving it for so long. I was reminded just how big the US is and how drastically diverse it's geography is. As much as I enjoyed seeing it, however, by the time I landed in LA, I was seriously craving summer colors. The US is quiet brown when not covered by snow (not just in Indiana) this time of year.

Speaking of LA, you would think that one of the most traveled airports in the country would be a little more user friendly, wouldn't you? That was not what I found; on the contrary, I walked for almost an hour before I found the Air New Zealand terminal, despite asking for directions and following signs correctly. So once I got up to the counter, I was sweaty but relieved. From there, I made a few last phone calls to Mom and Jeff (SO glad I got to hear their voices before I left!) and headed through security a second time (this one took about 10 minutes).

By this point in the day, it's nearing 8PM and my boarding time is around 9:15PM. I was also nearing starvation after a full day of travel. I had hoped I could find a place that served nice, warm, filling food. My only options, however, turned out to be a restaurant that served a hamburger at $11 and Burger King. I decided to go with the $1 burger, which I finished, but reluctantly.

My last meal:

After that, I found a few fellow IFSA-Butler people at the gate and began to get to know a few of them. Then it was on to the biggest airplane I've ever seen.

Finally my luck ran out and I was in the middle of the middle row of seats. On the bright side, I did sit next to a rather attractive, under 30 year-old, extremely polite Australian that I think a few of my friends back home would trade their left arms to sit by, so it wasn't a complete loss.

I was highly impressed by the entertainment options: 25ish movie selections with no limit to how many you could watch, 15ish television shows, not to mention countless music selections. (I was a little less impressed by the airline food, but I was too tired to eat much anyway.) I decided to kill the first 2 of 12 hours by watching 500 Days of Summer (which I highly recommend) and then found myself struggling to stay awake. So I switched over to some very low-key Debussy piano music and settled in for a very uncomfortable sleep. The few Z's I caught were only managed by means of the pillow the flight supplied, the extra neck pillow I brought, and Lumpy, my blue and brown stuffed dog and ever faithful travel companion.

To be continued!