Adventures of Huckleberry Finn..not exactly!
If only travelling could be an adventure every time!
Alright, it was my first time to the USA. I was obviously thrilled, trying to control all the emotions - a royal mix of joy, anticipation, fear, hallucination and sometimes, void-ness (briefly meaning not knowing what to say or do). The problem with travel is the flight journey. I used to enjoy flying, but those were 30 mins - 3 hours flights. Now, when you have to travel 15000+ kilometers, it is definitely not going to be enjoyable. Though we have transits, they aren't always planned. So, here we begin..
When rain gods decide to visit deserts (especially on the day you are travelling), thunderstorms happen. When thunderstorms happen once in 50 years, runways get drowned and flights get diverted. So, on one such eventful day, the flight which was supposed to land in Doha, got diverted to Dubai. Unfortunately, Dubai airport denied entry due to lack of space (all flights from Doha were diverted). So, we were jay-flying in the air for a while before getting a green signal to land in Damam. Now, Damam is a new name..after looking for the whereabouts of Damam on the display map, restlessness started to unfold. Thank god for the aisle seat! After the drill of re-fueling (wait time + fueling took an hour), we took off to Doha, only to find 3000+ stranded passengers, waiting in the queue and frantically yelling, calling and complaining. What a sight in a foreign airport.
The next big thing to do was to WAIT. The Business class flyers were escorted to a nearby hotel for overnight stay, while the economy class settled on the carpet floors of the airport. Again, a sight to remember in a foreign airport. So, we ate, waited, walked, got worried, waited, stood in queue for tickets, settled next to charging points near washrooms and finally at 1 AM, which was 15 hours later, we got tickets to a flight bound to Philadelphia. There was no more excitement..we just wanted to get into some flight and sleep. Philadelphia or Slovakia didn't matter at that time. We ran to the flight. It is not a figure of speech. We actually ran to the gate to board the flight. Again, what a photo-worthy sight!
Sleep is a wonderful thing. It is like magic. The moment you fall asleep, you forget who you are, where you are. After being woken by the air hostess for a dinner or breakfast (I lost the sense of time - I want to take a minute to thank her for waking me though), I went back to sleep. After a while, I woke up fresh and realized we were flying over the Atlantic Ocean. Atlantic ocean is world's second largest ocean with a depth ranging from 8900 feet to 3 times 8900 feet. The point is - I was scared. I can stand on the terrace of a high-storied building and look down, but fear gripped me while flying over the deep ocean. Nature is mighty. And I suddenly had this strong wish to live long. Come what may :D
When we were a few nautical miles away from the magical land of the USA, we had to take a detour as one of the co-passengers was sick. Now, the place was Goose Bay. Another unheard name. It is a civilian airport in Canada, with no planes around. The passenger was taken to the emergency care and as luck has it, the conveyor belt was damaged while porting out the luggage. So, another good 3 hours of wait time. The silver lining was I saw snow for the first time. I went out of the aircraft for a brief moment and actually felt the snowfall :)
Finally, we took off to Philadelphia. We knew our adventure luck followed us. We had missed the flight to Dallas. We stayed overnight in Philly, made plans to visit the beach, but ended up sleeping. Next morning at 4AM, bearing the chilly winds of Philly (it was a delight!), we boarded the flight and reached the destination. As I complete writing this post, after almost an year of this wonderful adventure, I realize we are a very minute, tiny spec in this vast universe, which is the absolute unconquerable super power.
Alright, it was my first time to the USA. I was obviously thrilled, trying to control all the emotions - a royal mix of joy, anticipation, fear, hallucination and sometimes, void-ness (briefly meaning not knowing what to say or do). The problem with travel is the flight journey. I used to enjoy flying, but those were 30 mins - 3 hours flights. Now, when you have to travel 15000+ kilometers, it is definitely not going to be enjoyable. Though we have transits, they aren't always planned. So, here we begin..
When rain gods decide to visit deserts (especially on the day you are travelling), thunderstorms happen. When thunderstorms happen once in 50 years, runways get drowned and flights get diverted. So, on one such eventful day, the flight which was supposed to land in Doha, got diverted to Dubai. Unfortunately, Dubai airport denied entry due to lack of space (all flights from Doha were diverted). So, we were jay-flying in the air for a while before getting a green signal to land in Damam. Now, Damam is a new name..after looking for the whereabouts of Damam on the display map, restlessness started to unfold. Thank god for the aisle seat! After the drill of re-fueling (wait time + fueling took an hour), we took off to Doha, only to find 3000+ stranded passengers, waiting in the queue and frantically yelling, calling and complaining. What a sight in a foreign airport.
The next big thing to do was to WAIT. The Business class flyers were escorted to a nearby hotel for overnight stay, while the economy class settled on the carpet floors of the airport. Again, a sight to remember in a foreign airport. So, we ate, waited, walked, got worried, waited, stood in queue for tickets, settled next to charging points near washrooms and finally at 1 AM, which was 15 hours later, we got tickets to a flight bound to Philadelphia. There was no more excitement..we just wanted to get into some flight and sleep. Philadelphia or Slovakia didn't matter at that time. We ran to the flight. It is not a figure of speech. We actually ran to the gate to board the flight. Again, what a photo-worthy sight!
Sleep is a wonderful thing. It is like magic. The moment you fall asleep, you forget who you are, where you are. After being woken by the air hostess for a dinner or breakfast (I lost the sense of time - I want to take a minute to thank her for waking me though), I went back to sleep. After a while, I woke up fresh and realized we were flying over the Atlantic Ocean. Atlantic ocean is world's second largest ocean with a depth ranging from 8900 feet to 3 times 8900 feet. The point is - I was scared. I can stand on the terrace of a high-storied building and look down, but fear gripped me while flying over the deep ocean. Nature is mighty. And I suddenly had this strong wish to live long. Come what may :D
When we were a few nautical miles away from the magical land of the USA, we had to take a detour as one of the co-passengers was sick. Now, the place was Goose Bay. Another unheard name. It is a civilian airport in Canada, with no planes around. The passenger was taken to the emergency care and as luck has it, the conveyor belt was damaged while porting out the luggage. So, another good 3 hours of wait time. The silver lining was I saw snow for the first time. I went out of the aircraft for a brief moment and actually felt the snowfall :)
Finally, we took off to Philadelphia. We knew our adventure luck followed us. We had missed the flight to Dallas. We stayed overnight in Philly, made plans to visit the beach, but ended up sleeping. Next morning at 4AM, bearing the chilly winds of Philly (it was a delight!), we boarded the flight and reached the destination. As I complete writing this post, after almost an year of this wonderful adventure, I realize we are a very minute, tiny spec in this vast universe, which is the absolute unconquerable super power.
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