Airports

Lunch at Paradise Cafe

 Friday I woke up around 10am, took a quick shower, and began packing. I was allowed 2 suitcases and 1 carry-on. 2 suitcases were NOT enough for this girl for 5 months… just sayin. But after some cutting back, I finally managed to fill 2 suitcases up to the brim with everything I would need to move into my home in Adelaide, Australia. After packing up, I went out for lunch with my sister, Al, at my favorite restaurant, Paradise Café. We had a delicious lunch of soups, salads, and iced coffee, and got to sit and chat for a while before running some last minute errands and heading home to get ready to leave. I was a stressed out mess… gathering everything I would need for the trip. Luckily, both my sisters had studied abroad before in other countries, and so they had some very helpful advice. I was worried about my student visa, which I had just applied for Tuesday and hadn’t heard back about. I got online to check the status and discovered it had been accepted, all I had to do was print out the confirmation. I also didn’t have an adapter or converter, which I learned from my sister KC, are both necessary. I also had to suspend my cell phone service, which was straight up PAINFUL. In the next hour I managed to have everything pretty well packed.. every charger.. every sock.. every form of ID I’ve ever had.. and I felt prepared to leave. 

Goodbye Indy!

Dad, Al, KC, TJ, and I got to the airport around 5:30pm and checked in. We met Mom at Patachou and the 6 of us had dinner together. When we finished around 6:45pm, my family walked me to the security check. There was a sign that said, “Only ticketed passengers beyond this point.” I turned around and looked behind me at my dad, my mom, my sisters, and my little brother standing there.. unable to go any further with me. I hugged each of them tightly, Mom took tons of pictures, we said our goodbyes, and I began walking towards the security line… leaving them all behind. They were letting me go. It wasn’t till I got in line that the tears came.. unexpected.. suddenly. It was like 1 second everything was cool, and the next my eyes were filled with tears and I felt like losing it. I looked back.. I could still see the 5 of them standing there… watching me go… and I waved again, weakly. It took every bit of self-control I had not to run back to them… not to run back home.

My sibs and I in Wisconsin

It was there in line, the second I walked away from my family, that it became real for me. It was those first 60 seconds of walking alone.. completely alone.. that it truly became a reality for me. All at once I was on my own. It was up to me from that moment forth. I was holding back tears and shaky going through security, but it went just fine. I bought a bottle of water and some gum and got to my gate. I was terrified. Scared to death. I realized then what a completely dependent person I am. I rely on everyone else to take care of me, and I am next to clueless on how to be on my own. I like feeling safe and comfortable and surrounded by people who care about me. This adventure is completely out of character.. but I know it’s going to be a great experience and I will learn so much.

Anyhow, my flight (from Indy to LA) was supposed to leave at 7:50pm, but got delayed till 9pm, which means I would be arriving in LA at 10pm. That made me really nervous about making my connecting flight from LA to Sydney, which started boarding at 10. I rushed off the plane and frantically looked around for the gate listing, but just then I heard an overhead speaker mentioning Sydney. I looked over and it just happened that the gate neighboring the gate I had just exited was my flight to Sydney. And it had just started boarding.

The first thing I noticed about my flight was the diverse group of people. Then I noticed the accents.. some British, some Indian, and a LOT of Australian. All of a sudden I was self-conscious about my speech, simply talking. I felt that the second I opened my mouth, all I would immediately mean to people is ‘American’. I quietly waited my turn and eventually boarded my plane to Sydney, what would be a 14 hour and 21 minute flight.  Thanks to Mom, I had a window seat toward the back. I overheard a young guy in the seat behind me chatting with his new seatmates. He was clearly Australian and was having a nice chat with the American couple next to him going to visit their son who was interning in Australia. It was the first genuine Australian accent I’d ever heard.. and it was beautiful! I simply had to just sit there and listen to him speak for as long as I could.. which is totally embarrassing but no one could tell! I can’t describe it.. the sound of his speech, his words.. the accent he had as he cheerfully talked about his home-country.. the elegant, charming pronunciation of each word.. sentence.. it was wonderful. I honestly would have been happy just listening to him talk for the 14 hours and 21 minutes. I think it will be a loooong time till I get used to the Australian accent.

The flight to Sydney was long.. and dark. We took off Friday night and landed in Sydney Sunday morning. I missed Saturday completely! It just didn’t happen for me. It was weird too that the entire flight it was nighttime outside. I’d never experienced such a long night. I was able to doze off on and off throughout the flight.. watched a couple movies.. One called Never Let Me Go with Kiera Knightly (perfect Nicky drama movie), and a cute one called Flipped about young love. Overall, the flight wasn’t as bad as I expected. Though I would’ve liked to get more sleep.

Arrived in Sydney right at dawn Sunday July 10^th. I felt SO lost when I got off the plane and walked into that terminal. I didn’t understand what the signs meant.. even though they were in English.. so I wandered around for a few minutes then finally asked for help. I had to get in line at customs and it took over an HOUR to get through it. Once I got to the front of the line, there was some issue with my visa, because I’d forgotten to include my middle name. They took me aside and corrected it pretty easily on a computer. The guy then sent me to the bus station, where I needed to catch a bus to the Domestic Flight Terminal. I got my 2 gigantic suitcases from baggage claim, and dragged them outside to the bus, where I realized I needed some money. So I had to go back in, ask directions to the money exchange, and get some Australian cash. Man, their money is so pretty compared to ours! I finally got onto the bus with my 2 suitcases in tow somehow.. didn’t really get the money situation so I accidentally didn’t give the bus driver enough money. He asked me for 50 more cents but I had no idea what that looked like. I gave him the only coin I had gotten, which was 20 cents, but he was already tired of me so he waved me on.

I finally got to the Domestic Flight Terminal and tried to self-check-in, which didn’t work. So I waited in another line for about a half hour to check in and get my boarding pass. Then had to go through security, where they stopped me for having a “dangerous sharp object” in my carry-on, which turned out to be a corkscrew wine opener. For some reason that made me even more suspicious, so the security guy dumped out the entire contents of my bag.. which was a LOT, let me tell you. So, after loading all my bag contents into 3 trays and running them through the x-ray machine again, he finally let me go. Whew! But the hard part isn’t over yet..

Here in a couple hours I’m catching my flight to Adelaide where I’m hoping to find the Accommodation guy that’s picking me up and taking me to my housing. Then, I’ll have to meet my housemates and settle in as best I can before going to sleep so I can wake up early enough tomorrow to make it to orientation at 9am.  I’ll be keeping in touch!