From Dc to Paris to India

We left my house around 1pm on Saturday to go to the airport. In the car was my mom, dad, Anu, and I. We stopped at the bank, deposited some money, and started the two hour drive to the Dulles international airport in DC. When we arrived at the airport, we checked in, dropped off my luggage, and said our goodbyes.

I then found my gate, and watched “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” to pass the time. I stood in a long line to board the plane and finally walked all the way to the last row of the airplane, Row 52. I had an isle seat (Thank God), and sat next to a nice man named Mark. He was traveling for a work trip and works for a company that is all about free speech. We settled in for our trip and had a nice flight. Watched a few movies, ate the airplane dinner. Got breakfast about 2 hours later because of the time change. Classic. I tried to get some sleep but was so uncomfortable that it became impossible.

We landed in Paris, leaving me with about one and a half hours before my next flight boarded. After my security check and running around the airport to catch the flight, I had five minutes before flight boarding.... but then the plane was delayed for another hour, so I was back to watching more of “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”. We finally boarded and flew nine hours to Chennai, India. I had a window seat and luckily caught up on a lot of my sleep. I sat next to a kind Finnish women who was definitely a serious book worm. I don’t think she slept a wink the entire flight, which was nice because I didn’t have to worry about waking her up. The flight attendants came around to serve lunch and asked if I wanted vegetable or chicken. Why the word “vegetable” came out of my mouth, I will never know. They gave me some sort of Indian dish with rice, lentils, and tofu.... I picked around the tofu. Overall, the flight was nice.

We landed in Chennai, and went directly to the line for immigration. I stood in that line for probably 90 minutes. Every minute, I got a little more nervous about what questions they would ask me when it was my turn. The long line gave me a lot of time to pray that I would say the right thing. Eventually, I got to the desk. There was a camera pointed directly at my face. I was probably trying a little too hard not to look out of place. He asked me a few questions about the trip and I answered accordingly. He then asked me another question and I did not understand what he said at all. I had to have him repeat it about 4 times and then he just left and got another man to come talk to me. He was pretty hard to understand too. I think that they eventually just got annoyed with me and stamped my passport. So I was done with immigration, that was a relief.

I went and picked up my luggage and followed the signs saying “domestic flights”. It turns out, I had to leave the airport to get to my next flight. I walked out the doors and immediately felt the humidity. There were so many people. A massive crowd of people was standing behind a fence. They were all holding up signs for the people they were waiting for. Once I got past this, I saw another sign for the domestic flights. I followed it but didn’t see any more signs. A couple of people walked up to me asking if I needed a taxi. They directed me to a place to stand and told me that someone would come pick me up, to drive me to the next terminal. I was very confused, feeling a bit anxious and scared, but I did what they said. Then, a golf cart came and picked me up and drove me to the next terminal. They helped me get my luggage onto a cart that only had three wheels. Go figure. So I struggled for a while after that, trying to get my bags into the airport. Once I was in, I asked a lot of people where to go and I was told that I couldn’t check in for a couple more hours, so I just had to sit down and wait. This is the point where the fear really hit me. I wanted to FaceTime my family but everyone in the waiting area was so silent, you could hear a pin drop. I didn’t want to be that one American yacking away on her phone. So..... I watched more of “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”.

When the clock hit 4am I headed to check in. To my surprise, the guy next to me in line started talking to me. We just talked about our trips and what we were doing. Once I got to the counter, I came to the realization that I was not at the check in for my airline. Classic. So I had to go get in line again (for the correct airline). After that, I went through security and made my way to my gate. I had a couple more hours until the flight, so I walked over to a cafe. To my delight, I saw a familiar face. The same guy I had talked to in line. I went and sat with him and we were able to talk some more. I have no idea how to spell his name but phonetically, you would pronounce it (Kee-shure). He then went to board his flight. I got up to go back to my gate and realized that he had left his phone behind. I had to run over to his gate and caught him just before he boarded. I had been pretty nervous and I felt a lot better after having met Keeshure. It was good to talk to someone. I was going a little stir crazy. So I sat down at my gate and watched some more of “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”.

This was a much smaller flight and took about 100 minutes. There was a lot of fog over Bangalore, so the plane had to circle back around before landing. After we landed, I collected my luggage and headed for the exit. I was so happy to see Gillian and Pastor Bryan standing outside. We got in a car with their friend Chris, and drove to their house. Pastor Bryan scared me when he said that we had to go to a place where they would question me further, because I am a foreigner. Gillian’s laughter then told me that it was only a joke. Apparently, Pastor Bryan is quite the jokester. I guess I’ll see about that.