The past five days have been crazy. I’ve finished up the
quarter and taken finals, earning my Associate’s Degree and then registered for
classes this Fall, as well as made other preparations for transitioning to BYU.
I’ve worked my final shift at the theater. I’ve said goodbye to a lot of people that I’ll probably never see again. I’ve
packed up my whole life in boxes.
Basically, I’ve been running around trying to get things
done, and had to run out the door. I didn’t even get to say “goodbye, house”
when I left my home in West Richland this morning, with no plans of returning
for the next 6 months. It seems I’m always a little bit behind and I have to
scurry around like a shrew to get through life. I’m not complaining. I’m just
saying I wish I had time to take a breath now and then.
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| An analogy for my life |
At any rate, this morning (when I say this morning, I mean
about 30 hours ago) I left my house and made the long trip to the Sea-Tac
airport. It seemed like a way to short drive. I rushed into the airport and
attempted to check in. It took forever to find someone to help me, and when
they did it took like 2 minutes, and I just barely made the deadline for
baggage check-in, and then just barely boarded on time. Like a shrew.
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| Home sweet home |
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| I know the focus is the road in this picture, but if you look just above it, there's some lovely landscape |
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| Washington slowly gets more treesome |
My first flight took about ten hours. I kept myself
entertained by watching John Carter and then Man on a Ledge, to movies I never
bothered watching in theaters. And they were just about as terrible as I expected
them to be, but you never really notice on a plane until the end of it,
fortunately. I also got a little bit of sleep, about two hours, putting my
total amount of sleep at 4 hours for the past 48. I haven’t flown in about 4 or
5 years, so it was also very exciting just to experience those feelings again.
It also made me think about how weird flying is. I mean
basically we get in a metal tube with wings attached to it. And they’re just
like “it’ll fly” and we assume someone has done the math. Which they have, it’s
just crazy to think that we’re flying because this thing that weighs several
tons has some wings that are the right shape attached to it. What’s even more
crazy is thinking that the thing propelling it is an engine. Basically,
something that uses the mechanism of exploding to create kinetic energy. I know
that we’ve tested and calculated and people who are smarter than me have
figured out exactly how to account for all the forces affecting these things,
but I just think that if you explained the idea behind them to scientists a few
hundred years ago, they’d call that idea insane. So next time you’re on a
plane, remember that you’re in a several ton metal tube propelled by
explosions. I hope that doesn’t freak you out too much.
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| Getting close to Tokyo |
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It was pretty interesting to fly westbound though. Although
we lost a day by crossing the international date line, we pretty much only lost
2 hours (departed Seattle at 1 pm, arrived in Tokyo at 3 pm) because we were
chasing the sun. The international date line itself is pretty confusing. On my
return flight, for example, I’m going to arrive 6 hours before my departure
(according to local times).
After those ten long hours, I got to the Tokyo Narita
airport. Don’t ask me what Tokyo is like because I have no idea. I basically
showed up, got to where I needed to transfer, and then left. Although I hoped I
could see some part of the city, I was a little more scared of missing a
flight. However, after this trip I’m really hoping more travel is in my future,
so I doubt this will be my only visit to Tokyo.
The next flight was between Tokyo and Singapore. The All
Nippon Airline flight was a lot nicer than the United flight that got me to
Tokyo. Although I was a little stranged out by the inflight meal. I did try
everything, even though I sort of wish I had skipped some of it.
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| Everything is about as unappetizing as it looks. The thing in the little box was some beef and rice which was actually pretty good. |
The ANA flight was a lot shorter than my previous one. It
was a lot less comfortable too, though. I had a window seat, so I didn’t bother
standing up the entire time. Also, there was this awkward moment where I had
taken my shoes off and was feeling around to see where they were left, and I felt
something, turned out it was the foot of the guy sitting next to me. I spent
the majorty of this flight sleeping though, which makes sense because although
it was between 5-11pm local time, it was really between 1-7 am for my circadian
rhythm.
I arrived in Singapore pretty close to midnight, local time.
Again, I have no idea what Singapore is really like, I never left the airport.
But I have to say, the airport is probably the coolest and nicest one I’ve ever
been to. It was basically a mall. There were tons of shops, a butterfly room
and koi pond, free computers to use (free wifi too, but not worth the hassle),
and each gate had its own security checkpoint.
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| Does not capture how nice this airport was, but I was very scared of missing a flight, so I only took one |
Also, because of the timing, there were lots of people
sleeping. I didn’t want to be too pervasive, but I did get a picture:
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| Comfy |
This wasn’t even the best one. People were sleeping in
random places everywhere. Benches, right on the hard ground, and on top of
vending machines. Okay, that last one was made up, but I’m sure it’s happened.
At the time of writing this, I’m on my final flight to
Perth. We’ve been getting crazy turbulence. I wish I would’ve slept during this
leg, as that would’ve best adjusted me for being in Perth time, but I guess
I’ll just have to tough it out. After all, at the end of this I will have gone
72 hours on 10 hours of sleep.
I promise to post this as soon as I get in (probably
tonight… which for anyone in America means tomorrow). And there is more to
come, as my adventure has just begun! That even rhymed.
Oh! And I almost forgot: these are Rian’s best quotes from
the ride to Seattle:
My mom was explaining what a lumiere is, and before she
could finish, Rian interrupted to say “Blah blah blah, I already know.” She
doesn’t..
Rian and Olivia were playing catchphrase, Olivia gives the
hint that it’s an animal that “can be a pet or a snack.” Rian guessed a
chicken. (It was a goldfish).
Later, Sara and Olivia were both trying to help Rian guess
correctly. Sara said, “Dogs don’t have hands, they have…” “Whiskers!” was
Rian’s reply.
It was hard to say goodbye to those 3 goofy girls. I’m
really going to miss them.
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