So... International Flights

To start off, it has been hectic for a while now. I've been busy ever since I got back from Blue Stars, so I haven't been able to do very much prep for living in Rome. Even though I took an Italian class and two rome prep classes last semester, apparently, it didn't all get saved in my memory. So I was trying to pack and remember things that I needed to take, and things that I would need to have with me. When I think about it now, I don't really know what I was thinking. :) I was too worried about whether I would have everything I needed, that I didn't think about how to get to where I needed to be, and the exact steps to take in different situations. 





Cedar Rapids:


Chronologically Speaking, it kind of started shaky at the Cedar Rapids Airport, when the lady behind the counter wasn't as friendly as she could have been. I then tried to used the automated passport-check machine, it didn't like me either and referred me to the devil woman behind the counter. Luckily, a woman budged in front of me in line and I got helped by a man that had been helping someone else. He took my passport and checked my luggage. However, my check-in bag was too heavy, so I had to switch some of the things in my suitcase over to my carry-on. Apparently if I had left my bag at >50lbs I would have had to pay $200. So I quickly transferred stuff over.

Once my checked bag got a tag on it and my ticket, I took my bag to the scan machine, took the lock off, and gave the lock to the man scanning my bag, so that he could put it on after scanning. This would have worked wonderfully, but there was a random tourist-y man with a giant black camera distracting Scanner Man and taking pictures of his luggage next to the machine. So when the Scanner Man went to put my bag into the scanner, he dropped the lock. I thought he saw it so I didn't say anything at first, then realized he completely forgot because of the crazy tourist guy. So I asked him if he saw where the lock went, because it fell. Then everyone started searching for it. Well, except the tourist man because he was busily taking pictures. Click. Click. Click! We found the lock. My bag went through the machine and the lock was put on. Whew!

After that I was a little more than agitated from all that because I have very little patience for incompetence. I went and sat down to re-organize my check-on luggage and personal items bag.


---Side-Note: There was a little girl in the Airport that had squeak shoes, where every time she stepped there was a big squeak. ---


I then was trying to figure out what I needed to do, and where I had to be and when. SqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueak! My iPod wasn't getting my emails. And there was a notice that kept popping up. SqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueak! My phone was completely different and it's Windows operated, and I couldn't figure out how to get a hold of my mom and dad without my phone's contacts. SqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueak! I gave up on trying to fix that, and let mom handle it. SqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSqueakSque X "Thank goodness that girls's mom took off her squeak shoes." -Dad


 I feel really bad because I was trying to figure out how to get all of my things in order when Oma and Tyler walked in to say bye. Quick hugs! Picture! Bye! About that time, I finally got my carry-on organized.

Then my name was announced over the intercom to get to the flight as quickly as possible. So quick goodbyes to Mom, Erin, and Dad. Hug! Hug! Hug! Then I had to quickly go through security so that they would stop calling my name on the intercom. Beep! I forgot to take off my belt. I was scrambling to put everything back into its place and scrambling to put things back on. Then I was at the gate, and my carry-on needed a green sticker, so I had to go back and get it. Then they took that bag to put it somewhere else. I don't know where. I boarded the plane and sat down. Since I was flying United Express, there were only three seats in each row. One seat on the right and two on the left. I sat by myself on the right.

I was in my seat for almost a minute when the plane started to move and head out. My personal items bag was too big to fit under the seat in front of me, so I had to put it up in the glove compartment. I had a window seat for this flight. I watched the plane take off and watched the ground fall away. It was really cool because the plane had to make a loop to face the right direction, so we were at like at a 45° angle. The entire flight was me watching the cities and fields pass by. It was really awesome, I even saw the Mississippi River and the interstate that we normally take to get to Indianapolis. It was a very short flight, only 40-ish minutes long. I got my carry-on and went into the Chicago Airport. 



Chicago:


I had received a second "ticket-like" ticket from Cedar Rapids that told me to Terminal 2 and connect to Montreal through United using Air Canada. Well I arrived in Terminal 2 so I didn't have to go very far. I didn't know where to go, but I knew I needed to go to Gate E2. So I asked someone at an information desk. Then I went to that gate, and talked to the desk lady who was really friendly. Yay! She did tell me that my carry-on wouldn't fit in the over head because they are small overheads. I took out all the books that I could and put them in my personal items bag. I also took out my Blue Stars sweatshirt and wore it.

I had some down time between this next flight, so I had a pretzel and a coke at Auntie Annes. I then sat and listened to some Robyn songs until boarding. Then I had to go back to the information desk and get my seat number, because I didn't have it yet. Finally, I got on the plane. My carry-on didn't fit into the overhead. I ended up taking out Princess Sophie so that it would finally fit in the overhead compartment. I had the aisle seat so I didn't really get to watch take off. Sad. Thats okay, I put in my headphones and put Sophie around my neck and promptly fell asleep. I woke up when my foot got bumped by the snack cart going down the aisle. I did the whole wakeful resting until there was some lighter turbulence, so I took out the Canada document that the attendant gave me and filled that out. I also took out my next flight ticket and wrote down the gate number. Around this time the turbulence was fairly steady, I looked out the window and it was raining. Then as we started nearing Montreal it got really dark, windy, and cloudy. The landing into Montreal was probably the most scary because the closer we got to the ground, the more uncontrollable the turbulence/wind/Irene was. We landed just fine, but it was like a roller coaster landing. I arrived about 12 minutes later than scheduled. I was dashing into the airport to get to my next flight that was leaving in 30 minutes. 



Montreal:


So I got into the terminal just fine, but I wasn't really sure where I was going. I did know that I needed to get there fast. I had to go up 4 different escalators and then go through really long hallways until I saw "Connections." I then went through the passport stamp thing with the document that I filled out earlier. I had to wait in line for 20 minutes; now mind you I was already late to the boarding, and it took about 8 minutes to get to the "Connections." So as soon as I got my passport stamped I scurried to the information desk asking after flight AC 982 to Rome. There was a lady with a walkie-talkie who called the gate that I was going to, in order to tell them to expect me. I had no time to stop and see anything, or get something to eat. I rushed onto the plane, and got to my seat. Sigh!

My overhead compartment was full when I got there, so I put my carry-on in the overhead across the aisle, I was trying to close it when the attendant said to leave the compartment open, and they will close it later. Well, later came along and I had to take it out because it was to big, and she moved it up to one of the Business Seating overhead compartments.

So once I got that figured out, everyone just sat there for a long time. The captain said that we were waiting for the luggage to get loaded, and that because it was raining and windy, it was taking longer than expected. And after all that was taken care of, the plane started to get ready for take off. Now the first flight was in a small aircraft (3 rows of seats), the second flight was a little bigger (4 rows of seats), and this last flight was giant! It had 8 rows of seats and two aisles. I got to watch the take off, yay window seat! Then it got cloudy really quick, and there was a lot of turbulence, not as much as the previous flight though. Well there wasn't really any view outside what-so-ever so I played with the touch screen TV in my seat. I ended up having to use the airplane's ear buds because my nice Bose headphones wouldn't work in the jack. I wanted to go to sleep, but the plane said that they were going to serve dinner, and I was more hungry than tired. So I watched some of the movie Gnomeo and Juliet to pass the time till we could eat.

They were serving specialized meals first, and my seat partner had requested "no pork, no beef" so she got this weird Arabian dish that she wasn't very pleased with. Anywho, I had the option of pasta or chicken, so I asked for the chicken. With my chicken was: rice medley, gravy sauce, corn and veggie salad, chocolate brownie, and dinner roll with whipped butter. I ate it in that order. Except the veggie salad with corn had a weird spice in it so I didn't finish. The rest was good. I also had water and coke.

With my dinner out of the way, I finished watching my movie, which was good, but I wouldn't buy it or pay money to see it in theaters. After the movie was over I snuggled up and took a sleep/nap/thing. I slept for quite a while and then I woke up because my legs were uncomfortable. I then touched the map on the TV and looked at where we were at on the map, GPS tracking or something, I don't know. I still had 5 hours to go! Woohoo! So I went back to sleep.

I woke up again when we were over the Celtic Sea according to the map, and it was light outside, but I couldn't see anything when I looked out because the light hurt my eyes. So I took a short nap until the plane was over land. About and hour later, I woke up and cracked the blind open and saw the Alps, they are very pretty by the way, and I was up for the rest of the flight. They served breakfast, which was a muffin for me and a bagel for the person next to me. The muffin looked delicious until I bit into it and found out it was banana. I ate a little of it because I was really hungry, but only three bites. I also had some coffee with milk and sugar. I then went to the bathroom and came back. About that time is when we started flying over Rome and getting ready to land.


Rome:

I got my personal items bag from the floor and my carry-on from business class and got off the plane. I then took a shuttle bus to the airport and went through a very long line of people to get my passport checked, they didn't stamp it though, and I thought they were supposed to. I didn't question it though because I was groggy still and not sure how I would say it.

I then went through this hallway place and saw the baggage claim conveyor belts, I waited at one particular conveyor belt until I realized that it was the wrong belt. I then went to the correct belt and waited. However, apparently my luggage wasn't there because the next flight of people that came in started crowding around it. I then needed to figure out where to go so I went towards the doors that said customs. Well apparently that was the exit, so I had to find someone to help me get back into the baggage area to get to the ground services stand/counter/place. So I had to go through the metal detector thing again and take out my electronics and take off my belt and watch. And then put them back on and put everything away. I then went to the ground services desk and told them about my luggage, and showed them my luggage claim ticket. I then gave them the address for the studio. Okay now I was really tired, irritated, and hungry. And I think I had a headache at this point too. Also, I was hot and sweaty. I just wanted to leave the airport. So I texted mom and said my luggage was still in Montreal, and I had no way of contacting Katlin, so I was just gonna get a taxi and go to the housing office.

I went out side and followed the taxi signs, and saw several people standing next to the signs that looked like they would help because they were wearing uniforms and wore lanyards with their license on it. I couldn't really figure out what they were saying and I kept repeating "one person, center of Rome, flat rate." And they said yeah, yeah, yeah. I went to their car and they put my carry-on into the trunk. So this is when it gets kind of sketch. I think back now and I want to hit myself over the head and go duh, Aliya! But anyway, there was a man that opened the door to the car and started to get in, so I got confused, and thought that he was gonna take my cab instead, but apparently we were sharing a cab. So I got in. The other guy in the cab was from Dublin. There were two people in the front with the white taxi uniforms, and they had a taxi sticker on their window, so I knew that they were a taxi company, but I wasn't too happy/proud about the situation. I got to where I was supposed to be, but I ended up paying through the nose. Because I was pretty sure that the flat rate was 40 €, I got out 40 €. The driver said that the flat rate was 95 €. So I was really unhappy, but paid him because I needed to get away from these people as fast as possible. I then took my things and left, to go to the housing office, which took me a while because I couldn't find my way around very well. I asked a couple of people to point me in the right direction. I did end up getting there but it had taken a good 20 minutes.

So I made it to the housing office, gave a copy of my passport, and 20 €, and signed my name on a sheet of paper. I then got my keys, yay!!! Finally. Luckily the office manager called a taxi from a legit taxi service to take me to my apartment, and this guy was really nice. He was trying to understand what I was here for, and what I could say in Italian.  By the way, the housing office people were really nice too! So I got to my apartment and it was fairly easy to figure out where I was going, you just had to look very carefully for the names on the buildings and apartment numbers. I only had to pay like 8 € for the second cab, thank you God. I found my apartment. Hooray! I then tried my keys. I had such a hard time with it that I just ended up knocking to be let in.

Settled in:


So I finally was able to relax, kind of, and sit down for a minute. The girls here already were Ali, Rebekah, and Keyna. Keyna went out somewhere, so I talked to Ali and Rebekah. I told Rebekah a quick version of all the stuff that went down (stories mentioned above). I then started unpacking the few belongings I had into the closet and chest. I was feeling better but still slightly stressed, so I decided to shower. I grabbed the towel that was on the bed for me, and grabbed my baggie of travel-sized washing supplies. Apparently my bath gel decided to explode on the way from the United States, but no big deal. I cleaned off the stuff in the baggie, and I was still able to use the bath gel from the inside of the baggie. Clever huh?

Well I felt tons better after cooling off in the shower. I got dressed and finished unpacking. I was still unpacking when Katlin got to the apartment. Yay! So I rushed to give her a big hug, because I bet she had just as much of a fun time as I did. I helped her bring up her bags and figure out how to use the elevator, which the max limit on it is 3 people, hee hee. It's a really tiny elevator.

Katlin unpacked and took a shower. Then Rebekah, Katlin and I went to go look for food. We went outside and Katlin got a chocolate gelado, which was so messy that we had to go back to the apartment for her to eat it in a bowl. After she had finished we went back outside to get something to eat. We wandered around for a while and decided to eat at a pizza place next to a place called Chicken Hut. I had a bacon pizza and a coke. We then went back to the apartment, since our appetites were satisfied. Ali was still at the apartment, and I finally met Keyna. Katlin and Rebekah ended up napping because they were tired. I stayed up and started a blog on my computer.

About 2 1/2 hours later Katlin woke up, so we went out to explore, this time we ended up going to Bar Tabacchi Tavola Calda: Snack Bar and Tobacco. I got a big bottle of Coke, and Katlin got a big bottle of Fanta. Then we headed back to the apartment to put those in the fridge. Rebekah wanted to go exploring too, so after we rested a bit, we went back out to explore other parts of the neighborhood. I ended up getting strawberry and mint gelado at a corner store called Gelateria Cucurucho. We walked around a little more, Katlin got something to eat, and then we headed back to the Apartment. I was tired because I still hadn't slept yet. Rebekah wanted to watch a movie, and I started watching but got too tired to watch a movie. The power plugs short circuited earlier so there wasn't any power to Skype or go online, instead, I organized my phone so that it wasn't on dad's weird settings. I then set my alarms to wake up, and went to bed.




END of Day 1.