We sat on the tarmac for a while as the maintenance guys repaired a broken cable on the door of the airplane. I was impatiently flipping through the New Yorker trying to get interested in some story about a Florida Senator. I woke up this morning feeling a little sore and feverish, probably an oncoming flu. What a day to be sick! Twenty four hours in transit nursing a head-ache. I will take some Benadryl and try to pass out on the flight to Copenhagen.
Looking down as Charlotte began to disappear beneath the clouds was surreal as I remembered that it could be another year and a half before I return. A year and a half out of my country, away from my friends, family, dog, and house. I question the wisdom of this adventure. Liz, the dog, is getting old and the other dog, Tom, died last time I left. Grandma is getting old and I don’t want the last time I see her to be over some mediocre Panini in a noisy deli when I am struggling to maintain conversation because I am hung over. The house might be sold by the time I get back, which I am ok with, though I would like to have a say in packing my things.
The pre-adventure nerves were really kicking this morning. I woke up feeling melancholy as I took a shower, ate some eggs, and petted the dog for the last time…until I get back. No matter how adventurous one is, leaving the comfort and the niceties of home is always jarring. In Ukraine I will probably be sleeping on an uncomfortable bed and breakfast probably won’t be what I’m used to. I dread the day I run out of peanut butter— I only brought 3 pounds along. I really hope this flu goes away because I do not want to be achy and sick in an unfamiliar place with no one around to whine and complain to except my Russian speaking host-mother. On the bright side, this could be an excellent opportunity to work on my Russian medical vocabulary.
Anxiety. What if I don’t meet anyone I like in Kiev? What if I make some faux pas and am ostracized for the rest of the time? What if I miss my friends from home too much? This isn’t like last time. I am not going with an organized group. There won’t be a Shelly, a Marie, or a Maxime. I won’t have kids my age next door and I won’t have English speakers around to escape the Russian world. I don’t think I’ll even have internet in my room. What on earth am I going to do!?
Humbug. Gibberish. Nonsense.
This is what travel is about. The anxiety is what makes it exciting, at least for me. I’m glad that I’ll be stopping in Moscow for a few days first to see my friends. I’ll be staying at Alisa’s apartment. Last time I was at her house I tried salo, a Ukrainian dish of salted pork fat (the white part of bacon, basically) that you eat on bread with a shot of vodka. I’m expecting a warm reception at the airport from a lot of old pals. They said that they would bring some vodka so we could start drinking immediately, but I will probably be too tired.
Here comes a Moscow whirlwind tour. I hope I can hit my favorite Indian restaurant with the Russians in tow. They don’t like Indian food much, but that’s because they haven’t tuned their palates to the finer culinary intricacies and complex flavors that Russian cuisine lacks.
Anyway, I just got off the flight from D.C. to Copenhagen and I am killing time in the airport. On the flight. I sat next to a nice German girl and an American guy who lives in Denmark. I tried to get some sleep hunched over with my pillow on the tray table, but in that position I just ended up drooling all over myself and swallowing a ton of air so that when I sat back up I burped like crazy. The flight was not so bad, though the meat-loaf dinner left something to be desired. At least there was free beer. There were a lot of Danes on board (I was flying Scandinavian Airlines) and they are a pretty bunch of people.
I am exhausted. I’ve been popping ibuprofen every few hours but my neck is still sore. Damn this flu. Damn small airline seats. Damn the hand-rests on the benches in the airport that prevent people from stretching out all the way.
As it turns out, I shouldn’t have complained about the benches, because I found a four-seater with no hand-rests and passed out on it. I was soundly asleep when three Danish police came and woke me up to tell me to take off my shoes. Danish police: enforcing tidiness.
I sat next to some Russian girl and her little sister on the flight, but I only exchanged two words with her before I conked out again. I probably weirded them out drooling all over myself in my sleep. People shouldn’t expect too much composure when someone’s been sitting in upright airline seats for hours 8 hours straight.
Moscow had total cloud cover as we descended. I knew that the cheery sunlight above the clouds would soon be blacked out by the endless grey of the wintery Moscow sky.
They had evidently just received a good dusting of snow as the view out of the window was of a ubiquitous white. The grey snowy drear filled me with radiant joy. Back in Russia!
I was pleased to find that my bag hadn’t been lost in my extremely short layover in D.C., and I was pleased when the customs officers didn’t pay me any attention. I never know what kind of things have to be declared. I brought a bottle of whisky and some nice perfume as gifts and I was a bit worried that they would be seized. Also glad they didn’t find the kilogram of cocaine I had in my backpack, whew!
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