The Goings To

Entry One: September 9, 2011

            At 2:30 am Alaska time on September 8^th I set out upon my adventure for this term. I would be going to the Linguistic University of Nizhny Novgorod, Russia to complete my senior capstone project in order to graduate in December with a certificate of advanced proficiency in Russia in addition to a BA in Russian and one in Applied Linguistics.

            My itinerary to get to Nizhny was as follows. I would fly into Seattle and have a 7ish hour layover before continuing onto Frankfurt for a 8+ hour layover. Then I would fly directly into Nizhny. All together my travel time should have been around 33 hours.

            I said a sad farewell to my boyfriend and my parents and had an uneventful flight to Seattle. Luckily I was able to doze on the flight, and the sinus infection which had begun the evening before did not give me too much trouble. I had been eating vitamin C like candy and was taking decongestants  regularly. The only small issue I had was when landing, when I had to keep getting my ears to pop. I flew Alaska Airlines to Seattle and needed to get my additional boarding passes from Lufthansa Airlines when I arrived. This turned out to be a little easier said than done. Luftansa has very few flights that go out of Seattle, and as such, they do not have gates which are officially theirs in the airport. It took me about an hour to find what terminal Lufthansa usually flew out of and to get there. When I arrived, no on in the south satellite seemed to know what gates there Lufthansa usually flew out of, and there were no Lufthansa representatives. This would not have been a huge problem, as I knew they had to show up a while before the flight departed, however, I had planned to meet with Ken and Annette Rosentrater, my church's associate pastor and his wife who had recently moved to the Seattle-Tacoma area, at 11:15 and as my flight was not until 2pm, I doubted there would be a representative from Lufthansa at the concourse by that time. This would make getting back through security difficult. I grabbed a pastry and some orange juice to sit down and figure out what I wanted to do.

            Finally, I decided that it would be easiest for me to go out of security to the ticketing area and wait for a Lufthansa representative there. I waited for an hour or so and was beginning to get a little worried as it was getting close to 11am, and I really needed to have my boarding passes before meeting up with the Rosentraters. I called my dad to get a cell number for Ken and Annette, and right as I hung up, Lufthansa arrived. I got my boarding passes and had to pay for my second piece of luggage, and then I went down to the baggage area to wait for the Rosentraters.

            It was really good to see them, as they left before I made it home in August, and we had a nice lunch and talked. I got back to the airport around 1pm and was greeted with the longest security line I have ever seen. I kept praying that I would make it through in time, and God answered as they eventually opened up another line for the gentleman in front of me. I made it through security and to the south concourse before boarding had even begun for economy class.

            My original paper work said that the flight to Frankfurt would be nearly 11 hours, but the pilot predicted the flight would take 9 hours 15 minutes. By the time we arrived I was so tired, I don't know how long we took and whether or not we were on time. I was not very successful in sleeping on this second flight. Shortly after we got up to cruising altitude dinner was served. The stewardess seemed a little distraught that I refused the meal, even though I explained that I had just eaten. She tried to give me just the salad and dessert, and I finally compromised and took the bread roll, despite the fact that I was near stuffed to the brim. I tried sleeping and watched a few films.

            Although I had only just left Seattle, and we had to fly all the way across the United States, I felt that I had left America the moment I stepped on to the plane because the primary language for Lufthansa is German, as it is based out of Frankfurt. Breakfast was served an hour or more before we landed, and this time I did not refuse the meal.

=          I entered the Frankfurt airport into a wall of people. The American concept of lines had been left behind in Seattle. The boarding pass which had been printed for me in Seattle gave me a gate number, and I decided to head to that general area. I checked the departure screens, but they only listed times for the next hour or so. I would have to wait to later. I had to go through resecuring (basically another security point), and then found a restroom. I  changed my shirt and freshened up a bit before continuing on to my projected gate. I wanted to try to contact people at home, but I was unable to find a wireless signal. I realized that I was getting a pretty bad headache and went in search of water.

            Finding water was no easy task. There were numerous duty free shops, Versace, fancy watch stores, and other designers all over the place. I could buy a 6000 Euro purse, but a bottle of water? No where to be found. After about 20 mintues of walking this way and that I found a book store that sold water. I went back to my gate, put my bags up on a chair and used them as a pillow to try to do some dozing as I was too tired to read. A rowdy bunch of Moscow teens decided to occupy the same area, and they would wake me up every half hour or so. At 3:30 Frankfurt time I went back to the screens to see if I had a gate posted. There were several people at the screens to assist us, and the girl I spoke with said that gates are only posted 45 minutes prior to departure. However there was one rotating screen that would show me if I needed to be in the A or B concourse. I was in the B concourse, which was the correct one. She gave me a two euros off token for the duty free stores to use or save as a souvenir, and then told me that there was a short of hidden gate area close by where I could lie down. She said I looked really tired, and indeed I was. I found the gate, and there were a few other people sleeping there already. I slept for about an hour before an attendant woke me to say they were closing that area, and I went back to the other gate.

            The Moscow flight had apparently left. I tried reading again, but I just couldn't keep my eyes open. After some more dozing I went back to the screens to see if my gate was posted. This time it was and I walked to a different part of the concourse which was also much left crowded. Shortly after I arrived an announcement was made that the flight was going to be delayed 20 minutes as they were waiting on the incoming aircraft. The next thing that happened proved that God was watching over me. I somehow fell back asleep and was awaken at 6pm by  Lufthansa agent asking if I was supposed to be on the flight to Nizhny. I was startled awake to find nearly all the plane had boarded. Thank God I made it on that flight. I don't know what would have happened if I had missed it.

            The flight to Nizhny was about three hours long. I dozed on and off, and then dinner was served an hour into the flight. I guess this made sense as it was 7pm Frankfurt time, but my body was so confused. I hadn't eaten for ten or eleven hours so I tried to eat the dinner, but I could only get through the salad and rice. I forced myself to eat the roll for good measure, but I wasn't feeling super well and didn't want to push my luck. I had some tea and a glass of water which I popped an airborne tablet into. I had gotten really dehydrated in Frankfurt and was trying to reverse the effects.

            Two hours before I left for the airport in Alaska I finally got a hold of LUNN, the linguistic university to talk about my arrival. They asked me to call them back in an hour, which I did, and got to speak with the woman I had been thus far unsuccessful in contacting. Apparently she had been on sick leave. She said that they had decided to have a car meet me at the airport and take me to the dorm. However, when I arrived in Nizhny and got through customs it was half past midnight, and I had been scheduled to arrive at 11:10pm. Long story short, there was no one there waiting for me. I was so tired and weary that I was starting to get scared. One gentleman kept asking me if I needed a taxi. I said no, someone was waiting for me, but he kept watching me. After much time had past I realized that no one was going to be picking me up, and I was going to have to find my own way there. It was pouring down rain outside (which made me realize I forgot to pack my umbrella), and there were no taxi's in sight. The one driver told me he would take me, and that this happened all the time where people left the airport if the people they were supposed to pick up did not arrive in time.

            The man was nice in general, but I was definitely doing a lot of praying as it seemed he was not an official cab driver. Nevertheless, he knew his way around the city. He wanted to play English music, and it put a smile on my tired face to know that I had come half way around the world to listen to the backstreet boys at 1 o'clock in the morning. We got to the dormitory, and God answered my prayer as there was a security guard who let me in. She was not expecting me and made a phone call. I paid the driver (I'm not sure if I was jipped or not, but at this point I just wanted to sleep). The security guard sent me up to the eighth floor where I found another lady. She also seemed to not know anything about me. She made a copy of my passport and gave me a card for where I was staying. She then said that it was going to be 290 rubles for the evening. I was confused and told her that my semester was already paid for. It turns out the floor I was on was part of the school's hotel, and a few floors below was the dormitory. Once again no one knew what to do with me. I was biting back tears, and the wonderful woman took pity on me and just gave me a room saying we could figure it all out the next day.

            She showed me where the kitchen, toilet, and shower were before letting me into my room. I took off my jacket and shoes and had a good short cry. I tried to look at all the blessing I had had instead of the difficulties, but I was very tired, very scared, and very alone. I only allowed myself a few minutes for a pity party before deciding to go take a shower. It's truly amazing what a little warm water can do for a person. I brushed my teeth, went back to my room, locked my door, and went to bed around 2 am.