Week 1-Part 1 (aka traveling)

It’s only been a week since I left Corvallis but I’ve already had adventures. I ended up traveling with a friend of mine named Dawna (she’s going to be leading the Mandate team when they come in January). We left Wednesday morning and arrived in Seattle in the early afternoon. Everything went smoothly and we had a nice flight to London. I didn’t sleep much that night, though.

We arrived in London around 10am local time and had a delightful time in London. We boarded our plane around 5:30pm and sat on the plane for about an hour or so because there was a problem with the plane. Finally, they had us disembark and gave us some free food and drink in the airport. There was no communication, though, so we had no idea what was happening.

After about two hours, we tracked down someone who told us we were being put up in a hotel that night. It was a pretty nice hotel, too. We only got about four hours sleep that night because of the time we got to the hotel and the time our new flight was scheduled to leave.

Because of the new flight, we missed our connecting flight in Johannesburg. The British Airways people in London gave us these slips for a new flight on South African Airways the next day. When we arrived in Jo-burg, there was nobody there to greet us or tell us where to go. All we knew was that we were supposed to be put up in a hotel that night. We wandered the airport for about an hour before we were able to track down someone who could tell us where we were supposed to go. They took us to the hotel but by this point it was 2am and we had to be back at the airport by 7:30am. We got a couple hours sleep, though and a hot shower, which was delightful.

The next morning, we went to the airport to the British Airways line to get our new tickets. After waiting in line, they told us to go to the South African Airways line to get our tickets. After waiting in that line (by this point we’ve spent an hour in line), they told us we had to go back to the British Airways line. After waiting in that line, they told us we had to go to a different British Airways line. We went to that and they told us they were now changing our flight (again).

With new tickets in hand, we returned to the other British Airways line where we were informed that we had to have  a yellow fever shot to leave Johannesburg. I then informed them that according to both their website and the US Embassy website (I checked both before I left) I would only need a shot when I left Zambia and I had intentions on getting my shot in that country (it’s cheaper there). They disagreed so we asked for the manager. He said the same thing that the lady at the counter said.

At this point, admittedly, I was very frustrated. I just decided to brush it off though and get my shot in the airport. They handed me back my passport and I went down to the clinic. When I arrived at the clinic, I realized they had handed me the wrong passport! The lady at the counter found me on my way back and switched me. I went back to the clinic and got my shot (which, by the way, was actually way cheaper at the airport than it was in the States).

While I was getting my shot, Dawna asked to see the main manager. She told him everything that had happened and he finally set his employees straight and told them we were right that I didn’t need the shot until I came back. At least we were vindicated =).

Luckily, with all this hassle, we still made our flight and arrived in Zambia! Total travel time was four days (and about 8 hours sleep in that time). I was surprisingly not that tired, though. Ok, this is getting long so this is Week 1 part 1; part 2 to come soon.