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Published: November 26th 2009
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Background At the age of 92 my mother's father was my last surviving grandparent. He lived a full life raising 13 children in the Philippines, and managing to move most of them over to live in the USA. Papa Polding was the Civil Engineer grandpa I'd gotten to know quite intimately from a distance, through the countless stories told by his proud daughter. He was my inspiration to become an engineer.
After his wife and long-time love of his life went ahead of him a few years ago, he awaited the moment he could follow her. On his 92nd birthday his wish was for the Lord to take him away, as he was tired and missed "Mama". Nine days later his wish was granted and he left this world peacefully in his sleep.
The reason for my trip to New Jersey is to honour my grandpa and to pay my respects. I am travelling with my mother who needs my support as it will be a very emotional time for her. Although he is gone, his legacy remains in his children and grandchildren, who will be brought together by his passing. Although it will be a sad time,
it's also a time to celebrate the lives he has changed.
MEL - LAX 25.11.09 After receiving the news of my grandpa's sickness and a closing window on seeing him alive for the last time, we booked the tickets the day before the flight. Note to self: never book a last minute flight as it costs an arm and a leg. Easier said than done. These things aren't planned, and you can't put a price on family. On the bright side we got to book with Qantas, earning me my first frequent flyer miles and catapulting my tally to pretty much halfway to a free trip to the Philippines.
Last minute flights mean last minute notifying of relevant parties and last minute packing. Thank God work was graceful enough to allow me this pleasure to leave on short notice. Also it seems like I did a great job packing light (as I'll only be gone for 10 days) and not forgetting anything. At least for now I believe I haven't forgotten anything, until the day I realise I have to reuse the same pair of boxers 10 times and brush my teeth with my dirty socks.
Arriving at Melbourne airport accompanied by my dad, two beautiful sisters and stunning girlfriend, my mum and I checked in quite early, enabling my mum to get a much needed aisle seat. Our luggage weighed in slightly under 20kg each which I thought was a close shave until the not-so-gay sorta gay check-in man informed me that we were allowed to take 46kg each. Looks like I'll be bringing quite a lot of merchandise back to Australia (mmm 20kg of Cocaine
).
After the usual hugs and kisses goodbye we passed through the gate into the unknown. Well by unknown I mean known by one and somehow known by the other. Let me explain: my mum's been to the USA like 10 times (her second time in a couple of months) and I went 10 years ago.
Unbeknownst to me, waiting silently yet majestically was our pimping ride to the USA- A Qantas Airbus A380, the largest passenger aircraft in production and one of only 38 built . A completely widebodied aircraft with four Rolls Royce engines and double-deckered goodness was to be our home for the next 14 or so hours. They might as well have given us the Starship Enterprise as it looked HUGE! Boarding the aircraft gave me eyegasms as everything was new and pretty-looking.
The inflight entertainment system was tops, consisting of quite large touchscreens embedded in the rear of each headrest that contained video on demand, music and games. They also had the ability to play multiplayer games with anyone else on the plane and also to call anyone on the plane. I couldn't help but think how this was all networked with high capacity switches and servers that would need to handle great loads. My only gripe with the system was the sluggish touchscreen and the one time my sound failed for about 10 minutes (in which the solution to fixing the problem was the standard turn off/turn on technique).
As the plane began its takeoff you could feel the sheer power of this monstrous feat of modern engineering. I was amazed at the torque-a-plenty engines pulling an obese plane filled with people from two of the world's most obese nations, the USA and the AUS. The wheels said goodbye to the tarmac, and we were in the air. To the land of the opposite-direction toilet spinning, here I come!
The flight itself wasn't too bad. The inflight entertainment kept me entertained inflight, as it should. Movies I watched: "500 days of Summer" and "Angels and Demons". I love Zooey Deschanel so much, even more than Tom Hanks' receeding hairline. Both were pretty decent movies. I also watched a documentary on the "Thrilla in Manilla" which covered the whole rivalry between Ali and Frazier (Ali won but guess who's laughing now). It was very much biased toward Frazier which I liked. Also watched some Dakar Rally highlights and Top Gear episodes to satisfy my car fetish.
Airplane food is usually an oxymoron, but Qantas provided some great tucker. I actually ate too much and was kept full for the whole flight. This is a bad start to a trip to a country where our medium McValue meals are equivalent to their small. My mission is to not eat as much as I'm gaining too many kilos, or erm, pounds actually. It will be so tempting as there will be many sights, sounds, smells and tastes. Oh, did I mention tastes? Mmm IHOP, New York sidewalk hotdogs with mustard, pretzels, thin crusted pizza, thanksgiving turkey, Hersheys chocolates, Reese's Pieces, twinkies... I have never tried a twinkie, but I most definitely will during my stay! I promise you.
Anyways back to the flight.. It went past rather painlessly although my back started to hurt (from an old World War 2 injury) and that damned persistent cough which threatens to spew out my lungs. The aircon didn't help.
I have to finish this portion of the blog as it's just a small part of my trip! Talk about verbal diahorrea! Word vomit! Mmm Regina George. On landing I was very relieved to have arrived in one piece and not crashing on some mysterious island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean which has a black smoke monster and a doctor named Jack (it's a reference to Lost for those who are like.. huh..? WTH..?). Yeah I'm a bit weird. Scary thing is, though, that I left at 12:30pm on Wednesday, and arrived in the USA at 8am on the same day! I defied the laws of time! The Time Traveller's Wife eat your heart out, biznatch!
Customs was a great fear of mine, especially since 9/11 happened. The U.S. has gotten so much stricter. I was fearing a public strip search and a cavity search by a 50 year old pedophile, but was relieved when we passed through with ease only having to sacrifice some energy to put all my fingers on a fingerprint scanner and pose for a camera. I laughed as I remember a story my dad told me of his visit to the USA a couple of months ago- he thought the camera was a retina scanner so put his eye up to it. The customs officer was all like.. huh..? WTH..? Yeah I'm a bit weird. I just copy and pasted that as I thought it was relevant again.
LAX - JFK
As our plane got onto the runway at LA Airport, I looked out the window to see the city of LA and the surrounding Hills. In the distance I spotted some white on a hill, but blurred by the mist. Did you guess right? It was the HOLLYWOOD sign. I thought that was rather cool.
The smaller Qantas plane took off (oh how I missed the gorgeous A380) and I could see the beaches of LA and the whole city. I wish I could stay there for at least a night. This flight would take 5 hours, and went past very quickly as I finally got some shut-eye.
Landing in JFK Airport, New York, I thought of Eddie Murphy in "Coming to America". I giggled.
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