The beginning

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And now the trip begins…

My final day in Austin Tx, started out as an okay day. I was finally officially packing for good and had actually decided which pieces of luggage to take. Then I started reading the packing instructions from Arcadia. According to the instructions that we got one week ago we are going to orientation in Melbourne for three days prior to going to Sydney. What I had failed to read was the part where they were going to lock up your luggage at the airport while in Melbourne so you should have with you (in your small carry-on bag) everything you would need for the next 3 days. This disturbed me because I don’t like to carry a lot with me/have my bags packed full so I was upset but just grabbed a couple of extra shirts socks and underwear and decided that I could roll with the punches.
My next rude awakening occurred in the car on the way to the airport where I read on the flight itinerary instructions that Qantas (the airline that would take me overseas) had decided to stop allowing a personal item. I.e. you can only have one carry-on bag. I was like “No Way” can I possible fit everything I need for three days in my backpack along with my in-flight entertainment and computer necessities. I finally came up with taking the bigger backpack out of it’s secret stowed position in another bag and putting the contents of my smaller carry-on in it. This way I could put my regular backpack inside it if Qantas wanted to get made at me for having more than one bag. Of course all of this was a fuss for nothing because in the Los Angeles airport I discovered that everyone else had atleast two bags to carryon if not more so I was fine.
While waiting in the LAX airport I met Sam. Sam is from Ohio and she is a finance major at GW University. She was very nice and friendly and we talked for the next two hours while waiting for the flight to board. My seat number was 72B. This was the second to last row on the plane and I am happy of say despite first impressions it was not a middle seat. For some reason the last three rows of the plane on my side only had two seats in them. I sat next to a nice gentleman who was an entertainer on cruises. He said he used to do the Australian cruise circuit a lot but he hadn’t been back in a while and had jumped at the opportunity when it came up for him to come back this time. He said that he used to be away from home on the job about 4 months per year but now he can spend atleast 8 months of the year away. He said the most he ever was away from home in one year was 336 days.
After our nice chat we resigned to watching movies, eating and sleeping. For my Grandma’s sake I will try to remember the good times by the food I had. I ate the chicken dinner, which had some veggies too but too many carrots for me to explore. I watched the Heartbrake Kid, Bourne ultimatum, the final two episodes of the Vicar of Dibley, and an Australian movie about Ballroom Dancing. In between all of these I did get a chance to catch a little shuteye as well and walk about the cabin but was stiff and uncomfortable by the end of the flight. For breakfast I had Rasin Bran, an Apple muffin, orange and grapefruit slices and some orange juice.
Finally, we got off the plane. Customs and baggage claim went pretty smoothly despite their being no signs and it being hard to tell where you were supposed to go

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