Intro - American in Dublin

Kendra and I left for Dublin from Seattle on Thursday morning. I got dropped off at the airport by my mom and my lovely girlfriend Alyssa. Kendra drove to the airport with her boyfriend Steven. We both checked our huge suitcases and headed over to security. I had never been through one of the full-body scanners before, so I was intrigued by how it would go.

It did not go well. I took everything out of my pockets, put my laptop in its own container, and kept my wallet and passport like the nice lady told me to. But after I stepped out of the full-body scanner, the man working it told me I had set off some security warning. He pointed to a screen with a caricature of a person who was clearly enjoying his scan a little too much. On this display was a big yellow box over the man’s right buttocks. The security guard explained that this meant something in that region had set off the alarm. I tried to explain to him that it was my wallet and passport, which I quickly took out and showed him. But this little stunt (which I had thought was obeying the rules) earned me a proper pat-down of my derriere. It was an inauspicious start to a very long trip.

After I received my Freedom Massage, Kendra and I checked on our flight. We had around 2.5 hours to kill behind security before our plane left. So we did what anyone else would do: go to the food court. Eating before a flight is a precarious game of chance, and the stakes have never been higher. You have to eat something, or you will starve on the plane. No man can survive on peanuts alone. But you can’t eat too much, or you’ll feel gross and sweaty on the plane. And you can’t eat anything that might upset your stomach while you’re on the plane. Foods like Taco Bell and Burger King turn your insides into a ticking time-bomb. But of course all the choices in the airport are the last thing you’d want to eat before being trapped in a flying metal tube with a hundred other people for five hours. Who thought it was a good idea to feed people sushi and Qdoba before sticking them on a plane that fly across the world? Kendra and I elected to each eat a half-order of the Orange Chicken. Although still a little risky, it was certainly better than the alternatives. And it would be the last real meal we’d eat for almost 12 hours (foreshadowing!).

Finally it was time to board our plane. Our first flight was from Seattle to Philadelphia, and our second was from Philly to Dublin. The first one was interesting. We had turbulence during take-off, turbulence in the middle of our flight, and turbulence as we landed. And there were a TON of kids. Not babies, but like 4- or 5-year-olds. They behaved themselves fine. Like I said, not bad, just… interesting.

I was in a window seat near the front of the plane and got to board pretty early. Kendra was near the back and boarded later. As I got on, I saw that my row-mates were already there. When I asked them if I could get in, the middle guy (who was a total bro) had to hobble out of the way on account of his big leg brace. Awkward. I think that in my frazzled state I offered to slide past him, but that would have been physically impossible and socially unacceptable. Then as I sat down in my seat, I noticed that there was already a backpack in the space under the seat in front of me.  I asked the bro if it was his bag but he said it wasn’t. He clearly thought that I was trying to hit on him with these flimsy excuses for conversation. I then realized that the backpack belonged to the guy in front of me. He was a dad with a couple of kids and was sitting in the very front seat of coach. This meant that he didn’t have a space in front of him for his stuff, so he had decided to put his belongings in my space. This ignited a primal fury which interpreted that space under the seat as my territory. And I was NOT about to give it up. As soon as I felt that he had moved his bag (approximately 2 hours into the flight), I quickly swooped in and threw my bag under his seat. And I didn’t move it for the rest of the flight.

Between turbulence and a late start, we got into Philly almost an hour later than we were supposed to. This gave us 30 minutes to get to our flight for Dublin. Our baggage check ladies in Seattle had assured us that our two flights would only be 6 gates away. Boy were they wrong. We got off our first plane from gate A2 and had to get all the way to A26. If you’re unfamiliar with the layout of the Philadelphia airport, let me paint you a picture: A2 and A26 are as far away as possible. We power-walked like Olympic power-walkers, and made it to our flight with about 10 minutes to spare. But let me tell you: when you plan to use your layover to eat your first real meal of the day and divest yourself of 3 Cokes’ worth of urine, and then all of a sudden you don’t have a layover, your body kind of revolts. I’ve never had to pee so badly in my life – and I have an award-winning bladder. So when it got to be our departure time, then 5 minutes after, then 10 minutes after, I decided that I would rather be scolded by the flight attendants than pee my pants before a 6-hour flight. And it was hands-down the best decision I have ever made.

Our flight to Dublin was delayed because we were waiting for other stragglers from other flights – slackers! – and the natives started to get a bit restless. Finally, about 30 minutes after our alleged departure, the crew closed the door and we started to taxi. But this was only the beginning. At this point I was already suffering from that travel-delusion that makes time blend together and The Proposal seem like a good movie. But I do know that the pilot told us we were leaving “in the next 20 minutes” for more than 2 hours. People began whispering about that mystical “3 Hour Rule.” Stewardesses and frightened passengers spoke of it like an old ghost tale.  “Legend has it that if you wait on a plane for 3 hours, spin around in a circle 7 times, and flap your arms, the airline has to let you off the plane and give you money and a hotel room and a free car! It’s the law!” Or something along those lines. Once again, I was pretty out of it. But we never reached that glorious 3-hour mark. I was silently hoping that our flight would be cancelled and we’d have to get off the plane and get a hotel room and maybe we would just cancel the whole trip (but I’d still get credit for it). And that’s when we finally we lifted off.

I think this is a good time to talk about the fact that throughout this whole process, I was (and am) petrified about this trip. I started getting pretty nervous a few days before I left. It hadn’t even been 2 weeks since finals ended, and I was trying to plan out the next 10 weeks in a foreign country. I have only been abroad once before and it was for a week with my parents, which doesn’t really count. I have a very nice life in Seattle and I didn’t really want to give it up. I love my family and my friends and my church and my condo and all my stuff and America and my cell phone and my TV and just about everything. It’s really hard to leave it all behind, and it’s even harder to temporarily replace it all. On top of all this, I’m going to be starting a brand new job doing who-knows-what working with laws that I don’t know. Also relevant is the fact that I have a very Type-A personality – I like to be organized, to be on time, and to always know what’s going on. I can be flexible, but only when there’s a plan to start with. Being here in Dublin is the complete opposite of that mentality. Not only do I have NO idea what’s going on at every moment of the day, but the people here are very… relaxed. They just take life as it comes. Which can be good, in its proper place. But when I’ve just arrived from a foreign country and need food and toilet paper and an ATM, it would be REALLY NICE if others were a little more proactive. I guess this is what they call “culture shock.” Okay, rant over. Moving on.

The flight out of Philly was much less memorable (once we got off the ground).  I usually have a hard time sleeping on planes, which I think ties into my need to know what’s going on at all times. But between the scalding-hot-but-obviously-old food they fed us for dinner, and the fact that Jack the Giant Slayer was playing, my body kind of shut down and I was thankfully able to sleep. I awoke as the pilot announced that we had 30 minutes until landing, meaning that I was able to sleep for around 5 hours. Not great sleep, but more than I usually get. When I woke up, they were in the middle of showing a documentary about Captain Sullenberger, the guy who safely landed the damaged plane in the Hudson River. This seemed a little insensitive. But before I had time to think too much about it, the water and clouds out the window turned into land. And then the pilot greeted us: “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Emerald Isle.”

Something inside me told me that I was going to like this place.