Recap II

I threaded carefully along the narrow cabin isle in search of my designated seat. 24D. I passed through the business class cabin filled with smart looking gentlemen in expensive clothing. I presented them with a quick, envious glance before I entered the economy class cabin.

The cabin was chaotic.There was a baby crying loudly nearby, beating up my eardrum senseless. There were people standing along the isle, waiting to pass through. Apparently they had to wait for this really huge guy to store his hand luggage in the overhead compartment as he was blocking the hallway. But he took forever to do it, much to the displeasure and annoyance of the people waiting in line. I bet there will be a petition for the banning of super fat people on airplanes soon.

I found my seat. I quickly stored my bagpack in the space allocated and settle down on my seat. Not that comfy, but decent enough for a 13 hours journey. The seat next to me is still empty. I started to have kinky thoughts; hoping that the person who will sit next to me is a hot lady wearing low cut dress and would fall asleep on my shoulder. Haha!

God knew what was in my head. So He decided to disappoint me. The passenger who sat next to me for the next 13 hours was a middle-aged Chinese woman named Auntie Christie. Apparently she travels the KL-London route quite often, thanks to her 20 years of marriage with an Englishman.

***

13 hours is a very long time. It is more than half a day, and without something interesting to fill the gap, you will start to lose patience and become very, very cranky. As for me, I tried to watch as many movies as possible. When I got bored of it or my eyes feels swollen from overexposure to the small screen, I close my eyes and think of pretty ladies. Or maybe I go to the toilet, wash my face up and go back to my seat (and continue thinking of pretty ladies). In the worst case, I would look around me and see if there are any pretty ladies nearby.

***

The food was unsurprisingly average. It was not appallingly dull, but average. But then again, what would you expect from a pre-packed food? So, I devoured the foods like nobody's business.

***

I reached London Heathrow after 13 hours of flight. A strange feeling invaded me. This is the place I've always wanted to be at since I was little. To see the all magnificent buildings and long history associated with this old capital in a closer view rather than kilobytes of informations on the web. Now that I'm here, what's next? Upon waiting for my turn at the immigration gate, I called home for few minutes. It was nice to hear my mom's voice again. But the call charge was ridiculously expensive.

I remembered my first purchase on the British soil. It was a shower gel from WHSmith. Seniors who picked me up from the airport gave me a UK simcard and a credit-card sized travel card called Oyster. A rather dumb name, I supposed. We took the tube to get to my student hall. Another one hour journey. The good thing was I didn't have to carry any of my bags. The seniors carried it all the way, like a willing team of Sherpas in Nepal. But thank God they were there.

That night, I stared blankly at the ceiling, not knowing what to do. There was no internet connection yet. So I read all the lovely farewell text messages that I received before I left Malaysia. And I fell asleep.