Chapter the First, Section Kappa: Getting There, Part IV (now with UPDATES!)

As I type this, I'm sitting on my bed, in my apartment, in St. Petersburg, in Russia. Wooo!

The final flight was delayed a little bit; I think some guy got held up for lack of sufficient ID or something, but that was it. No serious weather issues or anything; we landed only about 20 minutes late. And then I made myself personally another 10-15 minutes later, because I'm a dumbass and it took me five or six tries before I filled out the migration card correctly (all I had was a pen, the blanks are tiny). I got through passport control just before they shut down the luggage carousel for my flight; my big red suitcase was the very last one on the conveyor belt, but I got it and found the guy sent to pick me up pretty quickly. A wheel broke off while he was hauling the suitcase to his van, but now that I'm in the apartment I don't think I'll need to move it again. And it's not that heavy. I guess I'm buying luggage at some point before I leave, anyway; that red suitcase should really just be retired. It's served admirably over the years, but the hard plastic lining inside has almost completely broken off, and now it's missing a wheel.

Before arriving, I had looked at maps of St. Petersburg and came to the extremely erroneous conclusion that it would not be difficult to navigate. See, I made the fatal mistake of assuming that they actually mark streets here in more than one location. The longer we drove around, the more disoriented I got, although part of that could have been from the sun going down and the tinted windows in the van. We eventually found my apartment, though.

I have four roommates. I've met two of them, and after my typical fashion, have already forgotten their names. I am a terrible person. There's a guy who isn't here right now for reasons I'm not entirely sure of, and another girl who is supposed to arrive tonight. Their names are Alex, Liz, Jorge and Corinne. Alex and Liz are both from Michigan and were here when I arrived; Jorge is from Iowa, and was out shopping when I got here as a way to avoid cleaning; and Corinne is from Texas, but she goes to school in Washington state, and arrived a couple hours after I did. If anyone is concerned about a man living among four women: there's nothing to worry about, as Jorge is very, very gay. It's like Three's Company, plus two people and minus the sexual tension and occasional appearance by Don Knotts. Jorge has offered-slash-threatened to take me (and Corinne) with him out to a gay bar; I actually think that would be pretty fun, just not tonight. He's fun to be around, though, as are the other girls.

I got here first, so I got first pick of the remaining beds. After talking with Alex and Liz for a while I retired to my room and sent the requisite "made it here alive, please don't start calling Eric in a panic" email, which if you're reading this means you probably got it. :) Once I'm done typing this post up, I think I'll take a shower...if I can. Of course I had to forget something important; to that end, I'm almost certain I don't have a bath towel (in addition to also managing to forget the toothpaste somehow, unless I derped and put that in another suitcase for some reason). I'm sure one can be purchased somewhere nearby, but I don't want to go back outside tonight...and I really, really want a shower. :( That'll teach me to doubt my roommates; there are extra towels, so I ended up getting clean after all, yay! The shower is kind of fiddly; there's a very, very narrow margin of error when it comes to positioning the handle. Mere millimeters to the left or right gets you boiling or frigid water, though it didn't take me too long to find the "sweet spot" as it were. I just don't know how long the hot water lasts. Guess I'll find out eventually; Corinne and I have to get up relatively early tomorrow and head down to the Vasileostrovskaya metro station with Liz to meet a guy for our orientation, where we'll get phones and get our classes finalized. I'm not sure which one I'm looking forward to more.

QUICK STATUS:
Headcold: [Swear word] [swear word] [swear word] [swear word] [swear word]. I'm just going to stock up on tissues at first opportunity.
Excite-O-Meter: 6/10. I'm here, the reality is still settling in, but I'm also tired and dirty and cold. I'll be more excited after tomorrow, when my schedule and everything is finalized.
Revised Excite-O-Meter: 9/10. Talking to Jorge and Alex got me pretty excited to start classes, and now that I'm relatively settled in and I know who I'm living with I can tell this semester is going to be memorable.

Chapter the First, Section Gamma: Getting There, Part III

How is it that sitting for eight hours gets to be so exhausting? I just got off the plane in Munich, and now I have a few hours to kill before my last flight leaves (boarding starts at 10:40 local time). I'm sitting in the waiting area at my gate, three hours in advance, trying to connect to an airport wifi network. There are about a dozen of them in range; most of them are inaccessible. I'm probably going to have to pay to get any kind of reliable internet service.

The flight was mostly boring. About 2 and a half hours before we arrived--just off the coast of Ireland, if I recall correctly--they shut off the power to the little touchscreen entertainment center monitors, which startled me because they didn't announce it or anything. I was watching It's a Wonderful Life at the time, so I was sad when all of a sudden Jimmy Stewart was gone and it was very dark. A woman sitting across the aisle from me, who was obviously a more seasoned traveler than I, explained that they probably did it as a precaution, due to lightning. Okay, either way, still freaked me out for a second. As the sun rose I caught a glimpse out the windows on either side of the ([swear word] gigantic) plane; the sight of snow on the ground made me much happier than it really should have, although it was really pretty. As a bonus, the obligatory screaming infants only screamed a couple of times, and were quickly shushed.

So, I have one international and transatlantic flight under my belt, now. Given that the flight was (1) eight hours long and (2) overnight, they fed us dinner and breakfast. The food wasn't too bad, really, although I may have been distracted by the adorable, IKEA-like aesthetic of the little trays they served dinner on. I know I was far too amused by the handy flip-down cupholder attached to the back of the seat. Dinner, I was told, was chicken with a side of mashed potatoes. There were also some peas and carrots in there, as well as a pasta salad consisting of mixed veggies and orzo on a bed of lettuce, a roll, a very dry brownie, and a small piece of cheese. Breakfast also included a piece of cheese, for reasons unknown, as well as a Nature Valley bar (I've never seen those available in single packs before today), a wheat roll with butter and jam, and a fruit cup. I requested coffee to drink and really shouldn't have; I'm guessing that coffee was made at the same time as the after-dinner coffee was, because it had obviously been sitting out for a while. It was really bitter and just generally terrible.

I miss everyone so much right now, and I feel so isolated without a cell phone (not that it would be of much use right now even if I still had my phone with me). I'm really looking forward to getting into my apartment on Zhukovskogo ulitsa so I can take a [swear word] shower; here's hoping that apartment complex has an internet hookup, so I can upload these posts and send the "still alive" email (♪ ♫ I'm speaking Russian and I'm still alive! And though I'm freezing, I am still alive! ♪ ♫ etc etc). From what I can tell it seems to be kind of unofficial student housing, so I imagine it does, but I honestly don't know.

Once I get this post uploaded, I think I'm going to locate a bathroom and change into warmer clothes; I have a set of long johns in my carry-on luggage, and I had the bright idea to move my boots and coat in there just in case my checked bag gets delayed. It was probably 40-ish degrees on the tarmac when we exited the plane here in Munich; all the weather forecasts for St. Petersburg I've seen have been in the single digits for today, so if I don't bundle up I may in fact freeze to death immediately upon deplaning (which is a [swear word] stupid term and I hate myself for using it).


QUICK STATUS!
Headcold: Ugh. Could be worse, I guess, though. My throat is a little bit scratchy but I imagine that's as much from this cold as it is from the fact that I just spent eight hours in confined quarters breathing dry, recirculated air with 200 other people.
Excite-O-Meter: 4/10. It would be higher but I'm really tired. I don't want to sit anymore, but I also don't really want to walk around because that means dragging my luggage with me. Damn terrorists, ruining it for everyone else. Also, my attempts to obtain some euros so I could use the airport's pay phone proved fruitless because the airport takes a huge [swear word] commission and there were no ATMs that I could see. 1,50 euro per minute to call the US? Really? And the commission is so high that nine US dollars gets me 3,50 euro (current exchange rate, if I recall correctly, is something like 1 USD = .70 Euro)? Eff that. I'd rather just pay for an hour of internet and send an email...especially because it's something like 3 AM in the Eastern time zone right now.

Chapter the First, Section Beta: Getting There, Part II

The flight to Charlotte was uneventful. The small children strategically placed around me didn't start screaming until after I'd turned my iPod on, and the combination of the Scissor Sisters and the roar of the plane drowned them out fairly well. I got an aisle seat, which ultimately gave me the most room, at the expense of the breathtaking vistas offered by the airplane windows. So I spent most of the flight with my nose buried in the Russian military history book I got for Christmas. I feel horrible for not remembering who exactly got that for me, so here's a blanket thank-you to the Kenton clan.

Charlotte-Douglas International Airport is really nice. Tastefully decorated, with some nice food options and a layout that makes sense (although that may just be me expressing deep gratitude at not having a layover in [swear word] Atlanta). Tuesday is evidently a quiet day for international travel; down at my end of the concourse, there are maybe a few dozen people sitting in the waiting area between a couple of gates, although I'm sure it'll get busier as boarding time approaches. At this point I'm getting ready to actually leave the country, so I hear snatches of English and German as the people around me converse quietly. A young woman behind me is going home on this flight, and conversing in German with the old American man sitting next to her.

I made a few calls from a payphone before settling in at my gate; if I called you, congratulations, you're special. :) I don't have an infinite supply of change, though, much as it seems like I do, so I can't call everybody, sadly. I'm not sure why I'm sitting in this waiting area; I'm about to be sitting for several hours, in close quarters. I should be up walking around. But, of course, this is an airport and aimless wandering tends to draw the wrong kind of attention.

I'm typing this post up in Notepad as I wait through the endless advertisements that are the price one pays for free airport wifi. Once I got off the plane from Orlando, I ducked into the nearest bathroom, intending to freshen up a little--for my sake as well as that of the people I'll be sitting with. I wet my hair and combed it, reapplied deodorant, and went to brush my teeth, only to find that I'd somehow mislaid the little tube of toothpaste I bought. I swore profusely inside my head, not wanting to upset the bathroom attendant (the sweetest lady! you are truly unshakable if you can be so happy cleaning and restocking airport bathrooms for a living). At least I have some Altoids.


QUICK STATUS:
Headcold: Still doing OK. I haven't burst into tears, yet, either!
Excite-O-Meter: 5/10. Omigod this is the furthest I have ever been from home by myself and I'm about to go a whole hell of a lot further. The feeling of missing everyone is stronger now; in the lobby at MCO, it was mostly boredom at having no one around to talk to. Now I miss people because it's really happening. I'm leaving, and I won't see anyone I know until May. May seems a long way off right about now.

As an afterthought, the woman across from me has a baby with her, and the baby's shoes are just the most adorable baby shoes I've ever seen. They're pink, with little purple butterflies embroidered on them! Precious!

Chapter the First, Section Alpha: Getting There, Part I

At the time of writing, I'm sitting in the Orlando International Airport, killing time in the lobby of Terminal B, because my flight leaves in an hour and 45 minutes. I'm probably going to get some lunch before I head out to my specific terminal.

I feel naked without my phone in my pocket. Every so often I'll do a possessions check--you know, pat my pockets and make sure I have every little thing. And when I don't feel my phone or my keys, I have a small heart attack before remembering that 1) my phone is in the very capable hands of my little sister, and 2) my keys are in my backpack because I don't need them right now. I wish I had it; I'd much rather kill time by texting my friends than writing up this post in Notepad to upload later, because there are no unsecured wifi networks in this lobby.

Where to begin? Once Galen and I actually found a [swear word] parking space, we began the long and arduous journey to the check-in counter. I headed to Lufthansa's counter where, to my dismay, there was nobody; I asked an employee and she said the desk didn't open until 5. Cue the first minor hiccup of the day. I checked my itinerary again, and it turns out the first flight (Orlando to Charlotte) is operated by US Airways, so I was able to check in at their counter (all the way at the other [swear word] end of the building). As we approached the US Airways counter, I saw a massive line and my heart sank...and then I felt better as we moved past it, because those people were checking in on different airlines. There was almost no line at the US Airways counter, and I was able to check my big suitcase all the way through to St. Petersburg. I got my three boarding passes, thanked the lady, and started the inexorable march toward THE SECURITY CHECKPOINT.

Mom, you'll be glad to know I made it through security without incident. I picked a line that didn't send me through the backscatter machine (those are the X-ray machines that I find to be an incredible breach of privacy, so here's hoping I'll remain so lucky), I wasn't scowling the entire time, and everything progressed very smoothly. The line was a bit long, but I wasn't waiting more than about 15 minutes and I was through and collecting my belongings again in all of two minutes.

Apparently, though, the Orlando International Airport believes that chewing gum is Public Enemy No. 1, because there isn't a stick of it to be found in the entire airport. I must have circled the counter of the airport convenience store three times looking for gum, and finding nothing but mints and candy. Well, okay then. I got some Altoids, hopefully those will help.

I've still got a good hour and a half or so to kill before my flight boards, but I've parked myself in a relatively comfortable chair in front of the Arrival/Departure boards. Waiting on US Airways Flight 1722, departing 1:50 PM EST, January 31, 2012.

QUICK STATUS:
Headcold: Still sniffly, occasional sneezing. Doing OK overall.
Excite-O-Meter: 3/10. Maybe it's because I haven't left yet, but I'm mostly missing my friends and family at the moment. I'm excited, but it's kind of on an abstract level right now, if that makes sense (it doesn't).

Prologue: Introduction

Hello, friends and family! This is the blog I said I'd be maintaining while abroad. Enter your email address in the box to the right and you'll get email updates when I post. Click Submit after you enter your email address; a box will pop up (you may need to disable your popup blocker temporarily). There will be an image of some distorted text at the bottom of the popup box; type the letters you see in the text box below it, and click Complete Subscription Request. Then, check your email for a confirmation. Click the link in the confirmation email (or copy and paste it into the address bar), and another box will pop up confirming that you've subscribed to my blog. Now, you'll get an email when I make a post, so you don't have to worry about missing anything!

If you have no idea who I am...well, first of all, how did you even get here? Second of all, welcome. My name's Emily, and this is a chronicle of my semester in St. Petersburg, Russia.

I'll change the background image occasionally; if the cell phone they give me as part of the program has a camera (I think all of them do these days), I'll try to upload my own pictures and use those. Otherwise, I'll raid Flickr. Right now, the image is out the window of an airplane; that one is a default image for this theme, but I think it's appropriate.