You know, the whole of last week was pretty stressful. You see I had to book my flight tickets and my travel route was a little more complicated. I am flying from London to Boston and then flying out from New York JFK into dear ol' Singapore and later back to London. I was overjoyed when I found a route that was suitable on American Airlines. It costs just about 2000 USD which was by far the best bargain I found anywhere! I was breathless when I found this. Unbelievable I thought!
Then the trouble started. I couldn't book it online since I don't have a UK, US or Canadian billing address. So Tim tried getting his friend in London to do it for us. His computer crashed while doing it, the ticket got rebooked twice later, I never received a confirmation from the airlines and the credit card eventually got rejected. ARGH! Imagine my frustration! Anyhow I then decide to use a different credit card, thanks to the help of my housemate's mum who lives on a farm in York. And all this time, I have been calling AA UK for a gazillion times and interestingly each time I get a different accent (I couldn't understand most of them to be honest and later someone pointed out that one was strongly Irish and the other Dutch, hmmm). BUT eventually with Joe's mum help, I got through and managed to FINALLY have my ticket! Amazing! I cannot thank her enough for my relief.
It dawned upon me how difficult it is living here and being so distant away from the conveniences of trying to do things like these. But the satisfaction upon having the e-ticket in my hands was just great! For your information, my entire vacation of a month will consist of 8 flights and 2 hovercraft rides (if it works). This is my breakdown:
Hovercraft ride 1: Freetown to Lungi Airport
Flight 1: Freetown to London
Flight 2: London to Boston
Flight 3: New York to Tokyo
Flight 4: Tokyo to Singapore
Flight 5: Singapore to Tokyo
Flight 6: Tokyo to Chicago
Flight 7: Chicago to London
Flight 8: London to Freetown
Hovercraft ride 2: Lungi to Freetown
Doesn't sound terribly exciting isn't it? But for all that trouble I went through to get this rather reasonably priced ticket, I am quite pleased and cannot quite give two hoots about the hours of flying I am about to do. I will certainly be complaining about it in time but for now, I'm just going to let it be.. See you guys soon! xxx
Monday 21 July 2008
Friday 11 July 2008
day two: snaps
This is a girl snapped on Bonthe Island.
An old house in Kent.
A view from the National Stadium.Thursday 10 July 2008
day one
Today I am exceptionally excited! We just got out tickets to London for holidays. By the end of July, I will leave my present job. Then in August, I will take my long-awaited vacation. Will head to London first and then to the States and then to Singapore and then back here. When I come back, we would have been here for about a year and one more to go. In anticipation of my upcoming travels, I am posting random notes and pictures - a story to tell what happens every now and then in Sierra Leone. Here's the first one:
This is along the stretch of Aberdeen Bridge. That's Tim in the foreground, going to find the boys underneath the bridge where they catch shrimps. From where I am, the road leads to my office. I used to pass by this bridge in the morning on the way to work. It is generally a lot nicer and less crowded than taking Wilkinson Road. Mornings are pleasant when you're passing by this bridge. On this day, we went to the bridge to try this new fishing line that comes with many small hooks attached on the line. We let it hang off the bridge and wait and this is what we caught.
I really don't know what this fish is call. Some boys call it the bait fish (!). Anyhow, we caught this and decided to use to catch the bigger fishes. Interestingly after lowering the line into the waters, and we tugged the line as specified in the instructions, the fish got caught by I supposed a bigger fish. Also, I forgot to mention that the hooks are pretty nasty if you were a fish. We caught this one by its eye. We did this for maybe about 45 minutes before deciding that it was too windy and the waters slightly too choppy.
This is along the stretch of Aberdeen Bridge. That's Tim in the foreground, going to find the boys underneath the bridge where they catch shrimps. From where I am, the road leads to my office. I used to pass by this bridge in the morning on the way to work. It is generally a lot nicer and less crowded than taking Wilkinson Road. Mornings are pleasant when you're passing by this bridge. On this day, we went to the bridge to try this new fishing line that comes with many small hooks attached on the line. We let it hang off the bridge and wait and this is what we caught.
I really don't know what this fish is call. Some boys call it the bait fish (!). Anyhow, we caught this and decided to use to catch the bigger fishes. Interestingly after lowering the line into the waters, and we tugged the line as specified in the instructions, the fish got caught by I supposed a bigger fish. Also, I forgot to mention that the hooks are pretty nasty if you were a fish. We caught this one by its eye. We did this for maybe about 45 minutes before deciding that it was too windy and the waters slightly too choppy.
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