It was no surprise to me that I
went to sleep at 3am the night before I had to catch an 10am flight. Since I
knew that I had to be at the airport at least two hours before my flight I set
my alarm clock to 7:15 thinking that I would at least get 4 hours of sleep, but
NOPE! I woke up at 6am to my mom pulling the sheets off me reminding me that my
flight was today. Thankfully, I didn’t
feel a single bit tired since I was hopped up on the adrenaline from the anticipation
of the journey that awaited me. I also knew that I would have a lot of time to
catch up on sleep during my sixteen hours flight.
Before going to the airport,
my mom thought it would be wise if I go to the bank and withdraw some money. So
we sit in the car, start driving and everything is going well. All the roads
are clear because its 7am on a Sunday. When we get to the bank I take out about
$1000 USD. As soon as I get back in the car, my mom starts the engine and…….NOTHING!
We both look at each other with an, “Oh my gosh I can’t believe this is
happening face!” My mom tries to start the engine two more times and still
NOTHING! I’m sitting there trying to figure out how this is happening, when I
look over and my mom had already opened the hood of the car and is already
looking around. I know my mom isn’t an
expert in the mechanics of cars, so I motion to her asking if she needs her.
She smiles and declines, knowing that I’m less of an expert than she is. Even
though it wasn’t a big deal her rejection was a subtle blow to my masculinity.
She spends about one minute fiddling with things under the hood and gets back
in the car and tries to start the car again….still NOTHING. She suggests we pray. We pray and she tries
again. She turns the key and we both sit there in suspense. It seemed like it
was going to be another failed attempt, but the car finally starts. Talk about
5 minutes of pre-departure anxiety mixed with faith in action!
We finally arrived at the
airport after a 40 minute drive. By this point I’m excited but I’m still
keeping my cool. I didn’t think the excitement would fully hit me until I got
to Hong Kong. As a whole I was being really nonchalant about the whole travel
things.
I get to the airport and I
see my friend Joy from Babson checking in. He is one of the three Babson
students I will be traveling with. He it takes him 5 minutes to check in. While
waiting on line, I see Imran, another one of the Babson students come in. As
soon as he comes in, he goes into the express line since he had already checked
in online. I tell my mom that I had already checked in online and she scolds me
for not going into the express line earlier. For a brief moment I hesitated
because I didn’t want to make a scene by moving my three heavy suitcases packed
with everything from clothes to laundry detergent under the rope separating the
two lines, but I quickly came to my senses and remember , “who cares I’m going
to Hong Kong.”
After checking in, we get to the metal detectors. I remembered that my mom had already warned me not to take any liquids on the plane because they will be confiscated and I could even get detained. Also after walking through metal detectors every day for four years at DeWitt Clinton High School, I think I was well prepared for this. I walk through the metal detector with no problems, but unfortunately, the person behind me wasn’t so lucky. They got stopped for having an opened bottle in their bag. Thankfully there wasn’t a big scene, but wouldn’t it have been amazing if after they got stopped red flashing lights and sirens went off and special forces officers came out of the wall and had to carry them away. That would be terrible for them, but it would definitely make for a good story.
Anywho….. Since Imran was close behind me I decided to wait for him before we both decided to go upstairs. We finally got upstairs to the waiting area where we saw Joy and Matt, the other Babson student who will be making the trip with me. After an hour of waiting I got on the plane for sixteen hours of meditating on how much Hong Kong was going to change my life. In other words, sleep.
If you want to read more
about the crime rate at DeWitt Clinton
High School you can check out this article by the Daily New. Keep in mind,
this article was published in 2012, I graduated in 2010 when it was a lot
safer.. Also don’t be swayed by the journalistic bias.
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