Touchdown!

Whew. I started writing this blog while in Cincinnati airport.. waiting for the rest of the gang to arrive. So far its Day 2 here already and I’m still writing Day1. J

Our travel started at Manila to Narita Airport Japan. Northwest Airlines flight 22 flew exactly 8:30 AM as scheduled. First stopover was Narita Airport where we landed roughly 12 PM MNL (1 PM Japan time). From Narita Airport, we flew to Seattle Washington for good 9 hours. That was the longest 9 hours of my life (so far!). I wasn’t able to sleep at all. God thing there was a personal mini tv in front of me and a remote control on the right side of my seat. I watched 4 freaking movies because I couldn’t sleep – Marley and Me, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The day the Earth Stood still, and Madagascar: Escape to Africa that I failed to finish because we’re nearing touchdown. I also played BEJEWELED, naaliw tuloy ako.

For quite some time now I’ve been flying through Philippine Airlines and this is the first time I flew through NWA. I can’t help it but compare. This is just my personal and lone observation. With NWA – I didn’t feel hungry at all and I didn’t feel the need to ask for water because they automatically offer you one. There were mini snacks in between lunch and breakfast. But they only have soap in the washroom. PAL offers toothbrush and toothpaste too in their welcome kit, but there’s none for NWA. There’s also cologne, alcohol, lotion and soap in the washroom of PAL – hygienic Pinoy eh. Hehehe.




We landed at Seattle Airport exactly as expected. We had to go through a brief immigration interview but we did pass smoothly. Unlike the other team which were interviewed further in Minneapolis Immigration for almost an hour or more. Thank God we don’t have to go through that; question and answer portion. We stayed and waited at Seattle Airport for more than 2 hours before boarding for Cincinnati. When we finally did, there were problems with the front part of the plane, cabin pressure, etc etc… so we got delayed for 30 minutes. I actually didn’t know because I was half asleep by then. I got tired waiting for the plane to take off plus I haven’t slept at all. I counted the hours we’ve been traveling and this last trip will make it 23:30 minutes already… almost a day.. hay.

Though we left a little late, we made it to Cincinnati earlier than the expected arrival. NWA flies ON TIME – really wonderful. It was 7:20 when we landed, few minutes after, our luggage arrived at the carousel already. When the other team arrived – past 9PM; we waited for another hour before their bags arrived.

I was terribly hungry by this time. My last meal was the flight from Japan to Seattle. When all had their respective bags, we then went took a free shuttle Nationale Rental Car. The 3 OM’s split up in driving the 3 cars. I hopped into Vida’s car with Joy and Chay. When we went out of the car rental parking we thought the other cars were waiting since we will be convoying on the way to the hotel.. but nope! They all went ahead. We ended up using maps and the GPS (which unfortunately dies often). We got to the North Kentucky (Covington) Extended Stay hotel around 11:30PM. Instead of going down and bringing our luggage to our respective rooms, we decided to go to the Supermarket. After 1 hour, we got back to the hotel again and finally I got to eat, take a bath and inform home that I survived and made it here safe and sound. I hit the sack at 5AM.

Recalling this whole event makes me dizzy and tired! The entire travel was 27 hours!!