Snowy Re-entry

I am home again. I know. Sad, isn't it?

I couldn't imagine a scenario that would've seen me happy to leave my little adventure behind, so I suppose having reentered life with a minimum of tears and hair-tearing is a good thing.

We also have about a million inches of snow here, so that, too, is a hilarious way for reality to say to me "welcome back...(sucker?)"

I will continue to post about my trip even though it's physically ended. I expect that over the next days and weeks, thoughts, emotions and memories will surface that got steamrolled by the crystal clear water and hilarious company of the last part of the trip, and wirting about them, even states-side, is important in helping me share the big picture AND in my own record keeping.

Will it be less exciting to read knowing I'm writing from an english speaking louse-free environment? Well, I suppose that's the beauty of a blog. You can just stop reading it if you feel gyped by the home-posts.

Anyways: today I will share the story of how I came home (or almost didn't come home.)

After I left Steph & Jordan on Kao San Road, I asked at the airport what it would cost to change my return ticket. The nice lady at the Emirates desk gave me a very satisfactory answer (cheap!) and told me I could change it to any open date for the same price and gave me a number to call where she assured me that an enlish speaker would assist me. Hooray!

So I flew from Bangkok to Koh Samui where I got stuck staying at the Mermaid Bungalows or Inn or whatever it was. I twiddled my thumbs pool-side waiting for 8:30 pm to roll around when I could call my toll free number and speak with someone in the US Emirates office about changing my ticket. Tick-tock, tick-tock. Life is hard here by the pool. Read, read, suntan lotion, move to shade, check the time. Food? Oh yes, I should eat. Check the time? Not yet? Ok, I'll take a nap. Etc...

After several failed attempts involving payphones and the Mermaid lobby phone, I managed to get through to Emirates...where their machine told me politely and in perfect english that their hours were from 8:30 am-5:30 pm, Monday-Friday. "Yes," I said to the machine. "That is why I'm calling NOW, at 8:30 am, EST."

Only then did it dawn on me that the lady had given me a number for the Bangkok office and the extension for the english speaker's phone. Idiot.

So I moved on with life. It was the weekend, so I couldn't call again the next day and I simply preceeded with the plan: go to Koh Tao, learn to dive, love life.

Which brings me to Monday. We had a classroom session in the morning for my dive course and between that and our 1 pm rendezvous for our first real dive, I got myself to the phone to nail down the slippery details of my return.

Again, several pay phones and internet cafe phones later, I was speaking with the ever-polite Emirates People.

"Hello," I said. "I'd like to change my ticket, please." My heart was thudding because technically, I was already going to miss my scheduled return date (that night.) (Have I mentioned I'm sometimes really stupid?)

"Sure, no problem," the man on the other end told me. (PHEW.) "When would you like to fly?"

"I'd like a ticket for this Saturday, the 27th or Sunday the 28th, please."

(Sound of typing from Emirates end of the phone line.) "I'm sorry ma'am, we have nothing available on those dates."

No problem, it's a weekend, of course. "How about the friday before?"

Typing, typing, typing. "No, I'm sorry, also full."

"Ok. The Monday after, then?"

Click click click click click. "Also full, ma'am."

Heart rate increasing at an alarming speed. "Ok. How about Thursday or even Wednesay?" (There is no way I can make it to the Bangkok airport before a Wednesday flight, by the way.)

"Yes, we have a seat on Wednesday."

"Ok, can you sort of put your finger in the page there and then go look at what your next available flight out of Bangkok is after that?"

Everlasting typing over the phone lines. Heart in throat. Frantic prayers.

"After Wednesday, the next available flight is April 25, ma'am."

Oh crap. Oh crap. Oh crap.

"Yes, please book me on the Wednesday flight."

Leaving Wednesday (at 1:05 am, mind you,) means many things:

First, I won't get to finish my dive course. I am crushed and bitterly disappointed by this fact.

I must arrange a boat ride to the island with the airport and also procure a last-minute seat on an airplane going to Bangkok. I begin the search and come up with...nothing.

My hands begin to shake.

I'm going to be stranded here. (Actually, that wasn't a bad thought, but the following ones were.) I'm going to have to purchase a brand new ticket for my return flight. How much would those be? I'll check. Oh. $1000.00 That's an expensive mistake Sarah, you big dumb 29-year-old infant.

I'm going to have to call Stevo and tell him I'm stuck here and can he please just keep holding down the fort while I play in the sun and behave like a child?

Do I even have $1000 for a new ticket home?

Am I going to have to call my parents (on their vacation in Israel, no less,) and explain this to them and ASK THEM FOR MONEY???

Who can I call for advice? Its after midnight at home, on a school night. What do I do? What do I do? Oh my gosh. I'm such a moron. I hate myself for doing this kind of stuff. Will I ever learn?

Then I turn to the lady who helped me with the phone, who runs the internet cafe. I recall that there are boat tickets for sale in this office and that I read something called "EK Travel" over the door when I came in. Perhaps she can help me?

And help me she did. After a few communitcation errors she procured for me a taxi ride to the pier, a boat ticket, a mini-bus ride from the pier to the airport and one (business class) ticket to Bangkok a whopping 5 hours before my 1 am departure on Wednesday morning.

I could've cried.

It all cost me less than $200, by the way. And yes, I really sat in business class for a 1 hour flight. And they used real linnen on my tray table when they fed me. It was rad.

Walking back to meet my dive buddy for our first real dives and my last real dives of the trip, I couldn't figure out if I was more sad about leaving early or relieved that the shame of a massive travel debacle had been narrowly averted.

This remained a toss-up until this morning, when I was clearing off my car to come into town and was soaked to the waist and freezing after 10 minutes with only the first half of the car clean.

Clearly, I should've embraced the debacle.

Clearly.