What happened to Sunday, September 13th

Saying goodbye to London was harder than I thought it would be. Of course I knew that the older she got the more difficult it would become. I just wasn’t ready for it to start being tough. To London I am sure it all seems normal, it was just tucking her into bed. The only difference is she will wake up and not see dad for a couple of weeks. Perhaps I am overstating it but for the first time it was hard to say bye to her.

On another note the flight was great. I always enjoy flying Asiana. Sat on the last row of the plane, got about 6 hours of sleep and watched 2 movies. Oh, and I was in the minority on the flight which actually always feels strangely nice.  Started off trying to watch Terminator Salvation and fell asleep. Only to wake up 6 hours later and pick up right where I left off over some delicious cuisine. Does anyone really like this movie? I understand fans of the series, Terminator is a great saga if you will, but this movie sucked big time. That coming from a Christian Bale fan. (as an actor not a person) No need to worry though the mediocrity would be swept away during the next feature which was none other than The Proposal.  I watched this becoming romantic comedy while we were landing, the entire time thinking “Natalie would be proud”. In fact she loved this movie and cannot wait to purchase it. When it was in the theater our small group went to the movies split up and the guys watched The Hangover while the girls watched The Proposal. So, although my wife had watched this wonderful slice of film already, I had not. First of all I love Ryan Reynolds and Sandra Bullock. Enjoyed the movie but not in the same way or to the same degree that Natalie did I am sure. After the show came the customs forms. Does anyone else not like filling these out? No matter how many times I do it I always worry that I am answering wrong and am going to be detained.

We landed an hour early 4:30am Seoul time. There was a log jam getting off the plane. Herding cattle doesn’t even begin to describe it. To no one’s surprise the holdup was a swine flu check point. You got pocked and prodded with this light thing they ultimately taped behind your ear. Still the whole thing went pretty fast, and after clearing customs in a record 30 min I had an hour to kill before I could catch a bus into town. It was then that I came upon a peculiar site, in the main reception at the Inchon International Airport there was a Mc Donald’s directly across from a KFC. Now both of these fine establishments are popular in Korea and China, so the interesting sight was that in front of the Mc D’s sat Ronald on a bench (I know you may have seen this before) and across the way in front of KFC stood the Colonel, Colonel Sanders that is. They were facing each other in a stare down. Now maybe it is because it was 5am and I had just been on a 12 hour flight but the grudge match of statues was pleasing to my need for entertainment. 

Finally on the bus for the hour long journey into town, to say that I was tired and delirious would be an understatement. Seeing the Hilton on the horizon brought hope. I jumped out of the bus grabbed my bags and headed to the front desk. Only to be told that if I wanted to check in this early I would have to pay for an extra night. Of course I refused and after some excellent discussion was told that if I could wait till 10am that I could check in with no additional charge.

So here I am. Waiting in the lobby trying to map out how to get to my 11:30am meeting and eagerly awaiting my 10am check in. Probably the one thing I can never get over is the complete weirdness of losing an entire day when you fly this direction.