Some of my flying adventures

So finally, I came back to Madrid, after a series of some problematic events that happened to me during my trip that made me change my mind officially: I hate travelling. Ok, let me rephrase: I love travelling, I just hate flying. Or any other form of getting to the final destination. Which is a bit weird of a turn of events, because I used to like it. But this trip? This trip was a disaster. Among all of those times that I have been flying over the years, and I started doing it when I was like 3 years old so it’s even earlier than I can remember, this was the worst of all.

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I didn’t sleep that night. I don’t know why – maybe out of sheer stress, which is weird, because I am so used to travelling all the time that I don’t freak out about it anymore. I had to wake up at 5 am to first get to Warsaw from my city, which is a 2 hours car drive and then you always have to be at the airport two hours before the flight. So, while I was standing in the line towards the baggage claim, it hit me: my vision blackened, my heart was pounding and I couldn’t stand up anymore so I sat on the floor, hid my face in my hands and started praying to make it to the plane. Thanks to the perfect reflex of the guy at the baggage claim stand, once I got there, he gave me the garbage basket just in time for me to vomit in there and thank God, not on anyone or anything else. He called the doctors, they gave me some pills, told me to be careful and set me towards the gate entrance. I made it to the plane, but it was not over yet.

I was travelling with Airberlin, with a transit in Berlin. Thing is, we had only 40 minutes to get out of the plane and find the new gate until it was going to close. Which is the minimum limit of time that the airlines allow for the transit. The plane from Warsaw to Berlin got 20 minutes late. It didn’t help me to keep calm at all – I was worried sick that I was going to miss my plane to Madrid, and then I would have to stay in Berlin for two more days, because it happened to be a Saturday and the next flight to Madrid was supposed to take off on Monday. Anyway, it turned out not to be so bad – we made it perfectly on time for the next plane to take off and I even got a chance to speak in French with a native French guy for a while. It was all going very well, until the landing. The landing was just... oh, it was awful! First, at one point I realized that I suddenly went almost deaf – everything seemed so quiet and I couldn’t even hear my own voice loud enough while I was speaking. You know this feeling when something pops in your ears all the time during the take off and the landing? Well, this was horrible. It hurt so much that I honestly think that I cried out of pain, although I am not entirely sure because since I was almost deaf, I couldn’t hear it. And then it happened again – we entered some severe turbulences that made my stomach jump. Which ended in me vomiting again, 3 times. I was a total mess when we finally landed.

And I have got to mention a woman who helped me back then and stayed with me until we found a medical service point on the airport for me. Which reminds me that I still haven’t called her back.

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But honestly, this is not the first time something happens to me during my trips. And I don’t know what it is, but something always happens to me. It is a rule now, seriously. I remember the other time when I vomited in the plane, but it was easier to explain, because it was simply because I drank too much the night before. It was when I had to come back to Poland from Murcia and had to leave my boyfriend there all alone. So since my plane was taking off from Alicante, we decided to go there the day before and have nice goodbye at the beach. With wine. Believe me, do not fly when you have a hangover.

I also remember another time, when I actually did miss a plane... It was when I was coming back from Havana to Warsaw, and had a transit in Paris. If you have been to Cuba, you would know that it was perfectly obvious that the plane was going to take off late. What was not so easy to predict though was that it was going to take off 40 minutes late. When I got to the gate, running like crazy and pushing everyone that stood on my way, it turned out that it closed 2 minutes earlier. Bad luck. So I did the only thing I could do: I went to the information desk and asked the lady for help. She found a flight for me that was supposed to leave in 5 hours but land not in Warsaw, but in Cracow. At least, I got to come back to Poland on the same day.

Then there was another time... Oh no, wait. It was the same flight actually. After I got to Cracow, it turned out that they have lost my luggage. I had fresh Cuban fruits in there. So you can imagine what happened to them when they returned it to me 3 days later. (By the way, it is technically forbidden to take out Cuban fruits and Cuban money out of the country, but somehow, I never had any problems about doing that).

Anyhow, travelling is fun, so don’t get discouraged by all of the things that might happen to you while you do it. It is no big deal after all.

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