Well, we are back home. Hubby and I came back Saturday night, our plane landed around 11:30 pm in Munich and we drove back to Nürnberg that night, I was in my bed around 2 am. Sunday the grandparents and the kids came back and tomorrow we are all back to normal, kids in kindergarten, me back to laundry and household duties and hubby back to working (even though he technically still has taken time off this week but his work phone already rang this morning)
While sitting on the plane during our mostly uneventful flight I was thinking about what I could write about next. The most obvious thing would be our vacation, but then when we were almost home, flying the last few minutes over Austria it started to be a little shaky and I was once again reminded why I usually hate flying, so I thought I would tell you a bit more about me and my - well I would say ambivalent - feelings about flying.
When I was younger I had no problem with flying, I don't remember how old I was when I first stepped on a plane but I remember it was a flight to see my uncle and it was with Lufthansa and I was allowed to see the cockpit and got a small pin to put on my jacket (I still have it) and some other souvenirs.
My parents really like travelling so we traveled to a lot of far away places during the summer holidays every year. Sometimes we would take the train or car but when I was 15 (I think) we traveled to the US for the first time so that was my first long-distance flight. I then flew again to Canada for my school exchange, and then to the US again with my parents and again and again for another school exchange and again to become an Au Pair in the US. Until then flying was no problem for me.
During my Au Pair Year my Grandmother turned 75 and I wanted to be there for her birthday (it was supposed to be a surprise) so I asked to take some of my vacation to fly home right after christmas (her birthday is Dec. 26th). I wanted to stay until the 30th to be back to spend New Years in NYC with friends, This time I would fly all by myself for the first time which wasn't a problem for me at all.
The cheapest flight route was via Iceland (with Iceland Air) from Baltimore via Reykjavik and Kopenhagen to Hamburg. It was an overnight flight but I didn't get much sleep because it was shaky and bumpy and plain horrible. The Reykjavik Airport is right on the coast, it was very windy, snowing, there were lost of icebergs in the water and the runway looked like a huge ice skating rink. I was sitting in a window seat (I actually had a whole row by myself, the plane was half empty) over the wings and it looked like my wing would crash on the ground first, the landing was more like sliding on an ice road. I was terrified. I also couldn't sleep on the trip to Kopenhagen and the last hour to Hamburg. I think the Stewardess probably hated me by the time we landed because I would call her everytime the plane started shaking to ask what is happening.
When I had to go back I had to be at the airport very early (around 7am), I was tired from partying with friends the night before, I was sad to leave my boyfriend again and I still remembered the horrible flight. My departure was delayed, and delayed again, and again. So after a while we asked what is wrong and were told there were some technical problems with the plane, it had been in Hamburg for 3 days and they had mechanics flown in from Iceland to find and fix everything. I was about to cancel my flight but my family convinced me to leave. During my stopover in Kopenhagen the plane was delayed again because apparently some more problems had shown up during the short flight from Hamburg. I called my parents and started crying and told them to come with the car to pick me up (which they refused and told me to step on the plane again).
Ever since then I start to get nervous as soon as there are slight turbulences, I react to the slightest change in noises on the plane (like the crunching sounds when the wheels are retracted), I hate take off and landing but not as much as bumps and anything out of the ordinary during the flight. And after 9/11 it was even worse, now I am not only scared of turbulence during flights but also get nervous when I am in a crowded boarding gate or I am irritated by people behaving strange on the plane. I once had some guy sitting next to me who was extremly nervous, sweating, fidgeting with his cell phone, calling someone, talking in a language I didn't understand and he got very angry when the Stewardess told him his carry on was to heavy for the overhead compartment and had to be stored in the back. It was on a flight from Chicago back home after visiting my friend Nina and I nearly left the plane, I was absolutely sure that guy was a terrorist.
My fear of flying is not so bad that I don't step on a plane, I love traveling way to much and I also love exploring new and far away places. I have friends and family who live far away, my favourite country is across an ocean, so I need to fly in order to get there. I just don't really enjoy it. It's like going to the dentist in order to have healthy teeth, something inevitable.
I hope some day it will get better, I know I have to pull myself together when we fly with the kids next time so I don't scare them and I hope that flight (wherever we will fly) will be as uneventful as the one on Saturday.
Irene
While sitting on the plane during our mostly uneventful flight I was thinking about what I could write about next. The most obvious thing would be our vacation, but then when we were almost home, flying the last few minutes over Austria it started to be a little shaky and I was once again reminded why I usually hate flying, so I thought I would tell you a bit more about me and my - well I would say ambivalent - feelings about flying.
When I was younger I had no problem with flying, I don't remember how old I was when I first stepped on a plane but I remember it was a flight to see my uncle and it was with Lufthansa and I was allowed to see the cockpit and got a small pin to put on my jacket (I still have it) and some other souvenirs.
My parents really like travelling so we traveled to a lot of far away places during the summer holidays every year. Sometimes we would take the train or car but when I was 15 (I think) we traveled to the US for the first time so that was my first long-distance flight. I then flew again to Canada for my school exchange, and then to the US again with my parents and again and again for another school exchange and again to become an Au Pair in the US. Until then flying was no problem for me.
During my Au Pair Year my Grandmother turned 75 and I wanted to be there for her birthday (it was supposed to be a surprise) so I asked to take some of my vacation to fly home right after christmas (her birthday is Dec. 26th). I wanted to stay until the 30th to be back to spend New Years in NYC with friends, This time I would fly all by myself for the first time which wasn't a problem for me at all.
The cheapest flight route was via Iceland (with Iceland Air) from Baltimore via Reykjavik and Kopenhagen to Hamburg. It was an overnight flight but I didn't get much sleep because it was shaky and bumpy and plain horrible. The Reykjavik Airport is right on the coast, it was very windy, snowing, there were lost of icebergs in the water and the runway looked like a huge ice skating rink. I was sitting in a window seat (I actually had a whole row by myself, the plane was half empty) over the wings and it looked like my wing would crash on the ground first, the landing was more like sliding on an ice road. I was terrified. I also couldn't sleep on the trip to Kopenhagen and the last hour to Hamburg. I think the Stewardess probably hated me by the time we landed because I would call her everytime the plane started shaking to ask what is happening.
When I had to go back I had to be at the airport very early (around 7am), I was tired from partying with friends the night before, I was sad to leave my boyfriend again and I still remembered the horrible flight. My departure was delayed, and delayed again, and again. So after a while we asked what is wrong and were told there were some technical problems with the plane, it had been in Hamburg for 3 days and they had mechanics flown in from Iceland to find and fix everything. I was about to cancel my flight but my family convinced me to leave. During my stopover in Kopenhagen the plane was delayed again because apparently some more problems had shown up during the short flight from Hamburg. I called my parents and started crying and told them to come with the car to pick me up (which they refused and told me to step on the plane again).
Ever since then I start to get nervous as soon as there are slight turbulences, I react to the slightest change in noises on the plane (like the crunching sounds when the wheels are retracted), I hate take off and landing but not as much as bumps and anything out of the ordinary during the flight. And after 9/11 it was even worse, now I am not only scared of turbulence during flights but also get nervous when I am in a crowded boarding gate or I am irritated by people behaving strange on the plane. I once had some guy sitting next to me who was extremly nervous, sweating, fidgeting with his cell phone, calling someone, talking in a language I didn't understand and he got very angry when the Stewardess told him his carry on was to heavy for the overhead compartment and had to be stored in the back. It was on a flight from Chicago back home after visiting my friend Nina and I nearly left the plane, I was absolutely sure that guy was a terrorist.
My fear of flying is not so bad that I don't step on a plane, I love traveling way to much and I also love exploring new and far away places. I have friends and family who live far away, my favourite country is across an ocean, so I need to fly in order to get there. I just don't really enjoy it. It's like going to the dentist in order to have healthy teeth, something inevitable.
I hope some day it will get better, I know I have to pull myself together when we fly with the kids next time so I don't scare them and I hope that flight (wherever we will fly) will be as uneventful as the one on Saturday.
Irene
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