Travel Days (Sunday, 3/11/2012 – Tuesday, 3/13/2012) – Haiti – Romania
Well, I have successfully completed another set of travel days. This travel experience was much longer than the others and full of many more changes but that kept it very exciting. It also reminded us not to have expectations (like thinking that we will get a layover in JFK to use internet and buy American food)! Overall, it was another GREAT travel experience. Our flight on Turkish Airlines from JFK to Istanbul was so AMAZING . . . the food, the service, and the movies! Everyone had excellent attitudes and worked together to make some crazy fast connections that seemed impossible and our Logistics team really did an awesome job keeping us posted and where we needed to be. As usual, I‘ve included a brief recap of our journey below.
**Sunday, 3/11/2012
3:45am Wake up & find out that the flight to JFK has been changed to 3:10pm and then go back to sleep
6:00am Wake up again & put packs outside
6:30am Breakfast
7:00am Load pack on the schoolbus
7:45am/8:45amFind out that Haiti has decided to observe daylight savings time, for the first time, so immediately lost an hour (always fun on a travel day)
9:06am Pull away from Militon loaded up on the schoolbus (with 17 more packs and 4 more people than piled in when we arrived)
11:00am Arrive @ the airport in Port au Prince
11:20am Begin the security, immigration, and check-in process
12:18pm Make it through to the gate and find out that the flight is further delayed until 6:39pm so settle in to hang out at the airport a while
4:00pm Find out that the flight is further delayed until 6:54pm and we will likely not make our scheduled flight out of JFK
6:30pm Board the plane
7:07pm Take off from Haiti
10:36pm Touch down on US soil (NOT FOR LONG!) – Go through customs, collect our bags, take a shuttle to another terminal, check-in, go through security, and RUN to the gate . . . Record Time!!!
11:59pm Board the plane (which was held for us b/c it was scheduled to depart @ 11:55p)
**Monday, 3/12/2012
12:18am Plane departs from JFK for Istanbul, Turkey (just over 9 hour flight + a loss of 6 hours due to time change)
3:39pm Plane touches down in Istanbul, Turkey
4:04pm Hurry to make our connection – deboard, go directly to gate, and go through security
4:40pm Board a plane for Bucharest, Romania then sit on the runway for awhile awaiting clearance (Hurry up and wait!)
5:29pm Takeoff from Turkey
7:24pm Find out for sure that though we made our flight out of JFK, our bags did not (as we suspected) and head to the office to file claims
8:25pm Head downstairs to a mini-market and get some food for the evening
8:58pm Board a bus and head over to the train station
9:45pm Arrive @ train station and go into the McDonalds to use Wifi to contact anxiously awaiting family
11:40pm Board a train for Dragnesti, Romania with our team and 2 other teams that our serving in our area
11:55pm Train Departs
**Tuesday, 3/13/2012
2:15am Train arrives and we are picked up by contacts
2:21am Arrive at the mission house where the other 2 teams are staying and say “bye for now”
2:33am My team is welcomed into a home where we will stay for one night before heading to our permanent location the next day
3:00am Go to sleep (in a bed with sheets, a comforter, and a pillow . . . SO COZY J)
9:30am Wake up; HOT shower (first in 2 months); Breakfast with our hosts for the evening
11:00am Head back over to the mission house to meet our contact/host for the month
12:30pm Depart with our contact/host and make a stop by the grocery store for supplies
2:30pm Arrive at our host home in Rusanesti, Romania where our team will live this month with a wonderful missionary couple and their 2 year old son
