Monday, November 26, 2007

Flying home...

The flight from Heathrow to Seoul left at around 8.45 pm which should have meant we could fall asleep naturally and spend some of the flight in slumberland. Well, some of us did, but not me. Tired as I was I remained awake and finished up watching three movies: Oceans Thirteen, the latest Die Hard and, for my choice from the classic movies, The Grapes of Wrath.
I’d slept a bit on the coach coming from Attleborough to Heathrow, so that helped, but I would have been happier to have slept some of the night as well.
When we got to Incheon airport in Seoul, it was 3.35 local time - but about 6.30 am England time, which is what my body was still trying to run on in spite of my efforts to convince it otherwise. So I’d been awake all night.
On the coach into Seoul itself I slept a couple of brief times, and again since we arrived at our hotel. Which means my sleeping clock is completely out of kilter.
We were at Incheon for quite some time in the end, firstly through trying to find somewhere to park our two large suitcases for the two and a half days we’re here, and then trying to find the right bus to catch to get to our hotel - a hotel virtually nobody seemed to know about. When you see the size of Seoul city, it’s probably not surprising.
Finally we caught a 5C bus outside the airport, but as time went on and the bus seemed to be travelling forever, we asked a couple of guys behind us, Koreans who spoke good English, if they could help. One of them finished up ringing up the hotel to check where it was, and wrote the address down in Korean. And then when they suggested a stop to get off at, they helped us get a taxi as well. Meanwhile, three black English-speaking women in front of us on the bus got in on the act as well, and discussed at length the fact that they didn’t know where the hotel was.
However, the taxi driver drove with confidence (and considerable speed) to the hotel, and was enthusiastic about finding it. So were we!
The Korean man at reception, when I wrote that our home address was Dunedin, cried with delight: Dunedin! I stayed there four years ago as an exchange student. If he hadn’t liked us before, he certainly thought we were wonderful after that!

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