My plane was flying out of Chicago at 4 PM. I checked online to make sure the flight was confirmed, because I don't like making phone calls, and in English I'd have suffered with it way beyond measure anyway. We arrived early, but at the wrong building – arrivals instead of departures. Fortunately, there's a surface metro running between the buildings, so it didn't become a problem. I checked in at an automated machine kinda like an ATM, so as not to stand in line. The machine didn't recognize my passport on its own, so I had to enter everything manually. After that, I weighed my luggage and got upset. It turned out that my super-economy class only allows 20 kg, and I had a whole 30. I had read about this beforehand in one place, but hoped I'd get away with it, because other sources either contradicted this or kept quiet. Nevertheless, it was true. Beware of the economy restricted label on tickets! The overweight fee was 50 bucks. Not to say it's a whole lot, but I'm no Rockefeller, so I pulled everything out of the boxes, and crammed the rest into my carry-on. I put my jacket on, which looked weird in the heat. All this junk in my carry-on later made my life much harder at the customs checks. They thoroughly checked me every time, asked me to take everything out and explain what it was, and explained to me that it's not recommended to carry such things in a carry-on. In short, it was a hassle. On the bright side, I was flying home, already had experience roaming around airports, and all of this made my movements much easier. Even so, I almost walked out of the security zone through an employee exit once, but turned onto the escalator just in time.
The officials, however, were always polite. Funny enough, one complimented my boots, and the second was surprised by the small size of the electronics [censored] that I was carrying. This didn't stop them from forgetting to take the departure form out of my passport. Don't repeat my mistake — if you don't hand it in, they might not let you into the US later. If you did repeat it, listen up. From what I managed to find out on the US border patrol website, you don't need to mail it anywhere if you left by plane and not by sea. What you do need is to keep the boarding pass, to prove that you flew out of the US before your authorized stay expired. Then, if you fly to the US again, you just take it with you.
On the way back in the American Airlines plane, I sat at the very, very back of the cabin on the right. Right next to the emergency exit. So I read the instructions on how to open it even twice, but there was still something I didn't like about it. Which means they could have made it clearer. I also watched the movie “Secondhand Lions” for the second time, a very good kids' film. I listened to the airplane radio a lot, where they were talking about something like cancer treatment and charities. For example, one that fulfills the dreams of dying and severely ill children — a guy from there asked to donate anything you can, especially free airline miles, because there's never enough of them, as sick kids love to travel. I'm generally not particularly healthy myself, and a kid at heart, so you'd be better off donating miles to me — I love traveling too.
Next to me sat an elderly Belgian couple, who stared at me intently until I said hello to them. During the flight, I was testing the theory that you adapt easier if you don't eat during the flight. Granted, I drank orange juice in considerable amounts, so I'm not sure about the purity of the experiment. I was supplied with juice by the flight attendants, who were concerned by my reluctance to have dinner, and by the Belgians, who turned out to be lawyers — husband and wife. The wife was no longer young, but still pleasant to look at, and in conversation, as the cliché goes: "you could feel the European culture." The Belgians were lawyers, and I talked to the wife for a bit, baffling her with my favorite question: "Why does the plane fly in an arc on the map?" The lawyers, as is customary for them, answered a question with a question: "Why does this interest me?" And so we talked. The Belgian lady pronounced English words with a pleasant French accent. When she found out I was from Latvia, she called it very cutely: "Lettonie." Clearly, she wasn't used to English at all. I didn't risk mentioning that I know a little French. The Belgian lady didn't remember the capital of our country, but generally showed interest. I told her various things, mentioned the problems with mutual understanding between different linguistic communities. Then about the facts I'd gleaned from Euronews, that they have that too. She said with a sigh, "Oh yes," so I became convinced that Euronews doesn't exist in vain after all — one European understands another a little better. She told me some other things too, for example, that they live not far from Brussels. I replied that I still had a 3-hour flight to Latvia, and then a 4-hour train ride.
And that's how it turned out. The plane out of Brussels was leaving in 1.5 hours, so I took a leisurely stroll, checking out the duty free and the dining Europeans. I didn't have any euros, so I avoided the temptation to spend them. As it turned out later, while lazily strolling around, I lost sight of the fact that I was supposed to pick up my luggage and check it in again at the check-in. Alas, on the way there the luggage flew on its own, so I didn't guess, even though it was written on the receipt. So upon arriving in Riga, I chatted with an airport employee, who was surprised at how strange the name of the street where I live is - "Raipoles". Then she said that streets in Daugavpils are generally named weirdly. Who the hell knows, maybe it's more obvious from the outside. The good news is I wasn't the only such idiot who didn't pick up their luggage — next to me was a girl with a red suitcase. By the way, I even managed to remember the brand of my bag — Bass, though it required some mental effort. Speaking of the bag, I took it from my sister, leaving her the one I arrived with, since it was smaller in size. We're always doing these switcheroos, because the bag I left her was, in turn, left to us by our sister on her last visit. I think this isn't the end of it — next year our parents will fly to the US, and they'll take this bag with them.
Upon arrival in Riga, in accordance with the theory-testing plan, I scarfed down a kebab at kebab fix, and then headed for the train. I had no energy left to go run errands, even though I was without a suitcase. The theory about fasting during a transatlantic flight didn't help — the jet lag was absolutely brutal. I went to work like a zombie until the end of the week — barely moving. They say you should calculate adaptation like this: a day for every hour of time zone shift. So 8 hours from the US means 8 days of jet lag. Well, I didn't have it for that long, but up to days 5-6 it was still noticeable. My boss, who flew in a bit later, bounced back in practically a day, but then again, that's why he's the boss. He also forced his way onto the plane without checking in for the flight, because he was running late, and that is very surprising in general.
In total, I was on the move for over 20 hours, so I arrived home pretty exhausted. My luggage was delivered to my home by courier a few days later, and for free, at that. Thanks to the Air Baltic airline for their responsiveness towards scatterbrains. But for the economy restricted luggage, on the contrary, no thanks.
This post is not the last one.