Travel to South Africa

From the retreat, James+ and I drove together down to Pittsburgh. We went to dinner in Pittsburgh's South Side with James+' roomate Steve and ate at a Japanese Hibachi restaurant. It was a great deal of fun because the meal is cooked at the Hibachi grill right in front of us by a performance chef. It turned out, our chef went to high school in northern Virginia. I keep running into folk from the DC area! After dinner I crashed at James+' and Steve's apartment for the night and got up at 4AM to get to the airport. That's when things got a little crazy.

I was scheduled to leave Pittsburgh at 6:25AM but the flight was delayed so much that I was going to miss my connection in Newark and would not have made it to BWI until 2:30PM. Being afraid that I would not be able to make it from there to Dulles in time for my 6PM flight to London, I asked them to see if they could adjust it to get me there earlier. They first rerouted me still on the same airline but then that flight was cancelled so they booked me on a direct flight to National Airport on US Airways. I got to National a bit after noon where my parents met me. Unfortunately, in the confusion, my bags did not arrive. We went to the US Airways baggage area where we met Ashley who was extraordinarily helpful. It also turns out that she lives just down the street from my parents in Maryland. Strange. Anyway, she finally tracked down my bags which were on their way on my original itinerary to BWI via Newark. She made arrangements for my bags to be transferred to British Airways where they would meet me in London. Mom and Dad took me to a very nice lunch at Tysons Corner and then got me to Dulles. I slept for quite a bit of the flight and then found myself waiting around for my bags to arrive two hours after I did. They finally arrived and I retrieved them. I've been able to change clothes, wash my face, and brush my teeth. Finally! I wasn't planning on bringing both bags with me. I was going to send one home with Mom and Dad. Oh well. Maybe I'll find some use for the tent that I don't actually need until Taize!