Stranded in Memphis

(Written three days ago...)

Well, I just plugged my computer into a North American electricity outlet! Woohooo!!! I guess I didn’t realize how homesick I was till I got teary when fingering the golden eagle seal on my passport yesterday morning in the baggage checking line. Of course, getting teary isn’t uncommon for me when I’m this tired…

Getting home has been an adventure, and it still is, because I’m not actually there yet. How ironic that I would take off from a snowy Ukraine without any problems, get through Amsterdam just fine, and then be stranded in Memphis, TN due to freezing rain. I was supposed to catch that last short flight to Shreveport at 7:30 pm, but no sooner had I settled in the terminal and started devouring a yogurt parfait than a man came up to me and said “Didn’t you know that the Shreveport flight has been cancelled?”

They had announced it several times over the intercome, but I guess I was too busy trying to fix my hopeless airplane hair and trying to unplug my ears and nose. He directed me to the place to get rebooked, and I thought, “oh, no biggy. It’ll be a late night, but I’ve waited this long; I can hold out.” So I was a little shocked when the lady handed me a new boarding pass and said “Your flight will board at 9:10 in the morning.” Then she gave me a purple hotel discount voucher and told me to call a hotel. What? Me? You’ve got to be kidding. Me, stay overnight by myself and get back to the airport in the morning?

I was a bit stunned, and felt tears of exhaustion surging forward. But I pushed them back and went to the payphone, popped in an outrageous 4 quarters, and made a series of calls that didn’t go through, both to the hotel help number and my parents. Another irony was that I had a cell phone in my bag…but it’s Ukrainian. And unfortunately, there is no Life:) outside of Urkaine. Haha. I love it that the phone company is called Life. So in other words, my cell phone was dead, and may as well have been buried.

So I returned to the counter, talked to someone else, and got directions to go to a kiosk way on the other side of the building. This older guy was really kind to me, and unfortunately that made me want to cry again. But the past few months in Urkaine haven’t been without effect. I snorted up my tears, took a stronger grip of my bags and headed for the baggage claim.

I held my head high and told myself, “No, we’re not going to cry right now. You’re a strong woman. You’re strong because God made you strong. Now go!” Whenever I talk to myself like this I laugh and think of the scene in Bambi where the Bambi has been wounded in a fight and the old patriarch deer thunders, “Get up, Bambi! Get up!” So with renewed confidence I strode down the corridor. I didn’t know that I possessed any determination until I went to Urkaine, and I’m slowly learning to employ the useful stuff.

As I went down the corridor of the Memphis airport, in spite of my troubles, I found myself thinking, “It smells like the south!” South America, as Broderic says. Or rather, the south of America. It’s the fried food and drab brown paint and thoughts of magnolia trees and the Mississippi river. It’s true that Texas is a different kind of south. In my skewed sense of domestic geography, I think of “The South” as just Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia…the states between home and Grandma’s house in Tennessee. Anything above that is north. Of course that’s completely inaccurate since the Mason-Dixon line is actually way up around, I don’t know, Illinois or somewhere. Wow, while my sense of world geography strengthens, I realize just how poorly I’m acquainted with my own homeland. Sweet country tis’ of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I speak-without-knowing-what-I’m-talking-about…

I tried calling home several more times, watching my stash of quarters all but disappear. I was glad I had all those…I can’t remember why I had so many quarters with me. Then I surveyed the hotel options, picked up the phone, and dialed the extension for Econo Lodge. Although I couldn’t understand the accent on the other end too well, I thought the guy said that the shuttle would be coming in about 40 minutes.

So I stood by the door watching with all the other delayed passengers. I finally phoned the Bourciers and got Mrs. Janet to call Mom and Dad since I couldn’t get them. Then I went back and watched again for my “mashrutka.” After the initial disappointment passed, I found myself a little gleeful over spending the night in a hotel. Shower. Sleep. I wouldn’t have to drive my loved ones away with my stench. Watching bus after bus pull by, straining to see mine, it dawned on me that the past few months in Ukraine primed me for this! I was just going to catch a mashrutka and go on my merry way!

Well, mashrutka after mashrutka came and mashrutka after mashrutka went. But not my mashrutka. The crowd of chilled huddling people diminished. Radisson went by, Alamo went by, Holiday Inn went by, Best Western went by…and went by again…all the shuttles came and went multiple times, but not Econo Lodge. After nearly an hour I called again, and the guy assured me that it would only be about 5 minutes. 5 minutes passed, and as many shuttles that weren’t Econo Lodge. Suddenly, about 15 minutes later, there it was! I dashed madly out to greet it, opened the door, and awkwardly stuffed my bags in. I felt a bit odd because I was the only person being picked up. I was just sitting there and there were two guys from the hotel in the front seat speaking Hindi.

Soon we were at the hotel, and I discovered that the whole place was like a mini India, complete with an elephant statue in the lobby. Here I was, just home from Ukraine, surrounded by Hindi speaking Indian guys. In fact, even the two other guests I met (who had cancelled flights like I did) were Indian, and on the way to the airport this morning they all spoke Hindi together like a big happy family, leaving me with doubts about which country I’ve actually arrived in!

Settling into my room was easy. One thing I’ve been learning from flying alone is that it’s not that hard, and there’s no need to stress out. Generally speaking, the people at the airport are there to help you, not out to get you. Everything is going to work out, even if you have to deal with a few delays. Same with the hotel. In fact, I wanted to try to call home again, but I couldn’t make a long distance call from the hotel. Seeing my obvious distress, the guy behind the counter offered his cell phone. I fumbled around with it for quite a while, trying in vain to phone Dad’s cell and then Connor’s. I wasn’t sure of the number to begin with, and my head was swimming after 25 hours pretty much awake.

I was overjoyed when I heard Dad’s voice on the other end saying “Hello?”

“Hi, Dad!”
“Hello, who is this?”
“It’s Cass.”
“Who?”
“It’s Cassie, your daughter who’s been in Urkaine and who is going hoarse because she has a cold,” I rasped. I hadn’t had enough water and I really was going hoarse, but I was a little upset that my own Dad didn’t recognize my voice. I couldn’t hear very well myself, because my ears had been popping pretty badly on the plane.

“Uh, I think you have the wrong number.” I was getting desperate. “No, Dad, it’s me!” I wanted to scream, scared that he was going to hang up. But instead I asked,

“Who is this?”

“This is Ron,” came the voice, “and I think you have the wrong number.” Oh. I apologized and hung up, looking around at the hotel workers, who were wondering what was wrong with this crazed girl. They seemed sympathetic, and thinking I was having trouble using the fancy cell phone, the other guy was about to hand me his. “No, no…it’s not that. I just can’t remember my family’s cell phone numbers,” I said, feeling frustrated and lost. They looked at me like I was a total ditz, but they seemed compassionate. “Take your time, Ma’am,” the first guy encouraged me in his polite Indian accent, “Please sit down.”

So I sat down and called the number I knew that I knew…the Bourciers’ home phone. Mrs. Janet picked up, and when I explained the situation to her, she assured me she would contact my parents and then got the hotel info so that they could call me in my room. I rushed back to my room, and sure enough, Dad called.

After that I felt much better, and sang joyfully all through my shower, then crawled into bed and went to sleep. I figured I would take advantage of every available minute to sleep, since I hadn’t really slept on the plane, but no. I woke up at 4 something and laid in bed trying to talk to myself in Russian since I couldn’t sleep. Finally, Russian vocabulary exhausted, I popped out of bed and started this blog entry (hehe, it’s been half a week now!), gathered my things, and visited the meager continental breakfast.

My flight took off after some more delays on the runway while they de-iced the plane, and I touched down in Shreveport and virtually ran to my waiting family…back to where I started. It was pretty amazing. I love those people. Now, three days later, we’re still catching up, and I’m eating up the car time with various family members. I can’t drive our new car because it’s a standard, so I’m getting carted everywhere, still feeling stunned to see gas prices at 1.58 when they were brushing 4.00 when I left!