The long voyage home.

The number of photos I take is inversely proportional to the amount of enjoyment I am getting out of my day - or not. On a really good day, I can take upwards of 300 photos. Today, with all the airport time, flying, and general discomfort, I took NINE. And 7 of those were on Mario's phone. I didn't even have the energy, or the drive, to take out my camera.

The morning started out fine. Granted, the alarm going off at 2:30 am is a very rude awakening, but adrenaline tends to override that, as does a brisk walk in the cool morning air back to the airport that you can walk in and out of. Check-in is smooth, except for the fact that I neglected to do so online, so Mario and I are NOT sitting together, not even close, and we are both stuck in the middle seats of our respective rows. More on THAT later.

We enjoy one last big, steaming bowl of breakfast Pho, warm and aromatic, and the only place open this early in the morning. Heck, there's not even a place selling coffee! But really, Pho is my new breakfast favorite, and it will likely become part of the menu rotation once we get home, much to Mario's delight. And we luck out once again - our search for those conical bamboo hats, synonymous with Vietnam, proved fruitless last night(as I thought it would), and the sad reality is that none of the airport gift shops are open this early in the morning. Having lost all hope of bringing the elusive hats back home, we plunk down on chairs at a far-off gate in the airport, to watch some soccer highlight reruns. What do we spot not 2 rows behind us at the same empty gate, but TWO conical hats discarded on the chairs, likely by some gung-ho tourist who finally got tired of carrying the things around, and didn't want to have to deal with them as carry-on! But we don't mind carrying them! And snatch! Those hats are as good as ours!(Note that Mario and I DID wait an appropriate amount of time, just in case someone came back to reclaim the hats, but in an empty airport at 5:15 am, when your flight is the only one boarding, you don't have to wait THAT long before realizing NO ONE is coming back for them!)

The Hanoi-Beijing flight was pretty standard, no entertainment, one speedy in-flight meal, mostly sleeping passengers. The layover in Beijing was also pretty standard, though you do have to go through added security when entering China, regardless of whether you are actually ENTERING China by leaving the airport. Even transiting passengers have to go through security. And for anyone curious, NO, there was no additional screening for the CoronaVirus, which seems a little bizarre given all the publicity it is getting outside of China. I wonder if they are trying to keep it under wraps here, especially with all the travelling the upcoming Lunar New Year involves...

And now the flight to Montreal. In one word? HORRIBLE. Probably the worst I have experienced, and it's not even the longest I've flown! Being in the middle seat SUCKS. Luckily, I'm next to a woman who gets up probably 20 times during the flight, so when she rises, so do I. I stretch. I walk around. I go to the washroom, or to the galley for tea, for water, for snacks. I make my way up to Mario, 15 rows ahead of me, and chat, albeit briefly, as he too is stuck in the middle seat, between 2 backpackers who sleep like the dead. I move as much as I can, but 4 hours out I am so restless I just can't stand it.

Being apart from Mario sucks. Yes, we don't often talk on long-haul flights, each nestled snugly in our own bubbles, but the option is there. Also, there is so much more comfort is having some you KNOW next to you, as opposed to complete strangers. You can overflow(for lack of a better word) into the other person's space, and vice-versa. You can put the seat arm up, you can stretch out, you can overlap. I fell so stuck, so confined in what seems like the narrowest middle seat even. Ms. Aisle-seat is petite, and takes up little room, but it is Mr. Window-seat, Mr.I'm going-to-spread-out-and-there's-nothing-you-can-do-about-it that makes the flight so uncomfortable. Trying to watch movies, and remain in my bubble, is so very hard when he stretches his legs out so far, and so wide, that they take up half of MY leg space. He wears a winter coat for most of the flight, but takes it off 15 minutes in and just lets it drape all over MY space. And of course, forget about sharing the armrest! I just hold my arms into my chest and try not to move for most of the flight. And forget about sleeping! Mr. Windowseat insists on playing games that frustrate him, like solitaire and Mahjong, and every time he makes a move he is unhappy with(all of them), he lets his hand fall dejectedly on his leg, which is also halfway on MY leg. Wakes me up EVERY TIME.

I practically jump out of my seat as soon as we touch down, and after the LONGEST taxing EVER, the door opens, the people get up, and I RUN out of the plane as fast as I can to Mario, who is waiting for me. Oh, and I remember to take those bamboo cone hats, too. Needless to say, I got no work done on plane, though with 13 hours of flight, I really should have, so the blog was a long time in ending. But here it is, finally at its conclusion. And what have I learned from all of it? Remember to check in early dammit.