Fans of Neil Diamond's version of "The Jazz Singer" will read today's blog title and shout "Today!" I am hoping that our kids are shouting that too and will be glad to see us. We will surely be glad to see them.
We were able to get a decent amount of sleep last night, so getting up this morning at 8:00 am wasn't too bad. Since we were all showered and packed, it was only a matter a completing a few tasks, including eating some great German yogurt for breakfast and we were ready to go.
It was sad saying goodbye to Jody, Erik, and the kids. For us, this was the longer goodbye that everyone else had to do in Salt Lake or San Jose. I hope we were able to be a real help getting the kids to Berlin and establishing them there. Jody and Erik were very kind and generous and we appreciate it very much.
Erik drove us to the airport. It was a nice drive and only about 20 minutes.
Checking in was different. We had a line for actually checking in, then a line for dropping off baggage.
Jody said that you can bring 70 lbs and she did have people on the phone tell here that, but for normal coach passengers, the person weighing our bags said 50 lbs. I had arranged ours so that one was just under 50 lbs and the other was just over. We didn't leave anything out, but I didn't want to tempt fate. Having one bag just over 50 would test Jody's theory. Well, they said we could take that extra out and put it in a carry on, or charge us extra. So be warned, perhaps some representatives will let you take 70 lbs, or if you are Delta Medallion you can take more, but there is a good chance you can only take 50 lbs to and from Berlin per bag and you only get one checked bag free per person.
After that we had a few minutes before we had to go through security, so we picked up something extra to eat on the plane. That ended up being a huge fiasco.
We wanted to get rid of our Euro instead of lose money exchanging it, so since we only had about 5.30€ left, we hit a bakery, a busy bakery. Alicia thought she saw that some sandwiches were 2.40€ each, so we ordered two. The lady at the counter asked for 6.40€. We didn't have it and asked about the price, but the price was for something else. We felt embarrassed, asked for one of the sandwiches to go back and ordered a strudel to go with one of the sandwiches.
Somehow I must have miscounted the amount again, because when I gave her the money, she said it wasn't enough. So once again I had to put back a sandwich and instead, buy two strudels. I didn't want to take any chances this time. The lady was upset, muttering in German while slamming food around. But to make things worse, she went somewhere else for a minute while other ladies sold things to people. When she came back and took my money she couldn't find the sandwich she was supposed to put back. So she accused me of taking it. I told her I didn't take it two times, but while she gave up and just handed me my food, it looked from her actions that she didn't believe. Oh well, there isn't anything I can do about that or wherever she misplaced the sandwich.
The security points at the Tegel, Berlin airport aren't in a big line before you get to the gates. Instead they are like many international airports, at the gate. I should have taken off my belt because with it I had the wand and pat down as did Alicia because of her underwire bra.
There was a little wait to board and then an eight hour flight to New York. No real events there, nor on customs or the two hour layover at the gate.
During the flight to San Francisco we were very tired and it was really hard to stay awake since the flight occurred during what we were used to being the middle of the night. The best thing to do was stay awake until we arrived at Mike's house in Modesto so we could get a full night of sleep, start the acclimatization to our normal time zone, and greatly reduce jet lag. But I couldn't stay awake the whole time no matter how hard I tried. Both of us were able to limit our sleeping to a short nap. So hopefully a little cat nap won't interrupt the process. I guess I'll find out tomorrow.
I do find it funny that Alicia an I were blessed to not get sick at all on our trip, not even from any of the food we ate... until the flight home. Then I picked up a wicked cold and Alicia became crazy nauseous. When Mike picked us up he was so nice and understood what would be a great dinner for our return to America, In-N-Out Burger. But we were so nauseous from the flight, that we couldn't eat a thing. Tomorrow.
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