Growing
up, I never spent too much time away from my family. Even though I
went to a boarding school for four years I went home every weekend,
and after the first year another brother from the Thorne-men
conveyor belt joined me. Before I joined Etihad, the longest I had
spent without seeing a single member of my family was the three weeks
I had
spent in Seoul, and that had been with my girlfriend. Etihad would be
the first time I was truly out on my own, without a familiar face.
This
is how my first bout of homesickness came about.
I
never really get excited about journeys until I set out on them. This
is an endless source of frustration to friends and relations
“James!”, they cry, “why aren't you grinning and clapping your
hands like a drugged-up seal!? You're going to the other side of the
world/coming to see me/starting a new career on a new continent!”
My go-to answer – that it never really hits me until I step into
the airport, sometimes until I board the plane, that I'm about to do
something fun – never satisfies them. Unfortunately, it's true.
Much in the same way that I can rarely remember what I had for
breakfast, all the pushing and shoving of the immediate future, such
as what to have for dinner, tend to leave the distant and
not-so-distant future bruised and battered by the wayside. After all
the blood, sweat, tears, PTSD and tears of the application process,
the business of flying to the
desert
my dearly-departed granda referred to as “Yabby-Dabby” seemed as
far off as, well, Yabby-Dabby. Something
always seemed to come up to distract me, whether it was a visit to a
different, more North African desert with my girlfriend or the latest
round of gossip and hearsay at the cinema. Sure, I had to pack my
bags (an aside: bring more family photos and books than you think
you'll need), but it still felt very far away. At least until my
tickets arrived.
As
I waved a final goodbye to my parents and stepped through the one-way
doors at Terminal 2, it occurred to me at last that I was setting off
on a completely unexpected adventure. While I always expected to live
abroad at some point I never imagined it quite like this. Though I
wasn't the first and definitely wouldn't be the last Irish person to
get on a plane with a one-way ticket off of the 'Aul Sod, I felt like
there probably was very few of us who were off to serve drinks at
35,000 feet. One of the few lads anyway. I had one last pint of
Smithwicks and headed off to the gate, where I realised I had been
bumped up to business! Though my desire to take full advantage of the
amenities was tempered by my innate yearning to “not be a bother”,
I did take full advantage of the free champagne. After all, without a
liquor license I was probably going to be rather thirsty in the
desert. Even though the flight went through the night, I couldn't
sleep. Excitement, nerves, the fact that even if I fully
reclined the seat into a bed it was about three inches too small –
who knows why. Perhaps a bit more sleep would have been nice for my
first day on a new continent.
Whenever
I'm sleep-deprived, I describe myself as feeling “greasy”. Every
movement feels like it's taking place in an unwashed frying-pan. I
blearily stared at the various queues in Abu Dhabi International
Airport, not really sure where to stand. After some trial and error,
I realised that I had to go and collect my visa, followed by an eye
scan and copy of my fingerprints. Somehow I managed to stay one step
ahead of the hordes of Chinese tourists for both the visa queue and
the eye scan queue, and when I finally stumbled through immigration I
was told by the handsome and helpful Etihad staff
that I was the first of the new batch of trainees to get through.
Luckily, a girl from Ireland followed quickly after me. She was nice,
even if she was from Cavan. We were loaded into a taxi – I had
actually packed more stuff than her, and in a lovely inversion of
gender roles I had to get help jamming my suitcases into the car –
and dumped off at our new home, a collection of high-rise apartment
buildings surrounded by a calamity of construction sites and open
pieces of desert. After
some more trial and error, two words which sum up much of what I do,
we found our buildings and headed on
into the unknown.
I turned my key in the lock, and following a satisfying click the door opened. Slightly. It had been chained from the inside. Of course. A combination of desperate clawing and shoulder charges popped the chain off, and I was in. Wary of the fact that I had no idea who my roommate was, whether they had just gotten back from a flight or if they knew I was coming, I crept through the apartment. There was a few personal touches around the place; a large pile of shoes, some takeaway menus and, hilariously, a Korean newspaper. I managed to find my room, a good-sized space with a high ceiling and some seriously pimping curtains. A cardboard box, about 4ft tall, sat in the middle of the room. I checked through the list I had been given along with my keys, and began digging through the box. A duvet, pillows, some instant noodles, cereal bars and other quick and easy food. After going through all of it, at the very bottom I found two sets of knives, forks and spoons. Just as I reached them, the call to prayer began to echo off the walls of the surrounding high-rises. I think at that exact moment, with the sun beating down on my box of cutlery and a foreign language ululating through loudspeakers outside my window, I felt more alone and far from home than ever before.
I turned my key in the lock, and following a satisfying click the door opened. Slightly. It had been chained from the inside. Of course. A combination of desperate clawing and shoulder charges popped the chain off, and I was in. Wary of the fact that I had no idea who my roommate was, whether they had just gotten back from a flight or if they knew I was coming, I crept through the apartment. There was a few personal touches around the place; a large pile of shoes, some takeaway menus and, hilariously, a Korean newspaper. I managed to find my room, a good-sized space with a high ceiling and some seriously pimping curtains. A cardboard box, about 4ft tall, sat in the middle of the room. I checked through the list I had been given along with my keys, and began digging through the box. A duvet, pillows, some instant noodles, cereal bars and other quick and easy food. After going through all of it, at the very bottom I found two sets of knives, forks and spoons. Just as I reached them, the call to prayer began to echo off the walls of the surrounding high-rises. I think at that exact moment, with the sun beating down on my box of cutlery and a foreign language ululating through loudspeakers outside my window, I felt more alone and far from home than ever before.
Since
then, things have picked up. I actually feel like I'm coming home
when I collapse through the front door after a night flight, and
those tall white walls have been softened by posters and photos. I
even managed to fit an old Turkish prayer mat in my suitcase after my
first visit home. Don't worry mum, I'll put it away if any Emiratis
come to visit. Next time, I'll talk a little about my basic training.
Sorry for anyone expecting more useful information!
Excellent, looking forward hearing, well reading more of it...
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I absolutely love your blog! Why don't you write anymore? Please give us an update on how life has been thus far because I thoroughly enjoyed reading xx
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