Chapter One: One Way Ticket to Monrovia
Well I am back from my one month vacation in Liberia. I have so much to say about my trip that one post would not do it justice. So I have decided to divide my thoughts into seven chapters. So I am dedicating my first post to my journey to the land of potato greens and ginger beer.
Okay I admit it I was a little hesitant to go to Liberia for the Christmas holiday. Not sure why since everyone I spoke to had amazing time when they went back home. I was not sure what to expect in Liberia, for one thing it was a country recovery from decades of Civil War and civil unrest. As far as I knew the country still was having problems distributing running water and electricity to the population. I was not sure that I could handle all of that for an entire month. On December 9,2010 my journey to my mother and father's land began. I was schedule to fly with Air Canada to Brussels and SN Brussels to Monrovia. I checked in fine, I have to give mad props to the Air Canada staff, hands down the most hospitable group I have encountered. I arrived early to security only to be told that my oil of olay face cream is too large to fly with. They have already scanned it and know that its not a threat but yet they throw it away. I died a little bit inside. I still can see their faces, they entered my shit list fast. So while awaiting to board my plane I learnt that the flight was running behind which meant I would miss my connecting flight from Montreal. So the Air Canada people actually arranged for me to fly with another airline to Brussels. We(two other women were in the same predicament)exited the terminal and had to recheck our luggage with Continental. It was complete chaos, we had to go to another terminal, go through security again and rush to the gate. To make matters worse I sat behind a complete jackass. He made the woman seating next to him change seats. He pretty much asked the the stewardess to check her ticket because he did not believe she deserved to be seating where she was seating. It was a little insane, I was happy I was seating with a nice woman the whole flight as oppose to that jackass. When we arrived in Brussels i immediately headed towards the direction of my terminal. I asked the ground staff where Terminal T was and immediately they said "you're going to Africa". Can you believe it? A whole terminal dedicated to African flights. So I went through security everything was fine and boarded the bus for terminal T. Let me tell you terminal T is nothing to sing about. There are no shops there and not much offered in terms of food. This is the terminal where all African bound flights go. It just left a nasty taste in my mouth. Just instilled in me the idea that many Westerners are African intolerant. When it was time for us to board our flight to Monrovia the line pretty much was non existent. People were rushing through and almost running over the girl taking the boarding pass. When I handed my boarding pass I was told that it was canceled because Continental failed to inform SN Brussels that I was flying with them since I was taken off of the Air Canada flight. Instead of getting bumped up for a better seat, I was given the last seat on the plane. I was not a happy camper. The entire journey felt like an entire fail. When I arrived to the airport I was beyond exhausted. I did not get into much problems during customs but one of my bags did not show up during the shuffle.
Okay I admit it I was a little hesitant to go to Liberia for the Christmas holiday. Not sure why since everyone I spoke to had amazing time when they went back home. I was not sure what to expect in Liberia, for one thing it was a country recovery from decades of Civil War and civil unrest. As far as I knew the country still was having problems distributing running water and electricity to the population. I was not sure that I could handle all of that for an entire month. On December 9,2010 my journey to my mother and father's land began. I was schedule to fly with Air Canada to Brussels and SN Brussels to Monrovia. I checked in fine, I have to give mad props to the Air Canada staff, hands down the most hospitable group I have encountered. I arrived early to security only to be told that my oil of olay face cream is too large to fly with. They have already scanned it and know that its not a threat but yet they throw it away. I died a little bit inside. I still can see their faces, they entered my shit list fast. So while awaiting to board my plane I learnt that the flight was running behind which meant I would miss my connecting flight from Montreal. So the Air Canada people actually arranged for me to fly with another airline to Brussels. We(two other women were in the same predicament)exited the terminal and had to recheck our luggage with Continental. It was complete chaos, we had to go to another terminal, go through security again and rush to the gate. To make matters worse I sat behind a complete jackass. He made the woman seating next to him change seats. He pretty much asked the the stewardess to check her ticket because he did not believe she deserved to be seating where she was seating. It was a little insane, I was happy I was seating with a nice woman the whole flight as oppose to that jackass. When we arrived in Brussels i immediately headed towards the direction of my terminal. I asked the ground staff where Terminal T was and immediately they said "you're going to Africa". Can you believe it? A whole terminal dedicated to African flights. So I went through security everything was fine and boarded the bus for terminal T. Let me tell you terminal T is nothing to sing about. There are no shops there and not much offered in terms of food. This is the terminal where all African bound flights go. It just left a nasty taste in my mouth. Just instilled in me the idea that many Westerners are African intolerant. When it was time for us to board our flight to Monrovia the line pretty much was non existent. People were rushing through and almost running over the girl taking the boarding pass. When I handed my boarding pass I was told that it was canceled because Continental failed to inform SN Brussels that I was flying with them since I was taken off of the Air Canada flight. Instead of getting bumped up for a better seat, I was given the last seat on the plane. I was not a happy camper. The entire journey felt like an entire fail. When I arrived to the airport I was beyond exhausted. I did not get into much problems during customs but one of my bags did not show up during the shuffle.
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