When my
day began at around 2:00 AM, I was nothing more than a nervous wreck. But,
honestly, when you're as nervous as I was and running on only four hours of
sleep, you can hardly blame me. Thoughts like "What if my luggage is
overweight?", "Did I forget something?", or "What if I get
arrested at the airport?" And the more I tried to reassure myself
that everything would be okay, the more anxious I became. Luckily, when my
mother woke up, she was able to calm me down with some encouraging words and a
nice hug.
My mother
and I arrived at El Cerrito High School at 3:40 AM and began to unload my
suitcases. As it turns out, I really was worrying for nothing, as my suitcase
ended up weighing only 32 pounds. Not too long after my luggage was weighed and
set aside with the others, the airport shuttle scheduled to take us to San
Francisco Airport soon drove up towards the school.
However,
our "shuttle" was the complete opposite of what I was suspecting.
From what I was told beforehand, I was expecting our shuttle to be a van, and
definitely not a stretch limo. I couldn't believe it--not only was I heading to
New York City, but I would be spending a portion of my journey riding there in
a limo. It was at this point, that I was sure that all the hard work, stress,
and sleep deprivation was definitively worth it. We celebrated the arrival of
shuttle with two group pictures--one simply in front of El Cerrito High and the
other in front of the limo.
Soon, it
was time to give our last goodbyes, and I as gave my mom one final hug I came
to realize something--this trip is my first time ever being away from home. The
realization was a bit unnerving at first, but now I see it as a form of
encouragement. This is my opportunity to prove to my mother, the Ivy League
Connection, and to myself that I'm an independent, responsible young adult who
is capable of handling herself.
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| The lobby! |
When we
passed security and arrived inside our airport terminal,
Mrs. L had us pick up our breakfast and lunches at an in-airport restaurant.
I enjoyed a breakfast pizza topped with eggs, bacon, and green
onions, a 7-Up, and, unfortunately, due to a mix-up in my order, no lunch.
After everyone had bought their food, we settled down for a quick breakfast
before finally boarding our plane at 6:45 AM.
Personally,
I think that plane ride was nice. Since we were seated together, Lenny,
Adrianne, and I managed to bond over things like broken remote controls,
wind turbulence, current events, bad reality television, and a lack
of a goodnight's sleep.
Our plane
landed in New York at about 11:00 AM and after gathering all of our luggage, we
were picked up by another airport shuttle, but this time it's destination was
not an airport--it was our hotel, Hotel Beacon.
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| My hotel room! |
We were
then divided into groups of two--Morvarid and Aurea, Lucas and Lenny, and
finally Adrianne and myself. Not too long after getting settled into our
assigned rooms, we were off again as we were scheduled to dine at
Keens Steakhouse for the night.
To get to
the restaurant, we took the Penn Station subway, located only a few blocks
away from our hotel.
New
York's subway system is certainly a lot different that what I'm used to back in
the Bay Area. Compared to BART, it's quicker, more crowded, and a lot
more intimidating.
After the
subway ride came a walk to the restaurant, and on the way there I found
the scenery breathtaking. We were even able to catch a
few glimpses of some other places that we'll
be visiting such as Madison Square Garden and Times Square.
When we
arrived at Keens Steakhouse, we were quickly seated and served. For
an appetizer, Mrs. L had ordered everyone a batch of oysters, whereas I
had order the short rib for dinner, which, despite it's name,
was absolutely huge. Because of my large entree, I barely had any
room any side dishes and even the idea of dessert made my stomach hurt!
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| Before |
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| After |
After
dinner, we quickly returned for the hotel room and went over
tomorrow's schedule. Afterwards, we all returned to hotel rooms for the
night.
Tomi,
ReplyDeleteI can see right now that starting with the next cohort we send off I’m going to issue a bunch of ZipLock bags so you all can take your leftovers with you. I’m a pretty good eater but what you and Adrianne left behind is more than I usually order. And it looks so good.
In closing, I have to say that I’ve experienced a lot of anxiety attacks from our ILCers over the years but it’s mostly because they’re afraid of leaving home. You’re the first that expressed concerns about being arrested at the airport.