I caught the Friday night SAA flight back last Friday 27 May. Man, I had a dreadful flight. We arrived early at the airport, anticipating the worst, so we stood for an hour before check in was opened. Between that and getting on the plane, we went through no fewer than EIGHT checkpoints! These ranged from cursory checks for passport and boarding pass to full baggage rummaging and X-ray (sans shoes and belt) scans. Erica elected to carry a Ghanaian mask with her, which led to a further delay - the customs guys insisting that she was robbing West Africa of one of its most priceless artefacts without the necessary paperwork. (For the record, the necessary paperwork is usually rectangular and has a number of zeroes printed on opposing corners, back and front). Just before going down the gangway, I was spared having my laptop bag ransacked by a fortuitously placed Twix that I had slipped in there for the flight. The customs lady looked meaningfully at it and suggested that it might be meant for a child. I wondered aloud if she might have such a child... The chocolate vanished, my bag was zipped closed and handed back to me otherwise untouched, with a warm smile thrown in. Sitting on the plane, now an hour behind schedule, some power supply problem kept us grounded for another half hour. The air conditioning wouldn't kick in till the aircraft was taxiing - so I sat in the sweltering, sticky heat, sweating as if in a sauna. The tickling that had started at the back of my throat on Friday morning chose this time to gain a foothold and develop into proper flu symptoms. I spent the flight unsuccessfully trying to sleep, with the oversized bloke next to me spilling unconsciously into my chair, while my head steadily turned to sludge and my coccyx ached as it atrophied.
We finally arrived at Jan and/OR Tambo International around 6.30; I stepped out into the sharp, dry winter morning air with relief bordering on joy. I swear there were tears in my eyes and I was choked up. Or maybe it was just from coughing and trying to breathe through a faceful of snot. Anyway, a quick 15-minute Gautrain ride to Sandton later, and I was deposited in a strangely familiar, yet oddly different new world. A place with wide, unbroken roads, orderly lines of cars, traffic lights that not only work, but people STOP when they're red! It was quite spooky. Picked up by my Beloved and Barney, I was a bit dazed traveling the old roads again. I'd been gone for just three short, non-stop weeks, but it felt like another life away.
After showering and changing we went to pick up the kids. Awake now for 28 hours. By the time I got them home, sleep deprivation and flu were pushing me to the verge of hallucination. Arriving back in Westdene, I crashed on the couch in front of the TV. Home, set and match.
