after a teary goodbye at the SLC airport, i was off to JFK, not having any idea what I was getting myself into. as i was about to get on the plane, guess who I saw?! my "big sister" Emily Daines!! after a weekend at home for her best friends wedding, she was returning to her new home, New York to get back to work. little did I know what a blessing she was going to be! she swapped seats with a nice guy on the plane so she could sit by me and we talked about cats, boys, and zoobs. it was fun.
look who i found!
yeah fyi, didn't arrive in JFK till 930. the delta app lies!!
RED FLAG NUMBER TWO.. has anyone even heard of Bradley!? Yeah, me neither! anywho. so we land at this teeny Bradley airport in the middle of Connecticut. we think we are just filling up for gas, but as the gate agent boards to greet us, she announces that the FAA building in Atlantic City has caught fire, and all the computers are down. so no one is moving. lovely right? At this point I wasn't worried at all. if "no one" was moving, this meant my flight to London was also delayed. or so I thought... we deplaned and hung around the gate for a while, probably about two hours.
the 'huge storm' that hit jfk rolling through connecticut. it was actually pretty intense... not enough to shut down an airport though. i think?
this is when i started to get worried. the tiny airport was PACKED with people being diverted from JFK and Laguardia.
the teeny airport! at least it was clean
the flight next to us, another to JFK, got cancelled. i almost peed my pants. another flight's passengers were directed to a huge coach and bused to New York. suddenly we were told that we had been cleared! we hurried onto the plane. he said that we were cleared to take off at 6:00. being just 105 miles outside of new york, i was hoping i could still make my flight. right before 6, the captain again got on the PA to announce that our flight was now waiting for clearance at 6:30. 6:30 came and went, still no word. the captain was unsure how long our flight was going to be grounded so he didn't want to deplane.
delays galore
the gate from hell. or to hell? haven't figured it out yet
Sooo we sat until about 7 and were finally let off for some food. at this point I had missed my flight. for some reason all of the London flights were still leaving on time. anyways... two hours later we were FINALLY out of freaking connecticut. I almost cried. (keep in mind at this point i was planning on staying in a hotel in new york for an unknown amount of time until the next london flight... which don't start departing until 6 pm every night. didn't sound too fun!)
took this right before leaving CT!
after the longest 35 minute flight of my life (isn't it pathetic we were so close?) i found that the two later London flights had been delayed and I still had a chance to connect! thanks to Facebook I was talking to some other kids with the BYU program who were on those flights, as well as people who were anticipating missing theirs and spending the night in new york. my plane literally pulled up to the gate next to the plane that was leaving for London within 15 minutes. I thought this was the last plane out that night, so i booked it to get there. just as i got there, they closed and let the last person on. I was freaking out. then to my surprise I found out it was the second to last flight, and the 9 o'clock one still hadn't even boarded (it was now about 9:30). the gate agent assured me I would get a seat, but I was put on standby, so there were no guarantees. she told me that when she had a boarding pass for me, she would call me up to the front desk. two hours later, the plane began boarding and i still had not been called. frantic, i went to the front desk.... by some miracle, i had gotten the last seat.
the golden ticket! my boarding pass to London!
the poor guy who had followed me to gate was not as lucky. (i felt bad!) but at the same time i was so freaking happy. i did a little dance and screamed with emily. everyone gave us some good looks.
after this, everything else calmed down quite a lot. i took an Ambien and was out until we were over the british isles.
LONDON! what a beautiful sight!
somehow my luggage also made the flight (i was the only one who's bags made it! thank you travel gods!) and i caught driven by a guy with a crazy thick indian accent into London with a girl from my flight who is also on my program!
side note! turns out Delta flights to London are FULL until Monday or Tuesday! i am so blessed i got on! i hope everyone currently stuck in New York makes it!!!!!
my place is so cute! BYU bought it in the 70's when the place was literally a dump. it is now in a neighborhood worth several million dollars! it has beautiful woodwork and the chandeliers in the entry are really pretty as well! as you go upstairs towards the rooms (all 5 floors!) you can tell this place is "well loved". apparently we are the last group here before the remodel. i love it though! we are right next to kensington gardens.
arriving at 27 palace court! we were freaking out hahahah we got some interesting looks
other then unpacking and resting, we went to the tube station and got our oyster cards, then went on our first "walk", which is one of our classes.
view of our street and the byu centre from our walk. isn't it cute!
we went in a nice little triangle in our neighborhood, seeing part of kensington gardens, the entrance to portobello market, the chemist (pharmacist), lots of pubs, restaurants, souvenir shops, etc. after our walk we were free to find dinner... so we got schwarma!! hahahah. like the stuff in avengers! it was so funny we were all cracking up. it was dang good! i think we will be going back. we got it to go and ate it in hyde park. it was very picturesque.
we then headed back to the center and had our meeting with one of the bishops to get our ward assignments! he was a super young bishop, he has been bishop for 5 years and is only 29. holy crap. but anyways. it used to be that everyone went to the Hyde Park ward, but everyone felt like there was something missing, so now the students are split up and actually given callings. I can't remember the name of my ward, but i know i have to take an overground train 30 minutes out of the city so that should be fun! i will get my calling tomorrow.i was nodding off so bad and desperately wanted to go to sleep, but i pushed through it and instead went to a pub with some friends and watched the UEFA game! france vs. spain! it was so fun! easily the highlight of my day. there were some freaking insane spaniards in there, it was PACKED. they were singing and yelling and it was a great time. good thing they won!
all the INSANE spanish fans! it was so much fun! notice all the cute british flags. this place is decorated like it's the fourth of july. i haven't figured out if its for the queens jubilee or the olympics. either way its adorable.
me and some girls outside the pub! excuse our ugliness. we have been traveling for wayyyyy too long.
'the phoenix'! it was too fun. yahoo!
thanks for reading! hopefully be posting again tomorrow:)
hope everyone has a great day!
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