Day 1: Travel

This is officially my first blog post ever. I am sitting in the LAX, waiting to board the plane to New Zealand. And by waiting I mean that I have already waited 5 hours, and I still have 4 to go. Fortunately, I am not alone. I flew from SLC with 5 other girls from the program and then we met up with 2 others here in LA. I wish we could have taken a picture, or better yet, a video of the eight of us trying to get from baggage claim to the Air New Zealand ticket counter…it was quite comical. Imagine 8 excited 21 year olds, each with 2 suitcases and 2 carry-ons walking through LAX without any clue of where we’re going. I tried asking for help, several times actually, but each time we were told the wrong the information. We took a shuttle to one terminal, thought we got off too early, walked to the international airport, but then had to walk all the way back to the first terminal. At least we got some good exercise right?

Now that we’re at our gate, we’re doing our best to keep busy while we wait. We’ve already played spoons (using pens instead of spoons), uno, speed uno, and, of course, taken pictures. One of our favorite activities was yoga. Yes, we did some yoga right there in the airport. We attempted whatever yoga stretch Anna’s iPhone app suggested—sometimes we were successful, and sometimes we ended up on the floor laughing and trying to ignore the crazy looks from the other lucky people waiting for flights.

Another exciting airport adventure took place at Burger King…when we met BonQuiQui. If don’t know who BonQuiQui is, look up the SNL skit on YouTube. We met her. Same talk, same mannerisms, same attitude. “Two tenna grrrils?” (meaning, “Who had the two tender grill chicken sandwiches?” or “I dun no. What size of fries you want? Medium? I dun no. (looking to the other workers) How much are the medium fries??” I don’t think that even does her justice, but it was hilarious. So hilarious in fact, that we went back a little later and asked to take a picture with her. We told her we were trying to document every part of our trip and really wanted a picture with her. She was a little hesistant because she didn’t know if she was allowed to take a picture with us, but we know she secretly loved it!

Well we are about to board the 747, direct flight to New Zealand! Probably a good thing because, as the picture below shows, we have been at LAX for much too long...