MY SKIN!!! Pt 1

I will first explain the title, as I am sure most of you will be wondering just what the hell is going on:

(Oh god mum it is doing that strange formatting thing I mocked you for and I can't stop it!!!)

Recently my family were flying to Spain for a cruise. There was a little boy on the plane who was NOT a good flier. He cried most of the time, and came out with such classic quotes as "I need some quiet time" (screamed at the top of his lungs), "we are still flying around in the sky" (also screamed at the top of his lungs, whilst we were not flying around in the sky), and my personal favorite, most mysterious of them all, and reason for the title: "MY SKIN!!!" (repeatedly screamed at the top of his lungs). 

3pm seems like a nice time to fly, it's pretty late so when I first booked the flights I was anticipating a decent lie in. Of course, you have to be there 3 hours before for long haul flights. Then there is the train, 2 and a half hours at best. And the tube from King's Cross to Heathrow, 45 minutes, but call it at least an hour with walking to/from the platform and waiting for the next team. Add that back, and the fact that trains come when they want and not when you want, and that means I got up at 7:20. Heck.

This trip started a lot better than my last one though. It wasn't a weekday, and that means that my return ticket didn't cost £144! (Those of you who read my last blog may recall my outrage at my train ticket costing a third that of my flights). Also a shoutout to the ticket man at Rotherham station, who was very helpful and pleasant.

I got lucky too, I had been planning on catching an 8:01 train and arriving at King's Cross at 10:48, but I was early enough to get one at 7:54, and so got into King's Cross at 10:08. No, I don't understand how 7 minutes turned into 40 either. Trains have their own maths apparently.

The train I got from Doncaster to London was fantastic too. It is by a company called Grand Central, of whom I have never heard before, but it was non stop, and the leg room was insane, at least a foot between my knees and the seat in front (see photo). My only problem was that for some unknown reason, the train smelled of tinned tomatoes. At least it wasn't cabbage (and I actually felt mildly sick typing that word. Seems like this has become a complex)

Grand Indeed

The ticket inspector was oddly perceptive too. I had asked him whether my open return was good on the train when he was prowling about the platform, and when I was on the train and he came to inspect my ticket he asked: "I noticed your hat on the platform; is it the one from InFamous?". It is (InFamous is a ps4 game, and the special edition came with a hat. I wanted a hat, and the game so...), but I myself had actually more or less forgotten this. I mean it has been a couple of years, so it had long since become "my hat" as opposed to "the hat from InFamous". But nothing gets past the inspector! We had a little chat about it, he was a nice guy, so of humans I talked to aside from my family today, that was 2 for 2.

I napped for the rest of the train ride (only about an hour from that point), as I know my sleep tonight will be curtailed (hopefully not by Billie Jean, see my Vietnamese blog if you don't understand the reference), and besides, it was still 9am on Saturday. That is the middle of the night for someone with my specialty! (Once again, thanks mum...)

My next pleasant surprise came when getting on the tube. My Oyster card had been loaned out to the family, and the last time this happened it had minus money on it when it came back. Not so this time, £12.80 was on, and so all of the London Underground was my lobster. A tram to Terminal 4 turned up less than a minute after I got to the platform too. This could probably be described as a lucky streak, or alternatively "luck like Vicky" (my little sister, and easily the luckiest person alive).

I once again napped on the tram, once I got a seat, and before that there was a guy practising his sleight of hand with a deck of cards. It was mesmeric, he was very good. Whilst napping I was entertained by a little girl singing a song for about 10 minutes. It followed the same pattern every 30 seconds, but she was basically was singing about whatever she saw, except for the culmination, which was "WATCH MY SCISSORS!!!". Yeah. I don't know either, she didn't even have scissors, but it was pretty funny.

Check in was insane. I really thought I'd have to wait at least 45 minutes, since I was there at 11:10 for a 15:00 flight, but no, the very nice Etihad lady I asked said I was fine to check in now. There was only one person in the queue and 6 stations, so I queued for about 1 minute, and you've never seen a more efficient man than the guy behind the counter, who had my tickets and sent me on my way in around 2 minutes.

To top it all off, a guy (also very nice, just like every other person I have spoken to today: I'm still waiting for the combo breaker) pulled me to one side in security, I only had 1 bag (you know, like the rules!), so he sent me through to the staff checking place, with no one else there. I was through to the gates in less than 15 minutes!

Of course this meant I had 3 and a half hours to kill, but it is better than rushing about. I intended to get a sandwich for lunch, but even the cheaper ones were about £5, so I went for a carbonara at Carluccios instead, which was £9. I think they will probably have sandwiches in Madagascar, but I am doubtful about pasta!

I was pleased to see this flight was an a380, as they are generally very modern, and I wasn't disappointed. The seats seemed wider than my plane last week, and my little to screen was very good quality. The films were also to my tastes. I didn't know whether to watch Deadpool, Xmen Apocalypse, or Captain America: Civil War first! Another pleasant surprise was that I had all 3 seats to myself!

These guys won't be addicted to Billie Jean!

Lenny Henry's insidious reach extends even to Abu Dhabi (it is a premier inn, in case you can't tell)

Things had to go downhill at some point, and it was on the next flight. Sort of. First of all, there was a guy at the gate who had some problem (I think ticket related, but they were speaking Urdu so that's all I got) so big that they had to close check in, and do it through the first class one instead. The very next people in the queue were 2 fat lesbians who were throwing a tantrum because they weren't sat together on their honeymoon. This was their own stupid fault, as they'd checked in online, and I saw some 2s free on the plane.

Next there was a 40 minute delay, once we'd already loaded the plane. I had 3 hours in Male, so no big deal for me really. Then there was the people I was sat around; of the 10 or so in earshot, 7 ordered tomato juice every round! What the hell is wrong with people?! Is tomato juice a superlative health drink all of a sudden? Next they did us breakfast... At 4am Abu Dhabi time/3am Seychelles time. This was as soon as we hit cruising altitude. Is that even breakfast? Finally my biggest problem I would say, some scientists had a captive black hole right behind me and every time I would drop off I would be awoken by the sound of space screaming as it was devoured. I mean okay, it turned out to just be the toilet flush, but it sounded like something more catastrophic and astral.

Despite the small hadron collider behind me, I actually had a half decent stab at sleeping. It was in fits and starts, but there was a good 3 hours (of the 5) where I didn't check my watch and moan. I think this was thanks to some turbulence keeping people in their seats, and away from the singularity. No extra seats for me this time unfortunately, so my neck feels like a pretzel, but you can't win em all.

The landing in the Seychelles was... Interesting. I almost felt like screaming about my skin! Very bumpy, and a triple bounce to land. I wasn't particularly worried, but someone did scream a bit. The airport is very picturesque though. It is 3 gates in a small building (though a nice one), on the beach pretty much, with mountains dotted around. I guess when you think about it, the Seychelles is ALL beaches and mountains, so it makes sense.

The beach starts just after the grass.

I slept once again until my last flight, then slept through much of that too. There was the annoying hurdle of having to complete one of those stupid forms, for which I had to borrow a pen from the people next to me, and that was about the highlight.

Getting a visa was chaos, but I lucked out by just asking some random woman, and she said she would do it, and mine was about third out, despite me being towards the back of the plane getting off. The taxi driver was waiting (he had a board with my name, which will excite mum), and he was very nice. At first I thought he was the guide because he was introducing stuff all over the place, but apparently not. I'm a bit glad, because understanding the guy was a struggle.

Antananarivo, Tana from now on, because that is it's nickname and because typing out Antananarivo is a lot of effort, is a very poor place, even in comparison with other places I've been. There are virtually no big, or new buildings, people are selling random things everywhere, and half the city appears to be a paddy field. I'll bet there's never been a fatal traffic accident, because traffic is too slow due to all the people just walking in the road (I was slightly worried to see we never did more than 0kmph according to the speedo), and the 'buses' for locals are minivans, where someone stands at the back and throws open the door, and people rush on whilst the bus is still moving.

We went past a fairly pleasant lake, which was a nice change of pace, and then up to my hotel. I was very pleasantly surprised. It is nice, by our standards, probably the nicest building I saw except the queens palace, which I saw from afar on a hill, and the American embassy.

The fairly pleasent lake

The view from my hotel balcony. The trees photobombed me.

This turned into a monstrous post, but that's what you get having nothing to do but write for 28 hours. Time for a shower and a nap!