You know that feeling when you wake up and just for a second you don’t know where you are? I haven’t felt it in a while, but today it was so intense. Every time I woke up I had to catch myself back up to speed. You’re not in your apartment. You’re on a plane landing in Iceland. You just changed everything about your life and you’re going on a long walk for the next three months.
“Oh, okay, weird!” My sleepy brain replied every time before back asleep.
I felt an emotion I’ve never before. Not 100% thrilled or scared. I felt like I was just watching the quiet ordinary scene of the plane interior in a movie. An anticlimactic part moving along the plot, but also a bit outside myself and my life, which my brain still thinks is the routine and life I’ve had up until now.
The plot moved along from the inside of the airplane to the airport in Iceland, where I sampled fish jerky and put together this fine outfit in the gift shop.
Because if it’s geography, I never understood Iceland was a Scandinavian country, but the Nordic cross flag everywhere and impeccably designed sink and hand drying system, (also a sort of stainless steel cross) in the bathrooms seemed prove it is.
After a 2 hour flight from Reykjavik, I arrived in London, another first. Shuffling through the longest immigration line at the Stansted airport, is when the day really got interesting because unlike any other place I’ve been to, I noticed these agents were really going in.
Not only did the line move very slowly, when I got closer to the front I overheard the types of questions they were asking. How much money do you make? I heard them ask an unassuming girl in her young 20s with a surf house Barcelona sticker on her carry on. How much do you saved? How did you manage that? How much do you make a year?
Is that what they need to know? I thought, Is that why this line is two hours? Needless to say, the process as not as breezy and chill as I remembered it being the last time I went through customs in Bali.
When it was my turn I walked up to the window with a deferent “Hi how are you?” which was not returned.
Because my trip involves traveling on foot and I think booking too far in advance (In this case 90 days) isn’t necessary, I had a one way ticket only to London. It crossed my mind I would need to explain this to the customs agent, but maybe I thought, I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.
And now this agent was asking her supervisor what to do with me. Of course, all the records she wanted to see were on my phone and my phone was on 11% battery from messaging my friends in the long line etc... (I even used through my battery packs on the flight, listening to music, selecting that Scandinavian sweater selfie 🤦🏼♀️)
So I pulled up what I had from my email and hoped for the best. The return ticket really seemed to be an issue, so I offered to book it in front of her from the American Airline app.
I held my breath as I input all my information and waited for it to process into a confirmation number. Less than 10% battery. Error- Please correct the mistakes in red- dang! I forgot to decline travel insurance.
For whatever reason, after what seemed like a two year processing signal, buying a return ticket online in front of the agent worked. The th-thunk of a rubber stamp never sounded to sweet. Even though I always took for granted the stamp at the airport, this one seemed like a badge of courage.
And I think I learned something important about communicating. Even though I have enough faith in my system of booking as I go from notes, a border control agent clearly works not on faith, but dollar signs and confirmation numbers. So I must concern myself with that too, if only for the purpose of making it through passport control smoothly.
But it all worked out. Maybe it’s impossible to 100% anticipate a situation before you actually live it, but working with what you have, even if it’s only 7% battery and a deferent, polite attitude, is omnipotent.