After a lovely, but busy, three weeks back in Korea, the boxes were shipped, the dog was vaccinated, Barry's grave was visited and the friends were said goodbye to. Thank you so much to Chris and Carla for taking care of our little girl for the past 5 months.
I had an amazing time with Sarah who kept me company most days and will be truly missed- thank you for the drunken escapades. Also, Dave, Ali, Jess, Oliver, Phil, Nick, Peter and Deborah- keep in touch.
Anyway, on the last day, Pinky and I went to say goodbye to Chris at work, and Pinky's new friend- the British Ambassador's wife- yes, our bulldog had become friends with the ambassador whilst we were away. So off we went for a walk in the embassy grounds.
After a tearful goodbye and a frantic taxi journey with Pinky in her first ever car ride we arrived at Incheon airport two and a half hours before we flew. Had problems with the taxi driver who wanted more money but I just said no and ran (as fast as one can run with a dog, three suitcases, two sets of pool sticks and a fishing rod)
Got into the airport. Went to the front of the queue because pinky was having a tantrum in her crate and I wasn't standing in line for half an hour with that going on. Got to the desk. Was told that I had to go to quarantine, which I already knew, and that the fishing rod and pool sticks would cost $230 each. Had a row about the fishing rod, holding it above my head saying "It doesn't even weigh a pound, how can it be that price, how.......pleeeeeeassseeee!". He laughed at me and then let me off with the rod for free.
He then told me that I had twenty mins to get my quarantine papers before the gate closed. I ran with pinky on a trolley to the quarantine office, filled in lots of paperwork very fast and then ran back with two mins to spare. Took the dog to oversized baggage. Done. I then had 40 mins to get to the other terminal to board but I also had pool sticks to get rid of. I took them to the post office who wouldn't take them. Ran to the other side of the airport and launched them at the hanjin tek bae man saying "I'll pay extra, just be quick, here's the address, I'm off". Got to the plane 10 mins before it departed.
I've been on hundreds of flights but this one by far had the worst turbulance of any and I sat the whole way there in a crazed panic thinking of Pinky and the other 6 dogs in the hold freaking out. (all the other dogs were flat nosed too- it was two days before the deadline to fly snub nosed dogs because of the heat).
So I arrived in San Fransico with two hours to get my next flight. I had to go through immigration who questioned me for 20 mins about why I was here three weeks ago and coming back, I eventually got let in when he said "So why would you teach English in England, everyone already speaks English". I wanted to say " Well in that case give me a visa for the USA and I can teach English to the 300 non English speaking Koreans that you just let through." but instead, I stuck with "well there are a lot of immigrants in london".
Had to collect my luggage, go to overszed baggage to collect the rod, go to quarantine to collect the dog and then check them all in again. Got to the baggage check in and they said I was too late and that I needed to get the next flight. Got to the desk and found out that the next flight was in 11 hours. Great. She took my bags but couldn't take the dog so Pinky and I spent our time between a "pet relief area" and a quiet corner by a baggage carousel. As they wouldn't let me take the dog food through customs, Pinky had a very unhealty feast of a Subway meatball sandwich (Don't judge me, I had to make the best out of my limited resources, I'm like Bear Grills frankly). I by this point was exhausted but couldn't sleep because Pinky wanted to come out of the crate. So I took her out and we both curled up on the floor and had a nap. She made lots of friends at baggage carousel number 3, including Jose the Mexican courier. Dee, the beautiful Prada wearing, Pomeranian owning, girl from Israel, Cara a six year old from Mississippi and many many others.
Three hours before the flight I decided that Pinky was probably better off being checked in so that I could get some sleep and she would stop whining. I took her back to quarantine, where everybody loved her and then I went to my gate and slept a very deep sleep this time with the luxury of a chair to sleep on. Got on the next plane and gave the stewardess my note to the pilot about the temperate the dog needed to have in the hold and he wrote me one back saying "Pinky is onboard and doing well, I went to see her before I got on board myself and she's great, sleep well and don't worry. G.Liggard". I thought that was nice. As shocking as this trip has been due to aiports, the United staff have all been amazing.
Arrived at Washington DC realising that I didn't quite know if it was Wed, Thu or Fri and thought that in my hour I had until the next flight, I would have a wash, get changed and brush my teeth. As I was standing there with a wet face and toothpaste dripping off my chin, I heard "Can Emily Ingham report immediately to Gate D30".
Went to the gate and due to my pessimistic ways said "has the dog died?" "No the dog is fine, she's having some food, but you need to go down and let them inspect her again because San Fran forgot to give her some paperwork". A manager came and ran with me to the quarantine office which was outside next to the planes. Went in and the officer said "Oh yeah, Pinky is already getting on the Plane, we usually have to have the owner there in case the pet is vicious but Pinky was fine so we just did the checks ourself. I then got shoved onto a truck and driven to the plane that was about to leave. As I was getting on I heard the baggage handlers shout "yay Pinky, have a great flight". I said "Is she ok" and they replied " yeah she's fine, we've been playing with her for ages, Pinky is so cool,". Hilarous.
Anyway we eventually arrived in Atlanta, as did the baggage. Pinky was very happy to see Shawn and we took her to a big field and she bounded around loking very... doglike. I felt quite emotional seeing her on grass like dogs should be, she looked so excited, the whole trip seemed worthwhile.
She likes her new house. She snuggled into the gap between Shawn and I last night, lay on her back, paws in the air and slept with a very loud contented snore. I think she's happy.
Em xxx
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