It took about two hours to get through check-in, immigration, exit fees, and security three times! Our flight out was at 8 am, so their deer in headlights look is quite a combination of several things; leaving everything they have known, first airplane flight, not enough sleep, Dramamine, long lines, pat downs, etc. Christine is much more the adventure girl, so she really was focused on the airplane and some fear of motion sickness. She was the heavy puker for the car ride from Rohoboth to Manila. I used five Ziploc bags! Criselda is more concerned with a fear of the unknown. Being use to being one of the leaders at the orphanage, she was out of her comfort zone. Criselda literally clung to me for comfort and clues on what to do next. It was a decent flight, 5 hours to Japan in which the girls slept through most of it. To everyone's delight we all kept our cookies inside our tummies too.
So a little sleepy, but only an hour and half to get through security, find our gate, experience a bathroom with multiple options that the girls had never seen before. Yes, the hole in the floor made them gasp the first time too, which I calmly pointed to the sign on the door for the "Western styled" potty saying that is why we were waiting in this line to go.
After studying the planes waiting for our flight to board, the girls had had enough of Japan but getting psyched up for a 13 hour flight is pretty hard to do.
Eventually we got to board and found our seats. Being through one flight, Criselda was now a little less scared, but still sleepy with a fresh dose of Dramamine.
Christine got her monkey all ready for this flight too! Yes, being the techie girls, she had the screens all figured out from the flight before, it didn't take her long to find all the Disney movies she had yet to see like Brave!
Yeah! Finally on American soil! We spent over two hours getting through the immigration lines in order to process our daughters' immigration packets and visas. The nice lady asked the girls to cross over the line once she had them fully in the system. She then exclaimed, "Welcome to the US! You are now in the country!" However, the girls were more concerned with finding the dogs that sniff the suitcases for contraband as we saw the video about them and their training for a full hour!
OK, Christine looks less than thrilled. But would you be if you had been traveling for 27 hours if you include the time from the hotel to get to the first flight. She was also FREEZING! her little body had not experienced weather below 60 degrees and it was a whopping 45.
