Flying High
31st May 2006
Meh. I hate flying. It took me 35 hours to get from the
doorstep at my parents' house to the doorstep at my new home in Budumburum
Refugee Camp.
I left my parents' place at about 2:30 pm and picked my sisters'
children on the way to the airport. Auckland airport was very same
old. It still has that mall-y feel to it. My mother was kind
enough to buy me a book for the journey called Emergency Sex and
Other Wartime Stories. It is written by three UN workers and
is about their experiences in some fairly extreme places like Haiti,
Cambodia and Liberia.
I bought a box supplies with me. Things such as condoms,
stationary and art supplies. I gave the checkout lady at the
airport my
I-is-a-wee-small-volunteer-and-these-are-going-to-a-good-cause story and
she let me off paying the extra baggage. Nice
My first stop over was in Melbourne, Australia. It was not
mentioned on my travel itinerary, so it came as a bit of a
surprise. I spent my time replying to the numerous "Good Luck
In Africa" emails in an internet cafe. Thanks again to all
those who wished me well. Unlike the vastly superior Changi
Airport though, I had to pay for internet.
My next haul was a big un. Melbourne to Dubai is a 14 hour
trip. Ugh. It was pretty dreadful. I passed the time
by reading Emergency Sex, watching the terrible selection of
movies, and fitful rests.
I initially thought Dubai was in India, when it is actually in the
United Arab Emirates. On my trip to the Philippines, I had a couple
of days in Singapore. The thought of wandering around India for a
couple of days on my own was not appealing so I made my stopover as
brief as possible. If I had know that the Oil Moguls in the UAE
were investing billions of dollars into making Dubai a tourist haven
then I would have definitely spent a couple of days then. Ah well.
The airport at Dubai is just massive. A bus picked us up from
the airport and took us to the terminal. The bus trip took about
thirty minutes. Dubai also has the mall atmosphere down pat.
You're assaulted with all sorts of duty free shops as soon as you set
foot inside the terminal. I arrived at gate 7 and had to be at
gate 42 for my connecting flight. It took me about 30 minutes to
walk between the two gates. The dinky travelators they've had
installed helped a lot.
The Dubai to Accra flight was a "mere" 8 hour flight.
I got chatting to a Singaporean guy who was sitting next to me. He
was an interesting chap whose job it was to fly around the world sorting
out Human Resources issues for the shipping company he worked for.
I was not surprised to hear that the pay was excellent, but the guy absolutely
hated his job.
After more bad movies and fitful sleeps, I found myself - at last -
descending into Ghana. The first thing that struck me was the myriad of
interwoven dirt roads with the odd village dotted here and there.
The villages looked pretty basic with tin roof style roofs on the
houses. The dusty roads soon gave way to Accra itself.
Accra is a dead flat city that would make both Christchurch and
Dumangas proud.
Before I knew it, I had stepped off the plane and was on African soil
at last. One of my first acts was to lie to a customs
official. A entry requirement into Ghana is that you must tell
them the address that you are saying at and I had forgotten to record it
somewhere. The immigration official insisted that I give him one
and I said that I planned to find a motel as soon as I left the
terminal. I asked him if he knew of any good hotels in the
area. He suggested the La Palms hotel and was kind enough to write
it down on my immigration card for me.
As I stepped out in the hot African air, I saw a couple of friendly
fellows holding up a "Children's' Better Way" sign. Some
quick handshakes and introductions ensued. I soon also met up with
a couple of other new volunteers.
The packed us into a car and an hour or so later I was in the Budumburum
Refugee Camp!
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(c)
2005 and 2006 Malcolm Trevena.
All the stuff on this site is written by me, Malcolm Trevena. Feel free to
link to this page. Heck, you can even copy stuff from here if you
want. Just make sure you sight me as a reference.
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