I arrived at O'hare International Airport promptly at 12pm and met up with my friend Andy Smith who had flown over from Detroit earlier that morning. We waited about 15 minutes until the rest of the group arrived. My dad assisted in taking our first group photo and then we said our goodbyes and headed to the check in counters. We still had about 3 hours before the flight was to depart so we spent about an hour perusing the food court before tackling security.
I had been looking forward to trying out the new body scanners that the TSA has become so infamous for. Personally I don't give a hoot what kind of scanners they use. I stepped into the machine and put my feet in the correct position. The "friendly" TSA officer who looked thrilled about his job told me to hold my hands up like I was about to catch a football. It was pretty cool if you ask me, however, he also told me not to move so I didn't know when to leave my Desmond Clark stance. I stood there for about 15 seconds longer than I needed to until the guy yelled at me to move along. It was embarrassing. Like I always say...you win some, you lose more.
Our entire group made it through security with no issues and we were quickly off to the gate just to wait another hour before we boarded.
I have never been too Europe or been on plain flight that was more than 5 hours. I really wasn't looking forward to a 9.5 hours flight, but it ended up going much better than I had imagined. The plane took of almost on time and before I knew it we were flying over the Atlantic Ocean. At around 6pm (CST) the flight crew served us a gourmet Christmas airplane style dinner dish. I chose the chicken over the fish. It tasted how it looked; bad. However, it was edible and I scarfed it down with ease.
I listened to my audio book for over half of the flight an periodically glanced at the tv monitors that had a gps map of our location. I was also mentally preparing for the time change that was about to rock my world. We left Chicago at 3:45pm and arrived in Rome at 8:15am on December 26th. Getting through the airport in Rome was a bit of a challenge. We had to get on a tram and switch terminals and then find our way to our connecting gate for our flight which was boarding a few minutes after we got off the plane from Chicago. We all got a sinking feeling when we turned a corner and saw a massive line at a security checkpoint....there was no way we would make our flight. However, myself and another student saw a man dressed in a nice suit who looked like he had some authority. We approached the man and he asked us if we were traveling with a large group. He then said something over the radio and said to us, "This way please." A moment later we were standing in the priority access security line bypassing the huge crowd! (SWEET) We pulled a Home Alone through the rest of the airport and made our plane with a few minutes to spare. Next stop: Athens.
We arrived in Athens and went straight to baggage claim. (I'm not really sure where Customs was but my passport was never stamped anywhere) My bag was the first in our groups to come over the belt: score. We then had about a 25 minute bus ride to the Greek Bible College and the rest of the day has been a bit of a blur. The time change is 8 hours ahead over here. They told us to try and stay awake until 9pm to help with the jet lag. It is now 9:15pm. I am going to bed.
Class starts tomorrow. We will have a 4 hour lecture almost every day in the morning and then do our traveling in the afternoons. This Wednesday we are traveling to Delphi and next week we are heading over to Corinth.
More updates to come.
-Chip
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