The journey back to Mumbai, a retrospective entry ... do read this one!

I started my travel at around 5 p.m. on Saturday the 23rd. Going by train to Manchester airport, I was aware that I would have to spend about 3-4 hours inside the airport. This time, I carried with me just one suitcase and one laptop bag. En route, my baggage will increase, as it always does!

Due to the onset of vacation time in the U.K., tickets to India weren't so cheap. I finally managed to find a trip that was reasonably priced; the catch, however, was that there would be a layover at Istanbul airport for over 13 hours. I left for Manchester airport by train, arriving there at around 6:15 p.m. I would be travelling by Turkish airlines. The flight time was 23:40 hours, and I had to while away my time in the airport, having food, relaxing, surfing the net, etc. until it was time for check-in to be announced. It was at about 11 p.m. that we finally collected at the gate from where we would board the aircraft awaiting us. (By us, I mean my fellow passengers, of course).

The actual boarding started after another 15 minutes, and the aircraft finally took off near around mid-night. I saw the newly made Disney movie Jungle Book. Food on the flight was quite okay, consisting of beef pattice on rice, bread, butter, dessert and, finally, tea.

I reached Ataturk International airport at around 05:30 a.m. The arrivals lounge was quite busy even at that hour. Transit passengers were all directed to the transit counters and then the international lounge, where I have been waiting since then until now, when I have begun to write this draft that will eventually appear on my blog.

I have had the occasion to meet a few people. The first was a mother-daughter duo travelling to Boston, Massachusetts. Mom and Dad live in Dhahran in KSA, where the dad is a university teacher. They have four children, two of whom are already married and settled in the U.S. One is a younger son, who is with the parents. The  last is the daughter who was accompanying her mom today. She has secured admission to a course on Politics in the University of Maryland, and they were flying there for her to start her course. They had a wait of over six hours.

After they left, I was joined by a Nigerian student of Hotel Management. Sarah is pursuing education in this course in Cyprus. Currently, she was travelling to her home country to meet her family. She, too, has a wait of nearly eight hours at the airport.

For lunch, I had a chicken hamburger with potato crisps and a diet coke. My new friend could not find something suitable and settled for just fries and a coke. Perhaps she would eat a more substantial meal later.

I have had the pleasure of meeting yet another interesting man, Philippe René Nsoa, a Cameroonian judge by profession.  This gentleman was returning home from a work trip to Malta, where he had gone to attend a judges' workshop. The sad thing was that he missed his flight yesterday evening, and has to wait until today evening (a total of 24 hours) at the airport. Additionally, he had to shell out €200 to purchase a new ticket.

In the later part of the afternoon, I had the occasion to meet Anjum, a Kenyan British person of Indian origin. This young, recently married girl is an auxillary nurse working in the community at Manchester. She had been to Male to be with her in-laws, and had arrived at Ataturk around the same time as me, and sitting just a few tables away from where I was during the entire morning. Now, she is returning to Manchester on an evening flight.

Wikipaedia would give you the exact details of this airport. What I wish to state here is that it is a very busy airport, huge in size, and handling at least 700-800 flights a day across its nearly 500 departure/arrival gates. The food court is FULL of travellers, and the tables at the side where people like me sit down to spend the whole day, perhaps placing our heads on the table and napping, and looking at the thousands of people who are all around me.

I did manage to buy a few things to take home, and will share pictures of the same in my subsequent entry. That's all for now ... so, as always, thanks for visiting and reading this entry. Although it was written "live" , I will be posting it a few days later after I am back in Mumbai and in my home internet network. 

Arrival in the UK

The preparations to come to this country took well over 2 months. First, I had to complete my medical council registration; then, the UK visa; and finally, do shopping and accumulate stuff that one should compulsorily have with them when they wish to immigrate to the UK - but especially important stuff like utensils, a pressure cooker, clothes to ward off the cold and wet climate with, money to carry along, and a host of other stuff. 

During the past few months, I also hosted a few get-togethers; the first one was with my Nagpada friends, Drs. Muhbeen, Arif Shaikh and Ashfaq; at this get-together, which I had in the month of September, we had Raan Biryani, the favourite dish of Persian Durbar- the place we ate at. The next one was a family get-together with Murtuza's family. This was hosted by Murtuza, and was also at Persian Durbar, with all of us again having the same main dish that my friends and I had gorged on previously. 

The final big get-together was the one we organised about 3 days before my departure from India. At this meet, we invited the entire families of my dear friends - the Jolly club members, my own family and my wife's closest family members - a brother's family and a cousin sister's family (Pappu being the brother and her cousin Lovely being the sister). This get-together was organised by us at the Kolsa Mohalla jamatkhana. Will post pictures of this one day in this blog.

On the 14th morning, I finally caught a flight from Terminal 2 of the Mumbai Chatrapati Shivaji International Airport (Gate 73, Turkish Airlines) to Manchester. My flight took off at 6.50 a.m. IST. I had a layoff for about 2 1/2 hours at the airport in Istanbul, which I reached after a journey of 7 hours and where I changed planes to continue my onward journey to Manchester. This second leg of my journey took over 4.5 hours. Thus, my entire journey took over 14 hours, and I arrived in Manchester at around 3.30 p.m. GMT.

En route, Turkish Airlines served great food; during the first flight, they served a Turkish meal consisting of cheesy salted items, spinach and smoked salmon with sides of salad and a strawbetty yogurt, On the second leg, they served snacks, which were equally delicious. All in all, the flights were good. Istanbul airport is a very, very busy airport. They have so many departure gates! Mine was gate 304! The population at the airport was completely cosmopolitan. My first flight was running full. The second was nearly full, too.

On arriving at Manchester, the immigration formalities and retrieval of luggage took over an hour, I got a local train from Manchester Airport to Poulton le Fylde. My bags were really heavy and I had a tough time transferring them from the airport to the rail station, and from the station on to the train itself. However, I got an empty train and got settled in into the second compartment from the rear. Disaster struck when the announcer said that only the first three compartments of the train would travel to Blackpool, while the rear 3 were slated to be disconnected and would be going to another place - with a new locomotive engine. I managed to disembark at Preston, and boarded the front compartments with some difficulty. I reached Poulton at 6.30 p.m. Took a cab from there and arrived at Blackpool Victoria Hospital around 7:00 p.m. 

That's all for now. More in my next post.