12:00

So. FYI: don't ever let me organise anything. Ever. Especially if it involves airports, aeroplanes or checking in. My father may remember in his daughter-anxiety nightmares the evening I called from a pay phone in Girona airport in incomprehensible hysterics because I had booked my flight home from my summer season for the 6th July. At the time, it was the 6th August. I had not realised my mistake until the nice lady at the check in desk pointed it out to me. €300, a lot of tears, and an overnight stay at an airport later, I managed to get myself home. 


Bridget Clay, who has been visiting for the last five days, will also never forget the following conversation, which occurred at 10:28 at Saigon International Airport:

Me: what time is our flight?B: you said twelve, didn't you?
Me: is our flight at eleven?
B: no, you said twelve.
Me: our flight is at eleven. I'm so sorry.

It was only after we began running that I shouted, blindly panicking, "wait? Do we know where we're going, or are we just running?" because in situations like that, sometimes it IS just a natural instinct to run without thinking about it first. Luckily this is neither Frenchie nor Bridget Clay's natural instinct, and they had looked at the gate number. Pretty sure Frenchie is going to sever all connection with me now that he knows what a moron I am. He will at least, stop dropping me off and picking me up from airports.

Me: we're so sorry, we're very late, but we need to get on this flight.
Check In Lady: no, I'm sorry, we are closed.
Me: no, no, it says 'last check in'.
CIL: hmm, but we closed ten minutes ago.
Me: (in exalted remembrance) WE CHECKED IN ONLINE! Does that make a difference?!

After a short verbal tussle that included some doubt about checking in Bridget's gap yah rucksack and a desperate glance back towards Burger King (we had had no breakfast) that only resulted in the kiosk crumbling into a pile of salt, we were flip-flop sprinting to the first security gate, which is quite hard to do, and very noisy.

Then, then, then! Thankfully everyone in every security and passport queue was KIND and by the time we got to the third security bit, they had heard us coming and stood aside to let us go to the front of the line. This security man was the only guy who seemed intent on doing his job, which was FRUSTRATING but understandably essential. God Bless America. We lost the Scissors and the Pen Knife Spoon in this great security gate massacre.  With the touching down of the plane and in the airport, we will remember them (we will remember them).  Worryingly, though, nobody seemed fussed by the big bottles of shampoo, the aerosols, the flammable hand gel, the tweezers, either razor or the kilogram of cocaine.

Whilst Bridget was putting on her Calm Face and sweating a little bit, I yelled: "I WILL GO AND HOLD THE PLANE!"

Bridget said, "Yes, this is a good idea," in a quiet voice that only just disguised her utter disgust at my Ace Ventura styled idiocy.

Turns out I did a pretty good job of holding the plane because we were able to run, in a swaying, back pack motion, squealing apologies in our plummy little accents ("sorry, so sorry! Awfully sorry!) down the umbilical cord that joins the plane to the airport before falling gracefully into the cabin and delicately stepping our way, like ballerinas to our seats to try and fool people into thinking that we had either been there all along, or planned the whole thing this way.

Bridget's tolerance to No Food Mornings has improved since the days of Tetouan/Chefchaoun so she was not sick behind a wall but instead quite perky having heard the news that lunch would be served shortly once we had taken off (on time).

I have booked all the hotels for our trip to Borneo. I'll let you know how this pans out.