First Morning in England

September 25, 2010

It is 10:00am, two hours after landing in England, and I am standing outside the Birmingham airport shivering with forty other international students, all of us waiting for the shuttle bus that will carry us to the university. I am watching people walking in and out of the airport when, slowly, the cobblestone walkway begins to tilt. I place my hand on the pillar next to me, steadying myself. Then the ground jerks sideways and my stomach heaves.

Before I can fall down, I fold into a ball at the base of the pillar. Feeling like I am on a rocking dock, I put my head between my knees, repeating to myself, “Don’t faint. Don’t faint. Do NOT throw up.” All the while, my head starts inflating like an overblown balloon, light, airy, like it could float straight off my body and into the clouds.

Suddenly, I realize I have been bitch-slapped by Jet Lag.

I sway in my little ball for a half hour until, with a screech of metal on metal, the bus pulls up. A wiry, man trots out and begins loading the bags into the belly of the vehicle. I hand him mine. Step onto the bus. And sit next to a quiet-looking man who talks to me the entire way to the university.

45 minutes later we arrive. Hundreds of people mill about, and I am shuffled into a corner of the parking lot with my backpack and two suitcases, clutching my messenger bag to my stomach. Accents I cannot place shoot from my left, now my right. Someone squeals. Someone giggles. A car passes. I squeeze my eyes shut. “Don’t faint. Don’t faint.” I whisper.

“Hello!” A cheery English accent quips. I open my eyes to see a blond, plump girl smiling four feet from me. “Just leave your bags here. They’ll be safe.” I look at the three bags lying at my feet, seeing everything I own in this country. Then I glance down at the messenger bag still clutched to my stomach, my most important possessions pressing against me, solid, heavy, and so easily taken away. “You can bring that one with you,” she says.

Nodding and clenching my bag, I follow her. She leads me into a room circled with booths. I walk behind her like a lost child. A man hands me a key, saying something about a fine. Another man hands me an Ethernet cable, saying something about a fee. A woman pushes a handful of paper towards me, shouting “Insurance!”

“Take this.”

“Remember this.”

“This is important.”

“Do this before this date.”

Names and dates and prices swirl around me. Hands shove papers into my fists. My head feels lighter and lighter. My leg muscles quiver.

“Don’t faint. Don’t faint.”

Finally, the booths end. “We’ll get your bags and go to your room,” the blond girl says. Hey, *Sam, help me carry her bags,” she yells to a boy standing a few feet away.

“I’ve got it,” I say, bending to pick up my backpack and swaying when I lift it off the ground.

“Why don’t you just carry the one you’ve got,” she says, glancing at my messenger bag and then nodding at Sam.

They lead me to my flat and set down my bags. I say, “Thank you,” shut the door, fall into bed and straight into sleep.

All too soon, I wake up. I look at my clock—only two hours. At least the edge of the nausea wore off. I walk out my door to see a Chinese guy walking into the room next to mine. Then I notice that the same guy who helped carry my bags is now standing in the hall holding my flat mate’s suitcase. Tall, wavy hair, big smile, attractive. How delirious was I before to have missed this? I smile, suddenly wide-awake.

*Name changed to reduce creepiness