The neverending day

Day 1 of the Big Adventure was certainly a long one... 31 hours from YUL to AKL, or 34 hours if counting door-to-door from Brossard to Auckland. It went as well as could be expected with some highs and some lows along the way. The highs: A nice going-away lunch with Mom, Dad, Jackie & Johanne, managing not to completely fall apart when saying goodbye at the airport, managing to sleep at least 5-6 hours on all the flights combined, my backpack arriving at Auckland airport at the same time as I did, and lastly but not least, arriving safe and sound.
The lows: A few minor ones like uncomfortable seats (no shit, excuse my language), and the same movies being shown on all flights (saw the movie Gracie twice, even though I had never heard of it before, and The Rise of the Silver Surfer twice as well...) but the only major one worth mentioning is that I managed to catch a cold & started getting symptoms the day I left. After 5 hours of flying, I was completely congested and both my ears were blocked. As of the time I'm writing this more than 50 hours later, my left ear still feels like I have an ear plug stuck in it...
I had a few "freak out" moments as well. The first one involving my money belt, as I was leaving the plane on my 2nd flight of the trip. I could not find it anywhere and was convinced I had left it in a bathroom stall at LAX. The freak out lasted 5 minutes until I got off the plane and dumped out my carry-on and found the damn thing.

The 2nd freak out moment was after arriving at the hostel. I had managed to start the trip without actually putting on the backpack. It was trekked from the car to a cart to a plane to a cart ... without going on my back. Getting it there is no easy task, let me tell you. I can carry it OK, but picking it up and putting it on in a quick and timely fashion is beyond me. I hope I get better at it soon. Anyway, back to the freak out. The hostel office was not opened when I arrived and I had to wait 1 hour before being able to check in. At this point, I'm exhausted, sicker than ever and thinking what the hell am I doing here. And I'm going to do this for a whole year?

It got better when I finally checked-in, even though there was only 1 bed left in my 5-person share, and that was a top bunk with no ladder! I was glad there wasn't anyone in the room when I got there, as I could practice getting on and off the bed without an audience. Not a pretty sight :-)

I spent the rest of my very long first day getting settled in. I walked around the neighbourhood (think a less trendy version of Laurier in Outremont), bought a new cellphone, got myself some dinner and shopped for my breakfast for the next 2 days.

All in all, not a bad start!