Ah Paris, oui oui

Well here I am back in the United States.  It is kind of strange.  In one way it feels like I never left and yet... even though everything is the same, it's different too.  Still trying to figure that out.

Had a slightly rough trip.  Pretty much everything that could go slightly wrong did.  lol
However I made it and I'm happy to be here.

The flight from Cairo to Paris was fairly uneventful.  We had screens in the backs of the seats in front of us so we could watch movies or whatever.  It's one of the reasons that I picked Air France, because their planes are pretty nice.  My seat mate was fairly quiet and didn't seem to want to talk at all but she wasn't necessarily unfriendly.

We landed in Paris just before sunrise and by the time we got off the plane and I was walking through the terminal, the sun was coming up.  It was really beautiful, though the picture below doesn't necessarily show it.

I used the bathroom shortly after arriving.  The airport was pretty empty seeing as how we landed at 6 a.m. and not even the shops were open.  In any case, there were people constantly cleaning the bathrooms and they were actually pretty nice.  I took a couple of pictures because I liked the color.  lol
The first picture is in the actual uh, stall.

And then the sinks that I liked.  They just kind of flowed all the way down, not completely separate.  And you can see me in the mirror at the end.

I was waiting in one particular are of the terminal, gate E65 I believe, which was all the way at one end.  About 5 to 10 minutes before my flight was due to leave, a lady made an announcement that my flight had changed gates and was down at the other end of the terminal.  Oh joy!  I got up and put my laptop bag over one shoulder and my large purse bag on the other and made a mad and very long dash to the other end.
I'm sure it took over 5 minutes to get there and I was so sure I had missed the flight.  Thankfully they were just starting to load people on.

Most of the time I was waiting in the terminal it was beautiful and sunny outside but towards the end it got cloudy and I could see when I got to the second gate that it was raining outside and I heard some thunder.  I was so thrilled I can't tell you.  We get so little rain in Cairo that it was just joyful.

So we all got on the plane and situated.  I took a picture out the window to show the rain.  lol

I had monkey with me, he wanted to visit the States and see his family and friends.  Here he is waiting on the plane for something to eat.  He was pretty hungry.

And then the waiting started.  At first they said they were waiting for some baggage.  And then half hour later it was because there was lightning on the runway and also because of an air show going on because of their national holiday.  I think we waited about an hour and a half before actually taking off.  Which sucked as the flight is long enough to begin with.  Also, these seats did NOT have the screens in the back of them, so that cut out almost all options as far as watching anything.  Very disappointing on such a long flight and I'm going to see what I can find out about the return flight and whether the plane will have screens or not.

Anyways, that flight lasted forever.  And ever.  And ever.  But my seatmates were nice, a young couple going home from some vacation or other.  And the flight attendants on Air France are always super friendly, more than any others I have ever encountered.  It's great.

They stopped me a couple of time in immigration to ask a slew of questions but they were nice and aside from the fact that I was super tired from not sleeping much or well on the flights, I didn't mind.

And then after I got my luggage, one piece of which I thought they lost as it didn't turn up til about 10 minutes after all of the rest of the plane's luggage had come out, I made my way out to my parents and son who were waiting and it was so nice!  We hugged  and hello'd and got started out towards the car.

Because the flight was delayed and it took so long going through immigration and to get luggage, we ended up hitting a lot more commute traffic than anticipated.  After an hour and a half driving we stopped for an early dinner and then got back on the road.  3 hours or so later and we finally got home.

All in all a very long time from leaving the apartment in Cairo to arriving home here at the folks.  Over 24 hours.  I was so tired and wiped out.  I had wanted to take a nice hot shower and get to bed but I didn't manage much before I just went to sleep.  lol

Anyways, nice to be here.  Very different than what I've been used to for the past year and four months.