the flights- installment one

anyone want a tip about flying with an infant?
wait until they are 25 and buying you holidays for your 60th birthday or wedding anniversary or something- AND DON'T TAKE THEM.

having said that percy was remarkably well behaved and caused us little trouble over the days it took us to get here.
we left sydney (australia) on an 8am flight on thursday 7 june. unfortunately the bad weather delayed us by two hours which really stuffed things up later on. seeing the news reports on how bad the weather got i think we were lucky. life seems far more precious now that we have percy. it's terrible to learn of those that lost their lives and to think of the suffering of those grieving for them.

our 8am flight meant rising at 4am. we'd booked a silver service taxi- station wagon with baby capsule for 4:30am. and guess what- it arrived on time! first tip to travelling parents (tttp) pack at least 4 or 5 changes of clothes. whether it's because we are still crap nappy appliers or percy thought this was a good time to vent we had to change her twice because she had poo up her back, before we even got on the plane. sorry percy, if you ever read this when you're older- don't be embarrassed, babies poo everywhere at least once. all babies.

note to designers/ builders/ owners of public spaces- your facilities for parents absolutely suck. no ifs, buts, howevers, etc. take a lousy 3 square metres and put in a decent change table, sink, bench space, comfortable nursing chair, bin and power points. would it kill you?
funny how this was never an issue a short three months ago. are parents supposed to cower at home until their children are toilet trained? are mothers supposed to formula or bottle feed always? personally i'm not bothered about breastfeeding in public but it would be nice to change my screaming baby in private.
the joke labelled "parents rooms" at syd international airport was not big enough for paul and i to fit into together once the change table was lowered from the wall. and we are not big people.
wait 'til we get to dubai!! ha ha.

percy slept thru the take off at sydney and the landing into singapore. so despite my dread about painful pressured ears and the associated yelling this did not eventuate. she was also a little angel during the flight, feeding demurely in my seat, sleeping a little in the supplied bassinet and more in our arms. she didn't even cry when we changed her in those appalling airplane toilets.
if you want to know how often your baby rouses or snuffles or whimpers or jerks in her sleep try holding her or peering over a bassinet edge for 8 hours. it's a lot.

we were late into singapore because of the delay in sydney. which meant we'd missed the connection to dubai. f**k. singapore ground crew tried to fob us off with a meal voucher to a burger king equivalent and a re-booking on a flight to leave 8 hours later. this is where i lost my cool. (do i have a lot of cool to start with?) we were 14 hours into this trip and only half way there. i sincerely intended not to sit in a transit lounge with a baby for eight hours. have you seen international transit lounges? they are open, plain, filled with wierdos, have no services or amenities and are not fun.
thankfully we got something slightly better.