My First UK Trip - Second Part

The excitement of my first trip to UK was beyond to any one's imaginations.

Keeping my cabin baggage at my shoulders and holding my passport with boarding pass, I entered into aircraft, well greeted by crew staff and got a direction to move to my seat.

I had taken domestic flights in the past and was not so comfortable the seats. It was too congested for me and feel very uncomfortable as seats are not full push back. I had a notion in my mind that international flights must be having spacious seating arrangements because people travel for longer hours and of course its an international flight.

As I approached to economy class seats, I could see the people struggling to get into the seats. This was the first shock I got ! I could not digest that I will be seating in this congested seat for around 10 hours, that too I haven't slept last night. I felt like shouting... but controlled myself...I kept my baggage and seated myself in the middle seat with lot of patience. I have heard that British people have good patience so have I !

I tried to console myself that I have a small TV for me. I could push back my seat a little bit...

I got seated in the middle seat... so you can imagine how comfortable I was..

Flight took off, I kept my eyes on the watch to calculate how much time is left to reach Heathrow airport. I just played with the menu bar of TV and got map of the running flight. So I was able to see flight route, country/ocean over which the aircraft is flying, IST time, GMT time etc.

Now it was the turn of aircraft crew members to keep us happy. They served hot breakfast with small dosa. Dosa was really tasty but It was not dosa at all. They kept on serving juices, water, snacks, meal at the interval of 1-2 hours. I tried to take small nap but could not as seat was not at all comfortable for me and if at all I get to sleep, air hostess will start serving something to you. I tried to spend my time talking to colleague who was seating next to me.

Anyway my 10 hours journey went off well. There was a final announcement for fastening the seat belts as the aircraft was about to land. I have seen a documentary in Discovery channel about Heathrow airport. It showed Heathrow is one of busiest airport in the world and hardly there is a difference of 60 second between the take offs / landing of two aircraft, and how the aircraft are made to descend in a cylindrical route. It was very interesting documentary.

We got down at airport at around 12.10 PM(GMT) at terminal number 5. No idea where to go, just followed the crowd. After going down to 2-3 floors, we found one train and boarded the same. I another 2-3 minutes we got down and went for Immigration check. Officer asked some questions and finally we came to collect our checked in luggage. At the entrance of airport, office cab was waiting for us. There was not much rush at the airport unlike in India.

We happily departed for our final destination to 2 Moselwalk, Pereborough. It took around 2 hours and we reached at around 3 PM(GMT) and it should be around 7.30 PM in India. Our HR manager was waiting for us near the house. She showed us the rooms and other arrangements and got the keys of rooms.

I was really happy to see the House. Its really neat and clean, well carpeted. Even bathroom floor has carpet. Really surprised how could they maintain it neat and clean. Fantastic ! Awesome !

Once my HR manager left, I realized my wife must be waiting to hear from me. I took out my laptop, comfortably plugged in and started. I searched for User Id and password for WiFi connection in the welcome kit given by my manager. Configured my laptop successfully. I had a feedback from my colleagues that the our accommodation will have WiFi facility, so i was prepared for that.
Opened the yahoo mail and passed on the message to my elder brother who was waiting for me. In turn he passed on the message to our parents, my wife. I could not chat immediately as I did not installed either Yahoo messenger or gTalk. Could not install yahoo messenger as my Vista was having some problem. Installed gtalk successfully and it became the primary mode of communication with all my family members during my stay in UK. I did install sKype for video chatting but later on I found it very convenient to make international calls. Although rates are slightly higher but its vary comfortable and provides good quality of service.
I also used one free sms website to send mobile messages to relatives on the first day. Its really worked and was very helpful.
We had our first dinner as Maggie. I was wondering what could be the time. Looked at the watch .. It was around 8 PM(GMT) and still we could see Sun! I believe the Sunset happened somewhere around 9 PM. It was a pleasant weather in Peter borough, temperature could have been around 19-20 degree Celsius. Its summer here probably it is similar to winter in India. I thought if this climate is summer then imagine how the winter will be. Thank god I came in right time to UK. I have too much of problem of cold weather.
Tiredness and fatigue of journey made me to sleep at around 10 PM but got up early in the morning, may be around 5 am. It was Sunday. Switched my laptop and found my elder brother on Yahoo web messenger.I had my first voice chatting with brother on gTalk and felt relaxed. I talked at length , told him about my journey etc. I managed to call my wife to cybercafe for voice chatting and felt even more relaxed.
It was a nice start in UK.......

My First UK Trip - Before boarding the flight

I joined to my new company somewhere in first week of June 09. I was immediately made an offer to travel to Peterborough, UK for a short trip(around 6 weeks). Accepted it gracefully because of two reasons : one, it was my first onsite travel, two , it was a very short trip.

All the visa formalities were done in 3-4 days (Business Visa), but hold on, the dates of my departure was not yet confirmed !

It took another a week to confirm my dates and was supposed to travel in a short notice of 3 days. Oops ! I did not make any travel arrangements for my trip as the dates were not confirmed. I did not do any shopping as it would have cost me around Rs 15000 and did not want to block money due to uncertainty of traveling dates.

Since the day one I accepted the offer of trip, lot of questions were haunting my mind. What shall I be eating in UK being a pure vegetarian, what are the things I need to carry with me, how is climate will be, will it be too cold, what will be the mode of transportation to office, on the top how will be my 10 hrs flight journey to Heathrow airport from Hyderabad etc....

I talked to some of my colleague who has already been to UK and got some wonderful tips which really made my life comfortable(read my next blog). I was preparing the list of items to be carried from the day one although I was not sure whether I will travel or not.

I took off the next day when my tickets got confirmed and did lot of shopping keeping in my mind that the maximum checked in luggage weight is 23 kg (British airways) and cabin baggage is 6 kg(excluding your laptop).

I made sure that I am carrying a laptop with Wifi in working condition with microphone headset. I did buy a UK adapter because in India charger plug has round pin and can not be used in UK.This is very important becauase I immediately needed to pass on the message to my family in India once I reach to my destination I think gTalk/Yahoo messanger/sKype was the only convenient tool for me to do so. I did note down couple of free SMS message sites to send mobile SMS from laptop.

Then I started shopping for ration items like rice, pulse, spices,maggie(This is most important easy to cook item), soup packets, corn maize packets. I bought 2 litre pressure cooker as well to cook rice and pulse. I bought 0.5 kg Surf powder, Vimbar to wash dished,bathing soap, scrotch bites(to clean utencils). Important medicines like Calpol, Pudin hara, Cough Syrup, band aid, dettol was also in my buying list. The climate is very good during July - Aug in Peterborough, its summer there but Its like a winter of India and one need a light jacket and sweater. It rains very often so I had to buy an umbrella also(But I did not carry due to weight restrictions). I bought new jeans, T-shirts, a pair of formal shirts and trousers with new leather shoe... I should look professional before the client, right? I had to purchase suitcase and cabin bag as per the standards defined in British Airways web site. I did shopping whole day roaming in Hyderabad in my sweet car (Wagon R) all alone. As I sent my family back to home town few days back. While I was shopping one question was troubling me a lot : what will be net weight of my luggage once I do packing. So I bought one weighing machine also for Rs 500 from Home Town,Panjagutta. It was an average machine with error limit to +-0.5 kg.

I completed all my shopping as per my list and returned back to home at around 7 PM(I started at 10 am in the morning). Thanks to my wife who has prepared a good list of items before leaving to home, as if she has already visited to UK. Good wife will show their care to husband only when they need it.

Felt a bit relaxed, talked to wife and updated all my day activity, prepared maggie for dinner. Now the big task was a challenge for me ... packing and weighing. After an hour or so I started packing and put everything in big suitcase, including cloths. I put one pair of trouser and shirt , laptop, travel documents in cabin baggage. I happily started weighing the luggage. Whop ! the weight of checked in luggage came out to be 30 KG and cabin bag 6 kg(with laptop).I started reducing the amount of items like rice from 5 kg to 2.5 kg, pulse 3 kg to 1.5 kg, maggie from two jumbo pack to 1 pack, left salt packet, left green chick pie packet, left moong daal packet etc. I managed the weight of suitcase to be around 22.5 kg. I was not able to reduce further. For cabin baggage I left it as it is because I thought I will take out my laptop while it is weighed. Laptop itself was weighing more than 2 kg.

It was almost 1 am in the night and decided to sleep as I have to go to office next day and day after tomorrow(Saturday) I had early morning flight at 5.45 am.

I came from office early 4 pm from office and tried to sleep for few hours as I was supposed to start at 2.30 am in the morning for airport. Slept for 1-2 hours, talked to family and started preparing for journey at around 1 am. Cab came in time and reached airport by 3 am.

One of my colleague was also traveling with me. She gave me a call saying that her luggage is weighing more than 34kg and if I can manage to take some item.

We went to near to weighing machine, put almost all cloths in my my cabin bag, took some of food items and both of us could manage the weight of suitacse to 24 kg each, hoping that BA officials will allow. My cabin bag was weighing around 7 kg without laptop.

We went to British Airways counter, showed tickets, identity proof. They did allow our 24 kg checked in baggage and collected our boarding pass. They asked us to put our cabin bag in a box to verify whether cabin bag will fit into space provided in aircraft, but they did not weigh it, amazing....

It was 3.30 am. We filled up one custom for with details like passport number, our address during stay in UK, flight details etc. We proceeded for custom check. Custom officer did ask couple of questions, like where are we going, what is the purpose, when are we coming back etc and got clearance in 10 minutes. We went through security checking and reached to waiting lounge by 4 am. . We need to wait for another 1 hour 45 minutes ... At Shamshabad airport one can have facility of free WiFi connectivity for 45 minutes, but you need to contact Tata Indicom outlet at airport itself for keys. I did not try as I took small nap for around 45 minutes and spent another 1 hour in admiring new international airport....

It was around 5.20 am, BA airways staff started making announcements related to the flight. Started inviting the passenger in the sequence of Older passengers, Passengers having infants and kids. And finally seat number wise. The management skills showed by BA staff was appreciable. Finally our turn came and made a march for my FIRST INTERNATIONAL FLIGHT !

More in my next blog