Wilkommen nach Deutschland

Our last day in Chennai was really crazy! Penri had to work until 4 p.m so it was really difficult for me to get our cases and hand luggage packed as I was looking after Dylan most of the day. Once Penri finished all his work he had to take the cats at 5 p.m to cargo to check them in for the flight. He was told to expect to be there for 3-4 hours, so we agreed there was no point in him coming all the way back home and we would meet at the airport at 10. Our flight was at 1.45 a.m.

Anyhow, he finished with the cats fairly quickly and phoned me at 7.30 p.m to see whether I thought he should come back home. Of course, it made sense that he did, then he could relax a bit before our journey and have something to eat.

I’m so lucky that my friend Christine came over at 4 p.m as I would never have got packed otherwise. She arrived at the flat and it was absolutely chaotic! There was stuff EVERYWHERE! None of the suitcases were packed; I still had washing in the machine and nothing was organised. She helped me by looking after Dylan so that I could get sorted. She also helped me pack all the cases and strip the beds, hang the washing, clean up the bedroom and have one last look for my mobile phone (which definitely is not in the flat). We finally finished packing at 8 p.m. We went downstairs where Penri had already arrived and had some dinner and hung out with the Sparky’s people for the last time.

We left Sparky’s at 10 p.m – Ravi (one of the waiters) drove us to the airport. There were the three of us, three large suitcases, two wheelie cases (hand luggage), Dylan’s nappy bag, the pushchair and Dylan’s moses basket. I don’t know how we had so much stuff when loads of it had already been sent by cargo on Friday. Anyway, we all got into the truck and put all the cases in the back and set off on our trip. About 10 minutes away from the airport it started to rain. Dylan’s pushchair was in the back of the truck and there was no cover on it so Ravi pulled over and brought the pushchair inside the truck. He got really wet ... I felt so bad for him.

We arrived at the airport, said goodbye and in we went. Check-in had already opened so we queued up and waited. When we got to the check-in desk we were told our luggage was really overweight. We had about 80 kilos (we were allowed 60). To pay the difference was going to cost us something like Rs.40,000 (which is about £500)! We had to move to the side and do some repacking and empty some of the weight from our cases, which we did and then we had to go back to the desk. I always remember seeing people in airports re-packing their cases and thinking to myself ‘poor people, but how do you pack so much that you have to lose some of the stuff?’ and there we were, experiencing it for ourselves! Luckily (or unluckily, I don’t know), we had already paid excess baggage charges for the cats journey. We paid for 29 kilos and they were only 21 so we had 8 kilos there. So, eventually, after a lot of re-packing and a lot of negotiation on Penri’s part, we ended up paying Rs.18,300 (which is about £230).

We got checked in and went through immigration. By then Dylan was awake and getting very hungry. Once we had finally got through all the immigration, passport control etc, I went to the mother/baby room to feed him. Pen was going to sit and wait for me in the seating area (where there were hundreds of people). When I got into the room there was only one other woman in there with a little girl (who was about 3 or 4 years old and she was running around) and the woman’s husband was sat there too. I went back out and called Penri and told him he might as well come in as well. Can you believe in an airport like Chennai (where the weather is extremely hot), there is no air conditioning or fan in the mother/baby room? Also, the wall along one side is entirely full length windows (on the other side of which is the corridor everyone walks through when they arrive in Chennai airport). There were curtains but none of them were closed. There were two beds to sit on but the sheets were dirty and had stains on them (there was no way I was putting my baby on them)! So, I closed the curtains, set myself up in the corner (on the floor) and because it was so stinking hot, I faced the corner and took off my t-shirt. I also undressed Dylan right down to just his nappy as he was really warm. While I was feeding him, another two ladies came into the room with small children. They lay on the bed to try and get some sleep and one of them told me that I shouldn’t be sat on the floor as it’s not clean. I replied that it was better than the bed, which was filthy! Anyway, once I had fed him and he had cooled down, we both got dressed and it was time to board the plane. Because we had Dylan, we were first to get on.

Our seats were at the front of our section (with the baby cot) and I was really happy that there were just two seats together (as the plane layout was 2-4-2) so no-one was sat next to us. Dylan was amazing on the flight. He only cried for about two seconds when he woke up at the end of the flight, other than that he fed with no problems and slept most of the way. It was great cause it meant that Pen and I managed to sleep most of the way too. The flight seemed to pass by really quickly and in no time at all, we were landing in Frankfurt. Once we got off the plane we had an hour or so before our flight so we decided to go for a McDonalds as I hadn’t had a Big Mac for ages. Penri went and ordered while I sat down with all our stuff – moses basket, pushchair, hand luggage, nappy bag, baby etc. Pen came back very pleased with himself cause he ordered it all in German! We ate our food and then made our way to the gate to board our plane to Stuttgart.

When we got there we were told the flight was cancelled due to technical problems and we had to get a train. We got our train tickets from the unhelpful woman at the desk and then made our way to the train station. There was no direct train to the airport so we waited 45 minutes for the train to Stuttgart Central. We had to go to the airport to try and find our luggage as we were told our suitcases would be sent by plane or train to the airport and we could pick them up from there. We arrived in Stuttgart Central and then caught another train from there to the airport. One thing I noticed about the trains here is that everyone reserves their seats. Obviously we didn’t have any seats reserved so we had to keep getting up at most of the stops and move to another seat that wasn’t reserved. We were quite lucky in that we managed to get seats for the entire journey.

At the airport, we found the Lufthansa desk and went to enquire about our luggage. We were told it hadn’t arrived at the airport but it should be there later on that day and it would be sent onto us at home. We left all our details and then got in a taxi to our flat. By the time we got there it was already 1.30 p.m (we were due to arrive at 10.30 a.m but because of the extra train journeys etc, it took longer than anticipated). We met our landlady, who is very nice and she showed us around the flat.

After being home for just 15 minutes I called Christine’s sister. Christine is our friend from India whose family live a few train stops away from us in Germany. They have really helped us by meeting with the landlords and making sure everything is alright for us coming to Germany. Christine also helped us LOADS by making phone calls from India and sending e-mails in German as no-one could understand me on the phone and I couldn’t write the e-mails in German. We had so much to sort out before we came here and she was fantastic! Anyway, Christine’s father and her sister came over to pick us up and took us for a walk around the local area. We then went to a big Markt (supermarket) and bought some food and drinks to put in the fridge. By the time we got back to the flat Penri, Dylan and I were all exhausted. We had a bite to eat and then went to sleep!

It was such a long journey, but well worth it. Our new town is lovely and the weather is beautiful! It’s nice to be able to go shopping in big supermarkets (although things are very expensive!) and it’s lovely to be able to walk everywhere. I’ve done so much walking since I got here – it’s great!

So, we’re now settling in well and things are going great!