Trying to get there...

Well after struggling with luggage limitations off to the airport we went. The "we" is my colleague, Mary Sue Preisler, and me. Much our trip can be explained as sit and wait. Sit at the airport and wait for the plane. Board the plane and then sit and wait to take off. After take off, sit and wait until the movie starts. As you can see a lot of sitting and waiting. Some of it with anticipation and some with dread. Anticipating getting to where you are going, in this instance Kenya, and dread in thinking about the number of hours in a cramped airplane. The plane was fairly booked and it seemed that there were more people than seats, at least that is what if felt like at times.
I am struck when I've flown internationally at the concept of duty free. Where else could you buy huge boxes of cigarettes? The sense of luxury and forbidden pleasures. If you've not had a chance to purchase before you've gotten on the plane, rest assured your chances are not gone. The fine flight attendants will be happy to sell you something from that cart that keeps hitting you in the knee.
After a six hour flight to London we had a three hour wait in Heathrow airport. Invariably, whenever I have flown from Heathrow I have flown out of terminal 22. Gates 22-25 are in an annex that takes about 15 minutes to walk to. On top of this the British system of air transportation seems to hinge on the fact that they won't tell you what gate you are at until about 30 minutes before your flight leaves. Quite a bother when walking around when your body thinks that it is about 3:30 in the morning and you've still got another flight ahead of you.While at Heathrow I had the "opportunity" to stretch out across five "seats" to catch a quick cat nap. Not too helpful, as I was awakened by a man plopping down in the adjoining seats. Scared me to death. I bought an alarm clock, liter and a half of water and a bag of crisps (cheese and onion--I stayed away from the prawn-flavoured).
Generally, our flight from Heathrow left on time and we weathered a 7 hour flight to Nairobi. Unfortunately, the seats on the Nairobi leg were closer together (front to back) by 1-2 inches than the earlier flight. To say the least I was cramped as my knees dug into the seat in front of me, especially when the seat in front was reclined, which it was the entire trip. OUCH!!! Not everyone is 5' 10'!
Once we arrived in Nairobi we needed to go through the Visa Application line and pay $50 to enter the country, which took about a half-hour. This went very smoothly, thankfully. Next was the wait for luggage. I swear that the last two bags were ours. After the luggage came customs. Once the customs agent heard where we were going we were ushered right through without any hassles! I nice end to a gruelling trip.
Oh yea, those luggage worries; you should have seen what people were hauling aboard! I worried for nothing, though some say they've been on a British Airways flights where they've measured and weighed every piece.