... and back again

I was pretty sad to leave Mum and Dad at Brisbane airport. It was a wonderful 2 weeks with them, and they'd been wonderful carers of my darling kids while I completed a week long course in Hervey Bay. Ellie had been pretty cute too, saying to them that she'd "come back quite soon" when they said they were a bit sad she was heading back to China.

My flight to Sydney was lovely, and the views from the plane were stunning, but arriving in Sydney was bedlam. Our only saving grace was a trip on the motorised buggy that drives along the concourse at the airport to get us down to the international transfer section. All went swimmingly until we got off the bus at international - then there was suddenly NOBODY around. We were the last off the bus, and so all other passengers had gone, and the only way to get up was using escalators. There was a lift which was not operational. Ellie is not quite 2 and a half - she hasn't had that much experience with escalators, not enough to do it without holding a grown up hand... what hand could she hold? I was carrying the hand luggage, Big Ted and had Jamie strapped to me... in the end I put the luggage on the escalator, grabbed her, pulled her on, let go and flung the luggage off at the top and then grabbed her arm and lifted - lucky no dislocations!

Then we proceeded through the customs and immigration sections. Ellie had a harness on, something that I've always abhorred, but I needed it for on my own, and I knew it in advance. We were ushered into the 'quick' or 'special assistance' queue, but it was neither. And in the blink of an eye Ellie slipped out of my grip (while holding Jamie, the carry on luggage and Big Ted) and raced into the general queue. I screamed out for her to come back, and a lady in a uniform stepped OUT OF HER WAY. I lost it then. I yelled at the woman why didn't she stop her, with a few choice expletives thrown in for good measure as I barged past banging the carry on into people and dropping Big Ted. Fortunately another passenger in the queue worked out why I was behaving like a lunatic and grabbed Ellie's arm and held onto her until I got there. I then manhandled her (and Jamie, and the carry on) back to our space in the special assistance line retrieving Big Ted along the way. And as I went past the uniformed lady who had let Ellie escape told me she wasn't allowed to touch passengers - GRRRRR, I nearly decked her, fortunately no hand was free.

Through customs finally and got a trolley. Put all carry on and Big Ted into trolley and then hoisted Ellie into the baby seat. Finally felt like I was in some form of control. Then over the loudspeaker: "Paging X, Y and the De Borde Family, recently arrived from Brisbane. Your flight QF129 is awaiting departure. Please go straight to the terminal or contact Qantas ground staff". WHERE WERE ANY OF THE QANTAS GROUND STAFF?? Anyway, ploughed on and reached the gate, where I promptly burst into tears. By now both kids needed nappy changes, I needed something. Then suddenly all these lovely Qantas ladies were around, gave me a glass of water, took my luggage, and assisted me in changing the kids before we boarded.

Finally collapsed into my seat, got kids sorted out, and we were off! Shanghai bound! Luckily for me the lovely family who helped me out on the way over were on our flight home too. So arriving in Shanghai, they were most helpful in herding Ellie in the right direction, as well as making her keen to walk. When other kids are around Ellie is a great little walker, when there aren't she just wants to be carried.

Best bit was coming through into the concourse and seeing Mike. Ellie just ran to him. We were so glad that there were no issues for us with respect to swine flu quarantine, that had been my angst that we would have been locked in quarantine for the 5 days before we headed to the UK!!

I was so happy to have my family together again!!