Two years almost to the day since I left Italy I was back at Perth international airport and on my way back again. To provide a bit of back story I had initially planned to return for Christmas 2012 but that seemed a bit unlikely with the money I was making so I put it off for another year.
It got to August this year and I found myself looking at flights over for Christmas. Imagine my surprise when after playing around with dates for a while I found flights under $1800 that also took less than 24 hours, quite a feat at the best of times, let alone 3 months before you intend to fly!
So after a stressful week of 4 exams in 4 days I had three days to hurriedly find a few remaining Christmas presents and get all packed. Heading off to the airport 20mins later than planned (and with still drying hair to boot) check in went smoothly and I was already to go.
Flying Singapore Airlines and with a 3 hour stop over in Changi I made it to Italy at 5.36am, the first flight to land after the end of the airports curfew. Although it did mean I got my baggage nice and quickly it also meant I ended up in a mostly un opened airport and with a 2.5h wait for the first bust to Turin. I worked out where to buy a ticket from (after fighting the website for two days and getting rejected on three cards) and planned out my whole conversation, only to find out that the person whom I had to get the ticket from wasn't in yet.
When arriving at the airport we were informed it was 2deg C outside and the elderly Asian couple next to me were concerned about my lack of jumper. Even once I'd excited to the airport proper I still didn't see the need for the warm coats everyone seemed to be wearing. But as i settled into my wait and as the airport became more busy I found myself digging into my bag for the coat mum and I had left at the top. I guess pulling around a 22kg bag with ~6kg hand luggage on top was enough cardio to keep me warm for that first bit.
After an accidental snooze (and being woke up by a kid playing candy crush on full volume) on the bus Jace and I arrived in Turin where we were met by Selene (who had skipped uni) and her boyfriend who drive me home, marking the end of my 28 hours of travel. After some morning tea and unpacking my bag (the work of but a few minutes given half of it was full of Christmas gifts) we planned to head over to Tancredi's school to see him.
He spotted us from inside the gates and came out beaming. I only just got a 'ciao Tancre' in before getting hugged. He's now taller than me, but not yet by much! As per tradition there were a few more 'ciao Bre's in the car ad we dropped him off at his grandma's for the afternoon.
When Sara came home from work in time for lunch two of the first three conversations we had were about how I'd lost weight (the other being what I was doing at uni). The rest of the afternoon has been filled with my trying to stay warm and awake. Soon we're off to pick up Tancre and buy me a sim. Somewhere in there I think we're going to visit Nonna Irma too.
