Saturday 20 December 2014

when a teenager moves to ct - the luggage thing

So the 19 year old, about to be 20 year old is leaving on Friday morning for CT for her 6 months' practical training in the crazy chefs' world. 

Now please understand that she is the person who goes to sleep at her BFF's house with a big suitcase in tow.  She is the one who goes to the coast with a large, and I mean LARGE suitcase which contains not only clothing for every weather condition from sweltering to snowing, but also a vast collection of her favourite thing .... shoes, plus a myriad of other stuff. 

So imagine when she moves to CT for 6 months.  Mango Airlines .... brace yourself!!!

Now firstly the chefs kit ...... 3 jackets, 3 check pants, 3 neckties, 3 hats, a pack of white tshirts, chefs shoes and lots of black socks.  That alone made up 10kg of the 20kg allowance of the airline.  Next the equipment of her own that she HAS to have with her .... which was tricky as she has a toolbox full of equipment she used at the chefs academy and had to be selective. 

 Next the chefs knives.  This R10 000 collection is the extension of any great chef's arms and hands, no chef is without them and they are worth gold.  You cannot take them as carry on and in some bizarre twist the airline would not allow them as booked in luggage lest they jump out and attack someone's suitcase whilst in the cargo hold.



So along came Craig.  Also posted to a upmarket restaurant in CT he decided to drive down.  And generously offered to take down a case for Jess.  So he became the "knife transport guy".  He has different rules to the airline.  Less paranoid.  He also does not have a 20kg case limit.  A decision he lived to regret when he arrived to collect the case.  I use the term "case" loosely.  Trunk would be closer to the mark.  He has the winter clothes and the first 96 pairs of skoene.  And the bulky stuff.  For someone who works 7 days a week she will have to get up during her 6 hours of sleep at least hourly and change to ensure she wears everything.  

That leaves the summer stuff, the balance of the skoene, the huge Winnie the Pooh, glasses, meds, a bag full of dressings since her stomach is full of staples from a double op last week, a lotto ball blow thing for her chest since the op, her journals, cookbooks, assignment sheets, photos, 2 goats and a sherpa. 

I can see that it will be necessary to prepay the R200 for an extra allowance of 10kg.  Note that this stuff has yet to be packed by Thursday.  By a young lady still battling to stand up straight due to aforementioned op.  She is also booked off till the weekend so the whole thing is shitty timing.  

But pack we shall.  Whilst we sluk back the tears.  This goodbye thing is hard.  Harder for a mom.  If one more person tells me it is ONLY 6 months I will throttle them.  For moms there is no such thing as ONLY.   Every time Jess and I look at each other we say "NO" which is our codeword for no crying. 

So Fri morn will come.  And we will load the cases.  And then it is up to the Airline to deliver her safely to her ouma in CT.  

And then the dream job starts.  Fly high angelface.  Because you can and you will. 

till soon 
c'est la vie xxxx

No comments:

Post a Comment

So how is your week going? Yes I wrote this blog a while ago.  I have tripped going up (yes up, not down the plethora of steps up to our hou...