Getting there… if you can!

For the first time in my life, I arrived at the airport two hours early for an international flight. Most likely because my IAPA was giving me a hard time as I wasn’t traveling on my normal airline, United. This trip is on Delta—which is great as my lifetime commitment to sisterhood, but turns out to be a bit nutty as an airline. 

The airport was empty, but my delay was long. It turns out when you pay with ApplePay in order to avoid sharing your credit card info, there is a virtual credit card number created by ApplePay for that transaction and there is no physical card that you can show that has that particular number. Delta requires you to check in with the physical card used to pay for the ticket-I completely missed this fact  

Needless to say, I was perplexed but undaunted. The explanation gave me pause, as the check-in personnel was way too comfortable reminding me of their rationale basis for this process is the substantial fraud that happens in Africa, particularly in Nigeria. In that moment I wanted to research when did Nigerian Fraud become a thing. Is it actually true or were there just a few bad actors?  In that moment, I needed to get on with my trip and I was already 30 minutes into my two hour buffer. I asked for alternatives and we were off to the races. I thanked her for her assistance and jetted through TSA. 

Everything else was as expected and I arrived in JFK and headed to the Sky Club to wait. Now, don’t get me wrong, I travel a lot and enjoy good food wherever I find it, so I was pleasantly surprised to find such deliciousness in the Sky Club. I hadn’t planned to eat there-I had a six hour layover, so I planned to hang out a bit and then go find one of the great airport restaurants. But a gentleman that was sitting near me retrieved a plate of food and it looked so good, I threw caution to the wind and grabbed my own plate. I decided not to be greedy and stopped at one plate, although I was tempted to go back. The wonderfully seasoned chicken thighs and rice and peas were amazing!  

Maybe it’s me, but this food was reminiscent of the first meal or so I had at my HBCU Alma Mater. I even ventured to eat the braised cabbage and green salad. I couldn’t help it, I ask one of the staff, “who cooked this food!”  She smiled and didn’t bother to answer; I already knew. If I thought this food was good, what is waiting for me in Senegal would be amazing and I am looking forward to all of it. 

However, the food was just the tip of the iceberg. Eager to get on with the trip, I decided to head to the gate for the last hour and a half of my layover. It was like going to the gate at Norfolk airport during homecoming, only I didn’t really know many, if any, of the folks waiting with me—at least not until I saw Papa Dia and the rest of the crew traveling together. I tried to sneak in a couple photos so you could see what I saw, only these photos don’t do the scene justice. (See the photos at the end of this post.) Suffice it to say, I haven’t even made it to Senegal and I am already finding my Sept! My SEG is in full effect and I can’t wait to get there!