Day One
June 26, 2004

I left my house for the airport at 12:45 to arrive at the airport at 1:00 for a 2:40 flight. I gave myself an hour and forty minutes on account that a) I've never flown before, b) I've never done the security thing before and c) the website said to arrive at least an hour early. Little did I know, that even after getting slightly lost and forgetting my boarding pass, I still arrived at my terminal at 1:25. So much for arriving extra early, right?

At the terminal, a bizarre thing happened. I ran into Jason and Aubrey, a couple who I've chatted with at a number of concerts. I hadn't seen them since early April, but last fall, we talked quite often. The two of them were a terminal to my left (B16, I was at B18) catching a flight to Las Vegas. Even though it's a small city, the last thing I expected was to see two people I knew at the airport.

Our flight, arriving from Vegas, was late, so we waited. Twenty minutes after we were supposed to take off, we did, and off I was on my first flight.

The trip contained a few other firsts. It would be my first time on a Greyhound bus. It'd be my first time in a different timezone. It'd be my first time vacationing on my own and thus having to rely solely on myself to do everything.

Things I heard about flying:

1) Turbulance sucks.

2) The seats are too small.

3) The seats are uncomfortable.

None of the above turned out to be true in my case, and I enjoyed a very comfortable flight into Seattle. I did however end up with a lot of pressure in my head when we were descending. I thought my head was going to explode. In fact, I didn't regain hearing in my right ear until the next morning.

I wrote a letter on the trip that I meant to send but never did. I wrote four drafts of it inbetween snacking on my complimentary peanuts and cup of Coke. And there's that unusual pen holding again.

A few obligatory shots from the plane:

And then, it was off to baggage claim, and outside to catch my bus to head downtown. I snapped this photo of the Seattle airport at that time:

The Green Tortoise hostel (where I stayed at the recommendation of a friend) was great. For $22 a night, you got free DSL internet access, free breakfast every morning, and a great discount on various things such as admission to a Mariners game or the Space Needle. Such an excellent place to stay and way to meet people.

Within each room (which consisted of three bunks or six beds) were storage boxes under the bottom bunk. They are large enough for your luggage and all you need is a padlock (which I had plenty of) to lock up your stuff.

The rest of my first day was spent taking pictures and exploring Seattle:

Pike Place Market:

Downtown Seattle (from Pike Place)

The beautiful water of Seattle (taken from same spot as above):

Seahawks Stadium (from the train station)

Safeco Field:

Downtown Seattle (from the two stadiums):

Train station and Seahawks Stadium:

EMP (Experience Music Project, the music museum)

Space Needle:

Key Arena. This and the two above are all at the Seattle Center, a definite hot spot in Seattle:

And two more from the street corner of the Seattle Center where the three above are located. No real point other than I liked the photos:

I spent a lot of time walking around Seattle on my first day (not as much as I'd spend the next day however) but still could not see everything. Maybe it's because I'm coming from a city in which downtown is incredibly small, but I thought downtown Seattle was huge. I could not see all that is Seattle in just a few hours. That alone excited me, and that night, I returned to my room, chatted with one of my roommates Luis (who was from guess where? Utah, by way of the Dominican Republic) before heading off to the common room to enjoy a bit of internet time. Not long after that, I went to sleep, tired and excited all at the same time, wondering what my first full day would bring me.

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