Friday, September 01, 2006

Leaving the US

In the early morning of 31. August, at 6:00 am, we locked the door, left the keys in an evelope at the housing office, and drove to the LAX airport - with 5 suitcases. Lena had her travel on Delta, I was travelling Continental.


The last picture of Southern California, on the way to the airport LAX. Posted by Picasa

The flights went well, stops in New York, then on to Manchester. From there with the Transpennine Express to Leeds, then with a taxi to the Kirkstall Brewery Residences. Handling 5 heavy suitcases + carry-on luggage on a train is not easy, especially when tired from an overnight flight!

Friday the 1.9. was the day when our Faculty had their "day away", as part of our Annual Leeds Met Staff Development Festival. I wanted to participate and go there right after my return, but it was well after 12pm that we arrived at the Brewery Residences. As we took the elevator, taking first two of the suitcases with us, the elevator stopped just before the exit on the upper floor - we were stuck. Pressing the alarm button caused a ringing somewhere, but nobody reacted. Fortunately I had my mobile phone with me, so I called the university, and got connected to the guards downstairs. They tried to open the door, but no success - an external mechanic had to come. So we waited for almost 2 hours in the elevator, before we could finally get out at 14:45.

Bringing all the suitcases up took another while - the elevator was working ok now. Then I went to the Faculty day out, just as it was closing at 17:00. The students at the registration desk were laughing as I told my story of travel and elevator...