Homeward Bound

Random photo of a fairly cool ice-lolly. The weather during my stay in the UK has been incredible. Temperatures over 30c some days - even hotter than Kigali.

All of this came to an end yesterday as dad and Marilyn drove me to Heathrow. The clouds tumbled in and wet stuff came from the sky.

I think a lot of Brits breathed a sigh of relief. With our pasty skin and propensity for moaning, we're not built for long, hot summers. Actually, we're not really built for cold winters, too much rain or windy days, either. It's absolutely incredibly just how much British people can talk about the weather. There's about a half-hour segment on the news every night - first the local weather, then the national. It's considered a light entertainment break between Brexit debates - *yawn*

I spent my last night in a hotel near the airport. Lovely room, but spooky hallway. It had a little carpet divider halfway along, like on a ship, and it created the impression of a mirror, as though the other end of the corridor was just a reflection of my end of the corridor - only I wasn't in it. Weeeeiiiird.

I took my mind off things in the restaurant with a selection tray of desserts. 

The next day it was back onto Ethiopian Airlines and home to Kigali. It was a more pleasant trip this time as I only had a three-hour, instead of a seven-hour, layover in Addis. Just long enough to befriend a lovely Canadian-Congolese lady called Evelyn, who had originally gone to Canada as a refugee many years ago and now runs a wedding planning business. She was returning to Bukavu for her own sister's wedding.

Watched Cat on a Hot tin Roof (love Vivien Leigh), The Greatest Showman (again), and Murder on the Orient Express (Branagh makes a very passable Poirot), then flicked to the ending of Walk the Line and that dance at the party in The Sound of Music. Pleasant way to pass the time. Again, a noticeable difference between the international and national flights. The latter having no entertainment, no air conditioning, and insisting on keeping the lights on full even though it was gone midnight.

Touched down without incident, despite bad weather keeping us on the tarmac for an hour at Addis. Lot of clapping when we landed. All's well that ends well.