Airline check-in guy: "Did anyone else pack your belongings?"

Sister and I: "No."

Airport guy: "Do you have any explosives in your luggage?" (Although I have to say I was worried about my sister's potent hairspray, because I'm rather sure it's manufactured in Benoni. However, I wasn't going to tell Airline guy that.)

Sister and I: "No."

Airport guy: "Do you have anything sharp on you?"

Me: "No... well, except (and at this Airline guy looks a little startled, and then almost gleeful and I can see his arm visibly twitching to press some sort of panic button under the counter)... for my wit."

Sister: "And my tongue."

Luckily Airline guy had a sense of humour, otherwise we probably would have been promptly thrown in prison for life without formalities like court hearings.

P.S. No, I haven't been anywhere. This incident happened more than a year ago at Cape Town International Airport. My sister and I were on our way to Johannesburg to attend our dad's birthday party. So this is just the normal timely journalism that you've come to expect from me, you demanding beasts!

P.P.S. Today is my personal web goddess Emily's birthday. Go wish her, I beseech you!

Okay, better late than never. (Or perhaps you'd prefer never, when you read it!) Almost two months after my trip, here's a bit more of the travelogue. I promise to have the next installment done before we are all dead, but please don't try and speed me up by holding your breath!

Post Card I

We arrived on a night flight.

I looked out the small window, not expecting to see much beyond the dim outline of my reflection in the glass. So the view I was met with made me gasp as much out of surprise as out of the beauty and wonder of it. And wondrous it was!

For on this occasion of our first meeting – or so I fancied - the City of Angels had donned her evening best. Her lights sparkled and twinkled like diamonds that had been sewn onto a ball gown befitting the Oscars. She wore it so beautifully! It hugged her ample curves and sprawling valleys and trailed off into the distance.

Whoever said that big girls can’t dress up?

Post Card II

We waited for our luggage.

The woman who had sat next to us on the plane let her pampered little pooch out of its cage. As soon as the cute pup tasted freedom, it began running around in frantic circles, giving a few excited yelps.

The dog's energy seemed to rub off on all the travel-weary folks nearby. It especially affected two toddlers, who had been cranky from the long journey just moments before. As soon as they caught sight of the dog, they immediately stopped wailing. With tears still dripping down their bulbous cheeks but already long forgotten, they wobbled over on their unsteady little bow legs to investigate this novel little creature.

As curious of them as they were of it, the dog stopped running long enough to allow the chubby toddler hands to pat-pat-pat its coat. This new sensation brought along shrieks of delight and toothless, drooling grins from the toddlers.

Their parents, although grateful for the distraction from the crying, nervously hovered nearby. Not near enough, it seemed. In what I'm sure was merely an experimental gesture, one of the toddlers leaned over and gave the dog's tail a firm yank. The dog growled and snapped at the air around the culprit hand. No damage done, thank goodness. Just a terrible fright all around. As their parents scooped them up, the wailing resumed again with renewed vigour. The pup guiltily slinked back into its cage.

We picked up our suitcases and left.

Post Card III

In the bit of travelling I've done thus far in my life, I've discovered that every place has its own distinct smell. Los Angeles is no exception. As we stepped from the airport building out into the pleasantly cool, clear evening, I inhaled deeply (although I'd deny it should I ever run for office, har har), and the smell was good. SO much better than I could've ever imagined it would be. And imagine it I did. I've always been partial to places with year-round palm trees (might have a little something to do with my aversion to any weather temperature below 65 degrees Fahrenheit), so for that reason, I've always wanted to go to California. After so many years of imagining and dreaming, I couldn't believe that I had finally made it there.

Post Card IV

At the rental car place, I once again waited with our luggage. I insisted on waiting outside, because for the first time since I'd been in the U.S., the weather felt "South African." We hadn't even left the vicinity of LAX yet, and I already wanted to move there!

The wait at the rental car place seemed endless (even though it was already long after midnight, LAX and the car rental office were still remarkably crowded) and quite suddenly I was overcome with the fatigue that takes hold of you when you've had an extended day.

A Latina grandmother who had also been waiting for her daughter and son-in-law to pick up their rental car, started pushing her little granddaughter around in a stroller. I watched them go up and down the sidewalk and every time they passed me, I smiled at them. At one time we tried striking up a conversation about how long it was taking to get a car, but she couldn't speak a lot of English and I can't speak a lot of Spanish (except to say "Pardon me. I don't speak Spanish." And, of course: "Beer, please."), so we continued to just smile at each other instead. Finally her kids came out of the rental office. Luckily the boy wasn't too far behind, because at that point I was about ready to keel over.

He smiled apologetically, but it seemed that the long wait had been worth it.

Because he had pulled up in a zippy little convertible!

Post Card V

On the road from LAX to Pasadena, we had the windows down (the night air was too cool to have the top down). The combination of the invigorating air and the happy, lively Spanish tunes blasting into the car drove away the fatigue and immediately gave us both a renewed energy. I STILL COULDN'T BELIEVE I WAS ACTUALLY IN CALIFORNIA! I leaned out the car window. Tall palm trees stood at attention and lined both sides of the street like a formal welcoming committee. I grinned from ear to ear.

Post Card VI

Woke up in the Hilton in Pasadena to a cloudy day. So much for sunny California! But I wasn't upset at all. I still thought the weather was gorgeous, pleasant and warm with low humidity. And later, when I glanced at the weather reports on CNN and saw the high humidity and warnings of bad air quality on the east coast that I had just left behind the day before, I appreciated the Californian weather so much more, sunny or not.

When I left the hotel at around noon to meet the boy for lunch, I saw something that almost had me weeping with joy: Just down the street from our hotel, there were these familiar trees bursting with lilac blooms. I know that sounds like a rather strong emotional reaction to have to trees, but the thing is, it was the first time since leaving South Africa that I'd seen any Jacaranda trees, and my South African hometown, Pretoria, is known as the "Jacaranda City." In fact, there used to be this superstitious tradition among students in the city to go and sit under the Jacaranda trees while they studied for their final exams. The belief was that if a blossom from the tree fell onto your head, you'd have luck and get a passing grade.

I scooped up a few of the fallen lilac blossoms and crushed the smooth silken blooms between my fingers.

From then on, whenever I left the hotel, I always picked the route that would take me to my beloved Jacaranda trees.

Why is it that our flight connection always seem to depart on the OTHER side of the airport from where we had landed?

We only had an hour layover at the airport in Phoenix, so we walked at a brisk pace. There was dire need for a caffeine fix, but a window display of beautiful wares created by local artists drew us into a store. We resisted the temptation of buying anything and quickly resumed our trek through the rest of the airport.

When we finally got to the gate, I fell into a chair while the boy ran to find the nearest coffee shop. I kept one eye on our carry-on luggage and another on a television tuned to CNN Headline News. Their story du jour was about Natalee Holloway, the high school grad who's been missing in Aruba for over a month now. At the time, the story was still new, and most of the people around me were watching the screen as well.

A beautiful redheaded girl (I always consider them to be freaks of nature, even though every single redhead in my life - including my mom - is beautiful. It's difficult for me, though, to see them in person, because it reminds me of all I should've been, if only my parents hadn't run out of the good genes to hand out. They spent it all on my three older sisters, you see) sat down near me and started talking soothingly to her carry-on luggage. But before I could silently gloat over the fact that she was clearly a bit insane and therefore not all THAT perfect after all, I noticed that the piece of luggage was actually a pet cage. The prisoner of the cage was a beautiful black and white kitty who regarded me with mild curiousity through the bars of the cage.

Damn, so the redhead wasn't crazy! I decided to talk to her about her cat to see if there were any shortcomings.

No such luck. Not only is she gorgeous, but she is funny, charming, clever and generous (she offered me some of her chocolate!). During the course of the conversation, I found out that she and her incarcerated cat, Molly, had been in the process of moving from Chicago to Los Angeles to be with her fiance. The boy returned with my coffee and joined in the conversation. He later casually mentioned my blog to her and the other day she actually left me a comment!!! (Hi, Lauri and Molly! See? I've finally continued the story and I've mentioned you! (Therefore you are now famous... NOT!) And just so you know, part of this had already been written by the time you left a comment! (Yeah, even the parts of you being beautiful and clever and all that. Really.) Please stay in touch, okay? And please send my fondest regards to one of the best-travelled cats that I've ever met.)

The universe must've sensed that I've been feeling rather pet deprived lately, because on the plane, the woman who shared our row had a small cage by her feet which, I was later to find out, carried the cutest little dog. What is it with woman who live in California? It must be the agreeable climate or something, because they are all beautiful! She was friendly to boot and for the duration of the flight, she gave us helpful advice on things to see and do at our destination.

We talked so much that the time literally flew by. Before I knew it, we were descending. I glanced out the window, not expecting to see anything since night had already fallen a few hours before.

However, the view that I was met with beyond the small window almost took my breath away.

I was excited about taking an afternoon flight.

We were going to fly over places that I’d never seen before (except in movies and on television, but we all know that doesn’t really count) and I was looking forward to at least getting a bird’s eye view of these new and – at least to me - undiscovered places.

My hopes of seeing anything from the sky in daylight was almost dashed when we arrived at the airport to an announcement that our take-off was going to be delayed for two hours courtesy of stormy weather brewing somewhere in the direction of our flight.

Luckily for me, the days are longer in June, so when we finally did take off later, the sun was still clinging to the sky.

The boy had graciously offered me the window seat, and he didn’t have to twist my arm very much for me to accept. Before we had even left the ground, I was sitting with my nose pressed to the glass.

But alas, before we had even left the state, a blanket of thick clouds had enveloped the plane. These stubborn clouds didn’t dissipate, even as we climbed to altitude. So about an hour or so later, when the flight attendants asked everyone to draw their window shades for the showing of the in-flight movie, I gave up on the view, pulled the shade down and began reading instead. Up on the small television screens throughout the cabin, several Hilary Swanks were boxing their skinny little arms off.

When drinks were served after the movie, I asked the older man sitting on the other side of the boy if he’d mind if I’d put the shade up again. He looked at me as if I’d just told him to go and sit on the wing. He frowned at me and shook his head in disbelief. I’m still wondering what he thought I’d asked him!

After the shock of his reaction towards me wore off, I decided to take the shaking of his head to mean “No, I don’t mind at all, you charming foreign girl you!” and thus proceeded to open the shade.

Outside, the clouds had vanished, and below, a multi-coloured world was unfurling in the dusk like a giant patchwork quilt. We were flying back in time, chasing the sun, and it was still light outside.

The landscape soon changed. It was as if someone had bunched up the quilt, because the flat plains of earlier were, seemingly all at once, interrupted by rocky, jagged hills, which soon turned into steeper, snowcapped mountains.

I opened the airline magazine and looked at the map, and guessed that we were in the vicinity of Colorado. Until that moment, I had never been further west in the U.S. than Tennessee.

A few hours later we touched down in Phoenix, Arizona.

The sun was also descending; its last rays kissed the surrounding hills, causing them to blush. Beyond the desert, in the distance, the mountains were still as blue as a cloudless day. I suddenly felt sad that I wouldn’t get to set foot on that land, and made a wish that I would be fortunate enough to return there one day.

I love flying.