The Kindness of Strangers

Sarah Weatherston

I try to get comfortable and consider it. I feel this has been so much longer than a day.

In truth, it has been - that's the consequence of crossing time zones. And though I've been asleep several times and my watch has shown 6am twice since I last saw a morning, neither of these mean that one whole day, from end to end, has passed. I'm still wearing what I put on (on a day that was possibly yesterday) in a city I may never see again. Looking down at myself, crumpled, sweat-bathed and stained, it seems funny to me that these clothes have crossed continents. This seems funnier the fact that my body has; that I have.

I make room for the grey tray table, folding Lufthansa's blanket down in case I slitter. I still have hours to sit under it. I'm thinking about how I got to this, and still find it hard to believe. It started out as a wistful dream I thought I'd never live out. I scoured web pages, half-wishing I had the money, but half-happy to avoid going as I couldn't bear the thought of the homesickness. I hadn't considered what I ended up feeling when I was there - and, until I got on this plane, homesickness was very far from my mind. I peel back the lid of the foil container. It may not prove as good as the sausages I got on the way out, but I love the neatly packaged portions, eating everything up like an obedient child. Next to me, a man is coughing up phlegm into a clear plastic cup. The blonde stewardess looks affronted, shooting him a real schoolmarm glare. I turn away, jamming my headphones in to disguise his hacking and storing this incident up to recount once I'm home. As if that'd be the first story to cross my lips.

Soon, I realised this didn't have to be just a dream and, after the year I'd had, I was exhausted with my lot. I needed a change and wondered if I could manage the homesickness after all. Then came the deciding stroke: my grandmother's inheritance. She said she wants me to enjoy it now, not wait until she's gone - of course, there was only one place I was taking it. Her scrimping has sent me to a continent she has never seen - nor cared for. I don't know, as I try to fit into the impossible angle formed by the seat and its back, that less than 4 months from today, she'll die in a stuffy room in Little France. But as I squirm in this tiny space I've rented for 14 hours, I've made good use of the money she's left me -that she has worked and saved for years has meant, for this at least, that I haven't had to.

Even after I'd booked it, a nugget of fear remained. During the last few months, I've told as many people as I could that I was going; the more people that knew, the less chance I had to give in. The days had ticked by. Suddenly, after months of having months to go, my bravery briefly failed; I made my head sore with crying and they'd virtually had to put me on the plane, but once I was belted in, I didn't look back.

I went out there to leave my sorrows behind. What I found instead was a mountain of new sorrows, although they belonged to other people. I saw poverty, abandonment and need, but also an ardent determination to fight these things, or at least to salve the wounds. Above all, I was struck by the trust of orphans who have no choice but to hope they will find kindness in strangers. The ache I felt on finally realising how fragile those children's futures are will stay with me forever. I was only a voyeur in their lives; now I am on my way back to my safe little life in the first world. I plump up my pillow and check my watch. For the first time since I left, in this quietly sleeping cabin, I feel terribly lonely.

I am jolted awake by the seatbelt alarm. The plane circles low over my hometown - the bridges are almost within reach. I see the landmarks, and realise suddenly just how much I have changed. I crane my neck to glimpse the terminal, the city's name in bold lettering assuring that for me, this is almost over.

We roar to a crawl and I feel a cold sweat of anticipation. I furtively switch on my phone to get word that only minutes now separate me from my father, and my need to be back where I belong is about to spill over. My acute irritation at the bloated woman blocking the aisle, labouring to remove a bulging vanity case from the locker, is almost too much - I just want the haven of his arms.

But then I'm out on the tarmac and I can feel my own country beneath my feet. I try not to run - I don't want to betray my excitement. This is a wholly private emotion that I'll savour. I'm almost there. I push down my frustration in the stifling queues for passports and belongings. I try to breathe calmly, and although my days-old sweat is just beneath the surface, there's something more familiar I believe I can smell.

Suddenly, I'm free to walk down the corridor, mouth watering. Breath comes sharply into my tight chest. The doors open. I'm poised to fight back disappointment. But my eyes cloud - here he is!

I may still be standing in the airport, but as he lifts me up as he did when I was a child, I know that in these arms - but for the luck of the draw -I am already home.