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Fly Now, Pay Later

Nida Spalding loves to read, travel, and spend time with family and friends. She believes that curiosity and persistence are key to happiness and success.

I walked briskly towards the plane, never looking back. It was November 1980. The Pan American flight transported me and my brother Nestor from Manila to San Francisco. Later, I learned that my sentimental brother walking behind me looked back to wave at relatives and friends who had sent us off at the airport.  

I don't remember much about that plane ride. But I like planes because they take me to faraway places. It was early evening when we landed in San Francisco. Wearing only a thin, cream-colored long sleeved georgette blouse, a black pair of trousers, and a powder blue sweater, I felt the chill.

My cousin Nem, her husband Bonito and their two-year-old-son AJ, met us at the airport. On the car ride to Santa Clara, I was quiet. As we turned into the driveway of the apartment building where they lived, Bonito said, "The homes here don't look fancy." I didn't know what he meant and didn't respond.

Their one-bedroom apartment was on the first floor. The front door led right into the front room, with a burnt yellow velvet couch and a Zenith TV on a stand. To the right was the kitchen. That night we had Chinese takeout and green bean salad that Nang Nem made. I remembered the rice tasted so soft.

It was late, everyone needed sleep. Nang Nem gave my brother and me sleeping bags. I slept on the floor, in their bedroom on her side of the bed by the window. My brother slept in the front room, on the floor. The couch was already taken by Bonito's cousin, Eying. Filipinos are known for their hospitality. Inconvenience or privacy didn't matter when helping relatives.

At last, we were in the USA. "You're in Silicon Valley," my best friend Marivic from Houston told me on the telephone.

Our first priority: apply for jobs. The bill for our fly-now-pay later airline tickets would come shortly. My brother found a job at Cellotape, a label printing company. Through Della from my hometown, I found a job in the assembly line at Verbatim Corporation. At $4 an hour, I was delighted to earn my first dollars. We paid off the airline tickets and the three thousand pesos ($60) owed to my Dad's sister.

It would be three years before I would take my second plane ride, this time to Houston to visit Marivic. It would be six years before I would fly to the Philippines with my husband and another six years for my next visit.  

I enjoyed the occasional plane travel within California for work. In 2000, I took my Dad to Naalehu, Hawaii to visit his birthplace. My brother met us there. Dad was thrilled with the side trip to Honolulu to visit the Pearl Harbor National Memorial. In 2002, my husband endured another long flight to the Philippines with our not-quite-two-year-old son. 

In retirement, I was finally able to afford a few pleasure trips to several US cities, France, Spain, Italy, Portugal and Thailand. In 2018, I flew to Houston for Marivic's 60th birthday. That same year, with an unbelievably affordable flight and a friend willing to travel with me, I arrived in Paris on my birthday. That was my second visit to the City of Light.

Now, in September 2021, I'm fully vaccinated. I watch as the world once again battles the COVID-19 Delta variant. I long to fly to visit family and see places again. Except now, with the climate crisis, I have to seriously think about the carbon footprint of these trips. 

~ Nida Spalding

 
 

 

 

 

 

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