the price of baggage

4:05 am, Wellington International Airport

we have not slept. we have barely managed to cram all our luggage into the taxi. five bags, each heavy, one on my lap, two in the backseat, two in the trunk. we wait in line for the air new zealand agents to open shop so we can check into our 6:00am flight to melbourne, australia.

the man in front of us in line throws his bags back on his luggage cart, spraying papers. he curses and stomps and pushes off. the woman behind us suggests he has been caught by the new "pay your fines before leaving the country" policy. those who owe the goverment more than $500 are now refused boarding passes until they pay up. it's a nice morning.

we roll up to the counter. we lift each bag onto the conveyor. the agent clucks and makes notes. he does some math on some scratch paper.

"you have a lot of extra baggage," he says.

"yes," we reply.

"the fee will be $800."

ha ha.

ha.

silence.

at 4:00am, everything is surreal. it's still night outside. no one is fully conscious. am i dreaming? did he just say $800 for luggage?

we politely explain that our tickets went through the united states -- all flights through the US have an extended baggage allowance. it's one of those rules that must have something to do with the need for yanks to pack lard and shotguns. whatever. i'm not complaining. we get 2 bags of max 32 kilos each vs. 1 bag at 20 kilos. kiwis wear shorts even when penguins are wearing scarves. they don't need lots of baggage.

the agent does some clicking and clacking on the computer. eventually he agrees that we did fly through the states and we do get the extended baggage allowance. he does more math.

"$300," he says.

ha ha.

er. ha?

how can that be? we don't have that much extra baggage! two-thirds of our belongings were eaten by recidivist mold and aggro cockroaches! he explains it's because we only have four bags. if we had five bags it would be cheaper because he could just charge us for an extra bag instead of $10/kilo over.

dude. we have five bags. i demonstrate by pointing.

oh. yeah. in that case, it's $60.

did i mention how much i love 4:00am?

he writes me out a little fee ticket and i go to pay at the service desk. he's written that i'm flying to auckland on the ticket. agent number two needs to confer with agent number one. agent number one is looking distinctly abashed at this point.

he loses the baggage stickers and needs to print them out again.

eventually we are able to walk away with boarding passes.

it is three hours later, on the plane over the tasman sea that it finally sinks in:

i am moving to australia. to live. for three years.

i've been so stressed out about details and possible baggage difficulties (see! i don't worry for nothing...) that the whole actually moving-to-australia thing was a bit vague.

now, not so vague. i'm here. i'm applying for permanent residency on monday. for all i know there's a freakin' kangaroo hiding in the back garden waiting to throw koalas at me right now!

it could happen.