The Right Choice - Alegerea potrivită [+18] (eng/ro)

Chapter 1 (eng)

Translated by Andreea-Florina Sandita

A high-pitched woman voice in a pretty hardly understandable kind of English announces us that the boarding for the flight to our destination, Lyon, is to start soon. I don't even check my ticket because I don't care where my seat is, so I just vacantly look at the people around me, who are in a rush to queue up according to the group they belong to, as if there were a limited number of seats. I'm tired and I know that it's going to be a long flight, so I wish for nothing more than to board the plane and get some sleep. Next to me, a warm arm covers me to offer me more comfort. I'm glad she stands by me and I thank her for being a part of my life. I look at that face and I smile.

"What would I do without you?" I ask, trying not to cry again.

She winks at me and we hardly get up from the chairs to head towards the little Asian girl mechanically tearing up the tickets.

I order a strong drink from the start, I take a sleeping pill and I fall in to a vortex of dreams and thoughts, trying to remember how I got into this situation and how the hell I'm going to get out of it.

***

It all started almost two weeks ago, at the airport in Lyon, my home city, at the beginning of September.

We had a layover at the moment and the manly voice of a tall and blonde guy was announcing us that the boarding was beginning in the order of the groups on the ticket. I look at Sabine and we go together through the information on the ticket one more time in order to make sure that our group has a little while left to wait. We've got our seats somewhere in the middle of the plane, so it will be a while until we board. We're nervous, me at least, but I'm full of enthusiasm and cheerfulness, because, after many years of dreaming about this trip, my dream has finally come true. Even now I feel like jumping for joy; I don't think I've ever been this enthusiastic about anything. Seoul, here I come!

Many have asked me "Why Seoul?" Why would I want to visit that city and not go to Tokyo or Hong Kong instead, which are more famous? But I don't think they would understand why, since I don't entirely understand it myself. "Something draws me to that place", I always said, and then I come up with all sorts of more reasonable explanations, that wouldn't make me look as nuts as people would have perceived me if I had told them that there was something in that place and I had to find out what.

But, after all, their opinion didn't matter. My dream was coming true and now I was about to board the plane to the much-dreamed-of-destination, with my best friend, Sabine, the only one sharing both the spirit of this adventure and the fascination for this country that's so full of tales and has a kind of culture that's totally different from ours.

She was as enthusiastic as I, but she was going there driven by the desire to visit this new place that she knew she wouldn't have the opportunity to see again. My madness about something drawing me to that place had no importance between us. We never judged each other and, after all, our common goal was to feel good and discover a country that was fascinating us equally with its cuisine, very different from ours, and with the colorful culture that we knew we would discover there. We were embarking upon an adventure, two women, maybe a little too brave for our nature, but, after all, two strong women that have gone through a lot in life and refused to be intimidated by a new place.

"Babe, you and me alone, I can't believe it!" she tells me while we take our seats on the plane. "It's going to be so much fun!"

"I've been waiting for this for so long!" I tell her, absolutely thrilled.

"Let's hope that the plane doesn't crash," she kids around and makes me frown at her joke.

"Nothing bad will happen. It's going to be memorably wonderful!"