20th APRIL 2020: After staying in Saudi Arabia for 7 long years, accompanying my husband who is currently working here, we have decided it was time to get back home for good. Eidul Fitr was also approaching and it was just the right time as I could spend the holy celebration with my aging mother. The only challenge was to get out of the country as things had been getting more difficult because of the COVID-19 pandemic and the Movement Control Order imposed in Malaysia, something like a lockdown, and the borders had been closed to both inbound and outbound flights.
We were still setting high hopes to get back home and had been following the updates on Malaysian Embassy Facebook page for any opportunity. Earlier there was a post which stated there was a special flight by Saudia, the national airlines, to send Malaysians with tourists' visa holders who were stranded here or for other Malaysians who had valid reasons to fly home. As this should this be our final exit out of the country for me and my two daughters, the Embassy might consider our appeal to take the flight on RUH-DMM-KUL sector [Riyadh-Dammam-Kuala Lumpur]. Unfortunately, the date given, the 25th April, was too near for us to pack our (accumulated) items to bring back and we were not ready to race against time so we decided to wait for another flight.
22nd APRIL 2020: We sent an e-mail to the Embassy to get our names registered for any possible upcoming special flights which could either be in the middle or end of May. Then there was this news from friends in Jubail telling the aforementioned scheduled flight on the 25th April had been postponed to a much later date in April. However, there was still no news and people who were expected to fly out started to get nervous and fidgety. We were not in the list so there was no effect whatsoever.
2nd MAY 2020: There was a notification in Malaysian Embassy website informing Saudia had prepared a special flight on the 7th May, but instead of the Riyadh-Dammam-Kuala Lumpur route, the first exit point had been changed to Jeddah. This means people from Riyadh would have to find their own ways to get to Jeddah.
4th MAY 2020: The Malaysian Embassy messaged us on Whatsapp and asked whether if anyone from Saudia had contacted us. There was none but we were advised to just get the tickets. We got into Saudi Airlines website and fortunately, tickets for the flight to Kuala Lumpur on the 7th May were still available. Once the tickets were secured, with only three days in hand, we started to pack only the important items, like our clothes and my children's books, in boxes. We were so ready to go home even though I knew there were still other obstacles ahead.
6th MAY 2020: Our names were already in the list of passengers in the Whatsapp group and the person in-charge of this "mission" was Lt. Cmdr. Mohd. Azli. The flight was scheduled at 8:15 a.m. the next day and we had to be there 3 hours prior to departure time. The journey from our house in Jubail to the airport would take about an hour so the plan was to wake up at 2.00 a.m. for sahur (the early meal before starting the breakfast) and we would push of at 3:35 after our Subuh (dawn) prayer.
7th MAY 2020: Things seemed to go well as planned, my alarm went off at 2:00 a.m. sharp until my husband checked the message on his phone. We were instructed to be at the airport at 4:00 a.m.! With less than an hour, we had no choice but to hurry and it was also a bit chaotic and panicky just to get ready in such a short time - taking our baths, eating our morning meals and manage all the stuff that had to be taken with us. I didn't have the time to take my sahur - I just did not want to be late and miss the flight home.
TO BE CONTINUED IN PART TWO ...
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