We rush to the gate to find out what all this means. Vika is sitting in her seat, suspecting nothing. It's true. The flight is cancelled due to bad weather! Is it really all starting over??? Is it really not meant to be?? Thank God we are now officially under the airline's care, and that the plane is full of people in the same situation as us. We are given food vouchers again, told that the airport hotel is full, and that everyone is free... until tomorrow. Until 12 noon. They said that only at 12 noon will they tell us what happens next. Tired as dogs, we walked back to the waiting area with our bags and now all our bottles too. On the way, we met some other students. The airline provided us with international phone cards and free carts. Without any ceremony, we just spread out like homeless people on the benches; the girls took out towels and laid them on the cold bench. I wrapped myself in a scarf and a raincoat, some guy gave me an airplane pillow, and I fell asleep. We wake up in the middle of the night because it's cold. We went with our bags to another terminal where there are sofas and cafes. We ate and went back to sleep. We didn't really sleep, just lay there. At 12 noon, we went to the airline. There was a line of passengers from our flight. We hate ourselves for not coming earlier, because there might not be enough tickets. The airline puts us on a flight via Paris that leaves the next night, or rather at 4 a.m.! We are already going crazy from this news! Thank God they will provide us with a hotel. When we approached the counter with the operator, the guy said to us:

• Since there are no more economy class tickets, we are putting you in business class, okay?

Okay??? And he's even asking??? Yes, of course OK!! Flying from Paris to Moscow in business class is the price for our suffering!! We were given food vouchers for the third time, but they refused us the hotel because we weren't supposed to be on this flight originally. We were horrified! Are we really going to sleep in the airport again, which we are already sick of! The operator called the manager, we explained the whole situation again, saying that we hadn't slept or washed for two days, and the girl easily said:

• No problem.

And she gave us rooms in the hotel, for which we were sincerely grateful.

The bus picked us up only at 5 p.m. and took our whole group to the hotel. There we were met, checked in, and informed that dinner would be at 7:30 p.m. in the restaurant. We were just beside ourselves with joy! Our joy knew no bounds, especially when we lay down on a normal bed and went to take a shower! There was still an hour before dinner, I went online, wrote a status on VKontakte, which many read, that instead of Novosibirsk I was still in NY, and then I just passed out. An hour later, the girls got ready for the restaurant, and I thought, "maybe I should stay and sleep," but I decided to keep the girls company. There was a buffet in the restaurant, we piled up what we wanted, and the waiter brought drinks. We sat there for several hours, each of us told how we spent the summer, then we discussed many other topics. It was so great, it felt like I had known Polina and Vika for a hundred years! Then we returned to the room, lay down in bed, turned on the dim light, and chatted, chatted, chatted.