It's currently January 6, and I am sitting at my grandmother's dining room table, watching my son eat toast that isn't falling apart (like it would in La Paz) and listening to Alexis watch Sesame Street. Why yes, we are still in Virginia. What, you ask, happened to this trip home? Allow me to elaborate on our journey. (The story of woe comes first. Regular news comes later...)
We woke up about 3:00 am on Tuesday morning, December 6 to begin our 22 hour trip back to Virginia. The kids were wonderful. This included a number of challenges. The first of which was our layover in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. We flew about an hour and had to get off the plane there. The problem, though, was that our ticket said 9:30 for the next flight. When we ordered the tickets and checked on times, it said something like 9:00. We went through security and looked for gate number four, where we were supposed to be. We found gate four, but the problem was that this gate was BEFORE going through customs, and there was no obvious (or even hidden) way to get back to gate four. When we attempted to ask someone, we got the blank stare reactions, which translates into " Why are you asking me such a logical question? Are you an idiot?" We proceeded through customs, hoping to find a way back to our gate, ate some breakfast, and checked our flight time. The board said 11:30 on time, which made no sense to us because it shouldn't have been on time according to our other information. We tried to ask someone. There was no one to ask. 9:30 came and went without our flight being called. We gathered the children up, starting to fear that we would miss this flight somehow, and began to gather around other gates. We basically jumped on anyone in any sort of uniform to ask them where to go. We walked back and forth between two gates multiple times because people told us to go different places. We were finally informed that we should wait in the waiting area (where in the world was that?) to start boarding. We watched other passengers gather in confusion and frustration until finally people started to set up ome table for yet another security checkpoint so that we could go through behind customs back to our gate. We pointlessly asked someone why there wasn't a sign informing people of this information, since this obviously happened every day. We received the blank stare of idiocy (our idiocy apaprently, not theirs). We finally walked down the hall to see hanging signs for gate three, gate five, but where was gate four? There was a sign for gate nine? We looked up and found the sign on the wall that actually said gate four instead of gate nine. We receieved a shoulder shrug of explanation. We boarded and prepared ourselves for eleven hours on a plane with two awake kids.
And the kids truly were great. This is wonderful because I can have some confidence that they're going to be pretty good on our overnight flight back to La Paz on January 20. Jason's not coming with us because he is going to Ecuador first.
The 20th, you ask? Wait! Let me do some counting! Does this mean that you have been in the states for already over four weeks? And that you'll have been in the US for about seven weeks?
Why yes, yes it does.
The day after we got here, we mailed off our passports and forms to get our visas, which arrived before Christmas. We were all good on that side of things. However, about a week after we got here, we were informed that back in Bolivia the offices that dealt with our paperwork were not going to process any of these applications between December 20 and January 23. This affects us because after we got our new visas here, we have 30 days once we land in Bolivia to complete the process. You need at least 15 days for this completion. We had always planned on leaving a few days after Christmas, but if we did this, we wouldn't have enough time to get our visas, and Jason's traveling to Ecuador made things a little more difficult, too. All of this to say that we ended up being here a lot longer than anticipated.
Alex will miss a total of three weeks of school, which really stinks, but she's excited about going back. We couldn't have done this without our familes. They've been putting us up, feeding us, helping us take care of kids, etc. The kids are doing a really great job overall, but you can tell when the constant moving becomes taxing. We were just at my parents' house for over a week, and you could tell that they were starting to settle in because they were calmer and not as out of sorts. It started to feel stable. And while I'm not necessarily a person who needs routine or stability, this has been a really long time of not having a stable life for the kids. We have literally been living out of suitcases since the end of September, when we began selling stuff in our old house. They need a regular life, and we're really looking forward to getting back to La Paz to provide that. While there will still be a ton of stuff to do in our new apartment (which we've only lived in for three days), it's ours, and that means something. And they'll have beds. And their toys. It will be nice.
Ultimately, though, it's probably better that we're here anyway. For a few reasons. 1. Our stuff still isn't there. It was held up because of labor strikes and other reasons, and now it's apparently in customs because there is medicine in a few of the boxes that they have to check. Hopefully it will be sitting in our apartment when we arrive there in two weeks. 2. We still don't have our furniture. I think that everyone selling us stuff forgot that they were taking off two weeks for Christmas or something, because it all should have been there by now. But it's not, so right now all I'm really hoping is that it's there by the time we get there.
Enough of our tale of misfortune, though. In reality, it's not exactly a tale of misfortune. After all, we got a free trip home, right? And how often do people make a huge move like this and get the chance to buy stuff back here only a few months after moving? And we have purchased a lot of stuff. My entire family doubts my packing prowess, though. However, I just "officially" did a trial packing, and have 1 1/2 empty carry-ons after it's all said and done, which was great. (Maybe I'll bring back some Trader Joe's pumpkin pancake mix... :) The real packing problem has been having enough hard shell cases for things we have. We have these large, soft duffel bags to use for a lot of things, but quite a bit of stuff can't go into something like that. Anyway, we have space for everything we bought and all our toys. AND when we got here last night, I knew I had left a coat, but I also discovered that I had apparently left another huge bag. (I had thought I brought four of those bags because they're easily packable if I didn't use them, but it wasn't at my parents' house.) SO MORE STUFF!!!! That sounds weird. What it means is that I can probably try to get them some more clothes for the kids to grow into and a few things I wanted to bring back but wasn't sure about (like mixing bowls) can go. Maybe even some of my old tupperware, which would be nice. Regardless, we still have quite a bit of space.
Christmas we great. The kids got a ton of stuff, but people were very cognizant of the fact that we had to take it all back. Alex got two Disney princess Barbies, Squinkies, My Little Ponies, and a bunch of other things. Micah was all about cars and trucks and tractors this Christmas, and he got ultra-excited anytime he saw anything with Cars or Mickey Mouse. One of his favorite things, though were his Hexbugs, these tiny little battery-powered "bugs" that skitter around different habitats that you can build. He adores them. And he loves this plane we got him that he flies around and makes the "mouth" chomp people while he flies it through the air and makes noises. We spent two nights in a hotel around Christmas Eve, which was actually really nice (especially because one of our nights ended up being free, but I'll explain that later), and took the kids to Jason's parents' house in their pajamas that morning to open their presents from us, which was lots of fun. Jason got me a gift certificate to a store in La Paz that I've fallen in love with, speakers for my laptop, and a new coat! And people gave us money to contribute to us being able to buy a television, which was really, really great because they're very expensive in Bolivia.
Speaking of money issues, this has actually been really funny while we've been here. On the bad side of things, we've had to shell out some money for our car, which hasn't sold yet. We'll have to spend a few hundred dollars because our power window regulator has fallen apart, so that still needs to be fixed, and we had to pay to renew out registration. However, we've had three "interesting" situations:
1. My new coat. To make a very long story short, there was a hole in the coat that I got that was going to require a seamstress to take off the collar and redo it so that it would be truly repaired. After a LOT of time, half a dozen trips to the store, a lot of misinformation from Target, and no other coats in two states, Target gave the money back for the alterations. However, instead of refunding the amount for the alterations, they refunded the other amount, meaning that we we charged about three dollars for the coat. When we finally realized this and called the store, we were told after everything we've been through "don't worry about it" by the manager. So we didn't. FREE COAT!
2. We bought two Phineas and Ferb movies for the kids to give each other for Christmas. But they weren't movies; they were just episodes, which wasn't described at amazon. Anyway, when I contacted amazon to ask if they could change the description, they just gave us our money back. (They did the same thing for another small item. Amazon is awesome!) FREE PHINEAS AND FERB!
3. The first night in the hotel we barely slept. It was really warm that night, and we needed the ac. However, when the ac turned on, it rattled so loudly that we woke up every time and didn't sleep until we turned it off. Not a comfortable evening. When we told the hotel and filled out a survey, they were really apologetic about it and refunded the cost of the room for one night. Country Inns and Suites. FREE ROOM!
Oh, and there's actually another one. Kind of:
4. Yesterday afternoon I got an email from my property management company stating that my hot water heater had stopped working and had to be replaced to the tune of $975. They took care of working it out, which is part of what they're paid to do. However, he didn't say anything about my home warranty, which kind of concerned me. When I called to ask him about this, he said he didn't see one on record. When he went back to check, they had all of our information about it, but it had not been put into their computers. When he called the warranty company, they said that if we had gotten preapproval that I would have paid the $55 deductible and they would have paid the rest. Without batting an eye (although I'm sure with a ton of frustration on his part), he said that we would be responsible for the deductible and they would pay the balance. Which means we're not out a thousand bucks like we were afraid of for a few hours. FREE REPAIRS! (Okay, not really, but we have a home warranty for a reason...)
In the midst of all of this, it's nice that when things go wrong, it seems like a number of people have been very customer service oriented, which is very nice.
On to other topics. Very briefly, because this is way too long. I chopped off a ton of Micah's hair yesterday, so he looks so much older now. I did it a little too short, but you have to try and see what works sometimes, right? He's still a cutie, but he looks like a little boy now instead of a toddler. We have been playing tons of games (which I have been promptly losing). We got Qwirkle for Christmas, and Jason and I found the 5-6 player expansion AND Barbarians and Traders for Settlers of Catan for half price (score! - yes, I'm a huge dork when it comes to games). The kids have also started taking showers sometimes, and by this I mean that I take the sprayer off and squirt it on them while they scream with laughter. Lots of fun. Jason had a two-week break during Christmas, but he's back working now, so he leaves most days to find a Panera or Starbucks or some place with wireless so that he can do his job. I started working on Tuesday; I'll be working two hours on Mondays and two on Tuesdays, which is a good amount of time but not too much. And one hour each day is a flexible time, so I can work it whenever I want to. And Alex has learned to cross her eyes and snap.
And I am not tired of typing. :)
