Seems like so long since I sat in my cozy lil room here in Korea.  I had a great time at home visiting but it sure is nice to get back into life here.

I left Dallas on Jan 21st at 5:45am.  (Sorry for Sarah who graciously took me to the airport at 3:45am)  My plan was to try and stay awake on the flight to Atlanta and then sleep from Atlanta to Korea.  Yeah, I was asleep before we pulled away from the gate.  lol.  After the short flight to Atlanta, I had a couple of hours to kill so I visited the McDonalds for a McGriddle since we don’t have those here.  It was at this point that my little pink rolly carry-on thingy gave up the ghost.  It lived a good life.  (though it did slightly break the very first time I used it on the way to Taiwan.  Can’t expect much from a $10 walmart bargain)  It has been my faithful companion in many countries.   RIP my little pink rolly carry-on thingy.   You will be missed.

Moving on…

I finally got to board the plane to my happy place.  As I found my seat, I noticed a young korean guy sitting on the aisle side of my row.  The handle on my aforementioned lil suitcase got stuck and wouldn’t go down.  Of course there were people coming after me waiting for me to get it up in the overhead bin.  So the nice little guy took it, fixed it, and put it up for me.  Sweet kid!  I moved into my seat and started buckling in for the almost 16 hour flight and the middle seat occupant came in and sat down.  As soon as we both made eye contact, we immediately recognized each other.  She sat next to me on my way to the US!

She screamed a little and gave me a big hug.  She speaks about 3 words of English, but on the way over, we discovered that we live in the same neighborhood in Suwon, and the friend she was with lives in Yeongtong, where one of my friends lives.  This lady was trying to set me up with her son on the way over and on the way back he was with her! lol.   Like I said, sweet kid.  Just a bit young.    Anyway, it was just too random.  I still can’t believe out of all those people on the plane, that we ended up on the same flight in the same seats as we had on the way to the US.  So weird.

A mere 15 1/2 hours later, we landed in Korea.  After customs, getting bags, buying a bus ticket, and riding the bus back for two hours, I was back in Suwon.  My little friend Jo met me at the bus stop to help me get my bags home.  He only lives about 5 mins from the bus stop so it worked out perfectly. I was so glad he was there to help.  I would have never made it with all of that by myself.

I spent my 1st day back unpacking and organizing.  It turns out that I got a lot of stuff at home.  And now my under-the-desk storage area looks like a minature walmart.

Or like I’m preparing for Y2K.  Could go either way.  Regardless, I’m happy for all the fun stuff I got at home.  It will be nice to have those little comforts over the next year.

Ok, as is the case in most of my blogs, I’ve rambled on way too long.  Perhaps b/c I only write about one of these every couple of months.  Whatever.