Rapid Decisions

Wow, where do I start?!? For those of you that DON'T already know because you're sooo out of the loop and we haven't seen you yet or you're on the other side of the world or you've just never met us before........you're never going to believe this! Knowing us, we aren't the type of people to make our plans way in advance or we come up with new plans quite often and fast when we do. On October 23rd, we were in Prilep, Macedonia and that's when the plans changed. I've never seen such a drastic move made so fast in my entire life. My back, like I said, has been killing me for the last 3 months or so. I was thinking of skipping the hike up to the monastery because it was affecting me so much. It was then that mom said we should go home to heal it. HOME!??! I never even thought about it. It was the most sensible solution to my problem yet it never crossed my mind to actually go home.
That day, we did end up going to the monastery (there's a blog on that) and staying the night. The next morning we hiked back down and went directly to the internet to check out flights, dates and prices. In the morning we went to the travel agency to book a flight. That was the day that Bre had her rather interesting accident. I'm sorry Bre, but thinking back on it now, I crack up every time. Especially telling the story. I mean, c'mon, mom tells the poor girl she's going to die if something weird happens in the next hour or two. Breaking out in bumpy, rashy, itchy spots isn't all that NORMAL wouldn't you say?! I don't blame her for thinking she was going to die. Love you Bre!!
The following morning mom and I parted from the core of our trip.......You'll never see me cry as much as I did when I left! I know you'd think that leaving your siblings after spending 24/7 together would be something of a relief but it wasn't at all. You become used to having them there ALL the time talking, laughing, arguing, walking beside you. I seriously had to go through withdrawls. I've never been away from my sister longer than 10 days on a couple occasions and that was hard enough.
Our journey home was long......We flew 2 hours on a tiny Macedonian airplane to Zurich, Switzerland where we had our quite adventurous 1 1/2 hour stop over. From there we went to Atlanta 9 1/2 hours away and waited 3 hours before our 5 hour flight to Seattle. We were awake over 27 hours (not that that's anything new, haha) but we arrived at night so our jet lag could have been at worse odds.
Ammon this one is for you bro. You will be proud to know that mom and I are equally as obsessed with stamps as you are. You taught us well! When we got off the plane in Zurich we were both thinking the same thing but......"Is there enough time?" That was the big question. "C'mom, c'mon, we'll just have to hurry. We've got lots of time." We both went rushing around reading english signs trying to find our way to the exit. When we got to the booth to get our stamp into Switzerland the guy just looked and said "go ahead"......what!?!? "Well, we need our stamp, sir!" He looked a bit confused as to why we wanted one so desperately but he gave it to us anyway. How exciting!!! We went down the escalator to find the door.....Go, go, go....TOUCH DOWN!!! We did our jiggy, jiggy, happy dance for about 20 seconds (Our new record for shortest stay in one country, hehe) then came back in to get stamped out and find our plane. The next guy was really nice and wanted to hear about our trip "Wow!! A year and a half??!!! Where have you been??" Of course I don't have TIME to talk so the best I could do was smile "32 countries....can I have the stamp now?" hahaha. Now, here's the stupid thing. Did you guys know that you're not allowed bottled water on a plane any more?! Well, we didn't and that's why mom had her whole daypack torn apart......therefore making us late. Eeeka!! We finally got to our gate and the people immediately said "You guys are going to Atlanta??!! Go over there to security.'' Uh OH!!! I don't mean to be mean or anything but I have to admit that American border guards are almost ALWAYS dinks. We were on Delta airlines so we had some guy come over to question us. "Why are you late, blah blah blah?" We told him the truth but how could a guy like that EVER understand our quest? He asked for our passports and of course mom's passport opens right up to the AFGHANISTAN, PAKISTAN pages. I'm thinking "Ok, we're in trouble now! Dead meat." He gives us the whole "Why, why, why? What was so interesting about these places that you just HAD to go there? What was the purpose in stay?" You know what? The key to getting through is just act dumb and they'll either eventually get sick and tired of you and let you go or if you look like a criminal (like Ammon, lol) you'll get hauled off to the back room! Seeing that we are simply young ladies too stupid to really know WHY we were there, he just said "Ok, go through. You're the last ones on the plane!!!" hahahah, suckers!!! We went running on as they were practically closing the doors off. Phew, that was a close call but we did make it and with great success!! Wahoooo! I'm one up on you now Bre......or wait, I guess we're at a tie still now that you went to Kosovo and have a better stamp than I do. DARN!! I miss you!
So ya, coming home was extremely crazy. I was shocked for the first few days and can't believe how fast things can change if you put you're mind to it. I cried so many times....I cried when I saw my first Denny's! hahahh, omg, how embarrassing. Sushi was AMAZING!!! I haven't had it since I left because they just don't eat it in the places we were. Or we were just to cheap to buy it.
Our plan is to stay here in Vancouver until my back is healed. Ammon and Bre are doing Greece and Turkey with out us and we'll go back for Africa. I had my X-ray taken today and we'll see what's going on tomorrow. So ya, if you guys want to see us and hear our stories......let's go hang out. I'm talking to you too Andrew!!!!
It's great to be HOME!!
Savannah