USA Spring Trip

First and foremost, I need to thank my guiding angels. The close friends and the sweet blog readers that extended their hearts to me to give my soul comfort. It was love without questions and I really appreciate them. You’ve made me realize how fortunate I am and not to cave in to self wallow and self pity. Life is constantly a battle… it’s bumpy and never smooth sailing… but it’s the people around us that gives us the courage and the desire to move on. In that aspect, I’m blessed. So thank you so much.

In regards to my trip, I hardly took any pictures this time as I brought the video camera this time. I tend to visit the big cities for most of my trip and do lots of shopping but this time, in the 3 weeks I’ve gone I’ve only done a day or two of shopping and the only big city I visited was New York. Instead, most of my time was spent in Georgia, in the mountains , warming myself with a cup of hot chocolate next to the fire place in the log cabin.

It was a back-to-nature kind of trip and for 3 weeks I was make up free… wore practical hiking wear with no sense of fashion… no dresses at all and I didn’t even have a hair dryer with me!! It was a good detox for my system. To live like a country folk immersed in forests and waterfalls… lost in old southern towns and huge empty beaches instead of constantly heading to shopping malls and seeing the latest fads.

The flight there was horrendously long. Singapore to Frankfurt to New York to Orlando… almost 28 hours including transit. I was DOA (dead on arrival), the only thing that kept me going was my adrenaline and my excitement to meeting my uncle and auntie once again. It’s pure irony that my closest uncle and auntie should live the furthest point of the planet from me! They are childless and have taken me in as their pseudo-daughter a long time back. Even uncle tom’s relatives would parade me proudly around the place introducing me as their grandchild or niece or whatever. Friend of theirs that didn’t know any better would think I’m either adopted or must be my aunt’s illegitimate love child… since I don’t look the least bit Caucasian.

The first couple of days were spent at my aunt and uncle’s lake house in Viera, an hour’s drive from Orlando, home of disneyworld. Some administrative paperwork had to be done… so I had to visit 3 different bank to verify my accounts and to meet friends and relatives that were so looking forward to seeing me again. Grandma Hicks was extremely happy to see me… I was touched to see tears of joy in her eyes. She still wore the necklace I gave her during my previous visit last year and never took it off. Her grand-daughter has come back to see her! I still remember the buckets of tears she shed the last time I said goodbye to her. I kept assuring her that I’ll be back to see her next year but to a lady of 82… a year was too long a wait and she worried that she may not be alive to see me again. Now that I’m back she was ecstatic! She introduced me to her friends who seem to already know all about me and never let my arm go. I love her so much… she is the sweetest woman ever.

The day before the long road trip up to the state of Georgia begin… Uncle Tom (sensing my need for a last goodbye to city life…) dropped me off at the mall 5 mins from the house. There I spent the day madly shopping… darting between the stores. Old Navy… Wetseal… Rave… Charlotte Russe… Kohles… and others… the choices were endless… It was like my favorite online stores came back to life! A quick stop at giant Pet Co to buy some pet supplies for my doggy and a round at super Walmart before I had to head home for dinner. Boy was I tired! Just look at my washed out face in the candid picture!

My trip is so long I’m gonna have to split it into several posts… gonna go eat breakie first!.