After visiting Abby Road in central London we travelled back to the house where my Aunt was hosting a big dinner. We had a great night with about twenty other guests from all walks of life. We told stories of our travels, ate delicious Persian food and danced the night away.
The next morning we slept in a bit more than usual and got up for a big breakfast with the family. Soon after the meal, we went to visit the resting place of the guardian of the Bahai Faith, Shoghi Effendi. He is the grandson of Abdul Baha who was the son of Bahaullah. Bahaullah is the founder and prophet of the Bahai Faith. Shoghi Effendi did insurmountable amounts of service for humanity all over the world and his resting place is in London. Recently one of the Bahais in Singapore bought the whole cemetary land because the previous owner wanted to develop parts of it into residential property. At the shrine there is a small plot dedicated to a beautiful garden of Shoghi Effendi's favourite flowers. There are three square marble steps leading to a very tall marble column with a golden soaring eagle statue at the top. We prayed at the sight for some time and enjoyed the peaceful ambiance.
After stopping to run a few errands on the way home, we enjoyed some tiramasu cakes and pastries with coffee. We talked with my Aunt about life and tests while playing and entertaining the baby at the same time. Tyson and I went for a walk in the small town and through the park. We stopped at the tube station to organize our plans for getting to the airport the next day and found that we were short English money by a few pence so we walked around until we found change on the ground to pay our fare. This took about an hour and it was a lot of fun. We wandered slowly back to the house in the sunshine. Dinner was left overs from the night before which we enjoyed and we spent the rest of the night chatting with my Aunt's two daughters and grandaughter. We watched some of the olympic games, packed our things, finished some laundry and relaxed with family. It was a great way to spend the last night of our trip.
As I call it "the last night of the trip" I still cannot believe that this is what it is. It has absolutely not set in and feels like we are just going to our next destination. Back to "normal life" means very little or nothing to me at this point because I am not sure what it will look like. With no permanent home, vehicle, furniture, job or belongings, everything is kind of up in the air. This does not make me feel nervous or excited but rather I feel nothing. Because surely one year has not gone by, surely this is not the trip we were on, surely I will not say things like "I once did a round the world trip". Surely.
We spent our final day waking up early and having a big breakfast. We made food for our day of travelling and Tyson woke up my Aunt by ringing the door bell several times. She came down with the baby and gave us a lift to the closest tube station. This is where we part ways from her with a big thank you and we hope to see her and the family again soon. When we got there the price that we expected to pay was triple because we no longer had the loyalty cards. We literally had exact change for the previous price that we had thought it would be. We explained our situation to the security guard who kindly just let us in for free. This was lucky because we would have been stuck otherwise.
We stopped at a station that we recognized so that I could run out to buy a couple of last minute things with the money we saved on the ride. Unfortunately it was a Sunday morning and everything was closed. We rode the rest of the hour and a half to the gigantic airport. Check in and security went quite smoothly and the line ups were very short. We checked in two very small bags under seven kilograms each and this was all we were coming home with. I bought a couple of horrendously overpriced items from the airport gift shop with the last of our sterlings and we were early to board our flight which may have been a first for us. The Iceland Air flight took us to Reykjavik, Iceland where we had a several hour stop over. During this time, in our thirty ninth and last country, we went outside briefly to smell the air and check out the scenery. We had to get our passports stamped but it was worth the effort. The air was crisp but the sun was shining and the landcape was beautiful. There was miles and miles of manicured green lawn with mountains in the distance. The air was bright blue with scarce puffy white clouds. We walked through the fields past a big man made pond full of clear water with a big silver statue of a pear in the middle. There was also a very colourful art piece in the meadow that added a different texture to the view. We took some photos and sat on the boulder rocks in the midst of green land for some time before returning to the airport. We had to go through security and customs again but the whole procedure from start to finish took under ten minutes. The gate was completely disorganized with people everywhere and nowhere to sit. Even the floor space was covered with people and we got bumped and pushed throughout the short time we were waiting for boarding.
Our next flight was eight hours long with Iceland Air but they did not serve food. We were shocked that they would not provide something to eat for that long period of time. The surprisingly poor service we recieved tied the airline with Air Canada for the worst airline we have flown this year. Luckily we had packed our own sandwhiches and snacks but we were still disappointed. This is not even their discount airline, they also run a sister company called Iceland Express which is meant to be their cheap fare line. I'd hate to see what that one is like. As we are now experienced travellers, Tyson got free headphones by complaining about the lack of food served. As we waited for the line up for boarding to die down a bit Tyson noticed that my sweater was missing. I realized that I had left it at security so we ran back full speed through customs to security just as they were calling our names overhead. Three more announcements came on as we ran full speed to rescue the jacket. For our last flight we were deadly close to missing it. When we reached the gate to board, the unimpressed hostess said they were seconds away from take off and we would have been left behind. Of course our last flight could not have gone smoothly otherwise I would have nothing to write about.
We flew in to Seattle airport where we had my family were lovingly waiting for us. It was an emotional renunion and it was wonderful to be back in their arms. My mother, grandparentsid and my Aunt, Uncle and cousins surprised us at the airport. They had a sign saying "welcome home, we want a baby!" They eased the pain of coming home and it was so sweet of them to show up all the way in Seattle. We visited with them and then head home with a pit stop at Ross and Taco Bell (the two musts during a visit to Seattle).
I passed out on the ride home and there was no waking me up. I was home. Returning to the homeland is, of course, very emotional after being away for a long period of time. This trip was a major dream in my life and I always knew I would do it. What I did not predict however, is that instead of returning home feeling satisfied, it only created an even stronger thirst for travelling. The list of places I want to see now is ten times what it was last year.
"If we are not happy and joyous in this season for what season shall we wait"
The next morning we slept in a bit more than usual and got up for a big breakfast with the family. Soon after the meal, we went to visit the resting place of the guardian of the Bahai Faith, Shoghi Effendi. He is the grandson of Abdul Baha who was the son of Bahaullah. Bahaullah is the founder and prophet of the Bahai Faith. Shoghi Effendi did insurmountable amounts of service for humanity all over the world and his resting place is in London. Recently one of the Bahais in Singapore bought the whole cemetary land because the previous owner wanted to develop parts of it into residential property. At the shrine there is a small plot dedicated to a beautiful garden of Shoghi Effendi's favourite flowers. There are three square marble steps leading to a very tall marble column with a golden soaring eagle statue at the top. We prayed at the sight for some time and enjoyed the peaceful ambiance.
After stopping to run a few errands on the way home, we enjoyed some tiramasu cakes and pastries with coffee. We talked with my Aunt about life and tests while playing and entertaining the baby at the same time. Tyson and I went for a walk in the small town and through the park. We stopped at the tube station to organize our plans for getting to the airport the next day and found that we were short English money by a few pence so we walked around until we found change on the ground to pay our fare. This took about an hour and it was a lot of fun. We wandered slowly back to the house in the sunshine. Dinner was left overs from the night before which we enjoyed and we spent the rest of the night chatting with my Aunt's two daughters and grandaughter. We watched some of the olympic games, packed our things, finished some laundry and relaxed with family. It was a great way to spend the last night of our trip.
As I call it "the last night of the trip" I still cannot believe that this is what it is. It has absolutely not set in and feels like we are just going to our next destination. Back to "normal life" means very little or nothing to me at this point because I am not sure what it will look like. With no permanent home, vehicle, furniture, job or belongings, everything is kind of up in the air. This does not make me feel nervous or excited but rather I feel nothing. Because surely one year has not gone by, surely this is not the trip we were on, surely I will not say things like "I once did a round the world trip". Surely.
We spent our final day waking up early and having a big breakfast. We made food for our day of travelling and Tyson woke up my Aunt by ringing the door bell several times. She came down with the baby and gave us a lift to the closest tube station. This is where we part ways from her with a big thank you and we hope to see her and the family again soon. When we got there the price that we expected to pay was triple because we no longer had the loyalty cards. We literally had exact change for the previous price that we had thought it would be. We explained our situation to the security guard who kindly just let us in for free. This was lucky because we would have been stuck otherwise.
We stopped at a station that we recognized so that I could run out to buy a couple of last minute things with the money we saved on the ride. Unfortunately it was a Sunday morning and everything was closed. We rode the rest of the hour and a half to the gigantic airport. Check in and security went quite smoothly and the line ups were very short. We checked in two very small bags under seven kilograms each and this was all we were coming home with. I bought a couple of horrendously overpriced items from the airport gift shop with the last of our sterlings and we were early to board our flight which may have been a first for us. The Iceland Air flight took us to Reykjavik, Iceland where we had a several hour stop over. During this time, in our thirty ninth and last country, we went outside briefly to smell the air and check out the scenery. We had to get our passports stamped but it was worth the effort. The air was crisp but the sun was shining and the landcape was beautiful. There was miles and miles of manicured green lawn with mountains in the distance. The air was bright blue with scarce puffy white clouds. We walked through the fields past a big man made pond full of clear water with a big silver statue of a pear in the middle. There was also a very colourful art piece in the meadow that added a different texture to the view. We took some photos and sat on the boulder rocks in the midst of green land for some time before returning to the airport. We had to go through security and customs again but the whole procedure from start to finish took under ten minutes. The gate was completely disorganized with people everywhere and nowhere to sit. Even the floor space was covered with people and we got bumped and pushed throughout the short time we were waiting for boarding.
Our next flight was eight hours long with Iceland Air but they did not serve food. We were shocked that they would not provide something to eat for that long period of time. The surprisingly poor service we recieved tied the airline with Air Canada for the worst airline we have flown this year. Luckily we had packed our own sandwhiches and snacks but we were still disappointed. This is not even their discount airline, they also run a sister company called Iceland Express which is meant to be their cheap fare line. I'd hate to see what that one is like. As we are now experienced travellers, Tyson got free headphones by complaining about the lack of food served. As we waited for the line up for boarding to die down a bit Tyson noticed that my sweater was missing. I realized that I had left it at security so we ran back full speed through customs to security just as they were calling our names overhead. Three more announcements came on as we ran full speed to rescue the jacket. For our last flight we were deadly close to missing it. When we reached the gate to board, the unimpressed hostess said they were seconds away from take off and we would have been left behind. Of course our last flight could not have gone smoothly otherwise I would have nothing to write about.
We flew in to Seattle airport where we had my family were lovingly waiting for us. It was an emotional renunion and it was wonderful to be back in their arms. My mother, grandparentsid and my Aunt, Uncle and cousins surprised us at the airport. They had a sign saying "welcome home, we want a baby!" They eased the pain of coming home and it was so sweet of them to show up all the way in Seattle. We visited with them and then head home with a pit stop at Ross and Taco Bell (the two musts during a visit to Seattle).
I passed out on the ride home and there was no waking me up. I was home. Returning to the homeland is, of course, very emotional after being away for a long period of time. This trip was a major dream in my life and I always knew I would do it. What I did not predict however, is that instead of returning home feeling satisfied, it only created an even stronger thirst for travelling. The list of places I want to see now is ten times what it was last year.
"If we are not happy and joyous in this season for what season shall we wait"
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