Getting to Merida

I am finally in Merida, Yucatan! After very hard goodbyes to family members and grandma, mom, and dad, and Neal, I was anxious to not feel stressed and worried anymore. When I get anxious about anything, as many of you know, I do not eat. I was proud of myself though for eating well Saturday night which would help sustain me for probably the hardest day of my life that was to follow.

Sunday was not fun at all. That is all I can say to describe it. Our flight left at 6:50AM from DSM on Sunday morning, so that meant that we needed to leave home at 4:30AM. However, I did not get to bed until 11:30PM Saturday night and woke up with the worst stomach ache I have ever had at 2:30AM which meant that there was no hope for me falling back asleep. But anyway, after much bawling and saying goodbye to Barklee, Mom, Dad, Neal, and I were on our way to the airport. Luckily, I was traveling with a girl from Central who I knew that is in the Merida program as well, so that calmed me down when I saw her very distraught as well. So, after we both bawled when saying goodbye to parents and me saying goodbye to Neal, Danielle and I were off to Mexico. But, before we could reach Merida, we would have to stop in Houston and endure a 9-10 hour lay over. We landed in Houston at 8:50AM and did not leave there until 7:05PM. We force-fed ourselves lunch and supper as well as bought a book (Julie and Julia), but I did not read at all. I spent time on the phone with Neal, Grandma, and mom, but none of the conversations were easy. I called Neal when I landed and absolutely bawled since I kept asking myself what I was getting myself into. But, as the day progressed, my tummy started feeling better. The day did not consist of more than that other than Jamba Juice which I fell in love with. But, we finally boarded the plane and met up with four other girls that were in the Merida program too. So, once we got on the plane, we thought we would have a 2hr. flight, but it was only 1 1/2hr.

We landed in Merida around 8:40PM and had to go through customs. Everything went smoothly until we put our bags through the belt and they found two computers in Danielle's rolling carry-on. Both of us forgot that I put my laptop in there so my backpack would not be as heavy. So, the customs people searched through her bags, looked at my computer multiple times, asked her how much it was worth, and were thinking of confiscating it. The thing that happened though was that none of us could be in there with her. They finally wanted me to come back in and they checked all my bags and discovered that it truly was my computer since the plug-in was in my backpack. That was quite an experience and not a fun one for just landing and being very short on sleep and food in my tummy! We finally got to Casa Central and they had pizza for us but of course none of us girls were hungry because we were so anxious about everything. The first thing I did was get on the internet since the mansion has wireless, and talk to Neal on Skype. I thought this would calm me down but it did the complete opposite. I bawled and bawled and bawled. Since we did not get to the house until 11:15PM, I was already tired and emotional, so that did not help either. But, the nice thing was that Eduardo, my spanish lab instructor from Central is from Merida and he met us at Casa Central. So, in total, I finally got to bed at 1:30AM after a shower (since I started sweating the minute I stepped into the house) and woke up at 4:30AM and started bawling and was thinking about leaving. But, this was from me not getting sleep, being up for 23 hours, and not having enough food in my tummy. But, fortunately I was able to fall back asleep quickly and got up at 7:30AM for breakfast. I will post another blog about today once I take pictures of the inside of the mansion!

Sorry this is so long, but I had to get it all in there. AND, if you know me, I tend to write novels when I type :). I miss you all!