Around the World...
... in 64 hours, more or less.

(I know it's been awhile since I added anything new here, but I was without Internet access for a bit. I'll tell you about the end of our journey, then add something new every day or so about the days I didn't write.)

We began our journey home at 5pm in Chiang Mai. 32 hours later we were back on Indiana soil. The really cool thing about the trip home is that we continued around the world. When we traveled to Thailand we went over the northern Atlantic. On the way home we continued East, flying over the north Pacific. The not-so-cool part about the flights is how l--o--n--g it took! I don't think I got more than 6 or 7 hours, taken in 1-2 hour naps, over those 32 hours. And my feet swelled up like pudgy balloons! This is Wednesday, and they're still swollen.

I sat next to a young businessman from Thailand making his first trip to the US. That leg of the trip was 18 hours long, so there was plenty of time to get to know him! Most of the time we compared the US and Thai cultures. He asked questions about life in the US, and I tried to give him a crash course in what to expect. Teerapol (TEE-rah-pole) was very friendly and made the long trip interesting. He told me what I was eating during the three Thai meals we had on the plane, and I tried to tell him that American food tastes very different in the US than what is served in Thailand! :-) I'm sure he's figured that out by now.

I also tried to explain snow since after his meetings in Orlando, he'll be spending a day in New York City the end of this week. By the way, I'm REALLY glad the blizzard came to Indiana when it did... a day earlier and we'd be stuck in New York! As it turned out, we've had two snow days following the day we got home which has made for a nice time to decompress!

Toward the end of the flight, I asked Teerapol if he would like the Jesus Film on DVD. He took it gladly. His English was very minimal, and my Thai is non-existent, so the DVD is the only way I can tell him about Jesus. I'm so glad I brought some with me, and that I had the foresight to keep a couple for the trip home. (I left a handful in Thailand with a new friend.)

So I'm home. I'll write some more each day about the highlights of the trip. It was GREAT!!! Talk to you tomorrow! (

Sorry there isn't a photo. I can't get Blogspot to cooperate!)