It has been three weeks since I got here, and I have experienced so much. I never left the country before this trip and I have never lived by myself completely. Two things most accomplish nowadays sooner, but I was stripped of the chance. On the plane, after I left Elite, and checked my bags in, sitting there, alone, watching the chart displaying my aircraft amongst the many states surrounding Illinois, steadily awaiting to be lifted, submerged within the clouds, it being so late. I didn't sleep before the flight since I wanted to be able to sleep on this long flight. My eye lids were heavy with exhaustion, and fright, and nervousness. I looked out onto the airplane for anything familiar, but saw nothing. I knew this was it. I gripped my seat as the plane ascended, in my mind contemplating jumping off in a last ditch effort to keep to the conformity that has defined my for all these years, begging and pleading the pilot and staff to allow me to stay just a few days more. They were conjunct with the devious plot to ship me off to the unknown. I stood my ground though, with the absent, weightless ignorance that things will go well. I knew I had nothing to solidify the fact, but blindly held on to it like a life raft off the titanic, thinking I will see those lights soon--
When I got off the plane, no one was there waiting for me. I was in a country that I didn't know the language to with all my bags and no one to help me. Lucky I didn't panic, I don't know why, thinking back, perhaps my suicidal fixation finally warped my mind into thinking the cyanide kool-aid in the form of being alone was a bitter drink that must be taken sometime. What could I possibly do? Lucky I was able to get online. Skype saved me. I talked to the program workers who scheduled everything and it was a mis-communication on their part, it will only be five hours before I get picked up, perhaps some KFC will remind me of the american processed delicacies that I so freely left behind.
On my first few walks around my mountain town I realized a very important fact. I am the only American most of these people have ever seen. That being so, most glare askance, curious, bewildered, astonished, each time I pass. My every movement is on their radar like I was some endangered animal, does it bite? Dross at every corner, the sky peppered with thick pollution that seeps into your lungs, but the mountains, they are breath taking. It's a nice change of pace from the hustle and bustle of the city I left behind. But, I do miss her...
