Going Home: The Lead-Up

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When people asked me how I felt about going home a week before my departure date my response was one of shrugging shoulders and a casual 'oh,it hasn't really sunk in yet.' And I suppose it hadn't. When I'd booked the flights a month ago, I admit I'd been very excited and the thought of having to wait a whole month was daunting, so I guess I tried to push it to one side and then other events got in the way, taking my mind off it.

But when it did finally hit me I was more excited than I've been in a VERY long time. The thought of seeing everyone - my family and people from church - was crazily exciting. And not just that, but the thought that I could return home, so changed to what I was when I first came to France and share my amazing testimony with people.

There was however, the small worry that I would be so busy and stressed out trying to see everyone. This didn't really excite me too much, as much as I like to be busy sometimes. But I trusted it to God and prayed that it would all work out.

But because it took a little while to sink in, I got to Monday and I still hadn't done any souvenir shopping. Luckily the family were planning on doing some shopping on Tuesday so I went along with them - family shopping experiences are usually something I do my best to avoid. It also so happened that day, that there was a children's carnival taking place all along Guebwiller high street, so I had to fight my way through flying confetti, bubbles and screaming children in order to reach the souvenir shop. And when I finally made it, it was shut. Damn. The French have holidays at such ridiculous times, not that there's anything wrong with taking holidays but still.

I was pretty disappointed that I wouldn't be able to take back Alsacian souvenirs for everyone but as I reasoned with myself later, they would probably just be so glad to see ME that they wouldn't really mind about the missing souvenirs part, at least I hoped not.

On Tuesday night - by this time my anticipation was really growing - we had a surprise party to organise, Fau family style. Laetitia's Mum was coming to stay for the week and as it was her 60th birthday that day, Laetitia wanted to have a small tea party waiting for her when she got in. So we got to work on making Tiramitsu, vegetable tarts and blowing up an endless amount of balloons.

At 7 o'clock everything was ready. Not long after the birthday woman arrived and then the invited guests - the Beruvet family (all 7 of them). We made a merry party and although I had hoped to get to bed early that night, I didn't mind too much what with all the food on offer.

I finally crawled into my bed at 10:30, nervous at the prospective journey ahead of me (my lift from the airport had been cancelled - Mum had nearly killed herself after her charity cycle ride across Kenya, which meant I was going to have to get the train from the airport back home - this part of the journey scared me the most but luckily I was going back with a practically empty suitcase - very different to the 19.9 kg that I'd brought over.)

I set my alarm for 5:30 - I wouldn't be setting off with Cedric until 7:00 but I wanted enough time to pray - I figured I was going to need a lot of prayer power for a successful journey - I love travelling but it still has a knack of stressing me out.

And I hoped this time I would make a more sophisticated traveller than I did when I came over.

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