here I am

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Greetings from little Millersburg, Pennsylvania!!

Yesterday, on the 16th, it all happened. The last goodbyes, hugs, kisses, a few tears, the last waves and there I went, with six other dutch people. The first flight, from Amsterdam to London, went pretty smoothly. It only took an hour before we were back on the ground and going through security. I remember now why I never take my laptop on planes. Taking it out of a bag that is actually a little bit to small for it every time you have to go through security takes a lot more effort than it should. Either way, we went through and sat around for a bit before boarding the plane to Chicago. Which would take over 8 hours. And unlike normally I would be in a really small seat. I got about as much sleep as I anticipated: not any. But luckily I got seated next to a Swedish guy (who got placed near Tampa, FL) and we dragged through the flight chatting.

Once we finally landed, we had to go through customs. That's where it went wrong. Now, I had roughly three hours time to get on my last flight to Harrisburg. Which should be more than enough. Unless the line through customs takes over two hours. Leaving you with a short hour to get your bags, get to your terminal, check in, go through security and board a plane. Spoiler alert: I didn't make it. Lucky enough, another plane was leaving two hours later. So after informing everyone who should know, I calmly went to my gate and waited. It wasn't until they started boarding that I noticed I was on stand-by. Now, there is something about being alone in a foreign country with basically nowhere to go and not being secured that you will make it to your final destination. The only thing you can do is nervously stare down the flight attendant in the hope he will pick up that you HAVE to be on this flight or you will be lost. I have never been more relieved to hear somebody call my name in a funny accent and hand me a piece of paper with a bunch of text on it. And I have never been happier to know that I won't have the chance through something like that again for about ten months.

Finally touched down to Harrisburg, I got welcomed with not just one, but two signs with my name on it and happy smiles. Really, I barely had to sit in silence as I immediately got dragged along in conversation between Ronda (my host mother), Jim (my host father), Kaitlyn (my host sister) and her boyfriend Jacob about everything and nothing. Apparently my delay worked out perfectly, because they discovered a great new restaurant due to it. So at least something good came out of all that hassle. We picked up my bag and a 45 minute drive and a drive-through McDonald's later, we pulled up in the drive-way. Surprisingly I still had the awareness for a tour around the house, even after being up for nearly 24 hours. It's bigger than I expected from the pictures. Yet it's really home-y and all the floors are soft and the dogs have already won me over so actually I already felt comfortable. Soon after I went to sleep, though. After all, it had been a long day.

Right now I'm just finishing my vacation until school starts on the 25th, next week. Getting around the house, getting used to the family and their routines, going around town. Basically just relaxing before things really get started.
Boy, do I feel for those who have to go to school tomorrow morning.

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Photos

Sweet Goodbyes
5:30am is too early for pictures