On October 19, our family is heading to Hawaii. When we were in Ethiopia last June, the US embassy gave us a 6 month visa for the boys to enter the States. Since our plans to return to the States didn't fit inside that window, we decided a trip to Hawaii would be necessary (and awesome) in order to finish up the boys' citizenship process. Plus, the US Citizenship & Immigration office (USCIS) in Honolulu can process their Certificate of Citizenship and US passports relatively quickly.
I'm looking forward to the trip for obvious reasons. It will be our first time on American soil in nearly three years. My parents, my brother & sis-in-law, and Kevin's parents are all coming too. People will speak English (well, sort of. I still can't pronounce many of the Hawaiian words because there are so many vowels!). There will be turkey sandwiches. The sky will be blue. What's not to love about that?
But there are some things I'm a bit nervous about too. First of all is the 10 hour flight to Honolulu with two lap babies. Not to mention the 20+ hour layover we have in Seoul on the way home. Plus we will continue to be subjects of public transportation. Even if we were willing/able to rent a car, both of our driver's licenses have long since expired. So the merry bus we will ride! I'm a little bit nervous about figuring out American life all over again. I called a pediatrician's office in Honolulu this week to schedule appointments for the boys and found my palms all sweaty when I was done, wondering if I had done it right and said the right things. It's funny now that I can waltz into a Chinese hospital now and get everything I need done but I get anxious about scheduling appointments with an American doctor's office. I can only wonder how many more of my China-isms will become apparent over the three weeks we're in Hawaii.
So there ya have it. Hawaii, here we come!
