how to lose 23 kilos in just a few hours.

well, i'm back. home sweet home. i love coming home to a clean apartment and a huge stack of christmas cards (i'm ignoring the bills). someone sent me a parcel over christmas (thanks, whoever you are) but of course it was returned, so please resend it. i love presents. i also had a voicemail from my high school grad date, that was a pleasant surprise.

my backpack decided it liked the weather in vancouver better and has chosen to spend a night there. i know it made it that far because i picked it up from customs and put it on the belt to magic bag land, so that's a good thing. i'm glad now i decided against that big bottle of bombay sapphire at duty free because i'd be sure they'd be rifling through my piles of damp and dirty clothes to steal it. i still can't believe my bag only weighed 23 kilos. i guessed more like 4839 kilos. though i did shed a few books and a pair of very used flip flops in ko tao.

my layover in korea actually was pretty awesome. there are times where i hate that i never have a quiet mind - i'm always thinking (over thinking) and analyzing and wondering about things. curiousity takes over all the time. today i was glad because it helped me kill 8 hours in the incheon airport. they had a cool little korean craft centre, and you know me and crafts, it's like the magic word. so, i made this little paper pencil holder thingymabob and she wrote my name in korean on it (it probably says "shithead" or something, but she swore it said "tasha".) i explored every wing of the departures area and found a great little lounge with couches, where i laid out for a couple of hours, read and had a nap. way better than a hotel anyday, and i didn't have to venture out into the cold.

amber, being the superstar she is, came and picked me up at the airport and took me to get groceries. now i'm contemplating if i have the energy to even have a bath - a bath would be so nice right now after 3 days of travelling (i'm sure my travelling neighbors would have all agreed).

and now that i'm back, i can say it. i had no stomach problems at ALL on this trip. none. no repeat of the great dysentery adventure of 2002, no food poisoning, nothing. shea had a little problem (she made me swear not to blog about it, but it rhymes with monstipation) and many of our friends reported horrific cases of either end explosions, but i was a-ok. i was pretty careful but no more so than last time, so i think my guts are just stronger. i think i have dad's "sit on the stove for 9 hours" spaghetti sauce to thank for that. so, thanks dad.

the trip was overall a tremendous success. you're all probably dying to know how shea and i got along, right? i mean - we're 8 years apart, have NEVER spent that much time in close quarters together (i've never spent that much time that closely with ANYONE before). you'll be pleasantly surprised to hear that it went really, really fantastically well. seriously. we had one, um, moment, a very well controlled burst of expletives (from me, not her) and it blew over in about 4 minutes. sure, there was eye rolling and snarkiness now and again, but overall, we got along really well, and we both saw sides of each other i think we didn't really know existed. all shea ever really knew of me was older sister who came home, worked like crazy all summer and then lived her life elsewhere. i think she was truly surprised to find out i'm actually pretty fun. i was surprised by a lot of things about shea too, like that she really does at the end of the day have a great head on her shoulders. it was a great trip. i wouldn't change a thing.

time for a bath. then i'm going to crawl under the covers of my thick down duvet into my bed that actually has coils in it and high thread count sheets in my warm winter red PJs and prepare for the real world that kicks in tomorrow.

over and out, thanks for reading. photos will follow soon.

xoxo
tasha.