Home is Where the Heart is

This morning we woke up, or at least got up, at 5:00 to say goodbye to Steven, Pemma, and Joi since they had earlier flights than us and then just hung out until 6:30 when breakfast started. It felt nice to eat american food again but, but I am going to miss the traditional Chinese meals that you can only get in China. While we were finishing breakfast, Morgan and Genevieve came over to the hotel so we could all take the shuttle to the airport together, so we hung out in the room and talked about the trip and everyone we met on it. Then we hopped on the bus and headed over to the airport. Checking and security was pretty painless so we spent the remainder of our time looking through the shops. Then we walked Alexis down towards her gate until we got to the tram entrance when we said goodbye and rode it down to our gate. We had a lot of waiting time, but compared to Beijing it all seemed easy and short since we were with the group.

When we boarded the plane, I tried to trade seats with the guy near Morgan, Genevieve, and Emily but he didn't want to. That's okay though because I didn't know how much extra leg space you get if you're surfing in an emergency exit. Although I was sitting next to two kind guys, the one next to me kept dozing off and dropping his head really close to my shoulder. It was a pretty easy hour and a half flight though. Since it was so short, we weren't spoiled with fancy tvs and movies, but I had a movie on my iPad and a lot of music on my iPod, so I had plenty to do.

Once we landed in Atlanta, we met our parents at the top of the escalator by baggage claim. It was such a comforting feeling to see their smiling faces and opened arms when we got to the top. We were all pretty tired so once we got our luggage we went our separate ways. My parents were going to make a nice meal for me, but I was so tired I couldn't stay awake for it. Hopefully I can get to bed still tonight at a reasonable time and break my jet lag. It's a nice feeling to be home, but a little piece of my heart will always be in Shen Yang back with the kids.