Welcome Home

I am back home. Returning from a trip like this is always filled with different feelings. Your happy to see loved ones upon your return. Your happy to be around things that make you comfortable, (your favorite chair, your own car and real traffic lanes). In the same breath, you are missing the new experiences you have been taking in. You are missing new friends you have made.

The trip home went well. When departing from Argentina to Brazil, everything needed to be announced in three languages 1) Spanish, 2) Portuguese, 3) English. While interesting, it is very confusing too. When the announcement was complete in the first two languages, those native speakers stopped listening and would resume there conversations increasing the volume in the area. I really had to focus to hear and understand the announcement. Now I think I have learned a little more respect for those visiting my country and trying to get around if they have a language barrier.

The airports Buenos Aires in Sao Paulo are a bit overwhelming when it comes to Duty Free shopping. You must go through the Duty Free shops to arrive at the departure gates. The prices are horrible. A set of Bose noise cancelling head phones for $350 US. You can buy them for $299 from Bose or in the airport in the US. There were a few other products that I looked at and they were again over priced, or essentially including the tax. Duty free is supposed to tax free from my understanding, and then you declare it when you arrive. All of these prices seemed to include the equivalent of the US Tax. Needless to say, I did not make any Duty Free purchases.

Disembarking from the flight from Buenos Aires, in Sao Paulo, I needed to find the United gate and be issued boarding passes. Neither Argentina nor Brazil allow for you to print you boarding passes for international flights. After making my way through security for the second time in one day and another Duty Free Hades, I could not locate any departure monitors to locate the gate I needed to be at. I had about 45 minutes before my flight to Chicago was scheduled to depart. I found a TAM airlines gate, and went over and inquired if they abla Ingles as I was in a Portuguese speaking country. The gate attendant's response was "yes, some small English, but more Spanish." I apologized and asked if there was someone else that spoke more English as I only had a small amount of Spanish. He directed to me to a colleague that spoke excellent English. I luckily by dumb luck had arrived at my departure gate. There was no United signage, and no departure monitors. I was able to get my boarding passes and start relaxing. I was heading home to the United States.

I took a quick trip through Sao Paulo's airport looking for a souvenir, but I could not find anything that was fairly priced. I was going to buy the girls mini Brazilian flags like I got them in Argentina, but they only sold 3' X 5' Brazilian flags for $45 US. I went looking for a bottle of water for the flight home, and the only stores that were selling bottled products were outside of security. Apparently, they have not learned the value of having TSA approve their water purchased after security checkpoints and charging $3.00 or more a bottle, (I am joking here against the US). Not wanting to go outside of security and fight my way back through, I bagged this idea and went back to the boarding area.

The flight home was good. We had to skirt a storm in the Bahama's and go way out over the Atlantic. I am pretty sure I have now flown over the Bermuda Triangle due to this route and from watching the map of the flight path. We arrived in Chicago at 05:30 to 05:45. Disembarked and again I only had about an hour to get to the domestic terminal, after going through immigration, picking up my luggage and rechecking it to Minneapolis.

Upon arriving at immigration, I filled out my declaration form. I had nothing to declare, but needed to fill one out stating that I had nothing to declare. You just have to love the bureaucratic red tape. All the information on this form is on my passport! This was the first time that I really started to get frustrated with all the extra steps international travel requires. I realized that some of it was due to being overtired, and I just wanted to get home. I calmed myself down and got to my turn to speak with the immigration agent. He took the declaration form, scanned my passport, looked up and said "Welcome home." I replied thank you, and felt the security and comfortable feeling that I have always felt when re-entering my home country, even if only from Canada come over me. I don't know why that is, maybe just that I know all the rules and customs here.

My flight from Chicago to Minneapolis was delayed an hour, but I met some Minnesotans at the gate and we had some light conversations and laughs. Arriving in MSP, there was only a short walk down to baggage claim where I received a nice hug from my wife and I truly was home. My luggage came down the belt, I grabbed it and we got the heck out of the airport.

I feel good. I am happy to be home with my wife and children. I thoroughly enjoyed this experience. This was the first time I have been outside of the US to a country that's native language is not English. This was not as overwhelming as I previously had expected it to be. In fact, it has fueled my urgency to learn Spanish even more. I will be hitting the Rosetta Stone CD's even harder now. And I think when I have some mastery of Spanish, I will be getting the German set as well to round out those skills.

Time to go get on the bike, and then to run. Time to refocus on the mission ahead. I look forward to it. With a twinkle in my eye and a smile on my face, it truly is a "Welcome Home" reality.