America - Oh Yeah!

Well, we’re back, and it’s definitely bittersweet. We’re doing a lot of reflecting back on our time with our friends and family, and the incredible efficiency and cornucopia that is the United States.  However, instead of going on and on about what is better about the US, we want to tell you what’s good about the Congo.  There are a lot of people working really hard here despite incredibly strong odds against them.  We have an incredible apartment/townhouse.  Matt really likes his job and has the flexibility in his schedule to do the kinds of things that, well, he wasn’t able to do much in the past.  Toni Lyn is truly “saving the rainforest”, or at least that’s part of her job description, and that’s something she’s been talking about doing since she was in 7^th grade.  Foreigners here appreciate each other in a very real and close way, knowing what they’re sharing and experiencing together.  Now that we are back, we’re looking for a puppy, reuniting with friends, planning vacations to Republic of (the other) Congo in the near-term and Kenya/Tanzania with family in the long-term, and enjoying the loads of candy, Cliff bars, movies, video games, car parts, and assorted presents that we bought ourselves during a stay in the US.

Our trip to the U.S.A was such a fast swirling chain of events that we need to write about it before it is erased from all memory. As with most of our stories lately, this one started in Kinshasa. The Kinshasa airport is only 27 kilometers (~17 miles) from our apartment but to make sure we had enough time to make our 9:00 PM flight we left our apartment at 4:30 PM. After being stopped by the police for eating potato chips in the car (not that eating chips in the car is illegal, but not sharing them apparently is), we arrived at the airport at almost 6:00 PM. Two and a half hours and four bag inspections, all done by hand, later we cleared security. Now, you might ask yourself, why 4 bag inspections? I know we did. But when, during the third bag check, we witnessed a sketchy foreigner hand a bag to a Congolese man, who then passed through security without being checked because he apparently works at the airport, and even when several of us who actually had to wait in line told the authorities and they began to open the bag (of cash, diamonds, heat-seeking missiles?) causing the foreigner and his Congolese friend to quickly swooped in, grab the bag  and passed through security with the bag unchecked (we never saw his bag or him again, thankfully), we decided we were very grateful for the 4th and final Air France check (done by presumably more reliable people by flashlight, by hand, just next to the plane). We boarded the plane at 9:00 and were airborne at 10:30. We thought it all went very smoothly.

(Insert imagination's picture of airport here, since we are not allowed to take pictures.)

During a 7-hour layover in Paris we took the train downtown with two friends who were also traveling to Paris (and joined us in the failed attempt to stop the security situation) and stopped in a cafe within sight of Notre Dame Cathedral for a cup of coffee and a croissant and to try out our newly attained french. 

 

Afterwards the two of us took a quick though rainy walk around downtown Paris, including through the incredible interior of Notre Dame and past the Louvre and within sight of the Eiffel Tower, before heading back to the airport.

 

Hours later, as the carousel spun in baggage claim at Detroit Metro Airport, a sinking feeling settled in. No Luggage. Four duffel bags with all of our clothes and gifts were nowhere to be seen. We started to get nervous, recalling the confusing conversation when checking bags in Kinshasa where it took 5 minutes to understand and then convince the Air France woman that Detroit Metro was an airport, not a subway that we would take to an airport ("metro" is the name for subway in french).  The carousel attendant was only discouraging when she looked at our hand-written baggage claim receipts (printed in Kinshasa) and stated the obvious: "These are hand-written". This was followed by an incredibly rude customs guy who couldn't understand who we were, alone or to each other, and why we should be living in such a strange place. However, a little investigative work from a more helpful attendant revealed that the bags were still in Paris and would arrive the following day - phew! We would however have to make due with the clothes we had on our backs, even for Toni Lyn's nephew's First Communion the next day. Luckily, here in America, it is possible to clean and dry your clothes in an hour!!

To zoom ahead, Toni Lyn had a whirlwind tour to the 4 corners (well, nearly) of the US (Detroit-area, Bay-area, Omaha, and Washington DC), and is still glowing from the warm and kind attention, while Matt was able to have a slightly more sane but still chock-ful trip in MI and Omaha.  We checked out our friends' engagement rings, rubbed baby bellies, celebrated birthdays, a First Communion, mourned and laughed and just generally caught up. 

Thanks especially to Amie & Krin, Corey & Patrick, Paul & Jenny, Jacob & Kara, Luke & Jackie, and Pete & Becky for putting us up, but there were also countless (really, we tried, and lost count) friends and family that made time for break-of-dawn dog walks, early morning coffee, tofu scramble breakfast, dim sum brunch, Indian lunch, Farmer’s Market grazing, afternoon tea-tasting, Cuban appetizers, Burmese dinner, Buddy’s pizza, Mexican feasts, cocktails, late night cocktails, late night lavash (not all eaten on the same day, but nearly so – we ate a LOT), and on and on.  Esme both made a picnic lunch and threw Toni Lyn a party, and Teresa and Toni Lyn’s dad got the whole family together for a bonfire that ended in a 2 am singalong (not to mention keeping us full of Mike & Ikes and homemade rice krispie treats and Sierra Nevada and and).  Matt’s sisters came up with a whole itinerary for his trip and took time off work to make it happen.  Cousin Eric helped to gather 16 people for a raucous Tigers event. It rained for 40 hours and 40 minutes and the game was ultimately called a rain-out. We had fun hanging out with the dedicated friends and family that stayed out late on a Monday night. 

Paul drove an hour, and Doug and Jessica drove several, just to hang out with us.  Cousin Becca took 2 hours out of her day-time job/night-time law school life (and during finals week!) to pick Toni Lyn up from the airport (and found a fabulous vegan-friendly Ethiopian restaurant to boot).  Jacob & Kara threw a Cinco de Mayo party. We obviously could go on and on, the glow is getting stronger as we think back about all the wonderful people we have in our life.  We had so much fun we even forgot to take pictures. We can’t wait to see you all in December, if not sooner.

PS – A special shout out to Kathy, Zach, J. Black and others for being such fabulous followers of (and even commenting on!) the blog.