On Thursday morning we arrived at DTW around 6:45am for our 8:30am connection to Chicago. After printing our boarding passes and dropping off our baggage, we made our way to security where we were shuttled through the TSA pre-check line. Although we haven’t applied for the pre-check program, we are apparently frequent enough fliers on Delta to be randomly selected and let me tell you it was awesome! No removing shoes or belts, laptops can stay in their bags, the lines are significantly shorter and you don’t have to wait for someone to swab your hands if you are carrying a kiddo. If you are at all a frequent flier and eligible for the pre-check program, do it! Getting through security was easily the best part of our day. Everything went down hill from there…
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And we’re home. After a whirlwind fifteen months on the world’s largest, most populated continent, we find ourselves at last stationary, comfortable, and unemployed back in the good ‘ol USA. Arriving in Detroit after twenty hours in flight, it seemed unreal that we were finally back. We would not have to find and haggle with a taxi driver. We would not have to worry about where to sleep and if there would be a toilet available. We could, at long last, understand every word we heard. I just about kissed the ground at Newark under the giant, American-sized American flag outside Customs and Border Patrol, right next to the fresh portrait of some guy we heard got elected while we were gone.
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When you set out on your journey to Ithaca,
pray that the road is long,
full of adventure, full of knowledge.
The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops,
the angry Poseidon—do not fear them:
You will never find such as these on your path
if your thoughts remain lofty, if a fine
emotion touches your spirit and your body.
The Lestrygonians and the Cyclops,
the fierce Poseidon you will never encounter,
if you do not carry them within your soul,
if your heart does not set them up before you.
Pray that the road is long.
That the summer mornings are many, when,
with such pleasure, with such joy
you will enter ports seen for the first time;
stop at Phoenician markets,
and purchase fine merchandise,
mother-of-pearl and coral, amber and ebony,
and sensual perfumes of all kinds,
as many sensual perfumes as you can;
visit many Egyptian cities,
to learn and learn from scholars.
Always keep Ithaca in your mind.
To arrive here is your ultimate goal.
But do not hurry the voyage at all.
It is better to let if last for many years;
and to anchor at the island when you are old,
rich with all you have gained on the way,
not expecting that Ithaca will offer you riches.
Ithaca has given you the beautiful voyage.
Without her you would never have set out on the road.
She has nothing more to give you.
And if you find her poor, Ithaca has not deceived you.
Wise as you have become, with so much experience,
you must already have understood what Ithacas mean.
—Constantine Cavafy (1863-1933)
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A word of advice: never trust a brahmin priest. Only a few hours after we tipped one for leading us through some good luck prayers, I was flat on my back in our hotel room, too weak to drag myself to the bathroom or even ponder what ungodly bug I had contracted. For a whole night I was left reaching for a bucket as waves of nausea and vomiting passed over me every hour like clockwork. It soon became clear that we weren’t going to Jodhpur in the morning.
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