Our Journey to Korea

Last Friday we started out on our journey to Korea. The girls and I were up bright and early…at 4AM, as our flight was scheduled to take off just before 7AM Eastern Time. My dad loaded all of our luggage (10 pieces to be checked and 5 carry on pieces) into his truck and my mom had the girls and me in her car and we were on our way. We checked in to our flight without any problems and made our way to our gate. My parents were able to escort us to the gate and they waited until we got on to the plane. I was a bit nervous about this trip as our first flight from Baltimore to San Francisco was 6 hours long, followed by our flight to Korea, which was 12 hours long. I must say that everyone did very well and we even got a little bit of rest too. By the time we arrived in Korea, it was 1:30AM Eastern Standard Time or 2:30PM local time in Korea.

We did a lot of walking to get to where we needed to go in this airport. Our first stop was immigration, where we ended up in line behind someone bringing in an animal. Needless to say, I think I had picked the wrong lane. It took so long just to process this couple and the girls began to get antsy. Finally we moved through the line and were on to our next stop, baggage. This proved to be a bit difficult as I had to manage kids, carts, and making sure we had everything we had put on the plane in Maryland. Customs was next on our list of stops. I had filled out the form on the plane and I was ready…but I couldn’t quite understand what I was suppose to do. It appeared that if I wasn’t declaring anything, I just needed to turn in my form and be on my way. After receiving some clarification, that’s what we did. As soon as we approached the doors after customs, the girls saw their daddy and began to run!

It was so nice to have our family reunited again!

We headed to the kiosk where we needed to go to sign in for the bus that would take us to the Army post in Seoul. We were informed the next shuttle would be there in one hour, so we waited. The gentleman who helped us told us they would call us when it was there. After waiting for about an hour, we checked back in with the gentleman only to find out that it had come and gone. Our option was to wait another hour or to hire a taxi for $120.00. If any of you know me, you already know which option we chose. We waited! And this time we didn’t wait inside hoping someone would let us know it had arrived, we went directly to the area where the bus picked up passengers. I did not want to miss this shuttle again!

Our drive to Seoul had many sights to see along the way…from oceans, beautiful mountains and rice paddy fields to the hussle and bussle of the city. When we arrived at the post, Angel loaded all our stuff into the vehicle he had borrowed and I took the girls for a potty break and to find something to eat. By this time it was about 8PM (7AM EST). Once we got our Subway sandwiches and everyone was settled in their seats, we were on our way to our apartment, about an hour and a half away. We hit lots of traffic in Seoul as the sun was going down and the city was beginning to shine. The older girls fell asleep and the little ones would not stop talking the entire way. When we finally made it to our home, the girls were both excited and tired. They wanted to explore but also wanted to go to sleep.

Well I will post more later about our first few days in our new home in South Korea