It wasn’t so supposed to be this way. By now, we were supposed to be in Bangkok, teaching cute Thai kids English, eating mangoes and fried bugs for dinner. But instead, the city caught on fire and we got a note in our inbox from the US State Department warning us not to go. Adjusting to living and working in Thailand would be weird enough without a threat of a civil war. That was May twenty-something ( a date I’m unsure of) but on May twenty-eighth ( a date I’m AM sure of), a tenant would move into our condo in Chicago. We had to be out of our home, someway, somehow. Miraculously, between packing up our boxes and watching the Red Shirt protests on CNN, we got new job offers in Kunming, China.
The contract date wouldn’t begin until August, leaving us two months to live uh, well nowhere. That’s when we began our Homeless Tour. We’ve squatted on couches, floors, foam cushions, bunks and spare beds everywhere from Door County, Wisconsin to Memphis, Tennessee. We put more miles on our car in six weeks than we had in the entire year, missing the magical moment when our odometer flipped over to 90K. Along with chewing on our fingernails while stressing out over lost VISAs in the mail, we got to devour regional treats such as boiled peanuts in the south and rhutabega pasties in the north. It might sound fun, but it’s been crazy. Nothing prepares you for living in a communist country like moving back in with your parents. Suddently, you’re living by someone else’s rules when you’re used to writing your own. But as of Sunday, our tour is over. We’ve condensed our lives down to 200 pounds worth of baggage plus a few carry-ons and will board a big bird to fly to Kunming, the City South of the Clouds.
July 23rd, 2010 at 2:44 pm Ginger and Jeff, know that I will be reading, I already put an RSS feed in my mail to keep up with your adventures. Which sounds like they have already begun. I wish you a safe journey! (The added bonus is I get to read Ginger’s great writing on a regular basis.)
July 23rd, 2010 at 2:55 pm I’m looking forward to your wonderful adventure. Best of luck
July 27th, 2010 at 6:10 pm from mom, “we miss you already, and we are thankful that you had a safe trip. We looked at pictures of your school and every thing looks great. We are happy that everything looks adaptable. We love you from mom, diane ellen, david, zeek and chloe xxoo