Some Background...Some Very Long, Text Only Background

For someone who was a journalism major and loves to talk...I am not a good communicator. I realized after we left for our vacation this summer, that I had not told many people about our plans. So, here's a little back story.

Jim and I LOVE the Olympics. I admit that I tear up anytime I hear the Olympic song or see someone get their medal. Last summer we spent two full weeks glued to the Beijing Olympics. We got so excited that we even bought an Olympics-themed game for our Wii and starting playing it religiously. At that point we decided two things: 1) we had to go to China and 2) we had to go to Vancouver in February 2010 for the Winter Olympics. Most of the time, my crazy ideas don't come true. We looked up plane tickets to China and found them really expensive and beyond our reach. Strike one. We looked up tickets to the Olympics and realized we would have to get into a lottery and that our chances were slim. Strike two. We also looked into lodging in Vancouver and found that everything was booked up (yes...a full 20 months in advance they were all booked). Strike three. I was pretty discouraged. Thankfully, the wedding starting occupying my thoughts.

In early spring, I starting getting antsy and the travel bug hit. I don't know how to explain it. It's almost like I have cabin fever and just need to get our of the Tyler-Arlington-Fort Worth pattern. And not any trip will do. I'm in this rut of needing to take "adventures." I began researching China again. To my amazement, tickets had dropped almost $1000 per person. I called Jim and we snatched up a pair. So, with no knowledge of China, we were now the proud of owners of round trip plane tickets.

We left July 5 (the one year anniversary of our engagement...for those of you who are sappy) from DFW. After a horribly long flight, we landed in Tokyo, Japan and boarded another flight to Hong Kong. We toured the country for two weeks and came back to the States (Shanghai to Chicago to DFW) on July 17. It's probably the hardest trip I've been on in my life -- even harder than Africa. But, it was also one of the most amazing experiences I've ever had. More to come in the next post.

P.S. We finally got tickets and lodging for the Olympics. We will be there the first week of the games. I'll write something as February gets closer.