The Big Trip

I am thinking it is silly to spin off yet another blog. (Three and counting at this point...) So I will be posting about my big trip to Vietnam here.

First, the particulars:

6 of us are traveling together. My husband, kids, my parents and I are flying from Providence to Chicago, from Chicago to Hong Kong and from Hong Kong to Saigon. (No one, and I mean no one, calls it Ho Chi Minh City!)

The flight between Chicago and Hong Kong is the longest leg, of course. It is just under 16 hours. Oddly, it is the one part of the trip that worries me. (Bad food? Nah! Malaria? Nope. Cockroaches the size of poodles? Pshaw! 16 hours in a confined space? It's enough to scare the crap outa me.)

I have prepared for the long flight by buying an inflatable pillow and packing ambien. Better living through chemistry, I say. I'll probably get some saline for my nose, too. The last long flight I took, my nose hurt like crazy by the end of it.

But oh, we are so excited. We leave in 2 weeks. My father in law is preparing for us. We are beginning to pack. We have our shots, our passports, our visas (very official from the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, complete with a red star in the corner.) We have rehydration salts and immodium. We have water tablets and nalgene bottles. We have 6 bottles of bean sauce for my father in law. We have a box of wine and a phrase book.

We are getting ready.