Travel & Thank: Day 14. The Day When I Was Supposed to Leave Country C.

As my neighbor here put it, “be scared of your heart’s desires”. Did I want to leave? No. Did I actually leave? No! I’m still here.

It’s just another case of silver lining in my life. Or another case of things going a certain way if it’s just written that they have to go a certain way. Everything happens for a reason, I believe in that.

So, what happened is, a few hours before leaving the house for the airport, I got a huge allergic reaction to something in my smoothie - I am yet to find out what that was. It started off normally but over the course of an hour and a half it grew into something terrifying – my face swelled, became tomato-red and increased in size, making every mimic wrinkle and every little skin imperfection I had stand out and thus making me look like an old ugly lady. My chest started itching crazily and, just like my face, it got red and was on fire, as if I was badly sunburned. Then it started spreading to my body and I started getting random white and red spots on my back, stomach and even underarms. The palms of my hands were burning and covered with weird white spider web like pattern, my wrists swelled, turned red, the veins also became more visible and got darker in color. Then the redness from the wrists started spreading further to my arms and all of my body started itching... And that’s how I arrived at the airport.

To make a long story short, I was taken to the doctor there and even though by that time I was getting much, much better, he still said he wouldn’t recommend I took the flight that night, but the final decision in my case was up to the plane captain. They contacted the plane crew and the captain refused to take me on board. My luggage was taken off,  I as taken to a few more airport offices and saw some more people, then I received back my ticket and was let go an hour or so later.

It all sounds pretty bad, but let me tell you – it could’ve been so much worse. At least I’m feeling well and I’m alive, at least I have a place to stay at, I have the money, I have food, my visa is still valid and I’m working on putting me on some other flight back home. Me and my family are really thankful it happened in this country, where I feel at home enough and can both take care of myself and be taken care of.

I’m thankful to the airport crew too, who had all been really kind, helpful and supportive, and I am thankful to my neighbor here, who has also been amazing and so willing to help out.

Needless to say, I am feeling super lucky. Not only did I not die, but my wish to stay here in country C. longer came true too. Oh thank you!

P.S. Next morning when I woke up at aunt's house that became such a dear place already, I was greeted with a plethora of rose colored flower petals by the front door... Beautiful.

Disclaimer: Travel & Thank™ is a mini-project within and is part of The ‘Thank You’ Project blog ©2009-2010. Travel & Thank™ updates are featured twice a week, are pre-written and not made in real time - each post was created during the author’s actual vacation in the mid-fall of 2010. For privacy reasons the names of the persons, places and geographical locations may have been shortened, abbreviated or changed and are not subject to disclosure.