12 hours and 55 minutes

This is me like 20 minutes ago. Technology these days!

We just endured a pretty long flight from SFO to Taipei, Taiwan. It was packed to the max, to the point where Ana and I couldn't even get seats next to each other and flight attendants seemed like they were about to lose it. We realized that the 13 hours we spent on the plane will probably be the longest break we get from each other for the next several months.

These were our friends that we made waiting for our flight in SF. The one on the left pointed to Ana's nose ring and asked, "What's that?" When we told her it was jewelery, she said wanted to buy jewelery like that too. We told her to ask her mom first. The smaller one on the right was speaking to us in a foreign tongue, but her body language and giggles displayed she was certain we understood her.

People had been asking me if I was scared or nervous in the couple days before we left. I didn't feel that. I've been more excited than anything. Surprisingly, even to myself, the most I cried was when I departed from My-Chi in So Cal and when shutting the webcam box with Diana (silly, I know since she's in Hawaii anyway!) Yesterday, I somehow said goodbye to my parents and made it from the airport without tears.

I'm sure at some point I will be homesick. But I realized that homesickness, like heartbreak, is painful and looming when it's present, but hardly given a thought about once the stage has passed. Maybe realizing that will allow me to skip that stage altogether.