pembroke pines

deery-lou.

the drive back to my sister was much better. most likely because i had my newly purchased ipod and with the adapter that i bought at target i was able to play music through the cassette player. oh how i love technology. to top off the trip back i had a chickfilet sandwich. oh how i missed them. i spent the next couple of days hanging out at my sisters playing with my niece and nephew. they are so cute. on thursday zoe and i went to to their neighborhood pool with the children and spent a few hours. swimming in a pool never felt so good. plus i had my newly purchased swimsuit from target. i finely have a bathing suit that fits. no more worring about it falling off as i jump into the pool. hee hee. later that day zoe took me to a comic book store where i bought nightwing year one. it was actually a pretty cool store. that had lots and lots of action figures where i found myself completely lost in them all. afterwards we stopped at hooters and picked up some chicken wings for dinner. hooters. need i say anymore. my brother-in-law, greg, managed to score a hotel room for zoe and i in south beach for friday night. we left for south beach around 2pm and got there a little before 3pm. we checked in and immediately hit the streets. the hotel was quite nice. all marble floors and counter tops. very chic. the guys that owns it is only 25. they were very nice. we walked around ocean drive for a bit that settled into the clevelander for a few cocktails and muchies. it was really nice to be able to just sit and chat with my sister. after our drinks we went for a walk on the beach. thats when we decided to high tail it back to the hotel and change into our suits. with suits on we headed back the beach. we spent the next hour or so floating around in the water. it felt like bath water. it was so nice. that night we went to a low key cuban restaurant called puerto sajous [spelling?]. the food was absoulutely amazing and very inexpensives. we shared a cuban sandwich, a ground beef dish, fried plantains, beans and rice. yum fest. we also had a glass a shangria that had fruit cocktail from a can in it. classy i tell you. after dinner we did some more walking around and then went back to the hotel. we were both beat. on saturday we hit the beach around 9am. we rented some chairs and stayed there for a couple of hours before we had to check out at noon. it was such a great day on the beach. the weather was perfect. after checking out we went to the urban outfitters which i discovered on friday night. it was so great to be in an urban outfitters. i bought a few things and then we went to the 11st dinner for brunch. they had the best pancakes ever!! we got back to zoe's house around 3pm. i borrowed greg's car and ran to toys r us and publix. i had to do a toy r us run. i miss toys. i even brought down and bought an action figure. hee hee. i went to bed fairly early since i had to be up at 5am to catch my flight back to korea. on sunday i got to the airport around 5:30am. i checked in and was all ready to depart. everyting was going on schedule. we boarding the plane at 6:30am for a 7 am flight. and then it all went to hell. we sat there for a half hour not moving. finally around 8am they made an announcement calling for a doctor. apparently one of the flight attendents passed out. they asked for all the passengers going to japan to come to the front of the plane. we deboarded the plane and they were going to find us another flight out because at this point we weren't going to make our connections in newark. they found a northwest flight for us to detroit and then on to japan. so far so good. when the woman from northwest appeared at the counter we got in line. the old hag immediately snapped at us asking what we were doing in the line. we told her our story and she was like "this flight is booked so i don't know how you're getting on." which was a lie. several people were arguing with her and she just wasn't friendly at all. when it was my turn she said i had a reservation for the detroit and japan flights but none for korea. she then said she wasn't going to book it for me and that i had to go back to continental. at this time the guy from continental came over and the two of them had words. not a very pretty scene. i told the guy what she said and he printed me out a piece of paper with my iternary on it to show her. when i got back to northwest i was at the end of the line. now there was another woman there who was just as friendly as the old hag carol. when the couple in front of me got to the counter she told them that they didn't have a reservation and weren't getting on the flight. then she grabbed my ticket and said the same thing. i told her that carol said i had a reservation. she ignored me and said "i have to get this flight ready to go." then she left. as she walked away i said "son of bitch" really loud cuz i was pissed. she looked at me from the boarding gate and said "now you're definitely not getting on this flight" and shut the door. meanwhile our luggage when placed onto the norhtwest flight. back at the continental counter myself and the other couple were absolutely pissed. i couldn't believe this all just happened. there were no other flights leaving for japan that we would make on sunday. we had two options. spend the night in miami or take a flight to newark and spend the night there. i decided to go to newark so that i didn't have to worry about making my connection on monday. so off i went. the folks at continental were kind enough to give us some food vouchers and placed me in first class on the flight to newark. at newark i went to the customer service and got my hotel voucher and more food vouchers. i had to spend the night in the holiday inn in newark. i thought about going into new york but was just too tired and seeing that i didn't have any other clothes i thought it best not too. i spent the day watch the top 100 child stars on vh-1. i also spoke with misty for almost two hours. hee hee. the next day things went a little more smoothly. i called continental and they said my bag was in japan. however, when i arrived in japan they had no sign of my bag. seeing that i had 5 minutes to board my flight to seoul i couldn't really do anything until i landed in seoul. the 2 hour flight to seoul seemed to last forever. at this point i just wanted to get there and go to my apartment. of course once i landed there was no sign of my bag so i filed a claim and then boarded a bus for ansan. another 2 hour trip. i finally got back to my apartment around 10 pm. i was beat. world traveling is hard! my first day back at school was pretty uneventful. i was just a wee bit tired. it actually felt good to be back. i misssed the kids.

footnote: i attempted to call northwest to claim but since they didn't have a 1-800 number i had to use my callilng card. well it took them about 20 mins to even answer the call. when i finally got to speak to someone she was very unsympathic. bitch! i started to get into it with her and then the phone card ran out of minutes. go figure. all she kept saying was "i'm sorry". whatever. once i get settled here i'm going to email them. in the meantime i advise everyone not to fly Northwest. they are rude and uncaring people. and if you are ever in miami international airport find carol and adriana and send them my love.

be well…

p.s. my bag arrive at school last night. YEAH!!