That's All They Wrote...

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Trip Start Oct 12, 2005 Previous
Entry Trip End Mar 31, 2006

  New York, New York, United States
Friday, April 14, 2006

Five months ago, this day seemed a long time away but here we are, kicking around our apartment in New Jersey! (Not sure we ever pictured New Jersey but it's been fantastic!) At first being back home seemed like just another stop on our trip, exciting with brand new things to do, but now we have finally settled back into the homelife, working and setting up our new place, cleaning up after the cat, and visiting with friends.

The words we've included in these entries are the closest we could get to sharing this incredible experience with you. We tried to include the good, the bad and the ugly. At times, our fatique has shown through our words like a threadbare, antique Turkish rug. At other times, I'm sure our excitement seemed over the top. The vascillation between good, great, excellent, incredible and sometimes just plain bad can be pretty tiring so after five months there was no question that we were both ready to come home

01 The Bags are Packed

. Over the past few months, we increasingly felt the presence of a tiny voice in our heads saying it was time to get home. A lot of people (including us) have referred to coming home as returning to the real world. In some ways this may true but it seems that this view shortchanges the quality and appreciation we have for our lives back here.

Long-term travel definitely impacts your outlook but we have a feeling we will not fully realize the impact for several months. So far, we're feeling really positive about being back and grateful for the perspective we've gained during our time away. Just as our travels unfolded gradually, we believe the difference in our life will be exhibited in a series of seemingly minor life adjustments. Most of all we discovered or perhaps rediscovered a spirit of adventure and anticipation for the future. The real challenge is channeling that into life here in NYC (or JC as the case may be)!

Q&A

So for those of you who haven't been counting, we traveled to 12 countries, 55 cities and stayed in over 60 different beds during our 158 day journey. Not too shabby. We made it pretty much everywhere we intended with a few notable exceptions (Egpyt, Laos and Myanmar)

02 Heading Home

. We circumnavigated the globe, taking off towards the west from JFK Airport in October and landing there from the east in March.

So what are we going to do now?

Since we did succumb and buy TWO Turkish carpets in Istanbul (see photos), we have to earn some money! Matt found some freelance work with his former employers within three days of our arrival home. Kristy started back at Assurant on April 6. We moved into a loft in a converted warehouse in Jersey City, NJ on March 30th. In addition to finding an apartment and catching up on business matters, we spent our first few weeks home catching up with family and friends. We also have been changing our clothes several times a day cycling through our wardrobes just for the feeling of outfits that we haven't been wearing for the past six months.

What was your favorite place?

Tough question. It's really hard to compare the places we visited and to seperate individual experiences from the trip as a whole but our favorite countries (in order) were: Vietnam, India, Jordan, and Japan

03 New Home

. Why? Hard to say, alot of it is just a warm feeling you have looking back at it. But probably what helped put these countries on the top of the list is because we had great personal connections in each place. In Vietnam we spent time with Nhat and her family, in India we travelled with Matt's family, in Jordan we travelled with our freind's Rebecca and Michael, and in Japan we hung out with Mogan and Kei (who had a baby boy, Athi, congrats again guys!).

What did you miss the most?

Before we left we gave what we thought we would miss: freinds and family, the cat, wearing other clothes and cooking at home. That turned out to be about right. But the main thing you miss is a sense of home. A place where you can stretch out on the couch and watch the tube, throw together some dinner, and just feel comfy.

How did the budget work out?
Our estimates weren't that off target. Basically if we estimated we could get by on over $70/a day we were ok. If we estimated under that, we didn't make it. Overall, we cut our trip short by about 1 and a half weeks, in order to save some money, and we ended up a little over budget (thanks carpets)

04 Kristy's Rug

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Have you experienced culture shock coming back home?

Absolutely! This country is incredibly clean and everyone seems so wealthy that it sometimes makes you want to stop on the street and stare at everything going on around you. MTV really cracks us up -- it's as if we're looking at a music video for the first time ever and they look really ridiculous. The subway seems like a dream compared to other crowds and forms of transporation we've experienced. Has everyone bought an iPod since we left? It's also strange to hear English spoken all around you and realize that you can actually understand what people are saying and that they can understand you perfectly well. Ordering a coffee in the morning is a pleasure because it's so easy!

Will you ever do this again?

I think we'll always love to travel and see new places but I'm not sure we'd do another six month trip anytime too soon. It's exhausting! We would not trade our experience for anything in the world but I think it's one of those things you do once in a lifetime

05 Matt's Rug

. In the distant future (post retirement) we'd love to be able to travel for a few months at a time. In the near term we want to take some easy, short vacations and hit the Caribbean next winter. Eventually we would like to get back to India (and see the Himalayas which we missed because it was winter) and Vietnam as well. We also are pondering parts of Africa and Argentina.

I'm sure there are some questions we've missed so feel free to e-mail us at kristy.matt@gmail.com. Thank you to everyone who has read this travelogue over the past six (plus) months and provided comments and e-mails. The only thing we loved more than writing about our experiences was the comments and e-mails we received from you - our friends and family. It's hard to express how important your support was as we made our way into the East (and then West).

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