Well, We Made It

We made it! I am typing to you over the slowest internet connection known to mankind, however. Here's a quick recap of the past few days:

Wednesday

The Moosh had recovered nicely from his stomach bug. I caught the damn thing and felt like crap, but I persevered and managed to get all the shopping done in the early part of the day. Unfortunately I felt so bad I ended up cutting short the last store of the day, which happened to be the bookstore. I only brought five books on the trip. For three weeks. Oy.

My mom came over that evening to help me pack, but ended up just entertaining the baby while I moaned and packed. R was being exceedingly helpful -- he kept telling me I was packing wrong and refused to put the baby to bed even though it was 10:30 and I still had a ton of packing to do. Love him.

Thursday

I felt marginally better when I woke up, but the Moosh had green stuff pouring out of his nose. We had to leave for the aiport at 1:00 PM, and our regular doctor was unavailable. I had visions of being at 30,000 feet with a toddler and an ear infection, so I availed myself of our PPO privileges and took him to another doctor's office. They were fantastic. We are switching. The Moosh's ears were clear, and the diagnosis was an upper respiratory infection. They gave him a stronger decongestant/antihistimine combination and sent us on our way. My sister came over and bought us lunch and then it was off to the airport!

We got there at 1:15, and the check-in and security clearance took so long that we had just gotten through security and it was time to board the plane.

Flight from Dallas to Frankfurt

I had been told that I was crazy to travel by myself with a toddler, especially on this marathon 9.5 hour flight. It was long, but it was also mostly at night, so for the 4 hours the Moosh was awake, I just let him color and we sang some songs. Then he went to sleep for the remainder of the flight. I don't sleep well on planes so I caught the last half of Finding Neverland and all of a movie I'd never heard of called After the Sunset. It was OK, but I will have to rent Finding Neverland when I get home. The ending was really good. We landed uneventfully in Germany at 8:30 AM local time on Friday.

Motel Zero

After deplaning, we had to find our shuttle to the Motel Zero. When I made this trip last year I couldn't find the airport shuttle meeting point, so I took a cab. It cost me 13 euros. I wasn't doing that again. It took me about half an hour, but I finally found it and we got to the hotel safely. I call this place Motel Zero because they are so cheap they don't even have clocks in the room. If you want to know what time it is, you have to turn on the television. The television also acts as your wake-up call. Gotta love it.

Since the Moosh had been cooped up in his car seat for the majority of the previous 12 hours, and he was starving because he'd slept through the airplane breakfast, we headed downstairs to check out the buffet and stretch our legs. We walked up and down the stairs a few times, and then ate breakfast. The Moosh ate even more than I did. After breakfast we wandered around the hotel for another hour or so, and then went up to the room. We both lay down on the bed and we were out.

I woke up about 20 minutes before the alarm was supposed to go off, but the Moosh was still asleep. I packed up all of our stuff and then got him a bottle of apple juice to help him wake up. I got him changed and packed up and we caught the shuttle back to the airport.

Flight from Frankfurt to Tehran

I think the worst part about traveling by myself with a young child is the security checks. I had to break down the stroller which meant unloading all of our stuff and him, and then I had to put it all back together on the other side. I didn't have any trouble, but I sure could have used an extra hand or two.

The Moosh fell asleep during take-off, so I got to enjoy a drink (Coke, shut up) and half of Wimbledon. Then they served dinner and I woke up the baby so that he could eat. He didn't, nor did he appreciate being awakened. He was grumpy but manageable for the rest of the flight.

Tehran

We arrived in Tehran at 1:20 AM local time on Saturday. I had a gentleman from the plane help me carry some stuff into the airport, but when we got to passport control, I was on my own. On the flight from Dallas, they give you the stroller right as you get off the plane, but in Tehran, you don't get it back until you pick up your luggage. This meant that the Moosh had to walk, and he was scared of the unfamiliar place, and my hands were full, so I kind of ended up herding him around. I herded him into the passport line and he was crying because I couldn't hold him. Luckily one of the officers saw me struggling, and helped me carry some stuff and let us go through the shorter diplomatic passport line. After we got through passport control I herded the Moosh onto the elevator and up to the baggage claim. The first item of ours that came through the carousel was our stroller. When the Moosh saw it, he insisted that I open it right away. Then he got in by himself and put the straps on, as if to say, "Hey! No more herding!"

I got a porter to help us with the rest of our luggage, and we went out to meet R's family.

Karaj

R's oldest brother lives in Karaj, which is about an hour from Tehran. We got there at about 3:30 AM on Saturday. We were dog tired, but his family wanted to play with the baby. They didn't seem to understand that he doesn't know them, even though we were here last year. They all wanted to hold him and play with him but he isn't having any of it. He goes through phases of willingness to interact, but today he's been especially clingy and tired. He's still got his cold, too. So at this point, we're just trying to get over the jet lag.

Did I mention I only brought five books? I've already read one of them. We've been here for a day and a half. Oy.