Home

So, we made it back. I am currently at work, dog tired from the damn jet lag. The Moosh woke me up at 4:00 this morning. This is not surprising, since he went to sleep at 4:30 PM the previous day. I'm not mad about it, I'm just very, very tired.

Our trip back was fairly uneventful, except for the general suckiness of traveling that far with such a young child.

We left Iran at 3:05 AM local time, so the Moosh slept through that flight. Upon landing in Germany, we ate our complimentary breakfast at a restaurant in the airport, then we went to the legendary McDonalds in the Frankfurt airport. I got two Chicken McNugget Happy Meals, and they had free balloons for the kids. The Moosh loves balloons, so I grabbed two of them, hoping that they would keep him entertained for the (long, long, long) trip home. We then did the standard security stuff, and boarded the plane.

The flight from Frankfurt to Dallas is 11 hours long. It also has the bitchiest flight attendants I have ever met. In general, I find Lufthansa's service to be outstanding. Our previous three flights were fine, and I had no problems with the staff, but on that last flight, the long haul from Frankfurt to Dallas (F to D, for short) , I have had problems with the staff for two years straight.

Last year, the Moosh was an infant, and we were carrying his infant seat with us. On every other flight they simply took the seat from us and stowed it. F to D? The flight attendant told us that they "didn't do that" when we asked her to stow the seat. R asked her if she thought this was our first time on a plane or something. We pushed, and she found a place for the seat. Later, that same flight attendant got in my face and started yelling at me regarding a conversation I was having with my husband. Granted, she was mentioned in the conversation, but you simply don't do that to customers. Ever.

This time around, they started giving me shit because they said that the car seat we had with us, the same car seat I had used on the previous three flights, was not airplane compliant. I informed them that it certainly was, and that I had already used it three different times on their airline. After much crap, they realized that the seat was airplane compliant. Imagine that. When the flight attendant told me this, I replied that I knew that, because we'd already used it three times. She smiled at me condescendingly, and said they just had to make sure, and then, leaning down so that she was eye-level with the Moosh, she cooed, "for the safety of the baby." I refrained from kicking her.

Then later, I got into a fight with a different flight attendant about food for the Moosh. On every other flight, when they served dinner, I just asked for an extra piece of bread and some extra cheese, and then I split the entree with the kid. He doesn't eat that much. But on the F to D flight, when I asked for extra bread and cheese, she told me that I couldn't have any. I pointed out that I paid a full child's fare for the Moosh's seat, and that included meals. She then asked me if he were over or under 2 years old. Irrelevant. I paid for a seat. That includes meals. It was on his ticket. However, I could see where this was going, so I told her that he was over 2. She gave me a full meal tray for him. He ate half of his bread, and the cheese, and a few bites of the pasta entree. What a waste.

The Moosh slept for the first 3 hours of the flight. After that, I really did my best to keep him quiet and entertained, but I will fully admit that I failed miserably. I was exhausted, and so was he. We were stuck on a plane. He didn't want to sing songs, or play tickle mouse, or color, or anything. He wanted out of his seat and off that plane. So yeah, he cried. A lot. I cried some, too. I kept telling him that we were going home, and that his aunt would be there when we got to the airport, and then we could sleep. I had really hoped that he would take another nap, but he didn't fall asleep again until about 15 minutes before we landed. He finally tired himself out crying. Then I had to wake him up again to get off the plane.

I got his stroller, and we went down to the baggage claim. I just kept up my little mantra to him the whole time: we were done traveling, his aunt was waiting for us, we were going home. Our first bag came off the carousel. Then we waited and waited, and then the carousel broke. It broke, and our other bag was still not with us. I nearly fainted. I also felt like a fraud, because I had visions of having to go through the lengthy lost baggage process, and my poor sister was waiting for us, and she had no idea what was going on. Luckily, they fixed it! And there was our bag. We breezed through passport control, but had to go through customs. They screened all of the people who had come from Iran.

In Iran, one of their things is that they always want you to take a crapload of food home. Dried fruit, nuts, candy, cookies, you name it. They don't ask you if you want it, they just put it in your suitcase. So when the customs agent asked me what food was in my bag, I told him I wasn't exactly sure. I was positive that most of the food would be thrown away. All around me, the other people from Iran were having their food items trashed. I opened up the suitcase for the customs guy, and I just chattered away at him, explaining how they just kind of threw the stuff into my suitcase, most of it was packaged food, etc. He poked at the stuff cursorily, telling me about mold or something, and I nodded and smiled and chattered. Then he closed up my suitcase and sent me on my way. I had the exact same food that all those other people from Iran had. They got theirs thrown away, and I got to keep mine. My theory is that I was American, and I wasn't emotionally attached to the food. I really didn't care if they confiscated it or not. Anyway, I got to keep it, and we were finally done with the exit process.

We walked up the ramp, and there was my sister, waiting for us. She saw us, ran over, and lifted the Moosh out of his stroller. She hugged him for a minute, and finally this look of recognition came over his face. "Sister?" he said, and then he hugged her. We got everything loaded in the car, and headed home.

My sister stayed for a few minutes, but she had to get to work, so she left quickly. We puttered around the house for about 30 minutes, then we went to lie down in our soft, soft bed. Both of us were so very tired, and we just kind of lay there, shell-shocked, for about five minutes. Then the Moosh reached over and stroked my face, as he always does when he's about to go to sleep, and, eyes drooping, he looked at me and said, "Home." I stroked his hair, and told him, "Yes, baby, we're home."