Years of dreaming about it, months of preparation, weeks of packing, selling furniture and cleaning up my life (to the point that all my material belongings fit into my backpack and 18 boxes in storage in Richmond), and finally days of saying goodbye to all those who are dear to me had gone past. The whole “journey to the journey” had been a great and exciting success. I felt ready to set off into a life changing experience, that would take me out of civilization and out of the comfortable existence that I had been in for quite a few years, and into a great personal Unknown. Eight months with a big orange truck as a home and all my key possessions on my back and in my mind. Simple lodgings (combination of hostels, yurts, camping and home stays) in unknown circumstances and cultures. I was beyond thrilled with the prospect of this ultimate experience.
I was (and still am) extremely grateful for all the support that people gave me and nothing stood in its way. Nothing? So I thought... At very last minute i needed a visa for Kazachstan because the itinerary was adjusted to avoid Southern province of Kyrgystan (a little war going on there!) and instead to go through the Northern province and to include going through Kazachstan. I had to apply for my Kazachstan visa from London. I had exactly five working days to get it before I was due to be off to Portugal with the boyfriend and to Poland to see the family. The visa service in London was supposed to send my visa and passport via tracked and registered UK mail to my parents in Poland. Well…that proved “a bit much” for UK mail. When I got to my parents on 20 July my passport hadn’t arrived yet. UK mail told me it had left the UK on 13 July, Polish mail said it hadn’t arrived in the country yet…no passport means no trip, and I was due to leave for China in 5 days! What then started was a frantic series of phone calls to UK mail and Polish mail. On 21 July in the evening I had given up on getting the passport back, and was preparing for a “plan B”, which would involve reapplying for all the visas with my American passport, which would take weeks. Somewhere during the day I had entered a “Zen attitude”, which meant I realized I couldn’t change what happened, but I could change how it would affect me, and I had resolved to accept my fate.
The next day a miracle happened. Out of sheer despair I phoned the UK mail again (mostly, I just wanted to scream at the folks who lost my passport) and the guy admitted that my passport hasn’t left UK yet. It was due to leave morning of July 22 and arrive in Poland afternoon of the same day! I immediately called the Polish post office to beg that they watch out for the package and keep it in Warsaw airport office until I personally collect it. By the end of the day I think every man and woman in the Polish customs office knew me and was on the outlook, and guess what…at 23:00 hours the redeeming word came: “Madam, we have your package . When can you collect it?”. I flew to Warsaw the next morning and experienced probably the happiest moment in my life few hours later when I held my passport in my hand!!
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