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What I Learned from This Trip

What have I learned from traveling for a year? The last homework assignment for my kids was an essay about what they learned about our trip around the world. I told them that Gregory and I had to do it as well. Here I am, in front of my laptop and not knowing what to start with. I know it will be me who has changed and not the people or the places around me. I know this by experience because I have been away before and I know that the biggest changes happen inside you, in the way you see things, your perspective changes and I believe that’s where the growing happens. Right now, we might not be able to see it because it is too soon, but once we go back to our routines and our daily old lives, we will see, feel and live the change. I’m happy to say that one of my biggest dreams was to travel around the world. I always wrote in my journal that I wanted to visit more countries or just travel more with my family, but I always wrote them as a wish, a dream and I never really worked to make
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Day 360 - Last day of the world tour. Flight back home

Tuesday, July 2nd, 2019 What a night! I hardly slept and woke up at 5:50am. I rested in bed until 6:15 and then I got up. We got ready and I went downstairs to check on Daniel. For some reason, I got lost so I came back upstairs to ask Gregory for directions and their room number. I finally found their room and was able to check on my baby. I could tell that he wasn’t feeling great but at least he didn’t have temperature and hadn’t thrown up. Sunshine and I brought their suitcases downstairs but of course, first we got lost, somehow we ended up on another floor. The whole hotel was weird, so we went upstairs to get Gregory and then, we finally made it to the first floor with the suitcases and then went by foot the last floor because the elevator didn’t go down all the way. That was the reason we got lost and ended in the garage! (Editor: I have no idea what she was trying to say there) Anyway, while we were bringing down the suitcases, Gregory called a Grab Taxi that came very fast an
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Day 359 - Flight and Day in Manila - Last Day!

Monday, July 1st, 2019. Today we got up, had breakfast, and headed to the airport at 10:00am. The hotel staff was so sweet and wanted to take a picture with us before we left. We thanked them and then we got our free ride to the airport which was only 15 minutes away. We got there too early, but in Manila it took a while to get to the airport and go through security. This time everything went fast and smoothly. We sat in the waiting room for a while but the wait wasn’t bad because there was actually decent WiFi. At the airport, we saw a Spanish family that we had seen in El Nido and in the Butterfly Sanctuary in Puerto Princesa. Small world. The flight was pleasant and quick. Arriving in Manila is never fun because traffic is horrendous and we had to wait for a quite a while for our Grab taxi to pick us up even though the hotel was less than 1km away. Gregory got a hotel near the airport because we leave early tomorrow morning. Plus, we are not interested in seeing anything in Manila.
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Day 358 - Beauty salon experience -Daniel gets a haircut

Sunday, June 30th, 2019. Oops, we woke up at 8:40am, breakfast is served until 9:00am but like Gregory pointed out, they normally leave it until 10:00am so he never rushes. We don’t touch the Philippino food because it is mostly meat. The kids only have cereal and fruit. We have never been excited about the food since we got to the Philippines but it is nice when breakfast is included and we don’t have to go out looking for food. In the morning, Gregory did some work, I caught up on the blog and the kids stayed in their room. I can’t believe that I had to force myself to go swimming but it is my only exercise and I have been feeling very lazy about it, so I did it. Once I’m in the water, I feel like a mermaid or a siren which is the same word in Tagalog and Spanish. At night we asked our driver to take us to Giligan's for dinner. It was just ok, Daniel was the only one who enjoyed his boneless chicken teriyaki. Have I mentioned that they served most of the meat with bones in the P
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Day 357 - Sunshine Goes to the Hospital - Butterfly Sanctuary - Dinner at Kalui

Saturday June 29, 2019 Today we took Sunshine to the hospital because I was really worried about her legs. She never complained but I saw her scratching nonstop. When I saw all the bites that she had on her legs and one that looked like a little dot in the middle, I worried. I read last night on the internet that female sand flies lay their eggs under the skin and they hatch 3 weeks later. I also read that when that happens, the flies normally die but I did read 4 severe cases in Colombia. Of course, the circumstances were extremely different [ Gregory's note: different insect, different continent, different diet, etc. Gotta love the Internet] but I was still worried and I needed professional reassurance. I had suffered a lot from bites in Port Barton and I was miserable. I actually spent one day taking cold showers and staying in the room because the heat activated the itchiness. We took her to the Adventist Hospital which was more expensive but recommended by and for forei
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Day 356 - Day at the hotel

Friday, June 28th, 2019 Today we didn’t do anything special. We felt lazy and stayed all day at the hotel. We swam, read, napped, etc. We didn’t even want to go out for dinner. We had noodle soups that we had bought in a convenience store for dinner. Gregory did go out with the masons. They took him out for dinner and he came back happy. He said he had a good time and got to know more about the life of the Philiphinos. For pictures please click here https://photos.app.goo.gl/vbHosXMuvye53onY8
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Day 355 - Sunshine’s birthday.

Thursday, June 27th, 2019 Today I actually had to go upstairs to the kid's room to wake Sunshine up for breakfast. She is normally the one who come knocking on the door for breakfast. We woke her up singing happy birthday. At breakfast, they had banana bread so we pretended that that was her cake. The staff heard us sing happy birthday to her and after we ate, they approached me and said that they wanted to do something special for her! They wanted to bring something to her room but she was still sitting at the breakfast table. I told the staff to just bring it to the dining room where we were hanging around. The cook and staff brought 3 special cupcakes on a plate that had her name written in chocolate. That was so sweet of them. They sang happy birthday, we took a picture, and we were all happy. I asked Sunshine if she wanted to spend her day at the beach, but she wanted to go to the movies and then have pizza for dinner! I don’t know what my family did in the morning, I spend m
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