Stepping Off the Plane

I arrived back in the United States on Sunday. I was looking forward to the journey home for some time now. I was sick of living out a backpack and I wanted to feel like a part of a community again. The members of my program definitely fulfilled some of the need to be a part of a community.

I miss them.

The little blonde haired girl in the photo below is Megan Campbell. Her parents brought her to India when she was just 18 months old. They were crazy, and I think they would agree. But she made the whole experience a lot more interesting and often times more fun. In that picture she is downing chocolate. To her, I hope I will forever be remembered as 'baby Sydney' or 'Sydney fingers,' or 'Sydney Color!'

I think I could last in India if I had a bit of space to make a routine. What can I say, I am a creature of habit. While traveling, I felt like I was in a stage of limbo. I was always traveling, 'sightseeing', trying to understand the 'true India,' when most of the time it felt like i was seeing what foreign tourist had altered India to be. In the village, I lived among people and although I still had to fight to be treated as an equal, the people let me live like a member of their community, with some exceptions. Since leaving the village I have had to fight a lot more to be treated like I expect to treated, which is cultural. It is one of those things I can't leave behind.

I hope I have come back slightly altered. I have a different perception of the world. Currently, I compare every thing to India, and I know that can get a bit annoying. I have come back tired. I may even be a little 'traveled out.' I know, me, a Lambson, traveled out, how could it be? Just give me a month or two and I will be itching for the chance to leave again.

So, thanks to everyone for reading my stories of India. It really was a grand adventure. Before I left, a woman told me, after finding out about my trip, "You really are lucky, there is not going to be another time when are able to do something like this." I told her then "I certainly hope that's not true." I have thought about her comment a lot. Listen, this really is the most 'convenient' time of my life, I am young, not married, I don't have a job and no real home, this is prime time. But I'm not about to die, I have my whole life ahead of me. You do too. Getting married, having kids, getting a job, doesn't equal death. If we have dreams, shouldn't we follow them? Within reason, right? Look at my Mom, she is almost fifty and she is traveling to every country and roughing it as if she were twenty. Don't let moderation and disillusionment slow you down. There are things to do, people to meet, languages to learn.

Everyday we got to keep on rockin' in the free world