I'm back!

Warning: long rambling post. These past few days have been quite interesting, to say the least.

24

It had been a hectic few days –– mostly caused by my procrastinating on packing or selling furniture, and playing FM14 instead. I did not realize how much stuff I've gathered in my ~2.5 years living at my apartment, but it was pretty crazy. I mean, it was a studio apartment; how much stuff can I have, right‽ Even though I thought I had moved most of my stuff out, I still had a whole van worth of stuff that day. It's the smaller things that was unexpected. I had boxes of just random stuff –– useful, but random –– that I didn't want to throw away and wasn't worth donating.

Before going to my aunt's, I walked into the Apple Store at Menlo Park mall at around 9 pm. 10 minutes later, I left with a brand new 13” MacBook Pro! I may or may not regret this very expensive impulse buy, but I really had no time to worry about that! And by the time I do, I would be in the other side of the world and no way to return it. Honestly, this purchase was mostly motivated by the fact that my old MacBook wouldn't be able to handle my FM games, 2012 or 2014. I could possibly play 2008 on it, but I don't know if I still have the .dmg for it (although the prospect of Rooney-Ronaldo-Tevez is pretty tempting now).

That night, I donated a few more bags of clothes and household items to Goodwill, moved my stuff to my aunt's basement, and then went back to my apartment for one last night at home.

25

D-day. I've been pretty scared and nervous about this for a few weeks now, and the day is finally here.

Waking up, I was greeted by the wonderful news of Mata's arrival at Carrington. He looks good in United red. I still couldn't believe that we pulled this off. The deal happened pretty quickly, and who would expect that it would happen at the start of the window? Interestingly, there was still a part of me that thought that it wasn't gonna go through. Maybe he'd fail the medical? Or he just changed his mind and took the helicopter back to London? But then I saw that he changed his Twitter bio, Facebook page, and it says "Manchester United 2014 – " at the bottom of the Career page on his official website, so I knew it was happening.

But then I had to go about my day; big day in my life, this. I still had a couple errands to run before I could leave, so I was running around that morning. Disappointingly, my last lunch in the US was Wendy's, because I didn't really have enough time to sit down and eat. It started snowing when I was finishing up my errands, and it got pretty bad when I was driving down to my aunt's. Visibility was low, and people drove slower. I worried that my flight would get delayed or canceled. I mean, I've been saying that I want to stay in the US, but not because of a canceled flight. After all the work I had done in the past couple weeks to move out of my apartment, I don't want any stupid issues. Although, a part of me loved the snow because it was such a beautiful send off.

On the way to JFK, I kept checking my flight status on multiple websites, because the roads didn't look too good. It kept saying "on schedule." I actually got there pretty early, which is rare for me. Security wasn't too bad either, so I was feeling good. I had 2 laptops with me (my old MacBook and my new MacBook Pro), so it was quite a hassle. But I thought it was fine, until that moment when I was putting the two laptops back in my bags, and one of them slipped and fell to the ground. Which one? Of course it had to be the new MBP! I've had the old MacBook for about 7 years now, and I have never dropped it once! I checked and saw no visible cosmetic damage, and it seems to be working fine so far; I really hope there are no issues!

The flight itself ended up being on time; the weather didn't affect JFK at all, it seems. Boarding the plane, there was a big part of me that was scared of never being able to come back to the US. I mean, not as a tourist, but to go back and live there...

26

I was in Frankfurt in the morning of the 26th (local time). I didn't sleep during the flight; instead, I played FM14 for a few hours. I'm approaching the end of my second season as United manager now, and I really want to get Mata. Unfortunately, I've spent my transfer budget on hot prospects I bought Mata. Speaking of, this really feels like the Robin van Persie transfer again. He's saying all the right things and seems very genuine. Juan, you don't have to do anything anymore (but play; well, preferably), I already love you.

Back to Frankfurt... I had just ate a meal about an hour before the plane landed, but I was pretty hungry. I had about an hour of transit before I had to board the plane again, and there was this bar thingy by the gates, so obviously I got beer, seeing as it was Germany and all. I didn't know what to eat –– a whole sandwich was too heavy –– so I just stuck with the beer. Not long after, it was time to go back to the gate and back into the plane.

27

I tried sleeping throughout the flight to Singapore, because I thought it would help fight my jet lag, but I only managed to sleep throughout the first 7-8 hours (only woke up for meals). I was wide awake for the last ~4 hours. Arrived at Changi airport at 6:50 am local time, which means my connecting flight to Surabaya was already boarding. I was a bit disappointed because I thought I would have more time there; I really like Changi airport, and I haven't been there in years. Hopefully I'd get to go back to Singapore soon-ish.

Anyways, it was only another 2 hours before I could be done with flights. Interestingly, I didn't watch any movies through the in-flight entertainment system throughout this whole trip! I thought about it; I think they had 12 Years of Slave that I actually want to watch, and Runner Runner with Justin Timberlake and Ben Affleck. I'm actually not sure why I didn't watch any. Now I'm a bit disappointed by my decision since 12 Years of Slave isn't playing here in Surabaya.

I managed to get a bit more sleep in during the short(ish) flight. Landed in Juanda, Surabaya; went through immigration (it's been a while); waited by the baggage claim. I was exhausted by that point, so I didn't care; but this is how my box turned up:

I still don't know if I lost any of my stuff. It's mostly filled with shoes boxes, and they were all still there. But, I padded the top of the box with dirty laundry (mostly underwear and socks), so I probably lost a couple of those.

In any case, it's awesome to be able to see my parents again. This week will be filled with family events, so I probably won't see any of my friends (do I still have friends here?) until next week. I think my mindset is still that I'm here on vacation, and I'll be able to go back to New Jersey soon. Maybe in a week or so (or month?) I'll start freaking out because I really can't... I guess it's time to start looking for jobs again?