New School Year Underway and Sofia Departs

By the end of our first week back, I was mostly over the jet lag and my room was set up. The laptop that connected to my projector was no longer supported by the district, so I had to move my desktop computer closer to the screen. Which meant setting up my desk in a different part of the classroom than it had been the past four years. Traumatic stuff, y'all.

In addition to a rearranged classroom, the big change this year is that I am teaching juniors instead of sophomores. A glance through my new rosters showed that I had about 40 kids that I taught last year. That's going to be a bit awkward.

And I am teaching a 6th period, which means no planning period. But I get paid extra for it. And though we stuck to our budget pretty well in Europe, we ended the summer with about a thousand dollars of credit card debt. So the extra period will help pay that off.

The school year started smoothly for Alex, Bella, and me. Sofia, meanwhile, was preparing for her trip to Panama. I'm not going to go into detail about why she's spending nine months in Panama, but if you don't know and want the scoop, mosey over to her blog and find out by clicking here.

It wasn't looking good for our lost suitcase. Cristina was calling every day, but it had not turned up. There's a website called wheresmysuitcase.com which we were checking every day, but it looked hopeless. The suitcase contained Cristina's clothes (some of her favorite things) and her toiletry kit (which is the size of a small suitcase, containing several sets of contacts and some jewelry, the loss of which was really bumming Cristina out). Everything I had read online about lost bags was doom and gloom. "Most missing bags are delivered within five days, but the ones that aren't have a 99% chance of being lost forever." Not real encouraging.

As we approached 2 weeks, I really had given up. (Cristina says she hadn't given up). The weekend of August 22, we planned to fill out the claim for a lost bag for compensation. The claim form involved listing every item in the bag, including the date each item was purchased and how much the item cost. Just doing that for Cristina's toiletry kit would be a nightmare. The prospect was so overwhelming that we procrastinated and did not get the claim filed.

Then, on Monday, August 25, I woke up and read an email that said our bag was scheduled for delivery. I couldn't believe it! Nearly two weeks after we had returned, the bag was dropped off at our house. Nothing was missing, nothing was broken. So glad we didn't fill out the claim form.

Two days before Sofia flew to Panama, the bag was in our possession and ready to be repacked and sent to yet another country.

 The night before departure. Bags are packed. The big one on the right is the suitcase that was missing for two weeks.

It was hard to say goodbye to Sofia, especially after spending eight weeks on the road together. It felt strange for Team Eury to be at another airport but with only one of us going through security. I don't like that feeling. Thankfully, she flew out of Gainesville, so that made it easier for us to all see her off. A few times when we were flying this summer, while passing out passports, I jokingly used names for everyone that would grate on their nerves a little bit. So our Team Eury names became Christy, Frank, Ofa, Al, and Isa. While we were waiting for Sofia to leave for Panama, I told Team Eury that it had been a pleasure to travel with them and called them all by their joke names. Needed to lighten the mood a bit.

Sofia got settled in Panama City and we chat with her via What's App or Skype, Just about every day. I can't wait to see how the experience changes her. Shes going to totally rock college next year with a year of spiritual and emotional growth under her belt, a heavy dose of independent living, and the international and language experience.