"It's time to get my fuss on!"
Yes, that is my new favourite expression from the land of stars and stripes. Hello, everyone! Apologies for the lack of blogging-related goodness for a while; I am sure you have all been missing it terribly...
Ok, now that my delusions are out of the way we can begin. The trip had now brought us to our final few days in Memphis. Before we were going to leave we had two major events to partake in, one was an epic party, the other was going to Diana's school as Australian "show and tell". Fortunately it mainly became about the showing, as it quickly became apparent not many of the kids could work out our accent, and were quite sure we were in fact from Africa. The day consisted of games, singing and generally observing the awesome teacher that Diana is. I can honestly say that if I was a junior school student there I would not be trying her patience. For one thing I would be having too much fun learning how to sing!
But the day was, above and beyond anything else, incredibly humbling. It is obviously not the most well-off school in the Land of Opportunity, but that was not stopping any of these kids. I saw more bright smiling faces than at a fluoro party, and to see the background of some of the students it was amazing. I can say without any embarrassment I shed a tear or two at how brave some of these kids are. Westside Wildcats, rock on!
And then came the party...
[Events removed]
So the day after the party was incredibly difficult, and not just because of the hangover. After seeing so many great sights in America, we had finally met some even greater people. It was impossibly hard to leave them, and I know we will see each other again soon. You guys know who you are - if I start mentioning names I might cry again.
The next day we made our way to St Louis. It was a really pretty city which actually reminded me of Boston. It was here that we again found snow, which while nice we had come to the conclusion we were a little over. We took in a concert, which I will allow Sarah to explain - I know I won't do it justice. Apart from that we took in the world's biggest (and seemingly most useless) arch. I kept waiting for the other half to appear and the world's biggest Macca's to rise up out of the ground, but it never eventuated. We also took many more stupid photos, mostly centred around the statues of the St Louis Cardinals baseball team.
Following St Louis we achieved one of my lifelong dreams - we went through Springfield, USA. Now unfortunately there wasn't really anywhere to stop so I could take a photo next to the welcome sign, so hopefully we will find one of the other eighteen Springfields that seem to exist. We also lived out a "Friends" dream and spent some time in Tulsa.
Next on the agenda is Oklahoma City, where we hope the sunny weather will continue, and that Route 66 lives up to its reputation.
Until then... look after yourselves, xoxo
