Back to America!

After a week of much paperwork, running around, and stress in Dakar, last Friday night it was finally time for me to go to the airport, hop on a plane, and come home to the U.S.  I got lucky in that an American woman I'm friends with who works at the embassy in Dakar was flying to the U.S. the same night, so we went to the airport together.  Everyone there knows her because she flies so often, so she gets VIP treatment, not having to stand in lines with the masses.  And since I was with her, I got the VIP treatment too!  Someone came over and told me to give him my  passport and he would take care of everything, which he did.  It made the whole experience so much more survivable, especially since it was 3 am and I was exhausted.  The flight was fine, except that Delta's "dinner" meal (served at about 4 am Dakar time) was ham sandwiches.  On a flight from a country that is 95% Muslim!  A woman across the aisle from me complained, and the stewardess (or air hostess, or whatever you're supposed to call them) told her she should have ordered a special meal ahead of time.  That made me kind of mad.  On a flight from a Muslim country a non-pork meal should not be considered a special request!  I didn't specially request not to be served monkey eyeball soup, (a la Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom), but I was still be pretty shocked if they had served it on a flight to America, especially as the only meal option.

Okay, enough ranting about Delta's cultural insensitivity.  I'm back in America  now, and everything seems pretty normal, not too much culture shock, except: all the electronic noise! Heating fans, TVs, kitchen timers, phones ringing... sitting inside my friend's apartment, all these background noises that I would never have noticed before are making me feel like I am inside a bomb that's about to go off.  And it's very hard to concentrate.  I used to be an excellent multi-tasker, but now everything is distracting me so I can't pay attention to anything for more than half a second, so I can't keep up with conversations, and I am feeling lost and confused...  But I have confidence I will get used to all this again, and everything will be fine.  Inshallah!