Hi.  It is with heavy hearts (and a great deal of heartburn–apparently a common side effect of food poisoning) that we announce that we are indeed aborting our disastrous trip and are going to head back home tomorrow.

When our kids were little, we used to read to them Berenstain Bear books, and one particularly resonates with me now–I think it was called Too Much Vacation.  I believe the premise was that they were all so excited about going on their family vacation; only to arrive to find that the “beautiful”cabin they rented was in reality a run down shack, etc. etc.—but at the end of the day they made the best of it.  Friends, family, we have really tried to make the best of it, you don’t even know the half of it. We tried hard to make jokes on the blog about what was happening to us, because if we didn’t, we would have cried instead. Everyday, after what was yet another crappy day, we woke up saying to each other, it will get better–it has to.  Here’s the thing, it hasn’t and in fact, it’s just getting worse.

We had such hopes and aspirations for this trip.  We were so excited to see this beautiful country while visiting places we had never been to before, and perhaps revisit places from our childhoods.  We knew from the beginning that it was going to be a challenge, a big one, but we did not imagine for one second that it would be as unbearable as it has been.  Tonight, we received a lovely and supportive email with inspirational words from the 20 year old daughter of an acquaintance of Ilan’s who simply said, please tell them to come home, rest, recover and then fly out to visit their grandchildren.  Her father added a wonderful old adage in the email–“it is better to have tried, than to never have tried at all.” We whole heartedly agree!! We are so grateful for your kind and caring words. Thank you.

The real takeaway from this for us–at least one of them—is the admiration we now have for all of those who have permanently left comfortable lives—-whether it was the early Americans who rode out into the frontier; or immigrants to our country; or refugees and displaced persons–every one of them had so much less than us, and they all had to start over, with nothing, and did so—they are our true heroes. Good night for now.