eine überraschung (surprise!) in texas.
This was written at 5:00 pm in Germany on Friday but the post was delayed and automatically posted today due to ultimate surprise element circumstances.
I am so. so. so excited right now. In 10 hours and counting, I will head to the train station (yep, train’s at 3:30 am) to hop on mine train to Frankfurt Airport. I still have not packed. I have to run two errands. I have dinner plans. I just got my new visa yesterday. Busy does not begin to describe the past few days, but busy was good because it made the time fly.
Oh, and for all wondering, had the best goodbye dinner last night with Calerie and friends. We ate a disgusting amount of queso that I made from my Amsterdam purchases and laughed and laughed at Caleb’s inappropriate jokes and our conversations that could never leave the group. Our group dynamic will never change. But anyways, back to the surprise.
Welp, it is possible to get to the Frankfurt Airport from Karlsruhe in the middle of the night. My other options include leaving at 430 and arriving at 6:38, or leaving at 5:55 and arriving at 7:02, for a 7:55 boarding time. With weather concerns and train delays possible, those just aren’t viable options. So here I am further sleep depriving myself. Praise ye the Lord for sleeping pills (don’t get all concerned people, I only take them for these long haul flights because home girl cannot sleep sitting upright and cannot afford business class).
Holding it in has been insanely hard and I’ve totally broken and told a few friends (don’t y’all feel special?), but in the end the surprise is mainly for my mom and I know she’ll be surprised. She told my best friend’s mom she wasn’t even decorating our house this year since I wasn’t coming home, tear.
I really was not planning on coming home for Christmas, but when a flight came up that was $775 on United/Lufthansa so I could collect double miles AND it worked with my work schedule, I could not possibly miss the opportunity to scare the living daylights out of give a special Christmas gift to my mom. My life long buddy Cristen will pick me up from the airport, and from there we will figure out where my constantly-on-the-move-can’t-sit-still mother is located. Hopefully I can find a way to really catch her off guard.
The timing for surprising my friends was extra awesome as one of our friend’s family’s has a big Christmas party every year that we’ve attended since high school, and it happens to fall on the day of my arrival, so lots of my close friends will be there to surprise, too.
I feel weird writing this knowing it won’t be read until after the fact, but I’m too giddy right now not too write it out. I will be running completely on Sugar Free Red Bull upon my arrival, but these are the sacrifices you make when flying internationally and being determined to party the same night. I don’t know about y’all, but traveling East to West is way more difficult for me than West to East. Some people say the opposite, but I think the red-eye flight ordeal is ideal. If you can get a few hours of sleep on the plane, wake up and it’s the morning in Europe, fight your tired eyes the next day, and fall asleep at night, you’re back on schedule. Flying from Europe to the US I find myself waking up at strange hours of the night unable to fall back asleep for at least a couple days.
What’s more difficult for you? Flying North America to Europe or Europe to North America?
Have you ever randomly showed up and surprised anyone?
I’ll be reporting back on how operation überraschung (German word of the day – surpise) went down.
that is amazing!!! yaya have so much fun going home, how exciting!!
how exciting! hope all of your travel went well, and that your surprise went off without a hitch. I bet your mom was excited
There are some really good deals out there right now! I got an awesome deal for India next month. Can’t wait!
Ah stop it – I so considered going to India over Christmas instead of coming home, I really want to go!
I went home early for Thanksgiving one year to surprise my mom. Of course she screamed bloody murder on the phone because I scared her and it turned out she was on a conference call WITH HER BOSS, so she kind of wanted to kill me, but I think she was mostly happy.
Enjoy your time back in Texas!
haha tooo funny. My mom choked on her drink so I guess it’s a good thing she wasn’t eating
It was so fun to pull it off!
Can’t wait to hear how your surprise went!
Have fun back in Texas.
how cool! i want more than anything to make a surprise trip to the US. my family is too spread out for it to work though i think…blah.
and your chili can makes me want a frito pie. like now.
enjoy your trip!!!!!! ive been oh so absent from the blog lately (what’s new seriously?) but i am hoping to get better at time management skills in 2013. it is my resolution.
People definitely don’t realize how much time blogging consumes – sometimes I can’t believe how much time I dedicate to it, but then again I do love it (most of the time).
It was SUCH a fun surprise you should really try someday. I’m only staying in Houston so it makes it easier, but I actually told the out of town friends before so we could figure something out so they are coming in to visit. It was just a blast and made me way more excited about going home, too. I don’t think I would have been half as excited to go home without the surprise factor, getting way too settled in German life
Flying North America to Europe is more diificult for me
Hope you will have a great X-Mas time in US 
AH!! isn’t that the greatest ever?! I did the same thing my first year in Germany! My brother filmed the surprise and it has since become my favorite christmas film of all time
hahaha you went ALL out – love the video!
Awww, how fun!! You have to let us know how this surprise played out – I bet your mom was totally ecstatic!!
This is SO AWESOME!!! I couldn’t be happier for you right now!
And for me, flying to the States is way harder.
I’ve been waking up SO early every morning still and it’s been 4 days, woof. It’s been a blast, so glad I decided to make it a surprise!
I think for me flying from America to Germany is more confusing because I can never sleep in the plane. And then I stand there in Germany, it is early in the morning, I am tired but don’t want to mess up my day and have to stay awake until the evening.
Oh I never sleep well on the planes either but sleeping pills help me manage to get enough that I can stay up the whole day when I arrive in Germany. When I come back here, I always wake up SO early for a few mornings and then am oddly tired for a few days.
And have a wonderful time back home!!!
Very cool.
I find it harder to fly from North America to Europe, because you lose that day- I also have need longer to get my sleep back to normal coming this way; going to the US was easy by comparison.
I envy people who can sleep on planes, though… I am not one of them.