Thursday, August 27, 2009

Final Destination

Sorry I haven't written for almost a week now. The Internet here has been very slow and not allowing me onto my blog site.

Anyways, so what have we been up to?! Well, all of our stuff came 3 days ago and we got our car 2 days ago!! Yeah! It feels great to have our stuff!! When Aisha saw her toys and "Momma's car" she was more excited than I! She now loves going for rides in our car and for evening walks in her stroller!

We also got our apartment painted (hired someone to do the work because there wasn't enough time to do it ourselves). Tomorrow, we will go to the apartment and start putting things together! I can't wait to get my life back together!!!

Omar has his 3rd tooth coming in on the top left. He is also scooting himself around anywhere he wants and starting to babble BABABABABABA! Aisha is behaving much better with the threat of taking away her favorite bear and little more patience from Mom.


The title to my blog today is called "Final Destination" because I wanted to tell you all about the journey our belongings went through to get from Milwaukee, WI to it's final destination: Amman, Jordan!

We spent 2 weeks packing everything we own and not in the usual fashion. Usually, when one packs to move to a new home, they just throw everything in boxes and pack breakables a little more securely. Well, who knew how our stuff would be treated going across seas. So we packed everything in plastic bins and a few things in cardboard boxes. We fit things securely to make sure nothing would break on its journey. We wrapped our furniture in large plastic wrap (imagine large, heavy duty suran wrap). We threw blankets over our couch and mattresses. Lastly, we stored breakables like mirrors, glass from the coffee tables and our computer in our car after wrapping them all with bubble wrap and plastic wrap.

I have to mention the fact that we did all this with a 2 year old who wanted to 'help' by throwing everything in boxes or taking everything out of boxes. We also had a 3 month old who needed to be fed at least every 2 hours. In addition to them needing love and attention from Mom and Dad. Many times I thought about running away and never coming back as the 2 kids screamed and cried for attention at the same time and I was having mixed feelings about the move.

Packing our things was the first step, we then had to figure out a way to get our packed stuff on to the back of a semi-trailer. We didn't have any family in the area and had a few friends offer to help, but the timing didn't work. Although, thankfully we did have one of Yanal's friend who was able to help load our stuff. Then we posted an add on craigslist.com to hire a few helping hands. We had many many responses and called back 4 other men to help.

Next was figuring out how to get the heavy furniture and the car up on to the back end of a semi (6 feet in the air).......the company offered no ramp!....and no one rents ramps that is tall or sturdy enough to hold the car.....trust me I called everyone! So...now what?! Yanal and the other men lifted the things up to each other and we called a tow truck with a flat bed to put the car in the semi.

Lastly, we had to figure out how to organize everything inside the semi so that things would be most secure. Again, who knows how things will be traveling overseas! We were stressed about this, but were happy to find out the semi driver was a big help in this department! We had to pay him, but it was well worth the money for his insight!

Yeah! The semi was packed and off to Chicago. From Chicago the semi would load onto a train and head to the west coast. On the west coast our container was put on a cargo ship and went across the ocean. The ship made many stops along the way and eventually ended up in the Aquaba, Jordan port. This trip took around 2 months for our stuff to get from Milwaukee to Aquaba. From Aquaba port our stuff was to go through customs to check everything that was in the container is allowed in Jordan and then it was put on a semi truck again and brought to Amman, Jordan.

In Amman, our stuff had to go through Customs again and paperwork had to be filled. We had to bring our passports and all sorts of documentation had to be done to prove that it was going to the right people. Now we have everything sitting in our apartment, yet our car still needs one final piece of documentation for complete release...although it is in our possession.

Tomorrow, I will be opening our boxes and bins to find out how our things survived the trip! So far, I know that the plastic bins are mostly busted from the top and many of our things like the couch and the mattresses are very dirty despite the covering we tried to provide. I am hopeful that we will be able to clean everything and the bins look worse than they are. I am certain that some things are broken, but most things are hopfully just fine. I will find out tomorrow and let you know! Either way I am thankful that our things are here and will soon be a part of my life again!

4 comments:

  1. I am picturing all the empty plastic bins you will have soon...I bet Aisha will have fun with them. My kids had fun with our empty boxes when we unpacked!
    Linds

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hooray! Im so happy to hear that your things are there! I bet you are all thrilled. How cute that Aisha was excited to see everything. I wish I could watch her "help" you unpack things tomorrow. :-) Hopefully most things survived the move. I look forward to hearing more. Love and Miss, Sarah

    ReplyDelete
  3. It must have been interesting being inside that semi as it sailed it's way towards Jordon. Let's hope things come together for you all now that your things are there. I think Aisha is ready for home to be home too. She may have been feeling alittle lost and out of place. Now Aisha and Omar will have there own rooms and all their toys around them. There's no place like home. Wishing a very good day today.
    Love Auntie Sharee

    ReplyDelete
  4. I'm a faithful reader- and am learning new things here. Thanks for sharing your story! Love to the cutest kids ever,
    Alison (Jorgensen) Schroeder

    ReplyDelete