A Euro Family Vacation

Guten Tag! We just completed our first ever family vacation to Europe! We, meaning the wife, Caitlyn, and I. And no, that wasn't a typo. Here are some of the winners and losers from our trip. 

WINNERS:

The Wang family. This trip probably wouldn't have happened if the sister-in-law and her family weren't living in Germany and hadn't offered us a place to stay. And I'm not going to lie. Being the lazy procrastinators that we are, barely any planning was done, so a big thanks goes out to them because this trip definitely wouldn't have gone as smoothly without all their help and guidance.

The grandparents. Three weeks alone with Hannah? No problem! Thanks to my parents for stepping up to the plate and offering to watch over Hannah for us. We contemplated for a long time whether or not to bring her. I felt pretty guilty, but can you really blame us for not taking her? Spend a day with "the Beast" and you'll understand. My parents have probably aged a couple of years, been traumatized for life, and will probably never offer to do this again, but at least they got to spend quality time with their granddaughter!

Disposable underwear. This is the first time I've used disposable underwear, and I am hooked! I don't like packing a lot of clothes when going on trips, but I do love the idea of coming back with less clothes than you brought. On a side note, I once went a month without changing underwear just to see what it'd be like. Not a good idea. I'm trying disposable socks next.

Winter weather. I've never liked the cold very much. Mainly because you have to wear so many layers of clothing, but I think winter and I have become a bit closer after this trip. Winter time is low season for tourists over there, which meant we barely had to wait in line for anything. I can only imagine what it's like in the summer. Not sweating from all the walking you have to do is another definite plus.

The Glockenspiel. I came, I saw, I heard. Now I can die a happy man.

$3.75 USD bottle of wine in Barcelona. Beer that's cheaper than water in Germany. Need I say more?

The late dining hours of Barcelona. They eat late, we eat early. Therefore, we never had to worry about waiting or reservations. That made it very easy to eat at some of the more popular places around town.

Snow. I'm from Texas, so you'll have to excuse me when I get a bit excited about seeing snow in any amount. It was also Caitlyn's first time!

Skiing in Austria. Given Caitlyn's very cautious nature, I wasn't sure how she'd take to skiing, but to my surprise, she was skiing like a champ after her first lesson. I think this was a huge confidence booster for her.

Heated flooring in the house. My feet have never been happier in sub-zero winter  weather.

Small Bavarian towns. They were basically exactly how I imagined they would be. Quaint, quiet, and clean.

Caitlyn's first tooth falls out. As to its whereabouts, all I can say is that it happened in a mall. I'm going to assume Caitlyn either ate it by accident or it fell on to the floor without her knowing. Either way, the tooth fairy has yet to visit her. No tooth, no tooth fairy, no money. That's a legitimate excuse, right?

Hannah's reaction when we came back. I'm sure you have seen those videos of dogs reuniting  with their owners who have been serving overseas in the military. There's excited jumping, running around, yipping and yapping, crying, and lots of hugs. That was basically Hannah when she finally saw us after three weeks. And in the midst of all of that, all she wanted to do was hold Caitlyn's hand. Super sweet. Super adorable.

LOSERS:

The flu. The wife purposely pulled Caitlyn out of school a few days earlier to make sure she wouldn’t get sick before our trip. So of course, what happens? She gets sick. Her fever was bad enough that we had to change our flight to a later date, which resulted in quite the hefty penalty.

Leg cramps. On the date of the changed flight, Caitlyn wakes up and starts crying about how her legs hurt and how she can't walk. She's practically hysterical. Naturally, this worries the wife, who starts to contemplate whether we should cancel the flight again. I'm guessing it's just an ordinary leg cramp, but I'm definitely not going to be the one who says that we should go on our trip only for her legs to get so bad that she needs to go to the hospital in another country where we don't have health insurance. Thankfully, the wife finally makes the decision that we should go. To think that we almost got thwarted by a leg cramp!

Paris. Ah yes. The City of Love. Unfortunately, I didn’t like it as much as I thought I would. With dirty, crumbling subway tunnels, graffiti everywhere, and pickpockets, I just never really felt safe there. Case in point, on the day right after we visited the Louvre, there was a man who was going around with machetes before being shot by the soldiers. You probably saw it on the news. Talk about a close call! But given that I didn't encounter any of the infamous rude attitudes of the Parisians that I'd heard so much about, I suppose that makes Paris somewhat of a winner. Plus, you really can't beat the Louvre or the D'Orsay.

Chinese tourists. Oh the horrors that I saw. All I can do is pray and hope that people don’t associate us with them. But given my skin and hair color, it’s hard not to. Therefore, any time I talked, I tried my best to enunciate and pronounce words as perfectly as I could so there could be no mistaking me for a Mainlander. Unfortunately, I think people just thought I was a Mainlander with good English. My next option might be to wear a shirt with an arrow that says, “Not with Them."

The fog. We make the trek to go visit Neuschwanstein Castle, and what are we greeted with when we get to the top? I'm not really sure cause we couldn't see a darn thing on account of the fog. Sigh. 

The food. All I kept hearing about before our trip was how awesome and amazing the food in Europe was. You can walk into any random restaurant, pick any random thing from the menu, and it'll be delicious. Now I'm no food critic. In fact, I just recently learned how to properly say bolognese, so take what I'm about to say with a grain of salt, but I was not impressed with the food. I'm not saying it was bad. It was good, but it wasn't "mind-blowing" as one online commenter said. Think what the Olympics would be like if judges handed out 10's willy-nilly. I've only had one thing in my life that I would consider a 10. That would be the BBQ that one of the teacher's husband at my
old school cooked up for a potluck. Now that was mind-blowing. 13 years ago, and I still think about it. Or maybe I was just really, really hungry that day.

 





















Different But Still The Same

In our household, my sister was always the smart, responsible, good-looking, sociable, artistic, good-at-everything sibling while I basically played second fiddle to her. She was the chosen one, the one who would go on to an Ivy League university and do great things while I would remain average and in mediocrity.

I remember how growing up, I always analogized it to the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie, Twins. In the movie, Danny DeVito comments how Arnold supposedly got all the good genes while he basically got the leftovers. I figured that my parents must have given my sister all the fresh, good genes, while I basically got the expired ones. I mean, how else do you explain the discrepancy between the two of us?

I mention this because Hannah is now about a year and 8 months old, and it's amazing how vastly different she is from Caitlyn when she was her age. It almost doesn't seem to be possible that they came from the same two people. They’re complete opposites like Arnold and Danny. But thankfully, in this case, Hannah didn’t get the leftovers. They both got the good stuff. Just different kinds of good stuff. Here are some of the ways the two of them differ:

Caitlyn never liked to drink her milk when she was a baby. Your fingernail probably grew a centimeter by the time she finished a bottle. From the start, Hannah could chug milk like a man chugs beer. We never needed to worry about her going hungry. Even now during meal time, Hannah probably eats just as much as Caitlyn even though she’s four years younger. It’s probably why she’s built like a tank.

Caitlyn has never developed a liking for stuffed animals, but Hannah has a little blue hippo named Harry that she will constantly carry around with her, especially when it’s time for bed. I was getting a bit worried for awhile as to whether or not there’d be someone to inherit my prized Beanie Baby collection.

At around three months, Caitlyn was already quite attached to her mommy and wouldn't let anyone else hold her, including me. Thankfully, I don't have to be rejected twice as Hannah is more open to letting others hold and play with her.

Hannah began running around at a year old. She somehow skipped over walking because she apparently only has one speed – fast. Caitlyn started walking over half a year later. In fact, we even had to take her to physical therapy to encourage her how to walk.

Hannah began speaking actual words around a year old and is quite good at verbalizing what she wants. Caitlyn was basically a mute until close to two years old, though she was always very observant and knew exactly what was going on or what was being said to her.

Caitlyn has always been a very cautious person. It takes a long time for her to build up the confidence to try something new. Hannah is as reckless as they come. She doesn’t seem to understand or care about the concept of danger. If we weren’t always there to catch her whenever she flings herself off the sofa, she’d probably be in a body cast by now.

Hannah puts everything in her mouth. Everything. Even things that she can't hold in her hands like the table or sofa still get a nice coating of her saliva. I always thought this was pretty normal baby behavior which is why I always found it strange that Caitlyn never put anything in her mouth.

Caitlyn loved her pacifier as a baby. If her pacifier fell out while she was asleep, she'd always wake up, and we'd have to quickly go to put it back in her mouth for her to fall back asleep. Hannah could care less about her pacifier. In fact, when she sees us bring it out, she knows it's time for her to go to sleep, and that's usually the last thing she wants to do.

Caitlyn never had much interest in TV until she got much older. On the other hand, Hannah turns from an active baby into a zombie when placed in front of the TV. Whenever she breaks into a tantrum over something and nothing can calm her down, all we have to do is say, "TV," and she will instantly stop crying, go and grab the remote, give it to us, run and sit on the sofa, and wait for us to turn it on. I'm still undecided about whether this is a good or bad thing.

Caitlyn has always been very gentle with her toys. In fact, I don't think she's ever broken one before. Those that were broken were done so by other children. Hannah, on the other hand, has made it a habit of trying to break, rip, and tear up anything she gets her hands on. In a way, I'm grateful for this because that means all those random toys that keep accumulating in our house have a reason to be thrown away.

I can already see the two of their futures shaping up. Caitlyn will be the intellect. Meticulous, cerebral, and patient. And Hannah will be the star athlete. Strong, fearless, and brash. Both different. But different in a good stuff kind of way. No leftovers over here.