Return trip

We’re finally bidding adieu to Villa Coronado, after an excellent stay for 6 weeks. As we drove towards LA airport, I kept thinking of the wonderful time we had here. Maybe some day I’ll get to visit my first school again!

The travel was unusually good fun. Before boarding the flight while waiting at the gate, Mom n Dad started singing ‘If you’re happy and you know….’ to keep me entertained. Now, if I haven’t told you so already, let me tell you that I love this poem more than any other, and it always cheers me up. So as they sang the poem, I started following the actions of the poem….. ‘clap your hands’…’turn around’…. Now, before I could move to the third stanza, a 6-yr old boy standing nearby also started singing loudly. That excited me even more, and I started dancing even more rigorously. By the time the poem ended, everyone waiting at the gate was looking at me and smiling, and many were standing forming a semi-circle around me. I immediately became conscious and ran into my Mom’s arms.
The story doesn’t end here… incidentally that boy’s seat was just ahead of ours in the flight, and even though I’d had enough of the poem that day, he kept singing it during the flight as well… which seemed to really vex her mom!

We flew into DFW airport at Dallas, where Veer chacha (who I call Veer for simplicity) was on his way to pick us up. Even though he got late due to traffic, I had a terrific time at the airport, where I kept playing hide-n-seek with Mom n Dad for about an hour, using all the open space to run around.
Veer – amongst Dad’s closest friends since his grade 4th – is one of the sweetest guys you’ll ever meet! We immediately become friends, and over the next 3 days we had a great time playing together. But that night I was tired, and as soon as we reached his place, I met Shilpa, played a little and went to sleep.