Booking

It's odd, but one of the strangest, yet strangest for not being strange things that has happened to me here is that I now routinely research and book travel arrangements. That has never been a part of my life before this year--I was always either just traveling along with my parents, or else a broke college student with no realistic travel plans in the works--but now it is. And, as a result of my being in another country, it has become quite a regular part of my existence.

Today, I completed three separate bookings, for both flights and hotel rooms for myself and a friend. Whenever I got to Taipei, I either arrange things or (more often, honestly) work things out with Karina, and pay her back. The same goes for other travel around Taiwan; it usually involves myself and friends getting together and figuring out what we want and can afford to do, and then doing it. Whenever people come visit me--my mom in December and, looking forward, my friend Lindsey in March, and my brother Alex and sister-in-law Melanie in April, it's me who does the background research and preliminary booking for everyone involved. If I make it to Japan and Australia before heading back to the States, like I hope to, all the planning and paying will, obviously, fall to me.

It's obvious. And that's odd. After my entire lifetime of not being able to make these calls, I suddenly can, must, and do, without giving it a second thought. I am suddenly capable of planning entire weekends, throwing fistfuls of money (okay, not fistfuls, I'm actually not rich, after all) down for a plane ticket and somewhere to stay, with scarcely a flinch. It's self-determination to the utmost. And I love it. And also hate it.

I just spent a good two or three hours searching through hotels to stay at in Phi Phi for when Karina and I visit later this month. And I have to say, finding the right balance of price, niceness, availability, and non-scathing reviews is tough. Much respect for all of you who do it with even more variables, like "good for kids," or "allows pets" thrown in. It's the ultimate in uncertainty, and combing through pages and pages of information about rooms, or flights for that matter, is simply no fun. Booking sucks.

What doesn't suck, of course, is the fun that booking makes possible. Which is why it's become a regular part of my adult life thus far.