Airport Stress

In a perfect world, I would be in Costa Rica right now.  Unfortunately, airports always seem to have something going wrong.  As I type, I am sitting in Dallas- Forth Worth International Airport.  It is 2pm, and my flight isn't for another 2 and a half hours.  BUT, I am very very glad that I am getting to Costa Rica today.

You see....This morning, I got to the airport at 5:45am... 2 hours before my first flight.  When I got to the check in counter, I was informed that my first flight was delayed due to "crew rest."  I mean, really?  So anyways, this delay meant that I would not be able to catch my connection to Costa Rica.  The next thing out of the airline woman's mouth were the words, "The earliest we can get you there is tomorrow."  I almost freaked out right there.  Then, she started looking and came to the conclusion that the only way I could get there tonight was if I were to drive to Atlanta and catch a 5pm flight to Costa Rica.  I then called my uncle who lives in Atlanta to see if he could possibly take me to the airport so I could leave my car at his house.  Now, my uncle flies all the time for his job, so he got online and said that there were other options and that I shouldn't drive to Atlanta.

I basically stood around for an hour while my uncle talked to the airline folks on the phone.  Apparently he's much more forceful than I am, because he somehow managed to get me a flight out.  And here I am...in Dallas listening to horrible elevator music waiting for my next flight.  I wish I could say that my stress ended there, but I still had the problem of needing to inform my host mom of when to pick me up.  I was supposed to get into Costa Rica at 1:30pm...I will now be getting there around 7:30pm.  For some reason, the people at ISEP don't like for us to call our host families directly.  I tried and tried to get a response from the coordinators via email, but finally broke down and dialed the cell number of my host mother about an hour ago.  It was amazing to finally hear a voice on the other end of the line, but I was super nervous to try and speak in Spanish to her.  Fortunately, she knew enough English, and I knew enough Spanish to have a comprehensible conversation.  Anyway,  everything seems to be running smoothly now, and I hope that it will continue to do so for the rest of the day at least. :)