Home. What would you give to keep it? Your comfort? Your peace of mind? Your DNA? We chose to give all three of those things in order to get back to our home in China. We did all we could think of to prepare mentally and physically for the trip back home, yet at some point between sitting on the bio-containment plane and watching an adult pass out at a checkpoint I found myself second-guessing our decision. It was brutal for our family with young kids.

I should mention that this was the first flight of diplomats back to Guangzhou and the first family flight of diplomats back to China. There was one test group before us which had a few extremely courageous diplomats, but families were not allowed on that flight.

The trip was essentially divided into three legs: I. The Commercial Charter; II. The Bio-Containment Cargo Plane; and III. Testing. All of it took over 38 hours from door to door.

I. The Commercial Charter

As far as I was told, there were certain rules about when our plane was permitted to land in China, so instead of planning our trip from start time to finish time, the State Department planned it from finish time to start time. That meant we had to leave Washington D.C. at 1:30AM.

For other unknown reasons (maybe because the airport was closing?), we had to be at the airport three hours early. With an 11-month-old and a three-year-old we tried to get them to budge on the check-in time, but it was to no avail. We woke up our boys at 10:15pm in order to be at the airport at 10:30.

The entire trip followed the motto, “Hurry up and wait.” … except for the “hurry up” part. We did a lot of waiting. And three-year-olds do NOT like waiting. A followed his own motto and made it known to everyone in earshot. “Let’s go! Let’s go! Let’s go!”

His first horrendous meltdown happened at midnight as we were going through security. HE wanted to put everything in the bins and HE wanted to push it onto the conveyor belt. This normally wouldn’t be a big deal, but it was midnight and we were going through a big life change. I tried to grab him so he wouldn’t get his fingers stuck in the conveyor belt and he screamed and jumped backwards into a sign, nearly knocking it over. I tried to catch him but missed and scratched his face near his eye. He screamed harder. I walked away to take a breath.

This is only the beginning, I nervously thought. God, please help us or tell us to turn back now.

We finally made it through security and took the train to our gate where we found our colleagues and their families spread out across the hall. It was strange yet exciting to see everyone in this setting.

The boys ate another dinner while Jarek and I collected our courage. After maybe an hour we boarded the plane for the easiest, most predictable part of the journey: the fourteen-hour  flight.

The boys did amazingly well in the air. We turned the empty row in front of us into a bed for A and he got a few solid hours of sleep (thank you, Melatonin). T didn’t sleep much, but he also didn’t have too many screaming episodes. That’s about all you can ask for from a put-me-down-so-I-can-explore baby on a long flight.

As we neared the end of the flight, the butterflies in my stomach danced enthusiastically. The easy part of the trip was coming to a close. The next two legs of the journey were a mystery to everyone.

The plane landed in Seoul and we were again told to wait. I guess they wanted us to attempt social distancing as we exited the plane and entered a small waiting area in a back room of Incheon International Airport. Time was already a blur so I’m not sure how long we ended up waiting in that little area.

II. The Bio-containment Cargo Plane

My nerves turned to excitement once it finally became our turn to board the bus that would take us to the bio-containment cargo plane. I cannot post pictures of that plane here, but I will do my best to describe it because it was a surreal experience.

The entire inside of the plane was bare—no carpet, no overhead storage (or overhead anything for that matter), or traditional rows of seats. There weren’t any video screens or entertainment options anywhere. There were three outhouses bathrooms installed in the back of the plane. There weren’t any windows, which made it feel like we would barrel-roll to our doom at any moment. The door for passengers was located in the rear of the plane as the front was outfitted as a bio-containment unit with air-tight doors and a large black tarp to cover everything on the other side. If anyone tested positive for COVID after we landed in China, they would board this plane again and be flown directly back to the United States.  

Excitement was accompanied by stress as we were told to follow a list of rules written by the Chinese government. We had to stay in our assigned seats at all times, except to use the bathroom or grab a snack from the back of the plane. We were only allowed to use the bathroom assigned to us. Because there weren’t overhead bins, all our carry-on luggage was piled high and strapped down near the back of the plane. If there was something we wanted for the duration of that flight, we had to get it before take-off.

We waited on the tarmac in Seoul for three or four hours before we took off. A was content watching “How to Train Your Dragon” on his Kindle while eating goldfish. T was as wiggly as ever, and his 25 pound body seemed to gain five pounds with each passing hour.

The time in the air was uneventful. T pooped for the sixth time and, despite packing an entire backpack of diapers, I was actually worried about running out of them if we were stuck in the airport for more than 12 hours. Jarek won Husband of the Year and changed T in the muggy, claustrophobic toilet closet.

It was time to land. Dancing butterflies in my stomach turned to stinging bumblebees. I was worried for my children as I faced the unknown. But I remembered my answered prayers and knew that no matter how hard the next 14 (or so) hours would be, we would make it through.

After landing we waited in the plane for at least another hour. A fell asleep (finally) and T wailed as he attempted to fight off exhaustion. They finally started calling people off the plane.

Now the fun part, I thought sarcastically.

III. Testing

After gathering our belongings and our courage, we walked down the stairs to exit the bio-containment plane and board a bus. We were greeted by Chinese government officials, their CDC workers, and other Chinese volunteers, all of whom wore white hazmat suits and blue gloves. This is where it all went downhill.

A was doing okay until one of the Chinese workers came over and tried to put one of their masks on him. He was happy to wear his own Paw Patrol mask (courtesy of one of his best friends in DC) but had no interest in touching what the people in suits gave him. They informed us that he needed to wear their mask. We bribed and explained and did everything we could think of to get him to put it on, but it was to no avail. The more we tried, the more hysterical he became.

In the midst of his hysteria, another worker came over and told me that the baby (not even one year old) needed to wear a mask, too. So Jarek and I divided and failed to get either child to wear the provided masks. We were left with two screaming children.

Soon after this episode, a kind worker brought us to the front of the group to give us our forms. She thought it would be helpful to have us do everything first since we had the youngest baby. She handed us the forms and my heart dropped into my stomach. We had to give approval for all of us to be Covid tested. We explained that this must be a mistake; the State Department informed us before leaving that children and babies would not have to be tested.

“We were all tested prior to departure,” we told her. “How could our baby or toddler have contracted Covid-19 in the last 48 hours without either of us contracting it?” It didn’t matter. We had to test the littlest ones, too.

We waited in line to show our documents and get our temperatures checked. A boy in front of us threw up in his mask and left the line in tears. Another woman passed out and was unresponsive for a couple of minutes.

How on earth were we all going to make it through the next 12 hours?

A worker escorted us to a lower level of the airport that had been blocked off and turned into a make-shift testing center. We chose our words carefully and informed A that he would have to be tested. We told him that we were so sorry and we did everything we could. He completely lost it.

Medical workers gave us vials with our names on them (the tests were supposed to be anonymous) and we moved into a testing room where they separated us. I took T who was strapped to my chest and Jarek took a screaming A. They did both the nasal and throat swab… at the same time.

T took it like a champ and got over it pretty quickly. A wouldn’t let anyone near him. He kicked and screamed, setting the tone for every other child who came after us. I felt bad, but also recognized that this was completely out of our control. Unfortunately, it was much more difficult than just giving a shot. The throat swab had to get all the way to the back of the throat, meaning the subject had to comply by opening his mouth wide. Even pinning him down wasn’t enough to get the test.

After an hour of screaming and kicking, someone in charge came out and agreed to let A lick the cotton swab. He was kind enough to let me give the “test” myself. A saw the cotton swabs in my hand as I approached him and he began screaming harder at me. He was sitting on Jarek’s lap, but still managed to kick and hit me with all his might. I explained that all he needed to do was lick the swab, but by this point he was so far gone that even that simple act seemed deadly to him. Against his will, I was able to get the test they needed.

I could feel my face getting hot and tears coming to my eyes, but I pushed all that away and thanked the kind man for allowing A to do an easier version of the test.

We found a spot away from everyone else and helped A understand that it was all over (for now). We all took some deep breaths and kept going. The worst was behind us, we hoped.

We followed paper signs down the terminal to our designated lounge. We shared a large room with four other families with babies. We were to wait there for 12 to 24 hours until our test results came back. The babies took turns crying and waking each other up, so Jarek found a closet in the hall and tucked T in there so he could sleep. I lost track of how many hours straight the poor little guy had been awake.

I pushed two seats together to make a small bed and slept with A for a few hours there. That little bit of sleep helped me feel a million times better. Unless we somehow tested positive (which I knew we wouldn’t), the worst part was over.

A few hours later, we heard cheering coming from the terminal. Everyone on the flight tested negative. We could all go home. Many people shed tears as Chinese workers and American diplomats rejoiced together at the news.

We weren’t completely out of the woods even though we tested negative. We had a few more hours of waiting and bus rides. When we finally arrived at our building, we had to wait to be escorted by people in hazmat suits who took us to a service elevator to enter the building. It all seemed so silly. All I wanted was to be in my own home again.

The elevator doors opened and the familiar smell of our hallway brought back memories and feelings I didn’t know I had. My eyes flooded with water before we even reached our front door.

We opened the door and A immediately ran to his racetrack that he talked about for six months straight. It was a Christmas present that he only got to play with for a couple weeks before we were unexpectedly evacuated. Both boys were so much bigger than when we left. T crawled around the rug for the first time–he could only roll over when we left six months earlier. It was after midnight and we were all exhausted, but we got out the cars and played together. After all we had been through, it felt like heaven.

We knelt to our knees as a family and cried to our Heavenly Father in gratitude for bringing us home, protecting us, and keeping us together. It was over. We were home.