The trip that wasn't meant to be...

As I type this I was supposed to be in South Korea on a business trip. After planning, visa applications, and changing previsou plans, the trip ended up not happening. I would like to blame it not happening on FedEx but after all that happened it became quite obvious I wasn't meant to go at this time.

It all started a week ago Wednesday. My manager at work informed me that he'd like for the make the trip so I'll need to bring my passport to apply for the work visa tomorrow. That Thursday I brought in everything I needed, obtained a passport photo for the visa application, and filled out all paper work and FedEx'd overnight to Arlington, Virginia for processing. The plan was to get the visa back on Saturday and after the Falcons game gig I'd leave.

Friday morning I call the visa processing company to inquire about timing and they inform me that they never receieved the application. I then spend the bulk of that Friday calling FedEx trying to find the overnighted package. They couldn't say why it wasn't delivered, just that it wasn't going to happen that day. So the original plans to leave on Sunday after the gig were changed.

Monday morning I receive a call from FedEx stating they delivered the package. This would have been great had it not been a government holiday. Tuesday morning I called the visa processing place and they had received and were pushing through the system. We had an overnight rush for processing but 24 hours to process and 24 hours to process and return mean two different things. So it was a wait and see. The next flight out to South Korea was Wednesday afternoon. If I didn't make that flight the next flight out would be Friday. Wednesday morinng came and no visa arrived. At this point I realized the trip wasn't meant to be. I informed my management and said we can try again in a few weeks.

Thursday morning arrives, in comes my visa and I'm still here in the states. Maybe in a few weeks I'll get to update the map of visited places with South Korea.