Traveling is amazing. Traveling with loved ones is better.
I have a few friends who travel for work. A lot of times for one reason or another, they are not able to take their spouse or children, even if they wanted to. I even know people who work for airlines, who have these challenges. That’s why I made it a goal to overcome that challenge to show others to have the freedom so they can enjoy traveling with their family instead of traveling by themselves.
My wife Cassy and I have many experiences traveling. We share that joy with others like my brother. Last month, I traveled to the East coast with my wife and my brother. After a business event in Florida, we stopped by Pennsylvania for more business. On our way back home we decided to stop by New York.
It was my brother’s first time and we wanted to show him around.
We took a bus from Pennsylvania to New York and we stayed in Times Square. Our friend from Great Neck visited us and we went to China Town to have amazing Chinese food.
God and family comes first.
The next day, we took the free Staten Island Ferry to see the Statue of Liberty. Unfortunately, my brother wasn’t feeling well. He has hydrocephalus and I feared that his shunt was malfunctioning disrupting the drainage of fluid from his head. I don’t have any natural remedy for mechanical malfunction of a tube is installed in his body .
Later, that evening we took him to the Emergency Room. We spent the next couple days at NYU Langone Medical Center. Initially, the painkillers they prescribed wasn’t taking away the pain.
All the tests came back negative indicating that there was no infection or shunt flow. My father flew in from Tokyo to New York (Over 20 Hours!) to make sure everything was okay.
By the second day, he was recovering and his pain was manageable. They suspect a mild shunt obstruction and gave the option to do surgery. My brother opted to fly back to Hawaii as soon as possible.
The followup with his neurologist indicated that hopefully what happened during our time came and went. God worked several miracles that week. My brother whose pain levels was at a constant 6-7, peaking at 8-9, not being able to sleep for over 24+ hours, was able to get rest and get discharged on Thursday afternoon.
Fortunately, all of my family members are self employed. My father rearanged his schedule without asking a boss for approval and had the freedom to travel from Tokyo to New York. My wife and I was able to extend our stay in New York without fear of repercussions. We weren’t upset because God and family come first and we have many opportunities to travel.
We had Broadway tickets for Lion King on Wednesday, but rather than go, we decided to stay in the hospital. From my understanding, those tickets were forfeited, but I decided to check in at the box office to see if we can salvage anything. Without going to detail, I told the ticket agent that we had tickets for the night before and wasn’t able to attend as my brother was in the hospital. Without a word, he left to talk to his manager, he came back and told us that he normally doesn’t do this but he was giving us three replacement tickets for that night’s show.
He cautioned us that the seats will not be in the same area as we initially purchased. At that point, I was appreciative to receive anything. We were extremely thankful!
Another Miracle
Later on that night, we arrived at the show. We showed the usher our tickets, and to our surprise, the seats we got were BETTER than our original seats. I originally chose third row center from the front of the mezzanine. We were on the three seats aisle left side from the second row from the front of the mezzanine, which made it easy to get in and out. Miracles happen. Lion King was amazing!
The Lion King debuted in 1997, but it was our first time watching it almost 19 years later. We all enjoyed it. We highly recommend watching it, even if you saw the movie. We started our trip with Disney (Walt Disney World, Florida) and finished our trip with Disney.
I have to give a shout out to Delta Airlines. Delta handled the situation really well. It is another reason why we choose to fly Delta. We were originally scheduled to fly out on Thursday, but Cassy called the night before to change it to Friday. Due to the circumstances, we were able to change flights without penalty (only paying the difference in flights), my brother was able to change free of charge. All of this less than 24 hours away from the flight. We didn’t see snow throughout the trip.
The day we left New York, it snowed.
It was Cassy’s first time seeing snow fall outside in person.
There was a slight delay and we flew back to Hawaii safely. Travel Tip: if there is a delay that will interfere with your connecting flight, don’t wait to change your flight at the connecting airport. With the Delta app on your phone, you may be able to change your connecting flight free of charge. This is also confirms your seat. In the past, when I missed my connecting flight, I am often put on standby (which with a larger party may not be fun)
Time with your family is precious. I’d rather stay at home, if I wasn’t able to travel with my family. You enjoy the experiences when your loved ones are with you.
The good news is you don’t have to choose between family and travel. You can have both. We’ve helped a lot of people start essential oil businesses that are able to travel with their families.
