Come to think of it, it has been good 6 months that we went on a trip, not counting short weekend visits to our home in Belgium, but that is also BC (before confinement).
People have been dwelling about the movement restrictions, but I have to confess – I don’t mind it very much. It’s a bit of a taboo this subject, but there it is! For one reason, I grew up during the siege in Sarajevo and staying indoors and missing out on things was one of the lesser problems at the time. To put it in prospective, when it all started one of the first episodes of the iconic show Beverly Hills 90210 aired and by the time I got to see it again 4 years later, the cast went from teenagers to University freshmen with receding hair lines!! Also, only then I found out that they lost Kevin again in Home Alone 2 and Roger Murthaug was still too old for this s*** in Lethal Weapon 3. The thing about missing out is that you catch up really fast.

I got to admit going to Disneyland was kind of my idea. I saw Instagram accounts with influencers posing so bubbly with their off springs giving an impression – it’s so darn easy. What, of course, is not mentioned in those posts the long list of credits to the staffers they have to handle the little ones while parents are getting Instagram ready and most likely a grand parent or two to take over when they want some r&r. (I am not judging!)

What was not exaggerated was the look of the place— it was very cool! The attention to detail is amazing and whatever budget you had planned, well, double it because before we were unpacked in the hotel, my boy was covered in Spider-Man merchandise as if it had been vomited all over him and I bought a quarter of my salary worth of Christmas’s ornaments in the shop of the hotel lobby. That was only the entrance!

To get back to the subject, I was puzzled when my husband mentioned that after things go back to normal, we should take our kid back to Disneyland. I was listening in disbelief. I guess, that’s also about the time passing by, we tend to forget difficult things and remember only the good parts. Six months earlier we returned home from “the happiest place on the Earth” exhausted and both of us swore to never again. We ate at shifts in the reastaursnts, that is while one of us was trying to keep our three year old from tearing the place down, the other one was stuffing the food down his throat as if we were in the pie eating contests and the moments that he would actually join us at the table, the mess that we would leave behind in the amount of open sugar packets and spilled food, we tried to compensate with large tips and a silent promise never to return to the scene.

Steep prices are not a novelty. The whole concept of the Creator of Disneyland was to lure the upper middle class and rich to the park. In 1955 when he came up with the idea, amusement parks were dying in America and the only people who visited were immigrants and people of light pockets. Mr Disney was considered mad when he decided to open an amusement park 23 miles south of Los Angeles in the middle of nowhere. No public transport was passing there, so no person without a car could get to the place and if by some miracle they would manage, entry tickets and prices were so high that those of modest income could not afford it. However, advertisements ran on the TV a year before the park was opened created such a suspension that the place was flooded with cars just before it opened its gates for the very first time.

I read up on these little trivia before going and some of them proved to be very handy -like express tickets. Lines for the attraction seemed immobile and uncommonly resembling nonchalantly dropped garden hoses. I was a bit uncomfortable with the side looks that people were giving us while were jumping the line, but I learned from the mistakes of others who left without express pass and spent the most of their time queuing from one ride to the next. Best money ever spent!

Second best was a photography pass. I am not the most photogenic person in the world, actually I resemble to Chandler Bing trying to take the photo for the wedding announcement, but the snaps that we downloaded from the cloud, made me jump with joy! Only 30 minutes after being taken, pictures are available with a password. Only, one has to check photographers schedule in the Park, but believe you me, not hard to be for the end result. Somehow they gave me this dewy glow that I haven’t had since I traveled to Caribbean and humidity was so high that my skin looked so flawless but my hair resembled Diana Ross on a bad hair day!

Being there just a few hours before the big Halloween party, made things even more exiting. Many of the visitors went to great length with the costumes, so much that the officials had to put up the sign not to imposter the characters posing with the guests of the park. I felt bad for not giving a bit of thought and dressing up.

Taxed with the day of fun, my boy was catching zees before the fireworks were out.

With the suitcase full of souvenirs and our energy batteries hitting the last bar, we left on the third day.

The hotel was getting a  Christmas’s make over and we got to glance a big tree. There were some challenges, but all in all it was a beautiful memory and that is the business of life – acquisitions of memories. So, yes, it would be grand to go back again!

Stay safe and love you for stopping by!

FdL