The adventure begins....and it's not what you expect.

**Special note - this blog lets you into my thought processes and my perspective. There are some topics in this particular post that some family members might consider inflammatory. This is not my intent. My intent is to simply tell you my experiences from my perspective. Everyone has their own perspective, this is simply mine.

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Expectations are bad... mmm'k?

I had expected to see lots of sculptures through Europe

I had expected to fall in love with the Czech Republic

I had expected to be bored in England

I had expected to be friends with my brother at the end of this trip

None of these things happened.

I know that having expectations, especially of people, will cause disappointment. But I had hope and that caused me to have expectations.  

I never thought I'd would like to go to England. It's very much the same as the US, or so I thought.   But I lucked into a great experience and was able to couchsurf with someone who had previously done the Mongol Rally. Not only that, but he and his partner are generous, giving, and wonderful people - the sort i would classify as Burners.  (I need a new word for these type of people, because not all of them would go to Burning Man, but it's an easy word to use to describe those types of people that are artistic, selfless, independent, ... present).  Chris and Xanta live in a small village just 45 minutes west of London, right on the Thames river. While we were there, they took me to the local pubs and I got to meet some of the locals.  Including one night when Xanta and I cooked for many who were going to be in an upcoming wedding. This is when I fell in love with England.

Because I wanted to follow the real essence of the Mongol Rally - driving across 2 continents in a crap car, I was ok with whichever car my brother, Brad, had chosen. When he pulled up a classic Mini, I was thrilled. It wasn't until we started driving it that we realized how much was really wrong with the car. We were really going to struggle with this car on this trip and it became most apparent when, just after leaving, we had our first "breakdown".  In Belgium, it started to rain, so John turned on the windshield wipers and ... fling!  One of the wiper blades just flung off down the road.  We had talked about getting new blades, but because we didn't get the car until very last minute, these little things never got done.  So now we actually had an official breakdown.  We couldn't go on without the wiperblade, so we scouted throughout a small town in Belgium to find an autostore and our wipers. This, in addition to leaving last out of Goodwood (because we were trying to configure some sort of electrical hookup to charge our phones), caused us to be so far behind our plan that we needed to keep moving - no stops allowed.  So much for sculptures...

It was at the autostore that our team disintegrated.  The problems started when Brad and I were in England, before the Rally. I don't even remember what started the first fight, but we had a fight - one where we reverted into teenagers and yelled and talked over each other.  For some reason, this man, my brother whom I've never known, has this power over me to make me feel tiny...very, very tiny.  Insignificant. Unimportant. And that's where I was after that fight. I was emotionally spent and ready to be done with the trip that I've been dreaming about for a year.  (It doesn't help that the day before this fight, the manager I had hired to take care of my business while I was gone just up and quit - no notice).  I started researching flights home.  But, Xante, our host, helped us navigate a conversation enough so that we both agreed to stay on the same team and give this a shot.

Between there and the autostore, I tried to be patient.  I tried to keep my mouth closed.  I tried to ignore the growing pit in my stomach.  I can't say Brad's perspective on this time of the trip, but I hope that he'll write a blog on it or at least share his story in some way. (Brad, the offer is still open to publish anything you write regarding the Rally on this blog). When we got to the autostore, the last straw came when Brad wanted to buy a particular item and i asked him why. It started an argument that finally caused John to intervene. He didn't want to spend the rest of the trip listening to siblings fighting and I didn't want to spend the rest of the trip being dominated and bullied. The tension had to come to a head. The argument and subsequent discussions lasted hours and it came down to the result that Brad and I could not ride in a car together to Mongolia.  It would simply be miserable for all 3 of us. I offered to leave the car and ride with another team, but Brad and John talked and Brad decided to leave the team.

We were still hours away from Prague, so the next half day was excruciating. All of the Czech Republic was colored with the frustration of this (forced silent) drive. We arrived at the Mongol Rally party in Prague at 2 am and separated.  At this point, I still had hope that Brad and I would see each other along the Rally and work on finding some common ground. I had the expectation that we would continue to move forward and get to know each other. I spent some time getting to know some of the other teams, then realized I needed to have the car transferred out of Brad's name in order to cross the borders. I approached him with the registration papers to have him sign them and he decided to keep them. To get them back, he insisted that I reimburse him from the team funds on the spot.. at 4am in Prague. This is where things got worse. I won't go into the details, but it was a good 3 hours of me, in shock, trying to come up with the amount of money he demanded. Other teams got involved... one even offered to pay him the money themselves!  I ended up getting in touch with of my bank, making transfers and paying him off. It was then that I lost my older brother.

I had expected so much more from this man I didn't know. Now, two weeks later, I can see that I should have had no expectations. I didn't know him well enough to have hope, to expect something from him. The level of disappointment has been unprecedented in my life. I couldn't have changed the situation, but I could have changed how disappointed I would be in the end.  

The second John and I set off without Brad, the vibe in the car was completely changed. We get along well enough that 3 days into the trip, we were still happily high-fiving "Go 'Taters" each time the car started properly.  We did walk around Prague a bit, making it to a few sights.  While it would be weeks before I was healed enough from the experience to write about it (hence the delay in this post), I am constantly reminded by my mottos: "Be Present" and "Let it go".

The Mongol Rally continues... The Baked Potatoes continue marching on.... I continue on.  Only this time with fewer expectations.