December!?!? And still in the 80s : )

Greetings from Puerto Rico!!! Hope you all had a wonderful and filling Thanksgiving---filled with food and filled with thanks.

Tomorrow is December already!?!? What? How did that happen?

I apologize for going so long without updating. I can’t believe a whole month has already passed. The past month was filled with even more travels and even some visitors! I’ve had to learn to be flexible and patient with the way the University works down here (I’ll explain) and how to take charge, be organized and be a hostess.

At the end of last month we had an unscheduled “academic recess” ordered by the University President. Apparently, the janitorial and grounds keeping staff were threatening to strike and in order to prevent the actual strike from happening, the President called a recess to allow for negotiations. We didn’t have classes for a whole week. Two of those days, Mon Nov 3 and Tues Nov 4, were already scheduled due to days off for the elections. Anyway, we had a whole week off! Since there was already a scheduled long weekend, Cara and some of her friends (the same ones we went to the river with) had already been planning on making a trip to Culebra, a little island off of the main island’s east coast. I was invited to go with. We left Friday afternoon. It took us quite a while due to traffic and rain to get to Fajardo, the city on the east coast where the ferry departs from. Because we arrived a little late and because it was a long weekend, the afternoon cargo ferry (cargo so we could bring Cara’s car) was already full. We would have to wait until the 4am cargo ferry left…a whole 12 hours!! Ugh. Lets just say it was a long, frustrating, sticky, uncomfortable and sleepless night waiting in the guagua (pronounced: wah-wah, the Puerto Rican word for big cars/trucks). We were at the ferry dock by 2:30am ready to get in line and get on. We made it on and I was able to sleep a little on the ferry’s uncovered upper-deck. There was a nice, cool breeze and the stars were so amazing and clear. I think I saw about three shooting stars before I drifted off. We arrived to the port in Dewey, Culebra’s only town, a little before 6am. It was pretty much deserted. The friends that we were supposed to be traveling with had come over on the passenger ferry the night before and had already spent the night at a campground on Flamenco Beach. Now we just had to find the campground and find them. Cara had been to Culebra and to the campground once before and kind of knew the way. After turning around once, we knew we were on the right path and made it to the campground just as the sun was coming up. We couldn’t find our friends right away so we just went out and laid our towels down on the beach and took a nap. We were tired, stinky and needless to say, a little cranky. Shortly after we’d lain down, Rene came walking down the beach. He took us to the campsite and we set up our tent. Then I headed back to the beach with my towel to catch some more sleep. The campground is about twenty steps off of the beach, so I didn’t have to go very far. I laid my towel down on the most beautiful beach I had ever seen in my life and rested amongst the fresh breeze, the sound of the waves and the coolness of the morning air, untouched by the sun’s fierce rays. By 9am I was awake again and ready to enjoy the day on the small piece of paradise. All seven of us loaded up into the guagua and were in pursuit of a good snorkeling spot. We found exactly what we were looking for on Melones Beach. The coral and the fish and everything were absolutely amazing! We snorkeled for almost two hours and I didn’t get bored once. It was so exciting watching the coral wave at you, the schools of fish (BIG and small) scurry when they saw you coming, the lazy jelly-fish lounge near the surface and the small octopus act like a scardy cat in our presence. It really is a whole different world down there. I was so impressed and will forever remember that day of snorkeling. After that we had some snacks and drank some water and then headed to the next beach. We went to Zoni beach, which is on the north-eastern side of Culebra. I was too tired to swim anymore and just laid my towel down and was lulled to sleep. The others swam a bit and walked up and down the beach. We made it back to the campground just as the sun was setting. We washed off under the cistern, put on fresh clothes, plenty of bug spray (the mosquitoes were fierce) and headed into Dewey to find a real meal. We settled at Heather’s, a bar and pizzeria. The pizza we ordered (spinach, pineapple and froschetta cheese) was wonderful and hit the spot. We walked around the little town a bit more and were back at the campsite and snug in our tents by 10pm. The next day (Sunday) I was awake and on the beach by 7:30am and spent pretty much the whole day on Flamenco beach. I just couldn’t get over how beautiful it was. The water is roughly eight different shades of blue-green-turquoise. The sand is white and soft. The palm trees a pure green and the sky an endless blue. I swam, napped and walked around the little paradise. On Monday we were up and all packed by 5am. Since we were unable to make a reservation when we had come over on Saturday morning because we’d been told all of the Monday cargo ferries were full, we had to get into town to see if there would be room for us on the ferry to get back to the main land. It turned out there was room for us on the morning ferry AND room on the evening ferry. Cara really wanted one more day to explore, so we made a reservation for the 6pm ferry. We left the little town and headed back to the campground. Instead of parking ourselves on Flamenco beach we took a twenty minute hike up and over a little mountain to get to Carlos Rosario Beach---which was pretty much deserted and maybe ever more beautiful than Flamenco! The water on that beach is so crystal clear you feel like you’re in a pool. You can see your feet when you’re standing in water that is up to your neck. If you look underwater with goggles you can see for quite a distance. It was amazing. We soaked up the sun, swam amongst a school of friendly fish (they looked like angel fish) that came right up to us, shell hunted and snorkeled a bit. We made it back on the ferry and onto the mainland by 8:30pm. We were tired, well sunned (I’d never been so tan in my life!) and ready for a good nights sleep in a real bed. We drove to Guaynabo, a suburb of San Juan where we stayed at a friend’s house. Cara and I both slept sound.
We drove back across the main island to Mayaguez on Tuesday, Nov 4…Election Day both in the U.S. and in Puerto Rico. Puerto Ricans are politic crazy. People were nuts---out in the streets shouting for their favorite governor candidate, waving political flags out the car and honking—constantly. Meanwhile, Cara and I were very curious as to what things were looking like back in the US. Both of us had voted via absentee ballot three weeks prior and were anxiously awaiting any news. We made it back to Mayaguez just after dark. I took a shower, talked to my mom and Sean on the phone (I hadn’t had any service while in Culebra), applied aloe vera and went to bed. I woke up the next morning to numerous text messages and voicemails announcing that Sen. Barack Obama was our new President-elect!
Going back to classes after a whole week off was really hard. It had been so nice to travel and be lazy. Plus, November 7th marked three months since the semester had started. I’m used to getting ready to start taking finals when the three month mark arrives…here I still had another month of classes.
However, things went relatively fast because I was anticipating and planning for the arrival of my first visitor from home—my mom! I went and picked her up at the airport in San Juan late on Thursday November 13th. My friend, Raiza, came with me as she’s very familiar with the San Juan area. It was so wonderful to see a familiar face---especially my mom’s face! Its amazing how safe and comfortable you feel once you know your mom is there to make everything okay. We had a wonderful long weekend. She came back to Mayaguez and was able to see the apartment, accompany me to History class, meet the ladies in the exchange student office and meet some of my friends here. We spent Saturday night at a small hotel near San Sebastian, a small town up in the mountains. Our hotel had an amazing view over a man-made lake. Saturday we went to some different lakes up in the mountains. We took a boat ride across to a restaurant for lunch and then got back on the road and headed to San Juan. We spent Sunday night and Monday night at a guest house in Condado, a district of San Juan. We were about two blocks from the beach. On Monday we went to the Bacardi rum distillery and took a tour and spent time in Old San Juan. The distillery was very interesting and well presented. We shopped and shopped in Old San Juan. It was sad to drop my mom off at the airport on Tuesday morning and make the drive back to Mayaguez. Oh, that’s another thing---I drove in Puerto Rico which was a whole new experience in itself, and actually a bit fun. People here are crazy drivers…no blinkers, sometimes adhering to stop signs, slow at merging, quick to use their horns…crazy. But I was able to do it.
So it was back to classes after a nice visit with my mom. I’ll admit, I felt a bit lonely after having had her company, but I just had to keep in mind that Thanksgiving would come soon enough and then Sean would be here to visit. I was really wishing that it would be Thanksgiving right then. Hmmm….well, wishes come true!
The next day, Wednesday the 19th we didn’t have any classes in honor of a Puerto Rican holiday (Discovery Day or Invasion Day---the day that Columbus landed on Puerto Rico in 1493). I was talking to my mom on the phone when Sean’s mom, Lori, called. Since I’m not so good at doing the call-waiting thing I kept talking to my mom and decided to call Lori back when my mom and I were done. Then pretty soon Sean was calling me, but again I decided I’d call him back. Then my phone beeped that I had a voicemail from Sean’s mom. Then another beep telling me I had a text message from Sean. Okay, I thought, something is up. I said goodbye to my mom and called Sean right away. He told me he had some news…that his mom had accidentally bought his plane ticket for the wrong dates, a week early which meant he would be in Puerto Rico….the very next day! My wish came true! We were both excited but overwhelmed at the same time. I had to do some rearranging of reservations and he had to talk to some of his professors and get ready a whole week early. It was lucky his mom had checked her email that morning because the airline had sent her an email about checking-in for the flight and that was how she realized the mistake.
It was so wonderful to see Sean! We had an amazing weekend on the island. The weather wasn’t so nice, but we did make it to a beach and were able to swim a little bit. We also spent time in San Juan and on Saturday night, went to Fajardo to the Bioluminescent Bay. We took a kayaking tour and we both absolutely loved it. There are only five bioluminescent bays in the world; three of them are in Puerto Rico and with the others in Jamaica and Bahamas. The most basic explanation I can offer is that there are plankton (the organism the lowest on the food chain) in all bodies of water. In these five unique ecosystems the plankton are much like fireflies. Meaning, at night you can seem them as they light up. Unlike fireflies, however, they don’t just light up at random. These plankton light up when they sense movement. It is a defense mechanism for them. For example, shrimp eat these plankton. When a little shrimp is swimming through the water looking for food, the plankton lights up because of the movement, exposing the shrimp to fish (next on the food chain), which then see the shrimp because of the light and eats the shrimp—thus the plankton is safe. Its fascinating. We kayaked across the bay from shore, then through mangroves and into Laguna Grande. As we got further from shore and closer to the laguna the water was getting brighter and staying lit longer as we paddled. Each stroke glittered. When we put our hands in the water and wiggled our fingers the water sparkled. We were in awe. To read a little bit more on it go to: http://www.puertoricodaytrips.com/laguna-grande-fajardo-bio-bay/ and/or see something on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ux5RBHOJIK0&feature=related (at about the 1:30 min mark).
Our weekend together ended all too soon. Thursday-Sunday afternoon went way too fast. But it was refreshing for the both of us to get to spend time together on the beautiful island and it was so great for Sean to do some traveling and see a new part of the world. He loved hearing the Spanish and was continually asking me to translate signs, song lyrics and what people were saying. I didn’t mind one bit. It makes me so happy that he enjoyed seeing and experiencing a culture and country so different from the United States. We’re both looking forward to future travels and he even indicated that he’s interested in learning Spanish!
After another wonderful weekend it was back to classes again. It was another short week, however, as we had Thursday and Friday off for the Thanksgiving holiday. To celebrate Thanksgiving I went on a short trip with Cara and another friend, Pilo, a native Puerto Rican. We headed south-east and spent a night there at a really cheap (and mildly sketchy) guest house right on the beach—we could even hear the waves at night! It was really relaxing—spent time on the beach doing yoga, swimming, shell hunting and reading. For Thanksgiving dinner we had rice seasoned with curry and lentils cooked with eggplant, carrots and potatoes and a side of avocado. Both Cara and Pilo are vegetarians, so no turkey for me this year, but the rice and lentils were absolutely delicious! It was a great little trip and I was happy I got to see that part of the island. We drove along Route 901, a scenic drive along the coast. Absolutely gorgeous. I counted my blessings with ease.
This week of classes will mark the four month anniversary of the semester….its really getting long for me. Then the next week I have all of my finals (keep your fingers crossed) and hop on the plane to come back to MN! Classes have been going well; I’ve been getting mostly As and Bs on papers, projects and tests. Finals should be just fine.
I hope all is well back home---sending you warm and tropical thoughts!!
Thank you for reading—sorry it got a little long.
Take care
Chels