Card Tricks and Pick-Up Stix

Card Tricks and Pick-Up Stix
I think that would make a great song title.

Maybe I’ll write that song.

Sometimes when I’m writing a new blog entry I experience fleeting moments of awesomeness, and I think to myself, “Kristin, we should really work on harnessing that, get some of that down on paper.” It’s like I’m in class and I have a really insightful comment to contribute to a discussion and I’m sitting there with my hand raised, literally straining to be called on, waiting while other people get called on and then when it’s finally my turn, I’ve forgotten whatever that brilliant comment was that I was so excited to share…then the teacher inevitably says something to the effect of, “well you’ll remember and when you think of it…” *sigh*
So yeah, that just happened to me; I thought I had something awesome to write about but it turned out that it flew out my head as quickly as the idea had come to me. Typical.

So here we are, a captive audience and nothing to say. So I’ll just talk around in circles until I either remember my awesome blog entry idea or come up with another brilliant one. We could be here for a while…try to contain your excitement.

Some observations I’ve made recently:

There have been winged-ant sightings in my room… and I don’t like it. I don’t like ants in general…just the normal ones in my house have the audacity to crawl all over my dishes while they dry in the basket out at the Pila and I have 2 problems with that (1) that it sort of makes me feel like I need to wash my dishes again and (2) when I grab a pot from the drying rack and bring it inside to start boiling some water, a few ants somehow stowaway in the creases of the lid. This ultimately leads to me finding little ant corpses in my boiling water/pasta (that’s right, sometimes I don’t notice until the pasta’s already been boiled. Yum Yum).

Oh, and (3) I don’t notice when they are crawling on me until I actually see them because they’re so light that I barely feel them. For example, today I spilled maple syrup on my sandals (I made pancakes for lunch and I got carried away with my syrup drizzling…) well, I thought I cleaned it all off but, from the number of ants that I found crawling all over my foot, later this afternoon, it would appear I missed a spot…

Anyways…on to these ants with wings. I don’t like them- they hop around, it‘s creepy. They irk me even more than those daddy-long-leg spiders with wings…woof; don’t even get me started on those guys…
These flying ants, in addition to having both the quality of an ant AND a bug that flies, are abnormally large and when I smash them with my flyswatter their blood is red. I know, gross; well at least I should be thinking, “gross“…but instead I’m just curious as to whether at some point, that red blood that I‘m seeing, was once mine? Could these winged (pronounced: wing- ed in this particular instance) ants be the culprits behind my many recent bug bites?

More than likely it is just the handiwork of my old bloodsucking friends, mosquitoes, however for unknown reasons (perhaps they’re getting sneakier) I have not caught many of them in the act of biting me, so it is hard to be sure. *sigh* I digress…

Well that was a nice little vent/distraction… still haven’t remembered the idea that I intended to write about when I opened this document…but I guess that’s okay.

I’ve been trying to get away from television and movies and reconnect with music and reading lately…I suddenly realized that I should save some of my media for the rainy season so that I don’t go crazy when I’m stuck in-site due to landslides, tropical storms etc.

Right now I have a few new music play lists…one of them is entitled “it’s raining outside” and I’m thinking that maybe I should make one called, “the power’s out” where the sum total of the running times of all the songs is equal to my computer’s battery life… that could be a fun little afternoon.

If I was going to make a CD that was called, Kristin’s March/April most played, it would include:

1. Hot Air Balloon - Owl City
2. She Moves In Her Own Way- The Kooks
3. Uncharted - Sara Bareilles
4. City Love- John Mayer
5. Ooh La La- Faces
6. West Coast- Coconut Records
7. I Hate Everyone- Go Set Go
8. Cryin’ Won’t Help You Now- Ben Harper
9. Holdin’ On- Citizen Cope
10. Waiting on a Friend- Rolling Stones
11. Tailor Made- Colbie Caillat
12. Right As Rain- Adele

So yeah, I guess that’s the kind of mood I’ve been in.

So let’s talk about April, since apparently I don’t write blog entries with much frequency anymore.

April started off innocently enough with my Mid-Service Conference at the Office. We talked about our successes in our projects during our first year and about what our plans were for the following school-year. It was a nice opportunity for us to see what everyone else has been up to, especially since the Phase II Healthy Schools Project is relatively new. It was also some great motivation to step-up our game for this year. I was really impressed with some of the projects that people have been able to realize. I had to remind myself that I live far away and don’t have access to a lot of the same resources and that there is still time for our schools. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed thinking about how fast this school-year is passing; yikes!

After Mid-Service Conference I elected to stay for a week of Spanish Classes to brush up on my linguistic skills. I think that Spanish was really beneficial but, by the end of the week I felt like I couldn’t speak Spanish at all. All of the different conjugations of verbs were floating around in my brain and hadn’t really had time to settle into my toolbox yet. I think now I’m just starting to pepper the new things that I learned in to my everyday speech, if not entirely correctly at least I’m trying to use them.

During this week of Spanish the other gals who were taking classes and I decided to do a sunset hike of the Volcano, Pacaya. It was so weird to revisit the volcano a year later, after it had erupted. It looks completely different. I thought of when we hiked it the year before during training and how much my life has changed since then- my attitude, my grasp of the language etc. I was able to listen to our guide tell us things about the volcano that a year before I absently nodded my head to and didn’t understand at all, and this time I actually did understand; it was fantastic and made me feel like I’d accomplished something.

Pacaya- where the top used to be

I also had the opportunity to visit my host-family from training, it was really nice to see them. I brought with me some photos of all of us together from my Parents’ visit in December which they thoroughly enjoyed.
Then it was time to head back to site and I made it back just-in-time for the Teacher’s strike! Yay! I returned to site feeling anxious to get back to work only to find that I was the only one, that school would not be happening until the strike was resolved. So…I spent the next week walking around, reminding people of my existence. Every time I leave for a long weekend or a week at the office etc. people are inclined to think that I’ve left forever and gone back to the States. So, generally, when I get back from a little trip I like to make my rounds in town and say, “hi” to as many people as possible. I have a few key tiendas that I like to visit and then I play the rest off the cuff.

After a week of being back in-site and having nothing to do I was starting to feel weird about all of the time I had on my hands…and restless in my SPOTLESS apartment. So I would start my days with a workout video, Jillian Michaels is insane (how does she know when I’m starting to fatigue and “phone-in” my workout? It’s creepy, creepy Jillian), then usually bathe, apply a ton of sunscreen (it’s been the inferno here) and then leave my house to chat with people. On one such occasion it occurred to me that my memory sucks…and I need to do something to sharpen it. I ran into this guy in the market and he threw a, “Hello Miss Kristi” my way, so I turned around, recognizing him instantly (but unable to place from where) and assumed he was a teacher. I started babbling on about school and if he was anxious to get back to work to which he looked confused, we said goodbye, and went our separate ways. Later, at home, it dawned on me that he’s not a teacher at all, he’s the guy who brings me new tanks of propane…nice one Kristin!

I wonder how many times this has happened and I just haven’t noticed…probably a lot.

So if any of you have any ideas on how I can bring my memory back to it’s former glory (I think it was at it’s highest capacity during Alpha Phi Recruitment ‘06 and has since, steadily declined…) I’m open to ideas.

my kitchen in my really clean apartment...

After a week of being unproductive and appearing in need of attention to Tienda ladies everywhere Semana Santa (Holy Week) hit and any hope of productivity vanished. The Schools were on vacation but, I was informed that the strike would be over and that everyone would be returning to work the following week; I had something to look forward to, thank goodness. Feeling that I was allowed to be unproductive I became a recluse and lazed about my house, reading, listening to music, cooking and threw in the occasional workout/hike. Thursday and Friday were the biggest days here, like the previous year, there were alfombras (carpets) made out of beans, sand, flowers etc. covering the pavement, outlining the path in-between the big Catholic Church in the center of our town, to the other Church at the top of the hill. I didn’t end up going to watch the parade this year, it started to thunder and lightning and rain really hard so I elected to stay inside, figuring the alfombras would probably be ruined. I was told the following day by my landlord that the alfombras were ruined but that once the rain stopped people went back to work and fixed them into the night, finally ending at around three in the morning. *snap*

an alfombra

I have mixed feelings about celebrations like Semana Santa, Feria and Carnaval…for everyone from here it’s a really exciting time, all of their family is together, they are enjoying each other’s company and celebrating out with the rest of the town…but, for me, the experience is a little different. I like to go out and take in the festivities and say, “hello” to people I know, show my face a little but, I have to really choose my moments because with all of the celebration comes things that I don’t love. They usually bring people from out-of-town who don’t know me, drunk people at all hours of the day (but especially in the evenings), unwanted attention from both the aforementioned parties, and a lot of pressure to attend religious events. It’s kind of a bummer because no matter how many people I know or how good my Spanish is, I can never disappear in the crowd here, I stick out like a sore thumb (literally a head taller than the crowd…also, red-headed and pale…). So, I usually go out and try and make the most of the morning celebrations and then, if say, a thunderstorm hits during the late afternoon-evening festivities, I have zero qualms with staying-in and missing-out; it kind of feels like a get-out-of-jail-free card.

The church in our central park...pretty.

So I’ve made it to the end of April without having worked in the schools a single day…and yet, while each day dragged-on, I blinked and the whole month disappeared. Crazy.

As for the rest of this month, I am happy to report that school is back-on and I am filled with purpose again!
What’s next?

Bring on May!

I have planned a trip to visit Los Angeles in May to celebrate my 25^th birthday (it’s the 22^nd…write that down…) I am so excited to see KP, Bri, Liz, and Mere!

I hope this finds everyone healthy and happy (oh, and Happy Easter!)
　
Peace, Love & uncomfortable too-long hugs.