Life is Gouda

Under Construction

2010-09-14T12:11:00.000-07:00

I've decided that I need to do a re-vamp of this blog. I find that at times I'm unmotivated to post, because I feel like I need to be talking about all these great adventures and not necessarily all the things that are going on in my life. Most of the times these things are good, but sometimes they are not so good. But I need a way to get things off my chest or that are on my mind without the "fear" that people are going to worry about me.

One thing I've found, now that I moved to London to be with Angie, is that I need to change the way I communicate. She and I had become so reliant on our e-mails, that I got very good at telling her stories, telling her how I was feeling, what was going on in my life, etc. Now that we are both around each other, in person, we've both had to work on that and we're coming along quite well. However, I still miss that opportunity to get my thoughts written down. Since I'm not one to keep a journal (even though that's essentially what this is), I need to re-configure how I'm going to approach this whole blog thing.

My apologies to those who have been checking in on a regular basis to see the same post over and over again. But thank you for hanging in there and continuing to check. Many, many thanks to those handful of people who not only check in regularly, but consistently tell me to keep writing (you all know who you are). I sometimes feel like I'm writing specifically for you all.

Hopefully, with this Gouda re-boot, things will become more regular, more diverse, and more entertaining. How many times have I said something like that before? But THIS time I mean it.

Dalston!!!

2010-08-16T04:32:00.000-07:00

After two weeks of searching, Angie and I found a flat in Hackney (a borough of London) in an area called Dalston. Hunting for flats here is much different than finding apartments in US. Most flats in decent areas go off the market 1-3 days after going on the market. You have to be ready and primed to jump on the tube and rush off to see the small, over priced space that you are going to live in the next 6-12 months and have money in hand to give to the realtor to say that you are serious about the place.

We started poking around different areas when I visited in March/April, just to find an area we liked. We did that and as soon as we started seriously looking when I got here earlier this month, we quickly realized that cost of rent does not equal quality of flat.

The first area we looked at, without knowing much about London was Bethnal Green. It was a decent area, but something about the lack of green space turned us off from the area. Then we checked Wanstead, which we fell in love with. This is where we found out about flats going before they were even being posted online and the ones that were able to be viewed, were a bit cramped. We then tried Leyton and Leytonstone, which proved to be quite scary. One flat could have been used in a horror movie set, complete with a downstairs neighbor who was looking at us through a barely cracked open door (all I saw was an eyeball glaring at us).

After this, we went for a drive and found this huge green space called Victoria Park (apparently one of the larger public parks in the city). This was in Hackney and we fell in love with the area again, but also found that prices right around Victoria Park to be quite high. So we went back towards Leyton to an area called Stratford.

Stratford was nice and it's being built up for the 2012 Olympics. We found a really great house, yes - house, not flat, that was the perfect space, but something still didn't feel right about the area. We did tell the realtor that we were 90% on getting the place and he really liked us, so he said, go check out your last place for the day and call me back. I'll hold it for you without you putting the money down.

We really wanted to check out more of Hackney to see if we could find a little pocket that would be affordable and feel safe to be in. So we went to see the last place scheduled for the day. The flat was in such a great neighborhood - one that we would definitely feel comfortable in. But the flat was in the basement, decked out in late 60's/early 70's furniture (and not in a chic retro way either - more of an old and decrepit way), with a bed that had springs poking out, a couch that felt like it was made out of bricks, and a shower that was build under a slanted wall (meaning that the only way to shower would be to squat...the ENTIRE time). Oh, did I mention the teal toilet and bathtub? We had to say no, even though we loved the area.

But I recalled seeing this realtors name on another flat when I was poking around online, but never found the ad again. So I asked him about it. It was a bit on the high end of our price range, but nothing ventured nothing gained. As soon as we walked into this place, we were floored. It was perfect. It was a newly built, gated apartment complex. The area around it was bustling and felt positive and there were about 12 buses that stopped about 3 minutes from our flat so we would have many access points to other parts of the city.

The realtor claimed that he had someone coming for a second viewing (although we both felt that even though flats go quick that this was a ploy on his part) and that we should act quick if we like it. Considering that we loved the flat, loved the area, were fairly close to Victoria Park, and know how quick flats do get snatched up, ploy or not, we were ready to make the jump. So here it is...

These are all pictures from the realtors website, but it gives a good idea of what the place will be like. Oh, the bathroom is huge too.

Woo hoo!!!!

That's more like it

2010-08-13T06:34:00.000-07:00

Since I got to England about two weeks ago, it's been warm and sunny every day. Ok, maybe not sunny, but definitely warm. And hardly no rain. Until today. There has been a slight chill in the air and the rain has come off and on all day long, even a bit of small hail at one point.

But this forecast seems more like what I expected...

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes...

2010-08-12T11:29:00.000-07:00

Even though I have only lived abroad for two years (and really only began international travel about three years), I feel like I'm a fairly adept traveller. I feel as though I can go with the flow and adapt to the circumstances. Especially in a country that speaks English.

Now, I thought this same thing when I moved to Trinidad and I came into a major culture shock for the first few months. It was my first exposure to driving on the left side of the road, Caribbean English can be hard to decipher, especially when you aren't accustomed to the slang, and the everyday choices (ie - groceries) had some similarities, but for the most part was pretty different.

Moving to London, I was prepared for all of that. After all, I'm "experienced" right? Given, I'm more familiar with the slang after having a couple of British friends and students in Trinidad, the last two years, watching some British TV, and having visited London a number of times. So I was good there. However, my first into the Tesco (national grocery store chain), put me in my place right quick.

We started in the produce section and Angie started grabbing all of her regular, favorite goods. I picked up a mango here, some plums there, and that was about it. I was a little overwhelmed by the choices. I had no idea that there were so many different types of lettuce. In Trinidad we had Iceberg and cabbage. Then throw in all the options between organic and non-organic and it started to get to be a bit much. So I said, I'll just follow your lead and add on here and there. My way of getting out of making any decisions.

We moved along and when we got to the bread aisle, it was more than I could handle. Wheat, whole wheat, multi-grain, oats, different sizes of each one, and on top of all of that, you had to check expiration dates, because stuff is fresh over here. By the time we got to the aisle with snack bars, and various other boxed goods, my head was spinning. I almost felt like I was having a panic attack. I felt short of breath and I couldn't even figure out if I was looking at a brand name on the box or the name of whatever type of food it was. I just couldn't do it anymore and I had to throw in the towel.

Angie agreed and said she remembered how overwhelmed she was when she first went shopping there and her running around like an old pro and break-neck speeds (because who really wants to spend an afternoon at the grocery) didn't help my situation. She then took a step back and really took in the panicked look on my face and said, let's go check out. I felt like such a tool. Who freaks out at a grocery store?

The next few days Angie had to work so I was kind of on my own during the day. I did some stuff around the house (laundry, making dinner, etc.), looked for flats on the UK's version of Craig's List called Gumtree, and went downtown once to visit a friend from Trinidad who was visiting family here (she's now teaching in Kampala, Uganda - Hi Sam!). But then, in order to be able to drive Angie's car that is provided by her work, I had to take a driving induction class, where they basically see if I'll be a danger on the roads or if I can be trusted behind the wheel of an automobile without killing anyone or driving on the wrong side of the road.

All I heard about driving in England is how incredibly difficult the tests are - the written and the actual driving test. We have all been told that most people do not pass the first time. There are many differences that you will be graded on, besides the obvious of driving on the "proper" side of the road. For instance, you cannot cross your hands while driving or turning. You can check your blind spot, but cannot turn around when driving. This includes going in reverse - all checking needs to be done from your three mirrors.

And then there are the signs, paint and the roundabouts. There are more signs on the sides of these roads than I have ever seen. They have signs that tell you that you are 300 meters from the upcoming exit, then 200 meters, then 100 meters. But you don't know that is what they are telling you, because they are just slanted lines. The national speed limit is noted by a white sign with a black line through it. But you can't just remember that the national speed limit is 70. No, no. You have to know from this same sign, what the different speed limits are if you are on a dual carriage way, rural road, or motorway. You also have to determine what speed limit you need to drive in residential or urban settings by the street lights - not necessarily a posted speed limit.

The streets are also painted with loads of different markings as well. If there is a white zig-zag (like on Charlie Brown's shirt) you cannot park there. If there is a double yellow line, you cannot park there. But if there is no zig-zag and no double yellow line, you still might be cited because you may block the flow of traffic. There are arrows galore and there are giant triangles painted on the road to let you know that an intersection is coming up, in case you couldn't tell by the traffic and road crossing your path.

THEN there are the roundabouts. Oh my are there roundabouts. There are roundabouts that are as small as a painted circle in the middle of an intersection and roundabouts that are so big that they are as big as half a city block and have buildings built on them. There are roundabouts extending off of roundabouts and signs that look like something out of Pee Wee's Big Adventure (I'll try to get a picture of one sometime).

But it's not just the roundabouts, because in all honesty, they do keep traffic going. It's the supposed etiquette of the roundabouts. If you are turning at the first exit, you must be in the left lane with your left turn signal on. If you are going straight, the you don't have anything on and you stay in the left lane. If you are going "past 12:00", then you need to be in the right lane, with your right turn signal on and when you past the second to last exit before your desired exit, you need to get in the left lane and when you pass the exit prior to your desired exit, you need to make sure your left turn signal is on, and then you can exit. I swear there are rules to the rules just to have rules and it gets quite ridiculous, if you couldn't tell.

Fortunately, I have always kind of enjoyed driving and while I may not always follow the rules, I tend to know them. Angie warned me that when she went out for this driver's induction class, the instructor kept grabbing the steering wheel and moved her from one side of the lane to the other. She told me how incredibly stressful it was and at the end of her class, the instructor let out an exasperated sigh and told Angie that she would most certainly fail the exam, but they will let her drive for now.

When I got behind the wheel, I had a slight advantage because I was used to being on the left side of the road from driving in Trinidad. We drove for about 30 minutes and I asked a lot of questions as my instructor was telling me where to turn and what not. After the 30 minutes, we pulled into a retail garden center and he gave me a quick summary - I followed the cars a little close on the highway (he keeps about a 4-5 second rule for distance so he's a little extreme), but said on the whole, that I was a very competent driver and then asked me if I would like to go have tea. I thought that was nice, so I did, we chatted and he dropped me off at home.

Angie was a little perturbed by the difference in our experiences, but is now very happy to know that she can hand over the keys and not have to drive everywhere anymore. I guess I'm happy with that too.

I'm also happy that things are starting to get a bit more familiar for me now that I've been here a couple weeks. Hopefully the differences won't be as extreme, although I'm sure they will continue for months to come.

The big jump across the pond

2010-08-02T12:35:00.000-07:00

I've made it to England...finally! It's been a long time coming, a year in the planning as a matter of fact. Well, maybe not so much planning, but a lot of talking and a lot of throwing things out there and waiting for them to fall in place. A couple things have fallen into place and a few things are still up in the air. But this is not about that, let's instead talk about my journey and first experiences as a new "resident".

It began with a trip to O'Hare airport in Chicago. Angie and I were dropped off at Terminal 2 for Air Canada. We both flew Air Canada to Ottawa on different flights and then to London on different flights, but flying at the same time. We waited in line for about 30 minutes and finally got to the representative (no self check-in's for Air Canada). She looked at us perplexed and said:

"Oh, your flight is being operated by United, you need to go to Terminal 1. Have you really been waiting in line this whole time?"

"Yes we have."

"Oh jeez. I better check to see if anyone else is waiting for that flight too..."

So off we went to United, in Terminal 1. Fortunately it was only about a 3 minute walk and the representative for Air Canada gave us a push cart to load our bags on. We had two suitcases, a giant duffel bag, and to packed backpacks (carry-ons) filled with my stuff, Angie's roller derby gear, and her clothing from her 3 week vacation to the States.

At the United counter, we weigh our bags and (of course) they are over weight. The weight limit is 50 lbs and we had my duffel bag at 52.5 lbs, one suitcase (fairly large) at 60 lbs and the last suitcase (a normal carry-on sized suitcase) at 40 lbs. The charge for overweight bags is $200, regardless of how little or over the weight is. So we stepped aside to a counter where no one was at and started digging through the bags, weighing each item we removed and put it either into our carry ons or into the small carry-on sized suitcase. With my masterful skills, we got both overweight bags down to exactly 50 lbs and crammed that little carry-on sized bag up to about 45 lbs. These things were busting at the seams. I realize that this may all seem impertinent, but it comes back into play when you least expect it.

Anyway, we move back to the check-in counter and Angie asks if we can get on the same flight to Ottawa. Yes, but there will be a fee. (No thanks) We ask if we can get on the same flight from Ottawa to London, considering that both planes are leaving and arriving at the same time. Yes, but there will be a fee. (Again, no thanks) We check in and are off...

Angie is the first to fly. I get her on her plane and I kill about 2 hours until my flight. I hop on my plane and arrive to Ottawa to be greeted by a very nice, but very inquisitive immigration agent. He's asking me why I'm going to London. I'd like to say "What's it to you?" but decide to take the nice honest route and tell him that I'm going to meet my girlfriend who is living over there while I look for work. He then proceeds with the 3rd degree:

"What does your girlfriend do over there?"

"Is she American?"

"Do you know that you can't work on a visitor's visa?"

"Do you know the requirements to get a work visa?"

This goes on for a bit and I'm thinking...Holy crap! If this is what it's like to just pass through Canada, what's going to happen when I get to England? He eventually let's me pass and I meet up with Angie on the other side as my plane is getting ready to board. Not many planes were flying out of Ottawa at 10:30 PM in the international terminals. I ask her where her plane is boarding and she informs me that we are on the same plane. That my flight got merged with hers due to lack of seats being sold. Wait a minute!! Wasn't that lady at United going to charge me to get on the same plane with Angie? Whatever.

The flight is great. Sleeping pills work wonders on a red-eye flight. We arrive in London and proceed to English immigration counter. I'm starting to get nervous, but we decided that honesty is the best way to go. We tell the guy what the situation is (her working, me looking for work) and he says:

"You know you can't work on a visitor's visa. Just be sure you follow the proper procedures for getting a work visa and leave/re-enter the country properly if you do find work. Now be on your way."

??? I love the crack security in Canada for someone visiting England, but England is just like, "eh, whatever." Fine by me. And our adventure continues on the long tube ride from Heathrow to the connecting Central Line in London proper. Here is where it gets fun...

As we are heading up the escalator to get to the Central line, I'm pulling/pushing the large suitcase, carrying my backpack (nearly 50 lbs as well) and lugging the large duffel bag, while Angie leads the way with the heavy carry-on sized suitcase and her carry-on bags. As I approach the escalator, I try to get the suitcase on one of the steps straightaway. But I misjudged and it's balanced on the edge of the step above the step in front of me. So I try to slightly pull it back towards me, but apparently I pulled just a weeee bit too much. Being not so balanced with my heavy backpack and the heavy duffel slung over one shoulder, I proceed to fall over backwards, down the escalator. Fortunately there was no one directly behind me, because I fell down 2-3 steps. Two guys down the escalator a bit run up and help me get up asking if I was all right. I respond, "Yeah, I'm ok. Now that's not something you see every day." They didn't laugh. I felt (deservedly) like such an ass, I had to try to make light of it somehow. Maybe I should have told them a pirate joke.

We got to the top. A guy in front of me who grabbed the toppled suitcase hands it back to me and the guys behind me ask again if I'll be ok. "Yeah" I grumble and I catch up with Angie who is rushing to get to our train connection. We get there as people are piling in and I ask her if we can just wait a minute. She looks at me a bit perturbed but agrees and then looks down at the blood that I have streaming from the palm of my hand and yells, "What the hell happened to you?" Apparently she was the only one on the escalator who did not see what happened so I fill her in.

Fortunately, the rest of the travel was fairly uneventful. We got to Chelmsford (where we are staying for the next 3-4 weeks while we look for a flat closer to London) and proceeded to crash out for close to 14 hours.

Fusion 2010

2010-06-06T10:09:00.000-07:00

The tagline on Fusion's Facebook pages says, "When you cross the finish line, you'll know more about yourself!" This could not be put in any better words. This year, Fusion found us a year wiser, but they usurped us in what to expect, because this year was exponentially harder than last year.

Again, there were a number of us from the school who participated and we again were split into two teams. My former teammates, Charlie and Nick were in a team with a couple of our friends from Ultimate Frisbee, while I teamed up with Aaron, Katie and another friend of ours from Ultimate, Steve. Last year the two teams were unofficially dubbed "team fast" and "team fun". I was on "team fast", but due to my ankle injury earlier in the year, I told them that I could not participate in a competitive fashion because I thought that I might just be too gun shy to take the trails like I did last year, in fear of re-injuring myself after 6 some odd months of physical therapy. Fortunately for me, "team fun" welcomed me with open arms.

The race began at our favorite beach, Maracas, at 3:30 AM. The first leg of this three leg race required all four members to participate. We started at one end of the beach, had to race to the other end of the beach, gather a plastic bottle and cup and then run back to our team. At which point, another member took the cup back to the other end of the beach, filled it with red water and brought it back to fill up the bottle. It took us 3 cupfuls to fill up our bottle. After checking with an official, we were off into the bush with headlamps on, looking for red flags with reflective tape on them to guide us through the rain forest. I have run these forests before on hashes, but never in complete darkness.

The statistics for this leg were that we would be running about 6.5 miles and ascending 5,165 feet. The ground was wet and muddy and the humidity was thick. We all felt really good and strong for most of this leg. Fortunately, because it was before dawn, the real heat hadn't set in yet. Don't get me wrong, we were all soaked through and through with sweat, but as we knew, the worst was yet to come. For a good portion of this leg, we moved at a decent pace. We passed a few teams and a few other teams passed us.

At the approximate halfway mark, there was a short multiple choice test about Trinidad and the race. Each answer had different time penalties if skipped or marked incorrect, but we felt that we did very well with this. We never did check to see if we missed any at the final results, but I'm going to go on the belief that we were correct across the board. We continued on, climbing, running, scrambling...

At one point, there was a team gaining on us and feeling strong, we tried to hold them off. The sun had risen by this point and we were trucking along the trail. As we continued along, one guy in the back of the red teams pack yelled out, "Hey! Wait!!" Being at the back of our pack, I happened to stop and turn around along with the rest of his team. He pointed up to the right of a point we had just passed, and there was a large Gillette Fusion flag up on a hill by a house. I called out to my team, and we all turned around and followed them up the hill.

We were extremely fortunate that this team was on our tail. When in the heat of the race, you often focus solely on the team ahead of you (as Red was doing to us) and you could very easily miss a turn in the trail. We were very happy to get passed by these guys at this point as they potentially saved us a lot of time. We had friends on two other teams, and both fell into a similar trap of following the teams ahead of them. Once they realized that they were on the incorrect path, they had to turn around, get back to the main trail, and proceed - now being behind teams that were much slower than them. They both said that their detour cost them 25-30 minutes. I can only imagine how frustrating that must have been because not only did you extend your time, but passing on these trails is very difficult and can only be done every so often if you want to do it safely.

After following the red team, we came to our second mental challenge of the race, which was to decode a message. Not very difficult, but kind of time consuming. We handed in our sheet and continued on. At this point, we were starting to get a little tired and of course, this is when we had to climb an extremely steep and muddy hill and then back down that extremely steep and muddy hill. We had to take it slowly and we made it without incident, but we were certainly starting to feel the aches and pains of this first leg. Katie had twisted her ankle (after the first challenge, but can't remember if it were before or after the second challenge). All our knees were hurting a bit and hills never help sore knees. We finally saw the ocean through the brush, and knew that we were almost to the finish of this leg. Soon after, we cleared the brush and ran down a road for about 5-10 minutes to the finish line. After all of that, we were the 17th team (out of 59 teams) to cross the finish line.

It was now about 7:15 AM and the sun was up and you could start to feel the heat for the day coming on. We anticipated that the second leg of the race would be back up and over that same mountain range into Port of Spain. However, we found out that the next leg was to begin at 11:00, at the top of Lady Chancellor Road, which is a somewhat steep road that you will always see people walking/running/biking and that looks out over Port of Spain. Fortunately for us, John, one of the guys on Nick and Charlie's team, lived nearby there, so we all went over to his apartment and sat by the pool, rinsed off in showers and relaxed in the shade.

Before the race, my knee had been bothering me and as mentioned, I was worried about my ankle. My ankle was good, but my knee was a little sore. Katie and I had discussed that one of us would drive if this were a 3 person leg, which it ended up being. But now with her new ankle twist, I told her that I would go on this second leg with Aaron and Steve.

This second leg of the race was told to us as being 13 km (a little over 8 miles). I was feeling good as were were looking out over Port of Spain and because I had just run a 10k race in Tobago the weekend before. That ended up being a lot of false optimism.

The horn blew and we were off. We started down this steep road that branches off of Lady Chancellor Road and headed down into the valley below. Once we were in the valley, we hit a very, very brief flat spot and turned left. It was a hill, but I noticed that everyone stopped to walk. Usually on any given hill, there are some people trying to run or go up it fast. We followed their lead and started walking...and walking...and walking...

This was a hill like I have never climbed before. Granted it was all paved, but that did not account for the incline, heat and humidity. It felt like the longest hike I had ever been on. I was dogging it real bad. Finally, we reached the top. It was a beautiful view, until I realized what I was looking at. Here is a shot I took the day after the race.

I was looking down this hill, thinking the worst was over, but then I noticed something in the horizon. That road, just to the left of that big white house, had a whole mess of people walking up it. I was devastated. Not devastated like a losing a loved one, but I felt all motivation and inspiration leak from my being. But I struggled on. At least I had a momentary reprieve going downhill.

We continued on, passed the white house, but the hill didn't stop. I didn't know what was going on. How could we continue to be going up? This was all that I saw in front of me.

It may not look like much, but it was steep. It felt like we were going straight up. And as you can see, it looks like it goes up for ever. Now, after the fact, we realized what we were climbing. If you go back to the picture with the road and white house, we're actually climbing that hill that goes up to the left. Allllll the way up. And then up some more. I did some research after the race and where the house picture was taken was probably about 1/2 to 3/4 of a mile up this 2 mile road/hill. We went from probably just over sea level to 1500 feet in that 2 miles and were only at 525 feet where the house picture was taken. The incline was about 15º at one point up to about 25º at its maximum incline. To put this in perspective for those who watch NASCAR races, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway has it's corners banked at 9º and the Daytona International Speedway has corners banked at 31º.

On top of that, the tar on the road wasn't even. It was melted and almost like waves of tar dripping down the road. This could either be from the continued heat that is the Trinidad climate or it's because the incline was so steep that it couldn't set in an even fashion. Also, to give you a picture of the gradient of the road, as we were climbing up, a 4x4 truck drove past and its tires skipped as it was trying to climb the hill. When I drove up this road the next day, my little Yaris was whining and crying and giving it all she could. Her tires were also skipping as I tried to drive to the top.

Needless to say, it was intense. What little life I had left in me was sucked out. My heart was racing, I couldn't catch my breath, the 90ºF heat at noon time was beating down on us and I just felt like I couldn't go on. For most of this hike past the house in the picture, I kept thinking to myself, "Is there a way that I can quit without penalizing my team? Is there a way that I can call an official to take me back to the start without our team being disqualified?" All answers led to "no" and I forced myself to carry on.

We got to the top of the road and realized that we had to continue to go up, but now though a wet, muddy trail. We continued up and up. Aaron in the lead and me and Steve in tow. Steve was feeling very much the way I felt though most of this leg. Aaron on the other hand, has become an exercise machine and seemed barely winded. I know it was tough for him, but he did not feel it anywhere near the way that Steve and I did. Aaron even carried Steve's hydration pack for a short while as Steve was recouping on the trail.

We managed to get to the top of the hill at last and started a short decline, which quickly came to a halt. We found ourselves at our first mental challenge for this leg. I didn't know how we were going to to, but we sat down on the road and dug in. This particular challenge was doing "deltoids", which are puzzles like: 52CIAD and you had to decode it to 52 Cards In A Deck. The best part of this challenge is that every one we got correct took 4 minutes off our time as opposed to penalties for getting them wrong. We sat there for about 15 minutes or so working on this challenge and got around 20 of them. We felt like we got the ones we could, have now made up the time we lost for the slow trudge up the hill, and moved on.

The rest was actually exactly what we needed. We were now going downhill and hitting some flats. We were actually running at a number of points as well. We passed a few teams, had to cross some river beds and ravines using ropes that were set up for us, and just continued to move as fast as our bodies would allow - which may not be as fast as normal. But all things considered, we were doing quite well.

We hit the final stretch, which I recognized from hiking Lady Chancellor Hill before and we turned on the speed as best we could to finish strong. At this point, my right foot cramped up and it felt like my toes were curling under my foot. Not a good feeling, but again, I muscled through and we finished strong. We now had another 90 minutes or so to kill until the last leg began. So we all went back to John's apartment again.

After more resting, showing and eating, we headed back to the savannah for the final 5k. The same run around the savannah to the port authority that we ran last year. We found out we were in 18th place and we also found out that Nick and Charlie's team were in 1st place. We knew that they were hovering around 4th again after the first leg and finishing kind of strong on the second leg, but we didn't expect this. Apparently, at that mental challenge on the second leg, they answered more than the other leading teams and it shot them to first!

Like last year, our whole team decided to run the final leg under the feelings that we started as a team and we're going to end as a team. Steve was still struggling and Aaron was still strong. Katie was doing well keeping up with Aaron as she was able to rest for the second leg (and her ankle was feeling a little better) and I was somewhere in the middle. I felt like I could have kept up with Aaron and Katie, but I held back with Steve to encourage him on. He was feeling bad for going slow, but I was there to reassure him that we ALL decided to do the race as a challenge to ourselves, and not to compete and win. Considering that the longest race he has ever done was a sprint triathlon (approximately 1.5 hours long), this was something that he (and any of us) really expected.

We carried on. We met up with Aaron and Katie towards the end of the race and we all crossed the finish line together, just as we wanted. Our overall place was 18th and we finished in 6:27:06 over the course of this 15-16 hour race. And as it turned out, Nick and Charlie's team took 2nd place. The other two teams behind them came out strong and John was tanking really hard on the final 5k. He gave everything he could and they were actually worried that he wasn't going to make it all the way to the finish line. The made second place by 44 seconds. Another close one, just like our finish last year.

Looking back on the race, I think I can say that this was the most difficult race that I have every participated in. Harder than my first marathon. Harder than my second marathon that was cancelled and turned into a "fun run" due to extreme heat (which looking back was equivalent to the heat that I did this race in). And much, much harder than last year's Fusion race. But the thing that I will take away, the same thing that I took away from each of those previous races that seemed to get progressively harder and harder; if I can put my mind to something, I will get through it. It may not be pretty. It may not be the fastest and it may not be as strong a finish as I would like. But I will make it through.

Fusion has definitely taught me a lot of things and I do know more about myself. I am grateful to be able to have participated in these races the last two years and it will be one of the biggest things that I will miss when I leave Trinidad.

Leatherback Turtles at Grande Riviere

2010-05-16T11:04:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I went to the NE corner of Trinidad to an area called Grande Riviere to watch the leatherback turtles lay their eggs. This is one of the last things that I felt like I had to experience before moving from Trinidad.

Leatherback turtles are pretty amazing creatures. They have to be the closest thing to dinosaurs left on earth. They measure from 1 -3 meters long, about 2-3 feet tall, and about 3-4 feet across. They can also reach about 800-1200 pounds. I realize that I'm math teacher mixing measurement units - deal with it.

Here's the story of how these turtles lay their eggs...

When the sun sets and darkness falls across the beach, these massive creatures come out of the ocean, back to the very beach that they were born. When the eggs hatch, the hatchling turtles dig out of the sand and by the touch and smell of the sand, they know where they were born.

They find the beach by following the moonlight. This sometimes causes problems with hotels on the beach, because the turtles think the lights from the hotel are the moon. Apparently the turtles do not see (or are not effected) by red lights, so all the lights outside our hotel were red. Also the tour guides from the Trinidad Forestry Division have red head lamps to show you around at night. Most of my pictures were taken after dawn, when the last stragglers were on the beach.

After finding a spot that they feel is suitable, they start digging a hole with their back flippers. These flippers take out about 2 tablespoons of sand at a time. They go back and forth with each flipper, digging and digging, until they get a hole about 2 feet deep.

After they feel the hole is deep enough, they lay their eggs. They lay about 70 eggs and do this every 2-3 years after they mature. It takes about 15 years for the turtles to mature, and they can live to about 80-100 years old. About a third of the eggs that they lay (the last third) are infertile eggs. They do this because after the eggs are laid, they bury them with the sand and then compact it with their hind flippers. These infertile eggs act as a buffer to the fertilized eggs in case the sand crushes the eggs or if they get dug up by stray dogs, other turtles, birds, etc. While they are laying their eggs, the turtles go into a trance and this is when white light does not effect them and also when the Forestry Division will tag the turtle for data tracking and conservation purposes.

The picture above is the only picture in this series that was taken at night.

After the eggs are covered up by the hind flippers, the turtle then takes its front flippers and starts swooping back the sand around it to cover up and camouflage the nest. The span of these front flippers are about 6-7 feet when fully outstretched.

Once the turtle feels the nest is fully camouflaged, they head back into the ocean. The whole nesting process generally takes around 45-60 minutes. Although one that we watched at night was up for about 2 hours. She was really big and we guessed that she was a little more experienced with the process, so she was a little more careful about making sure her eggs aren't dug up by predators.

Look at that. Doesn't it look like some kind of ancient dinosaur? So cool.

Some other interesting things we learned about these leatherback turtles is that they have some of the softest shells of all sea turtles. This is because their defense against predators in the ocean (sharks, whales, boats, etc.) is to dive to extreme depths in a short amount of time. They can descend to 100 meters in 6-7 seconds. This is close to the length of a football field, including 1 end zone.

Being a diver now, I can attest to the pressure that can be exerted if proper measures are not taken to equalize when you descend. If the turtles did not have a softer shell, the pressure of the depth would crush their shells.

This had to be one of the coolest things that I've been able to experience while living here. And it was also kind of cool that we were there on Mother's Day.

J'ouvert!!!

2010-03-06T21:19:00.000-08:00

Well, I guess I should know better than to promise a blog update "in a few days" or at any time. Seems consistency with this thing is not my strong suit. Although I'm trying to get better. Anyway...

J'ouvert!! J'ouvert (pronounced joo-vay) occurs the night before Carnival Monday. Well, actually it begins on Carnival Monday at about 2 AM. You still sign up for different bands like you do for Carnival and you still follow around a series of huge flat-bed trucks; one filled with a dj and speakers, one filled with a pan band, and numerous drink trucks. The music is still deafening and people are still jumping and dancing (chipping and wining) in the streets.

The thing that differentiates J'ouvert from Carnival (which is also called "pretty mas" because everyone dresses up in their fancy outfits), other than the partying from 2 AM until 8 AM, is that you are covered in...something. Some bands use paint, some use mud, some use oil. The band that me and my friends played was called the Hard Wining Devils, or more aptly called, Cocoa Devils. Yes, we were covered in cocoa.

Me, Katie and Aaron - sporting our new look for evening. Aaron is doing his best Blue Steel.

As the morning progresses and as you wind through the streets of Port of Spain, you often come across another band. Sometimes there is room to pass along both sides of the street, but often one band waits while the other passes. But what is certain to occur whether you are passing or waiting, is that the substance of choice from the different bands get passed back and forth between each band. And as you can see below, people get pretty colorful.

Me, Nick & Gina, Ginger, Meredith and a two of N&G's friends who came down from Canada for Carnival.

With all this splashing of mud, cocoa, paint, etc., one has to think ahead a bit. If you have ever spent time in Port of Spain around Carnival, you'll see nicely painted walls with paint smears on it and big splotches on the streets and sidewalks. And if you're not careful where you park, your car might get hit a bit too. Here's a couple that I saw as I was driving home.

My car was on a side street, so I escaped unscathed. Although I did find some cocoa on my seat when I went out later that day. Oh, and I've been told that with a 2-3 good washes, most cars come clean.

After the night of revelry, everyone heads back home. Some to clean up and immediately head back out for Carnival Monday. Some, like myself, clean up and go to bed. I can't even begin to say how much fun this was. Even though I did not play pretty mas, I am very happy that I have this to take away from Carnival this year. It was a most incredible experience!

I have found a number of ways in Trinidad that when the adults play, they still get the pleasures of being a kid and don't mind getting messy. It's such a great feeling!!

Carnival Tuesday 2010: Part 2

2010-02-20T05:10:00.000-08:00

As I was going through pictures with some friends last night, I realized that I missed one of the most surprising costumes that I saw out on the road...

Can you believe that they walked around the streets of Trinidad, in 90+ degree temperatures? That's insane!! But how cool are those costumes?

Here are a few more pictures and costumes that I like that I thought I would throw out here since I wanted to add the Trini Revelers (the mas camp above). Enjoy!

These guys weren't in any mas camp (which is short of masquerade camp if I didn't already mention that somewhere), but I always think people who can do stuff like this are pretty cool.

Next up should be either J'ouvert or Kings & Queens. Stay tuned...

Carnival Tuesday 2010

2010-02-16T15:46:00.000-08:00

Wow! It has proven to me to be much more difficult to keep this blog maintained than I had anticipated this year. As previously mentioned, I have had a much more difficult workload and on top of that, I've been looking for a new job as my contract is up in June. But that is all a discussion for another time. Today we are here to celebrate Carnival!!!!

Carnival is an experience that can only be experienced in person. The excitement, the energy, the parties (called fetes)...I can try to explain to you or show you in pictures. But really, to truly understand, you need to live it.

This year, I was going to play Carnival (buy a costume and "chip" all around Port of Spain), but at the last minute I decided to not actively participate, but to rather try to document it a bit. I bought a new camera over our winter holiday, and I was itching to use it. So the following posts will be things that I saw or experienced during Carnival season this year. They necessarily be in chronological order, but I will do my best to get everything out there. I would go in sequential order, but that would mean that it would take me a while to get these pictures up, and I know there are people out there who are anxious to see them.

So without further ado, here is a handful of pictures I took of various bands...

Here is the littlest masquerader I saw along the parade route.

And now we have reached the "end" of the picture show.

J'ouvert and Kings & Queens pictures will be along in the coming days. I promise.

My goodness it's been a while.

2009-11-16T19:05:00.000-08:00

I guess it's been a good 4 months since I last posted. Holy smokes! Where has the time gone? Well, not much has happened, but at the same time, quite a bit has happened.

In the category of not much happening...In my last post (back in August), I was training for Coast 2 Coast, an adventure race that consisted of running, biking and kayaking across the entire northern coast of Trinidad. I was in a 3 man team where I was going to be doing the running legs of the race. However, during the training, I was out on one of the trails that I would be running in during the actual race, and as I was coming down off a rock that was in the middle of the trail as we were going downhill. I jumped down at a slight angle to try to slow myself down and some rocks under foot came loose as I landed and I sprained my ankle pretty bad.

It was swollen for a little over a week or so and I finally went to an orthopedic doctor who took some x-rays of it. He confirmed that it wasn't broken, but it was a Type II sprain. I don't know what that means, but there there are only three types of sprain and I was in the middle. Ultimately, I had to start going to rehab and here I am, 3 months later, still with a swollen ankle and still going to rehab to try to rebuild my ankle strength.

The byproduct of this sprain has meant no ultimate frisbee, no hashing, no running (or training for the half and full marathons down here in Trinidad), no yoga, no hiking, etc. etc. etc. My days have been quite inactive, although I am slowly able to start running on a treadmill now. I'm still in physical therapy and expect to not be fully back to into all of my activities until after Christmas (at the earliest) and most likely later than that.

So what has been keeping me busy is my class load. This year I am teaching two new classes: Pre-Calculus and AP Statistics. Pre-Calculus thus far hasn't been too bad, but in the coming month or two, we will be getting into topics that I was never very fond of when I was in school. So this will be quite the challenge for me, to re-learn it and be able to make it more engaging for my students than it was for me when I was in school. AP Statistics is a very in depth statistics class, and I have been told is more in depth than most college introductory statistics classes. This too has topics that I haven't taught before, but I am really enjoying teaching this class as I find it incredibly applicable to every day life. Don't get me wrong, I also enjoy teaching my other classes as well. I think AP Stats just offers unique content and a unique challenge for me. So it stands out as far as topics and research.

The other thing that has been keeping me busy the last few months is organizing and sorting out my resume and job search. My contract is up this year so I had to get all of this together. I never planned on trying to extend my contract here. As a matter of fact, I had intended to go to some South American schools for a few years, then jump over to Europe (hopefully the UK), and then possibly head back to the states. But some of these plans changed in the last 4 months as well.

As it turns out, when I was back home this summer, Angie and I spent a little time together (and I mean a little - something like 2-3 days). And through the course of those 2-3 days and numerous phone calls and e-mails, we realized that we needed to try to move this relationship forward instead of continuing to put it on hold. So now my plans (and job searches) are focused on England. Angie just started a 3 year contract doing social work in Essex County in England, which is just outside of northeast London. I'll be trying to get into one of the international schools in England. But if that doesn't work out, I'll look to get into one of the local schools. Fortunately for me, there is a shortage of maths teachers in England right now and we are in high demand. So hopefully the job search will be a short and prosperous one. I knew that getting a maths teaching certificate was going to be useful in finding jobs. Here's one time that I actually had some good foresight.

So that's a quick nutshell of what I've been up to. Sorry for those faithful followers of my Gouda Life and who have been really bugging me to update my blog (you three know who you are) and all those other people who also check my blog regularly but haven't been as vocal to me to update. I am hopeful now that I have broken my dry spell of not writing that I will get back into the groove again. We'll see though. It's hard to write and post things when I'm not actively participating in them (Coast 2 Coast, half-marathons, etc.) but rather supporting my friends in them.

Anyway, that's about it for now. Be on the lookout for pictures and stories from my trip to the Bahamas for Thanksgiving. If you don't hear from me before then, you will definitely hear from me when I get back from that.

Oropuche and Pitch Lake

2009-08-08T03:23:00.000-07:00

As I mentioned, I've been doing a little swimming and snorkeling since I got back to Trinidad (as well as running, hiking, yoga, and ultimate frisbee). Aaron, Katie, myself, and a few other folks from school are also training for this event called Coast to Coast. Coast to Coast is where individuals or teams, Aaron and I are a team, run, bike and kayak across the entire northern coast of Trinidad (more about that in a later post).

Neither of us have really done much kayaking in the past, so we have been looking for ways to break ourselves in. Aaron, always being the source of our many, many adventures, found an eco-tour on the south part of the "bite" of Trinidad. So off the three of us went, along with a friend from ultimate frisbee, John and his girlfriend, Anika.

We got to the southern coast around 7:30 AM and after going over some quick tips, we were off. The kayaking was just the means of going on this eco-tour, which took us down the Oropuche river, to the Oropouche Lagoon, which was kind of like a swamp. As we were heading towards the swamp, there were two paths that we could take, the easy way and the slightly more difficult, but interesting way. Not fearing a little challenge, we took the difficult way.

This path was quite scenic and also a bit foul smelling. It's down in one of the large industrial corridors of Trinidad, where a lot of mining of natural gas and oil takes place. The water was definitely not the cleanest we have seen either. But that was not the difficult part. The difficulties were that the river got very narrow and there was also a bit of overgrowth where we actually had to chop through branches to get the kayaks through. The end result was that we got to this somewhat secluded place and got to see some interesting birds. Aaron has become quite the bird watcher, and I can kind of see why. We saw some pretty cool and colorful birds - a couple were photogenic, others not so much. Katie took these two pictures.

After checking out the birds for about 20 minutes, we had to head back, as the tide was going to start rising and would cause some additional complications for our return. So on we went. Getting through the overgrowth was a bit easier, although there were some hiccups here and there. The interesting part was almost immediately after we cleared the overgrowth and the canopy that it provided, because it started to rain. Now it is rainy season here, so we shouldn't have been too surprised to be caught in the rain. But the thing that was a bit surprising was the type of rain that we were caught in. Thunder and lightening is not all that common here, at least not in the north where I live. But this was a pretty hard and steady rain with both thunder and lightening. The fact that it was lightening and that we were in a river was not really my concern. Rather the fact that I was holding an aluminum rod/paddle was.

Needless to say, our kayak back was a bit more expedient than our casual drift into the swamp. But it was without incident, which we are all pleased about. No one capsized (although there were a couple near misses). We got the kayaks loaded up on the truck and headed back to the tour guide's house to drop off the kayaks off, change clothes and went and got some food.

After lunch, we went for a short hike, to try to see some toucans, macaws and red howler monkeys, but it was too hot and none were out to be seen. We parted ways with the eco-tour guide and since we were in the south, we decided to go to the pitch lake. This is essentially a natural opening where pitch (the stuff used to make asphalt and fill cracks in roads) comes up from innards of the earth. It doesn't look like much as you look at it from a distance or as you try to take it in from a wider point of view.

But as you get closer, it actually becomes quite interesting. You can walk on it, because the outer layer has "hardened" a bit. I say that in quotes, because during the day, when the sun is out, if you stand in a spot for a minute or two, you can actually feel yourself sinking a bit. Not a lot, but you definitely leave indentations where you stood. Another really cool thing is that there is a lot of different minerals coming up in the pitch. There are sulfur pools that people soak in for healing purposes, there are spots of iron, where the pitch has a slightly redder tint to it, and there are spots where natural algae form. But all of it comes from these cracks in the pools that you can see in this picture.

These pools are sometimes shallow and sometimes very deep, depending on the cracks in them. It was very cool to be right there and be at a place where you are basically seeing the opening to the inner layers of the earth. I've been to two volcanoes before (Mt. St. Helens and one in St. Vincent - which I should post some pictures from now that I think of it), but those are such huge openings and because they are not currently active volcanoes (in the sense that lava is flowing from them) there is a lot of hardened lava/rocks and growth so it doesn't really feel like you are looking at the openings that you are.

Every once and a while, our guide at pitch lake, would direct us to not work in a particular place and tell us to follow his path because he didn't want us to fall into a weak spot. It sounds like most of the weaker spots were around the far outside edge, but better to be safe than sorry. We did find one spot where there was an opening to some actual liquified pitch, and our guide was nice enough to show us what it looked like in it's natural state.

Kind of cool, huh?

Snorkeling in Macqueripe Bay

2009-08-06T05:04:00.000-07:00

Among the things that I have been doing to fill my time during the last couple of weeks before summer break is over is that I have been swimming and snorkeling in a small bay about 20 minutes from my house called Macqueripe Bay. Sometimes Aaron, Katie and I go here after a hike to cool off and do a few laps and sometimes we just go to see if we can see any marine life.

From what I have been told by some locals and people who have lived here for a few years, Macqueripe used to be one of the nicest beaches in northern Trinidad. It's a very small beach & bay, but as they say, size isn't everything. But then some brilliant politicians decided that it would be good to develop some of the area around Macqueripe, as long as there wasn't a lot of clear cutting of the trees around the bay. Contracts were handed out to a company and the first thing they did was clear cut a bunch of trees, which then caused a considerable amount of run off from the land into the bay, thus dirtying up the water and reducing the visibility considerably. But sometimes you get some good currents and you'll get a day with somewhat decent visibility.

Anyway, the first time that we all went to Macqueripe after we got back from our trips to the states, Aaron, Katie and I went out to snorkel and see if we could spot anything cool. Unfortunately the visibility was quite poor and my mask kept fogging up. So as it got harder and harder to see, I would have to pop my head out of the water, wash out my mask and then go back in.

One particular time, I couldn't tell if it was the visibility or my mask starting to fog up, but I came up on this really big rock that was a little fuzzy. I was about to pull my head out of the water to clear my mask, when I noticed this huge (about 5 feet wide) white thing slowly rising up from behind the rock. I stopped kicking and just froze. My heart started racing because I had no idea what it was. Then it leveled out and swam down below and in front of me and I realized that it was a spotted eagle ray. In my snorkel, I said out loud "uhlh grnnp". It's hard to talk with the snorkel in. What I actually said was "holy crap" and the noise of my grumbling voice must have startled the eagle ray and it shot off.

This is a picture of what I saw. Not a picture that I took, but one that I found on the internet. As you can see, the bottom of manta and eagle rays is all white. This is because if predators are below them, as they look up, they will blend in with the light that the sun reflects off the surface of the water. And if predators are above them, then the spots (or other patterns on the different types of rays) will blend in with the surface of the ocean floor or coral or whatever.

I can't even begin to tell you how cool it is to see this stuff in person.

End of Year One

2009-06-29T19:19:00.000-07:00

I have officially finished my first year teaching internationally. What an incredible year it has been. I have done and experienced so much this last year that I can only imagine what the next year will bring. But the end of the year does not bring all good things. As this year wrapped up, I discovered something unique about teaching in an international school - the mobility of so many staff and students.

This is probably pretty obvious to anyone who has given it an ounce of thought. I mean, I know that I'm only going to be here for another year and then I'll be moving on as well. But what I saw on the last days of classes, was not a celebration of the coming of summer and 6 weeks of no studies, no tests and no homework. Rather it was a mourning of the loss of best friends, boyfriends and girlfriends as their families move to another part of the world.

I had three guys defy the dress code by dying their uniforms black in tribute to their friend who was moving to Rio. I had the dream couple that everyone knows and loves see their relationship go from a few miles between them, to having the entire Pacific Ocean part them. I consistently saw tears flowing in the hallways and on the last day of school, one of my most vocal, confident and outgoing male students had to leave the awards ceremony because he was having an emotional breakdown from seeing all his friends for the last time.

I also felt this a bit. While the majority of my very close friends are the ones that I started with at the beginning of the year (thus will see them again next year), one of my good friends left the country for her new job in Africa at 6:00 AM the day after the last day of school.

What this made me realize is that in an international setting like this, bonds are formed very quickly. I think everyone involved knows that we are in a mobile setting, so there is always a sort of feeling of isolation as they move from continent to continent, country to country. But having these bonds form quickly helps ease that blow a bit, even with the knowledge that the time together is limited.

I believe that everyone has a "home" that they will always identify with. Mine of course is and always will be Chicago. But I also believe that home is wherever you make it. Right now, my home is Trinidad. And as much as I love it here, I realized today that I don't think I would love it as much if my mobile "family" were not here with me.

Krav Magouda

2009-06-02T17:18:00.001-07:00

Amongst the many, many new things that I have been trying since moving to Trinidad (hiking, yoga, ultimate frisbee, hashing, scuba diving...), I have also recently taken up Krav Maga.

Krav Maga is a self-defense technique that was started in the ghettos of Hungary and Czechoslovakia in the 1930's by a man to help protect the local Jewish community against the Nazi militia. It has since been adapted by the Israeli military and police as the preferred method of hand-to-hand combat. Because of the effectiveness with the military and the police, it has now spread world wide and is being taken back to it's roots to help civilians protect themselves against the unsavory elements that are found in most cities.

I have always wanted to learn a martial art for self defense, especially as I started working in schools. I wanted to be able to know that while I have never been in a fight, if something went down at my school between some students (or by a student against me) that I would be able to protect those involved until more help could come along and get the situation settled. I don't know if Krav Maga actually counts as a martial art, but it will definitely help in a bad situation. The main point of Krav Maga is react to a threat, control the situation, counterattack (if necessary), and disengage from the situation - all within 3-5 seconds if possible.

I realize as I start to travel more in less developed countries, that I am a bit of a target. While I am learning how to fight (for the sole purposes of getting away from an attacker) it has made me so much more aware of my surroundings and has started to prepare me for a possible attack. I see the possibility for situations turning bad much easier and I'm much more aware of not putting myself in bad situations.

The great thing about Krav Maga, at least with the group that I'm learning with, is that when we learn new techniques, we are then put into fairly real situations to see how these techniques work. I've been accidentally hit in the jaw by people in class, kicked in the junk, and I almost always come home with new cuts and scrapes. But tonight was probably the most "real" it has ever been in class.

After we learned some techniques for breaking a choke hold that someone might put you in, we were put in a real situation, repeatedly, so we knew how it would really feel if it actually happened to us. The situation was that someone knocked us to the ground and as we were lying on the ground, they were trying to get a choke on us while we were on our back. We were to fight it and they were to do their best to get the choke hold on us. Now they weren't really choking us, but they were holding our necks fairly tight, so we had to really fight to get out of the situation.

No one really got hurt, but I actually felt like what it would be like to be attacked by someone, because no one was holding back. I have never been in a fight and I hope to keep it that way, but I'm starting to gain the confidence that I would know what to do if something did go awry and that I would get away and not become another statistic.

Fusion 2009

2009-05-11T17:16:00.000-07:00

This last weekend, a bunch of friends and I participated in something called Fusion 2009, which was sponsored by the Port Authority here in Port-of-Spain. Fusion is something along the lines of an adventure race. Adventure races are done either individually or in teams (in this case teams) and it requires multiple events and multiple disciplines (running, biking, etc.).

It all started about 2 weeks ago. Aaron saw an ad in the paper talking about this race and sent out an e-mail to a bunch of us asking if we wanted to give it a try. We were all intrigued, as last year's Fusion apparently started with a run where teams were tied together, followed by a 17 mile run, followed by a 2 hour hike, and finished with a quick 5k run around downtown. That is all that we knew about Fusion and had no idea what it would be like this year, because with these races, they tell you what will happen on that leg of the race about 10 minutes before you start the leg. So we really had not idea what we were getting into.

We did a crash course in getting ourselves ready for this by scheduling hikes, yoga, runs, and what not for the 10 days leading up to the race. Yes, we only trained for 10 days after hearing what last year was like. We split ourselves up into two teams based on the anticipated pace that each person would match up with and away we went.

The race started in the NE of Trinidad at 5:45 AM Saturday morning (with an informational meeting at 5:00 AM). We stayed at a little guest house about 30 minutes away from the starting line, so to get ourselves a little breakfast, and get to the start on time, we were up by 3:30 AM. As we were driving to the start, we literally woke up some roosters. It was a nice payback for once.

As we were milling about the starting area, we looked around and we noticed that we were the only two teams who were not in matching uniforms. We also noticed that we were the only ones without a lot of gear with them. We were just a couple of rag-tag teams, thrown together at the last minute, completely unprepared for what we were about to get into, and it showed.

The first event was called "Divide and Conquer". Every team had to split in half and send two people to a mental challenge and the other two to 'get wet'. My team consisted of me, Nick, Charlie, and Tara (a friend of ours from ultimate frisbee who filled in for another friend at the last minute when he found out that he was going to be traveling for work. Tara only trained with us for about 4 days.). We decided that Tara and Charlie would do the mental challenge and Nick and I were going to do the 'wet' leg.

The whistle was blown and we were off in opposite directions. Nick and I started running up the road and within about 5 minutes were directed into the woods, where we were immediately greeted with someone passing out life vests. At this point I thought "oh crap!" and apparently Nick was thinking "YES!".

The trail was pretty straight...downhill. The ground was wet from some early morning sprinkles and I slipped a handful of times. It was a little worrisome because I really didn't want to start out with losing my balance so much. And I'm sure that Nick was rolling his eyes as well. We wound our way down the hill and hit a shallow river. Fortunately this isn't anything too bad now that we've started hashing. However, the shallow river got deeper and deeper and the life vests started to come in handy, especially if you have every tried to swim with shoes on.

We kept going, slowly passing people and we hit a checkpoint where they gave us a red rope to signify that we got to the checkpoint and told us to go back to the starting line. So back up the river we went and up that long, steep, wet hill that was so slippery coming down. It wasn't much easier going up either, especially with this guy who was running by us, constantly yelling at his partner, telling him to hurry up, this is what we trained for, where are you boy? etc. The last statement was probably the most accurate, because the only people in sight were me and Nick. Fortunately, this guy finally figured out his partner was no where to be seen and went back for him.

Nick and I soldiered on, running down the road and as it turned out, we finished in 4th place out of everyone who went on our leg. And then, as it turned out, Tara and Charlie were the first to finish their puzzle and second to finish their leg. We were quite shocked that we finished so well. All in all, this first leg took us about 1:30.

After about an hour rest, waiting for the other teams to finish, they sent everyone on their way to the next starting point, about 45 minutes away at Las Cuevas beach (actually it was on a road above the beach, but anyone looking at a map can now orient themselves a bit).

This next leg was the hard leg. It was basically a hike up a mountain on the north coast called El Tucuche. Apparently this mountain is the second highest peak in Trinidad, with a summit height of 3071 ft. Giving a rough estimate that our starting point was bout 70 ft above sea level, we hiked up 3000 ft in this leg. Now to give you some perspective, a story in a building is generally 10-12 ft. So this would mean that we were about to hike roughly 250 stories (and it felt like it).

This leg started with a "burn" (a steep climb that makes your legs work so hard that the lactic acid buildup feels like it's burning in your legs), followed by a long climb, followed by a flat river run to a checkpoint where we would have to answer some puzzles/mind benders, followed by another burn, another shorter climb and then a 3-4 mile flat run to the end of this leg of the race. It was not pretty and it was a little intimidating.

Since we all didn't have this great gear, like hydration packs, we had to put all our water and some trail mix into a backpack and trade off from person to person throughout the hike. Keep in mind that unlike marathons, mini-marathons and what not, there were no water stations in this race. You had to provide everything for yourself. And considering that it was around 90 degrees and we were carrying water for 3 grown men, we had the odds stacked against us because someone was going to be carrying all this extra weight.

We started out and our goal was just to keep a steady pace. We jogged along until we got to the first burn and just kept going at a slow-to-medium pace. We slowly passed teams and after about an hour and 15 minutes, we came across the quiz checkpoint.

Here the questions each had a time penalty attached to them. If you got a question wrong or skipped a question, the time penalty would be added to your finishing time. There was one question that consisted of finding the next letter in a sequence, a logic question sorting out information about people's names, ages and places that they got playing chess and scrabble, a question about a ladder during high tide, and a fill in the blank to write out a word. We felt very comfortable about all except the logic chess/scrabble question. They all had 9 minute penalties and the logic chess/scrabble had a 7 minute penalty. We thought we would spend more than 7 minutes on that question, so we just filled in an answer and were on our way.

After the questions, the burn and the steady climb were tough, but not as bad as the first burn and climb. Then before we knew it, we were on a flat straightaway. As we were going, we had to occasionally take 5-10 seconds to stop and look at the view, which was just incredible. We looked out onto valleys of trees surrounded by mountains, on a clear day. It felt like the valleys went on forever even though they were surrounded by mountains. The colors were so rich and vivid. I haven't seen constant shades of green like that since I arrived on the island. The sky was cloudless and was such a rich blue. Nick had said at one point that 'it was nearly a religious experience' and I would tend to agree with him. I wish I had my camera with me. Maybe I'll find the trailhead and try to hike back there some day.

So after taking the moment to take in the view, we were back on our way. Fortunately, it remained a nice flat path and we quickly approached a bend. As we rounded the bend, we started a slight descent. Then before we even knew it, we heard clapping and cheering. There had to only be 30 people waiting for us, but it sounded like a thunderous applause. It reminded me of finishing a marathon, with the feeling of incredible accomplishment, pushing myself harder and farther than I have before. And to top it all off, we again came in 4th place.

We went straight back to the car and were talking with Tara and Katie (she didn't run for her team on this leg) and they were shocked at how quickly we finished. They were the ones to tell us that we finished 4th and that they had only arrived to the finish line about 30 minutes earlier (our finish time was about 2:27 minutes or there about).

As we were chatting, we made note when the next team came across the finish line and it was more than 7 minutes after us. So we were thinking that if the first 3 teams were not the first 3 teams from the first leg, that we would actually be in 3rd place overall. Only time would tell. The other teams came rolling in, some strong, some looking quite tired and weakened. But everybody got a lot of applause, cheering and support. It was definitely a challenge to remember.

After a bit, we were told to meet at the savannah for the final leg of the race. This last leg would be a run around the savannah (a little more than 2 miles) and then down a few streets of Port of Spain, to finish at the port authority offices.

As we were waiting to start, we killed the time by stretching and discussing the questions on the quiz during the second leg of the race. The other team of my friends answered one way (the same way we originally answered - but then we changed our answer). So now the question was who was right and who would get the time penalties. Also, as we were waiting the organizer of the race was walking around from team to team, telling them the standings. He didn't give out times or anything of the sort, but confirmed that we were in 4th place. He pointed out the team that we needed to beat in this last leg if we wanted to take 3rd and also told us that 2nd place was out of the question for us. So we set our sights on that 3rd place team.

This leg our entire team ran together and they told me that this was "my leg" since I was the road runner and that I was to bring us home. They told me, "set the pace and we'll be there." So that was my job - to have us finish strong, but not burn us out.

The horn was blown and we were on our way for the final leg. We started out a couple people behind the 3rd place team and I noticed that one of their team members was already falling behind their front runners. So I increased the pace just a bit, but not too much, knowing that we would get them in the long run. We quickly passed their slowest person and were slowly gaining on their fast team members. Nick kept pushing me to go faster, but I had to hold him back because I knew we would lose Charlie and Tara as well as the 3rd place team.

About one-third of the way around the savannah, we passed the 3rd place team. After we got to approximately the 2/3 mark, the 3rd place was no where to be seen and we were still holding strong as a team. We rounded the savannah and started down the final stretch on the streets of POS to the finish line. We stayed fairly close as a group and we rounded a couple corners and there was the finish line. Nick and I turned around and started running back to make sure that we all finished together. Charlie and Tara were with us in a matter of seconds and we all sprinted to the finish. Our eyes were focused on the finish line and our friends and family waiting for us and our ears were filled with cheers and clapping from the crowd.

We finished 3rd out of all the teams in the race. The 3rd place team that we had passed came across the finish line about 4-5 minutes later and now it was just a matter of whether we cut down the time difference enough to make it into 3rd place overall.

After a short bit, Aaron, Katie, Mark, and Karen came running across the finish line and they too were greeted with great fanfare from the crowds and friends and family. We filled them in on the finish situation and we all anxiously awaited the final results.

So here we are...the moment of truth. The race results began with Team Spirit and the the winner of the all female teams and then they started the slow countdown from 9th place on up, each of which received a prize package for their efforts. So it comes down to the 4th place team announcement, and at 4 hours 37 minutes, the 4th place team was...The Ultimate Frisbee Players (my team). It was kind of a bummer, but we felt like we did really well considering this was our first time. They then announced the 3rd, 2nd and 1st place teams, all of whom received not only a trophy, but also one of those big checks like they always show on game shows and Publisher's Clearing House commercials. How cool would it have been to actually get one of those big checks?

Anyway, as we were listening to them announce the top 3, Mark leaned over and said that if he heard correctly, we only lost by a little over 1 minute. WHAT!?!? That can't be!! So after all the announcements were done and everyone was on their way, I went up to the organizer and asked him the times and he said that we finished in 4:37:57 (hrs:min:sec) and that the 3rd place team finished in 4:29:21, which was a difference of 8:36. Ok, that wasn't as bad as 1 minute. But wait a minute...that question from the second leg of the race that we were discussing...we got that wrong (actually both our teams got it wrong). So that means we had a 9 minute penalty tacked on to our final time, which also means that if we did not miss that question, we would have made 3rd place by 24 seconds. 24 SECONDS!!! Nick reminded us that there are olympic athletes are beat by fractions of a second, but I'm no olympic athlete and this was a hard pill to swallow.

So this little rag-tag group, thrown together at the last minute almost pulled off a decent upset. We learned a lot from this experience and all of us have ranked it in the top of all experiences since we have moved here. Next year though, watch out. Because we're going to train hard and we'll get that big check.

Oh, and here is a picture of our 4th place prize basket.

Yes, those are boxes of Uncle Ben's rice, aluminum foil and cake mix (along with outdated warm yogurt, canned sausages, and Nutella - at least we got Nutella).

Modern Marvels

2009-05-03T05:05:00.000-07:00

I believe that I have stated in the past that Trinidad driving is something a little different from other places. You need nerves of steel and have to have a lightening quick reaction time to avoid potholes as wide and as deep as your tires or to avoid cars swerving into your lane to avoid potholes in their lane. And on top of that, many of these cars are driving at excessive speeds.

With all of this also comes an incredible amount of traffic and congestion in the streets. The rules of the road are really just guidelines. Cars will cross into the oncoming lane, in traffic, to park on the wrong side of the street because they see a parking spot. On streets where there is a steady flow of traffic and cars are driving along at 50 km per hour, someone will come to a complete halt, nearly causing a pileup, so another car can cross the street, even though there will be a break in traffic in a matter of seconds.

While I'm becoming adjusted to it, and just accept that this is the way that it is, there are still times when you get completely frustrated and there are times when you have to take a look at around and realize what is going on.

On May 1st, Trinidad completed what I believe is the first flyover in the country. For folks in the states, a flyover is basically an overpass on the highway. There is one point going from Port of Spain to San Fernando, a city south of POS, where there is always backed up traffic. To alleviate the problem, the government started building the flyover. I believe that it took 5-7 years to build (I have not confirmed that timeframe), but do know that it was extremely over budget and 2 years past the initial deadline.

Here is a picture of this incredible feat of modern engineering, taken from a video that I found on YouTube of someone driving on it. That's how big a deal this is.

So some friends and I were going to a hash near Chaguanas, which is between POS and San Fernando, and we had the pleasure of driving on this new modern marvel for Trinidad. We approached the flyover and expected to continue to zip along to our destination. However, once we actually got on the flyover, the traffic came to a screeching halt.

What caused this? Well, along the shoulder, there were a string of cars pulled over with everyone out taking pictures. And then we saw the flashing lights. We approached a police car, which was also pulled off on the shoulder and a big black, tinted SUV stopped in the left lane. We were all diverted into the right lane and as we passed, we saw that the police were also standing on the shoulder looking around at the view, and the SUV had a police light on the top of it, with no one in it.

So in a nutshell, this great innovation of traffic flow was stopped so people could take pictures, including some police officers, who couldn't be bothered to pull onto the shoulder, but instead decided to park in the middle of a lane on a highway. Only in Trinidad...

I love me some Canadians

2009-03-29T06:20:00.001-07:00

Let me tell you about the weekend I had last weekend. I do realize that I'm going out of sequential order, because I still need to tell you about the great weekend I had diving with my students, but last weekend was so much fun and so chill, that I wanted to get some pictures out of where I stayed.

I guess it all starts with a (non-student) diving weekend about 4 weeks ago. The usual crew, plus one - our friend Roshan who works for the Clinton AIDS Foundation down here, went back to the Manta Lodge to see what we could see underwater. When you are not diving, you are basically hanging out in the dining area, near the pool, because there are no TV's or internet access at the Manta Lodge. After dinner, we met a couple teachers from the Maple Leaf Academy (the Canadian International School here in Port-of-Spain) who were there with one of their students from their school's SCUBA Club. We were playing cards after dinner and Christal, one of the teachers, tells us that a whole group of them are going to Toco (northeast corner of Trinidad) to see the turtles lay their eggs (a natural phenomenon that occurs here). Aaron, Katie and myself have all been wanting to do this, so we jumped at the offer.

Christal told us they all rented a house up there that sleeps 25-30 people, so we thought it was going to be a big guest house, which aren't always the greatest accommodations - usually a bed, a small sitting room and maybe someone there cooking for you. If you get a fan in your room to keep you cool, you're kind of lucky. As it turns out, we were the lucky ones, but not because of getting a fan.

Here is what we rolled up to...This giant corporate guest house that was built by some company to entertain it's employees (or executives) on the weekends, which is also rented out to the public.

It rests on about 9 acres of land and is on the edge of a cliff looking out to the Atlantic ocean. It has access to two small private beaches as well as a larger public beach that is within walking distance.

Here is the view of the backside of the beach house. On the right of the picture (not shown) is a large manicured lawn with a large open BBQ pit. On the left is another small field and the paths to the private beaches. Behind me is an outdoor, covered dance area, complete with sink, a place to serve drinks and bathrooms. This was not really used, but it's nice to add to the impressive list of things that this place had to offer.

Here's the picture of the inside of the beach house. The backyard/pool is out the doors on the right. There is obviously enough space to sit and feed the entire group and there is a pool table just peeking out of the corner of the picture.

So it's obvious that the amenities were great. But what made the weekend one of the best weekends since I arrived in Trinidad was the people that I was around.

Just like when I first met my ISPS family, there was a lot of bonding and everyone was welcoming with open arms. And meeting another large group of people like that just made the weekend so great.

We did get to see one turtle laying it's eggs, but that was actually the most depressing part of the weekend. We had a large group with us (20 people went) and we were merged with another group of about 10 people. But then there was another group of 20-30 people out on the beach also looking to watch the turtles lay their eggs. So the only one we saw had close to 60 people surrounding it and the magic of mother nature was lost amongst a bunch of people not so in awe of what was happening around them, flashing pictures that was more like paparazzi than capturing memories, and just inconsiderate people.

So I choose not to remember the weekend as the weekend of watching turtles, but rather the weekend of meeting some more incredible people.

Oh, and also some good times playing Super-Spectacular-Catch in the pool. Here's my favorite shot of one of my catches. A great shot, but let me tell you, the landing was not so great and it ended my afternoon of catches.

Here's a quick video of Aaron and Katie trying to do a double catch. They never quite got it, but it was fun watching them try.

This video also reminded me of one of the other really cool things that happened during this weekend. The woman floating on the purple noodle, Pierett, didn't know how to swim, but she had a waist floatie on while she was in the pool. She also played Super-Spectacular-Catch, but that wasn't the cool thing.

Before we went to see the turtles, we hiked up to this waterfall. It was around 5:00, which gave us sunlight, but when we got to the waterfall, the tree cover was making it kind of dark (hence no pictures). You could climb to the top of the waterfall, maybe about 20 feet up and jump into the pool, which I did a couple times - it was so much fun. But the really cool thing is that Pierett really wanted to join in on the fun. So she climbed up and with myself and one other person waiting in the pool below the waterfall, jumped in. She landed right between us and we took her back to dry land. It was really cool being a part of her literally taking this leap of faith. In hindsight, this may not have been the wisest thing to do. But then again, life is about taking risks and trying to overcome fears and I think Pierett did that this weekend.

More Excuses

2009-03-23T15:54:00.001-07:00

I realize that I have been shirking my duty of posting lately, but I am hoping that over the course of the next week or two, that I will get myself all caught up. Pretty much since Carnival, I have been going non-stop again. But not in a bad way.

The weekend after Carnival was a weekend of catching up with my rest. The next two weekends I was in Tobago diving, once with friends and once with the SCUBA Club that I helped with at school. Then last weekend I was in Toco (the northeast part of the island), hanging out with the teachers from the Maple Leaf School, the Canadian international school and seeing some leatherback turtles lay their eggs. I feel like I've been on vacation for the last month and a half, and in a mere two weeks, I will officially be on vacation, back in the states.

I have lots to show and tell, but I need to get it all sorted out first. So keep an eye out. Hopefully a few more posts will start popping up a bit more frequently.

Carnival Tuesday (long overdue)

2009-03-19T19:54:00.001-07:00

I realize that this is now quite outdated, but I also realize that I owe people some pictures of me in my Carnival costume.

First off, I want to try to explain what Carnival Tuesday is really like. However, my friend Nick put it best when he posted to his experiences on his Facebook page, “no matter what I say, you will never fully understand what Carnival Tuesday is like until you experience it for yourself.” There are no truer words than those. But let me try.

On Tuesday, everyone comes out in his or her full costumes and one of the highlights is when they pass the stage. The stage is basically a big set of bleachers set up facing the road on the Savannah that we all walk by. We were supposed to be at the starting point at 6:30 Tuesday morning. But after a long day Monday, Andrea and I decided to try to get there about 8:00 or so, figuring that we wouldn’t miss much. As we drove in, we got a call from some of our other friends and ran into even more looking for parking. I guess all our bodies felt the same way.We found out where the band was at and we started walking in that direction, when we got word that Harts (our band) had just crossed the stage. So there we have it, we missed the biggest event of the day. Who would have thought that it would happen so early? But then again, now knowing what came next, it did make some sense. Because as everyone started drinking and dancing, the extravagance of the costumes was slowly stripped off to essentially what we were wearing on Monday.

Even though we missed crossing the stage, we still got there to see everyone in their costumes. The music that is played all day long is called “soca” which is a mix between dance and calypso, and they tend to play the same 10 songs over and over and over again. By the end of Carnival, I had had my fill. Yet oddly, by Thursday, Andrea and I were both looking for a little soca music on the radio. I guess it just gets in your blood a bit. The music was starting to pick up and got progressively louder. The alcohol started flowing a little more and the dancing was starting to pick up. At this point, it was about 9:00 AM. So here are a few of those pictures that everyone was looking for.

So what is Carnival Tuesday? It’s a day filled with drinking. Some to excess, although most people realized that it was a marathon and not a sprint and paced themselves accordingly. I saw very few people completely sloppy drunk, even at the end of the day. But more than drinking, it was a day filled with dancing, laughter, smiles, and some of the most beautiful people in all of Trinidad.

It’s also a time where people let go of all their inhibitions and there is incredible safety in numbers with that. In these skimpy, tiny, ridiculous outfits, there were all body types. There were tall, short, thin, not so thin, and those that would fall in the “overweight” category. There was every skin color under the rainbow and everyone was dancing with everyone. So while we may look like total tools in these pictures, you didn’t feel that way walking through the streets because everyone was dressed up. Actually, those people not dressed up stood out and looked more awkward then we did. And really, if this is a ll I have to do to see and dance with all those beautiful women, I’m ok with it.

So here is me and Andrea in our gear at the beginning of the day and then more what I looked like as the day progressed. Although the best part may be that we are wearing our trainers with this get up.

And I have a bright, shiny quarter for anyone (who wasn't in Trinidad for Carnival) who can guess who this guy is with Andrea and my friends Gina and Rebekah.

Oh, I almost forgot, if you want to see some more, really cool pictures from Carnival, my friend Sam (one of the English teachers at ISPS) is also an amateur photographer and she took some great pictures, which are posted on her blog. On the right side of my blog, under my Profile, there is "My Blog List". Under that is a link for "3Limes". That's her. Just click on the link and then look for the posts with Carnival in the title and you'll see her pics. They're great. You'll love them.

Update: The bright, shiny quarter has been claimed by one of my former students in Indianapolis. The man in the photo is Lennox Lewis, a retired heavyweight boxing champion (41-2-1), who had defeated the likes of Ray Mercer, Evander Holyfield, and Mike Tyson.

Carnival Monday

2009-02-23T15:43:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I picked up my cousin Andrea from the airport. She's been teaching in Brazil for 5 years and decided that she wanted to see how to really celebrate Carnival. Ok, maybe she didn't say that. But it will be interesting to hear her comparison of Carnival in Brazil versus Trinidad. I know there are some differences that make each one unique, but it will be cool to hear from her after all is said and done on how the compare and contrast. Maybe I'll have her write a 2 page report that will be due by the time she leaves. If we can dish it out every day, we should be able to take it too. (She's a former teacher and current co-principal for those who don't know her).

FYI - the things that were most exciting for Andrea since she has arrived is the fact that we drive on the left side of the road (complete with the steering wheel in cars on the right side) and all the things that we have in our grocery stores that they don't have in Brazil. I've never seen someone so excited to see Ragu before.

Anyway, today was the first official day of Carnival, although the celebrations have been going on for weeks. We didn't don our full costumes today, so it was really more like a dry run. I just wore my shorts and she only had her sequined top and bottom on. The full headdresses, hats and other accessories come out tomorrow. So no pictures today, but definitely some for tomorrow.

We basically walked up and down the streets of Port of Spain with incredibly loud music being played. There are about 5 tractor trailers pulling flatbed trailers with stacks and stacks of speakers. And as you would probably expect, they are turned on full blast. But that doesn't really bother anyone too much because everyone is busy dancing in the streets and enjoying lots of water and various adult beverages.

The temperature was probably in the upper 80's and it was overcast for the first half of the day. It did rain for a bit, but that was actually quite a relief because it was so hot, the rain was actually quite refreshing. However, with heat and sun, there comes sunburn. We cut our afternoon a little short because the skin was starting to get a little too red and we wanted to be able to participate the entire day tomorrow.

But here's a little tidbit for the family members who are probably rolling their eyes at us. We had sun block on before we left and reapplied 2-3 times throughout the day. The other thing that I feel I should point out, is that I was NOT the one one to get sunburned this time. Maybe I built up a bit of a tolerance or my skin has become some kind of thick, leathery substance. Or maybe Andrea is just not quite used to the sun a bit closer to the equator. Either way, even though I know she's hurting just a little bit, I am still gloating a bit that I didn't succumb to the sun and that I don't have funny tan lines the shape of my hands. Of course we all know that I've just sealed my fate for tomorrow. Oh well. It was nice while it lasted.

Kings and Queens

2009-02-22T07:11:00.000-08:00

As previously mentioned, probably the one thing about Carnival in Trinidad that stands out from the rest is the costumes that the revelers wear. But that is just for the commoners; the peasants. The REAL costumes come out for the King and Queen competition.

I still haven't figured out exactly what makes a contender for King and Queen. I believe that each band competes. Bands are the different groups that you sign up to walk with in the parade - which is what most people believe is the only way to celebrate Carnival. But I also think that there is a competition open to the public to submit their costumes for judging as well. However, as with most competitions, those entrants with deeper pockets and sponsorship from bands are over the top and tend to take the top prize.

Here are a few of the highlights...

Believe it or not, this is one of the individual costumes which are much smaller than the sponsored costumes. This particular one had an underwater theme. She was dressed as a fish and there is a giant fish on her head, with very large fins.

Here are a couple more of the smaller costumes that I liked. Not sure what their themes were.

The sponsored costumes also consist of things worn by the individual, but they are also usually wrapped or pulling some kind of cart which brings the rest of the costume. Some of these bigger costumes range in size from 20' x 20' ft to the biggest that I recall from the night, 30' x 35'. Here is one of the smaller of the sponsored costumes, also an underwater theme.

This last one was one of my favorites.

Aaron, Kate, Meredith, and I went to the semi-finals for the kings earlier in the week and are hoping to make it to the finals tonight. Kate took all of these pictures except for the blue one, which I took. She asked if she could go up to the front of the stage and take pictures with the rest of the press photographers, and they let her. That's why all of her pictures don't have heads in front of them. She was standing with this group when she took all her pictures...

The anticipation builds...

2009-02-19T14:23:00.000-08:00

Those who know about Carnival, know that it is one giant party. Whether you are in the states (New Orleans), Colombia (Barranquilla), Brazil (pick any city), or Trinidad, the party is well known. However, Trinidad has one thing that sets it apart from the other Carnival celebrations, and that is the costumes of the thousands of revelers.

Some of you may have been privy to e-mails and links from me, giving you a hint of my costume. Some of you may know from other sources. Some of you may have no idea what the costumes are like. All I will say at this point is that the theme this year is Persian Empire (not quite sure what that has to do with Carnival, but when in Rome...or Persian...or Trinidad for that matter...) and that I picked up both mine and my cousin's outfits today.

The interesting thing about the costumes at this point, is that they were given to me in two shoe boxes. Have you ever tried to fit one of your outfits into a shoe box? I didn't think so. Not much fits in there and you will have to wait to see pictures of us in our get up. But I will provide you with a glimpse to whet your appetite.

Panorama 2009

2009-02-18T18:38:00.000-08:00

There are many kick offs for Carnival in Trinidad. There are fetes (large parties that usually go from 10 or 11 PM until 3 or 4 AM) pretty much every weekend after New Years Day. Some say that is the beginning of Carnival season. I never made it to a fete (although I did try but my ticket got stolen) so for me the kick off has been Panorama.

This is an event where steel pan bands from across the country, and Tobago, come to compete to claim top prize as the best pan band. Steel pan drums are one of Trinidad's claims to fame. It is the only instrument that has been invented in the last 100 years or so.

There are small bands, which are bands with less than 50 players (called pannists), medium sized, which is 50-100 pannists, large bands, 100+ pannists, and single pan bands, where each pannist only plays one steel pan. The small, medium and large bands, a lot of the musicians play more than one pan at the same time. It's really quite impressive seeing all these pan players playing in unison.

Here's a link to a quick history of the steel pan if you are interested.

The vibe of these steel pan bands is enough to get anyone ready. Here's a short video that I took of a medium sized band practicing.

For Panorama, most spectators just hang out and watch the bands practice in the fields around the savannah instead of paying to watch them being judged. I actually got up to the fence by where the judging was happening and the stands were completely empty, but the fields by the bands practicing were packed.

I have had some apprehension for Carnival because it's an event that consists of a lot of drinking and a lot of wining (a dance that is a lot like bumping and grinding on complete strangers). Neither of these are my cup of tea - not to mention that I'm sure I will look like a complete tool in my Carnival costume. But after going to see the semi-finals of pan a couple weeks ago, and stopping by the savannah tonight to see some of the finals, I am full on ready for Carnival.

Focus people. Focus!

2009-02-12T15:05:00.000-08:00

I wish I could say that Phase 3 of my root canal came and went. But it came and it's kind of stuck with me. Allow me to explain...

Everything was pretty similar to Phase 2. My dentist dug out the temporary filling and then started to fill it my tooth with the permanent filling. I don't know why they couldn't just put the permanent stuff in the first time and make this a 2 part process. I'm sure there are reasons, but those were not fully explained to me. Of course I didn't ask either, but I will next time I'm in there. Yet I digress...

I'm in the chair and all is going well. He's digging out the temporary stuff and after that is all said and done, starts filling the tooth in with the permanent stuff. Now it's important that all the spaces are filled, otherwise there is opportunity for decay from the inside again. So he has to make sure that he gets that filling all the way up in the roots. Basically, from what I can tell, this consists of putting the filling material on something small and needle like and shoving it into the empty spaces (ie - the roots) of my tooth. All is well for the first 3 roots. Ah, but I am one of that lucky 10% who has the 4th root.

Since the first 3 roots went so well, the conversation between the dentist and the dental assistants increased. They were talking about carnival, who's playing and who's not, internet phone services (Skype vs. something called MagicJack), and the cost of various office items (gel tip pens) in Trinidad vs. the cost of the same item in the states. All very stimulating indeed - although I will say that I was a bit intrigued about that MagicJack thing.

So Dr. Dentist starts packing the filling into the last root. He went a little too deep and I winced. There was pain but at least it was quick. Unfortunately, I don't think he saw the wince because the next little pack of filling went too deep. This time there was A LOT of pain and it was not so quick. From what I can gather, or at least what it felt like, was this needle thing went a bit too deep and really felt like it went through the bottom of the root into my gums. The pain was fairly intense and my hand shot out to the arm rest of the chair and my back arched up as all my muscles tensed up and as I tried to not jump out of the chair.

He says "Oh, oh. Ok, it's all right." But really it wasn't because whatever he was working with came apart in my mouth, with the needle jammed into my gums and him still holding on to the tool. So now he's trying to get it reattached or dig it out with some kind of tweezers or something. I don't honestly know how he got it out, but it did come out after a couple quick attempts.

Now, when I said in my last post that the root canal is kind of like digging the marrow of a bone out of your tooth, I think I was only partially correct. The other stuff that is getting dug out is all the nerves. So while this did hurt, it wasn't the kind of hurt that you have when you have exposed nerves or a chipped tooth and air gets on it. This is more like you have that piece of popcorn or apple that gets stuck between your teeth so far that it hurts and you can't get it out. Except that the popcorn, or apple if you choose, has a needle attached to it and actually imbeds itself into your gums for a minute or so.

I didn't really think that this was going to be eventful enough to have another post about my dental work. But after that little mishap, I just felt the need to share the final phase. Next comes the crown. That should be uneventful. We'll see though.

Does it hurt when I do this?

2009-01-27T13:53:00.000-08:00

Everything is not always blissful down here in my own little tropical paradise. Sure there are little quirks that drive a lot of ex-pats crazy down here, but that's not what I'm talking about. Actually most of those things don't bother me much at all. What I'm talking about isn't about the country at all.

For the last few months, I've had a kind of a dull, annoying pain by my top back tooth. One day, not quite sure when, it got to the point where I couldn't really chew on that side of my mouth anymore. So I decided I should probably get it checked out. I asked around and found a dentist to go to in St. James (a neighborhood about 5 minutes from my house and just outside Port of Spain). I made an appointment, showed up at my scheduled time and about 45 minutes got called in to see the dentist (I guess some things are universal, no matter what country you're in). Within about 30 seconds of talking to me and taking a quick x-ray, which took about another 30 seconds, he concluded that I needed a root canal. Great. I waited until I had got crappy dental coverage with my insurance and until I moved to a third world country to get my dental work done. Perfect.

But he told me "...not to worry. It would be a difficult tooth for me [him] to work on because it's in the back of your [my] mouth, but that's not anything that you [I] should worry about." Huh? That's absolutely something I'm going to worry about. I'm the one who's going to feel it. But I needed to get it done, so I gotta get it done. We made a follow up appointment and I was on my way. I don't know if it's common in the states, but I guess they do root canals in 3 phases down here.

Phase 1: I showed up and he sprayed on some topical anesthetic. It dripped down into my throat, so the back of that was also numb. That was a weird feeling. It actually felt like I had a hold in the back of my throat. Anyway, the drilling started, and the picking, and scraping, and all the other good things that go along with a root canal. But part way through he said, "Wow, look at that?" Never something you want to hear as a dentist is digging around in your mouth. He called in some of the other dental assistants and showed them too. Apparently I am one of 10% of the population that has 4 roots in my back tooth. So I get to have more fun during my root canal than 90% of everyone else does. Woo hoo!!

The procedure goes fairly well, with my only complaint being that the dental assistant wasn't too good at sucking the spit out of my mouth. I felt like I was choking on it a number of times. But there wasn't any pain after the anesthetic set in. It also gave me a chance to practice my yoga breathing. Did I mention that I started doing yoga down here?

Phase 2: They go in with another set of files and a drill and scrape out a bit more inside the roots. My understanding of the whole process is that they have to go in and dig out what would be like the marrow of your bones, but it's inside your tooth, as well as any of the decay. How do they do this you ask? Well that's a great question.

Put your thumb and index finger so the tips are touching. Now stick a tiny file that looks like a thick tip of a needle between those fingers and start moving them up and down. That's what it is. And surprisingly this is done without anesthetic. I stopped him before he started, and then asked another couple of time..."Are you sure I don't need any? Positive?" And he said that I would be fine. But before he can start digging around, he has to make sure that he doesn't go too deep into the tooth's root. Apparently this is why no anesthetic is needed. What he does is take different files of different lengths and thicknesses and sticks them in the tooth's root to see if I can feel it. So he'll stick something in there and if I wince and start making noise, he knows I can feel it and not to use that tool. And since I'm that lucky 10%, I got to go through this 4 times instead of just 3. Lucky me.

Most of the filing went well with a couple occasions where he went too deep. Then he busts out a drill and starts drilling in there. Talk about a feeling of panic. What if he hits that deep spot that he's not supposed to? I think every single muscle in my body was tensed up, but he did not hit anything with the drill.

I got some rinse, got some temporary filling stuck in there, and now I'm awaiting Phase 3, which comes in about 2 weeks. I can hardly wait.

Holiday in TT

2009-01-11T05:11:00.000-08:00

This year for the school's winter holiday, I decided to stay in Trinidad. Initially, I was going to try to go to Peru, but due to issues with my passport and my multiple entry/exit visa, I stayed here. Since I wasn't going away, Angie also decided to come down to visit from the 25th, December to the 4th, January.

My first week of break was pretty uneventful. I did a bit of reading, a lot of napping, and some cleaning for Angie's arrival. I really didn't feel like I did very much that first week, but that changed as soon as Angie showed up. She wanted to relax on the beaches, but also wanted a tasted of what my life was like down here. So we were pretty active and did a lot of great stuff. I had made some notes of all the stuff that we did when we were sitting on a beach one day, and by the end of her stay, I had about 5 pages (front and back). Feeling that writing all that out might get a little long winded, I'm going to do like Angie did on her Facebook page and just try to show it all in pictures with little tidbits here and there. Shall we begin??

Angie showed up Christmas night after about 13 hours of traveling and layovers in airports. So our adventures didn't begin until after sleeping in on the 26th. Wanting to get out and see a bit of Trinidad, we decided to go on a hike to Edith Falls and Bamboo Cathedral. Edith Falls is really only a waterfall after a rain. We were fortunate to see some water, but sometimes it's kind of light. Next we went to Bamboo Cathedral, where we ran into Aaron and Katie and Katie's family who were in for Christmas. We also got to see some red howler monkey's crossing over the path in the trees above. That was really cool. Here's a shot of Bamboo Cathedral, so named because of the shape the bamboo trees make over the path.

Day 2 consisted of going to the market. Wandering the streets of the shopping district in Port of Spain and meeting up with Aaron and Katie for a hash. This was something that Angie was very anxious to do and she really enjoyed hiking through the rain forest, rivers, and all the excitement that hashes provide.

Day 3 we went to Maracas Bay. The waves were rough, so we moved to another, nearby bay called Las Cuevas, where we spent the next few hours. Here is an overlook of Maracas (a bit cloudy) and Las Cuevas (where Angie got her first taste of TT's dreaded sand flies). She seemed to be a major attraction for the sand flies and mosquitos. That was kind of nice for me, because they left me alone and all went to her.

Day 4 was an early wake up and a ferry ride to Tobago. The waters were incredibly rocky and Angie got pretty sick. I normally don't get motion sickness and even I was feeling a bit queazy. The rest of that day was spent waiting for our hotel room to get ready and recovering from the ferry.

Day 5 we went to Pigeon Point. One of the most beautiful beaches on Tobago. It's a private beach and you have to pay an entrance fee to get in. We stayed there from about 9:30 AM until about 6:30 PM. The day was perfect. We swam, slept, went for walks, read, and really just relaxed the entire day.

And let's not forget about the sunset. It was incredible. Oh, we also saw Queen Latifah vacationing there. Not an actual queen for the older folks - she's a actress and hip hop artist.

Day 6 we headed up to the northeast coast of Tobago to a small town called Speyside. Along the way we stopped at a place called Argyle Falls that has 4-5 tiers of waterfalls. We hiked up to the waterfalls and hiked and c

limbed to the top of the 4th tier.

At the top of the 4th tier, you could see the down the waterfalls and out past the trees to the ocean. It was an amazing sight. Then down at the bottom tier, the pool was deep enough that you could jump in from the surrounding rocks. That was really fun and felt like we were diving from the tops of the waterfall, although in reality, it was only 6-10 feet up.

After Argyle Falls and a dip in the pool at the bottom of the falls, we finished our trek to Speyside, where we would go to a local Old Year's party (what they celebrate instead of New Year's Eve) and bring in the new year SCUBA diving. This was where we stayed in Speyside, a place called the Manta Lodge.

Here is a view from our balcony. The Manta Lodge is as peaceful and cathartic as my aunt Jane and uncle Mike's cabin in Hayward. No tv's, no phones. Just the peaceful sounds of the water to put you at ease. Of course Jane & Mike's has a phone and tv, but they are rarely on. Yet I digress...So we took ourselves a nap, had dinner, and went to the Old Year's party.

Day 7 was New Year's Day. We got up early and had a big breakfast. Angie got a shotgun course in the pool on how to use the SCUBA equipment and I tagged along for a quick refresher. We were geared up and ready to go.

What an experience SCUBA diving was. At times I had a hard time keeping my breathing regulator in my mouth because I was smiling so much. Angie felt the same way. It was an incredible experience and a first for us. A couple years ago, I decided that I wanted to try to do, see, or experience something brand new on New Year's Day. This fit in perfectly with that. SCUBA diving was so incredible, that it will get a post of it's own. As a matter of fact, I'm going back for more diving in a week, so I'll put something up about my first few dives then.

Diving apparently burns a lot of calories and really takes a lot out of you. When we finished, we went back to the Manta Lodge, ate, took a nap, and immediately ate upon waking up. We played cards with another couple there in the lodge, snacked a bit, and called it a night.

Day 8 we're heading back to Trinidad. We got up, Angie took a dip in the pool while I read, and we headed back to Scarborough to catch the ferry. Angie doped up a bit heavier on motion sickness pills for the ride back and slept the whole time. I didn't sleep, but the ride was considerably smoother. Apparently on the way back, you're moving with the waves instead of against, so it makes for a smoother ride. We got some take away Mediterranean food and finally got back to my flat around 6:00-ish. Promptly upon finishing dinner, we were both asleep on the couch and didn't wake up until about 9 AM the following morning.

Day 9 was a pretty low key day just hanging out at my flat. I taught Angie canasta and she kicked my butt the first hand. I may have found a natural here, because we both crossed 5000 at the same time, but I had about 200 points more in the end to just barely win. After cards, we went out to a place called Bombay Duck, which was excellent Indian food. Then we went to Aaron and Katie's house and also met up with Ryan and Meredith and traded vacation stories for a couple hours. But we didn't stay late, as we had an early start the next morning to get Angie to the airport.

Day 10 we were up by 5:30 to get some breakfast and to get Angie to the airport in time. It was great having her down here and it was sad to see her go. But we both had a blast with all the stuff that we did and even though it chocked full of activities and experiences, there was also plenty of relaxation.

This is the way that vacations should be.

A Strange Morning

2008-12-21T17:50:00.000-08:00

This morning started out like most mornings of my holiday break - waking up at 7 AM. For some reason, I can't seem to sleep past this point in time. Granted, while school is in session, I'm getting up every day between 5:00-5:30, so I guess in some respect, it is sleeping in. But that is not the point of this story.

I had made plans with my friend Aaron to go find a new doubles stand that a colleague of ours claims are the best doubles in the country. (Doubles are an incredible breakfast that are served only by street vendors and are rampant all over this country. You usually can only get them in the morning hours and they are usually sold out by 9:30 or so.) Anyway, Aaron had said that he would call when he got up and we would head out. Knowing that he probably wasn't going to be up at 7 AM, I read a bit and actually fell back asleep a for a bit.

I woke again around around 8:00-ish and as I was laying in bed, I heard this really big truck drive by my apartment. I live nearby a fairly main thoroughfare, so it's not uncommon to be awoken or to hear the traffic driving by. But this was an usually loud truck.

Then came this weird rumbling and my apartment started shaking a bit. I thought there may have been an accident, but there weren't any noises of the truck hitting anything. I ran to the windows and didn't see anything that looked like an accident. So I thought, maybe there was an explosion. I have no idea how the oil derricks in the ocean dig for oil and I'm very near the coast, so maybe that was it. Or it could have been this building that is going up not too far from here (developers are taking out part of a mountain to put up these condos, so maybe they were doing some demo). But I didn't hear any after effects or noises of the earth rolling down the mountain.

So after all this, I came to the conclusion that there was a small earthquake. Now there was one in Indianapolis before I moved and thinking back to that, I think that's what this was. I had no idea that earthquakes occurred down here (or in Indy for that matter), but apparently they do. I got a call from Aaron and when he showed up, he confirmed that he felt it too (it sounded like a large truck to him also) and that they said something about it on the radio on his way over. Now that we got that cleared up, we shrugged our shoulders in the manner of "Oh, I guess there's another thing about T&T that we didn't know about."

Ok, learning that there was no need to dwell, we moved on to our short trek to get some doubles. The directions, which are quite common in Trinidad were as such:

"Go to Valsaynes (a town east of here) and turn left at the light by the drive in theater. When you take a left, you're going to go up the road a bit and about 2 blocks before the stoplight, there will be a little lady with a doubles stand. That's the one you want. Now don't get confused with the orange pedestrian crossing lights, you want the actual stop and go lights."

Directions are given strictly by landmarks and visual clues and never by street names. This is probably because only half the streets are labeled with street signs. For a while, this was very confusing, because I didn't know where anything was, but now that I have a number of places committed to memory, I'm getting better at following the directions. And surprisingly, we found this lady quite easily.

As for her doubles, I wasn't that impressed. Aaron and I decided to do a taste test and got one doubles (always stated in the plural because you get two pieces of barra or the baked dough/bread that they put the channa or chick peas on) from the lady we were seeking out and one from a nearby competitor. We both decided we liked the competitor a little better, but the jury is out because Aaron got the bags mixed up when we purchased them, so we aren't really sure which was which. Either way, I still think I had better doubles at other stands, but these were still pretty good.

Now we were on our way back home - this stand we went to was about 30 minutes away. And as we were driving down the highway (Aaron driving and me as the passenger) he blurts out "Pig". I thought there was a cop, but the police in Trinidad don't really do much. As I looked around, there was a huge pot-belly pig walking down the side of the highway. Stray dogs are a frequent sight. You might even catch some roosters and chickens here and there. But pigs are a rarity. Especially strays just wandering down the highway.

I can say that the rest of the day was relatively normal and lazy. But it's not everyday that you have an earthquake, drive an hour round trip for street vendor food, and see farm animals wandering along a highway. But that's Trinidad for you...once you think you've got it figured out, they throw something like this at you.

Darkness and Christmas

2008-12-20T06:11:00.000-08:00

I've heard stories about the northern parts of Alaska, Canada, the U.K., where there are periods of the year when it is dark for 20+ hours a day (or something like that) and other parts of the year when it is light out for 20+ hours a day. Apparently this can effect people adversely. People go into long hibernating sleeps when it's continually dark and have intense bouts of insomnia when it is light out. It's hard to get a bearing on what time of day it is when the days do not change to night or the nights do not change into days.

That's kind of how it is right now for me here in Trinidad. I have absolutely no concept that it is almost Christmas. Don't get me wrong, I still see advertisements on TV about the coming holiday. The Trini's do Christmas big down here and there are decorations out. But not having any change in the temperature has made this kind of a non-event for me.

I know that in the states, everyone would say that I am completely nuts to say that being in the caribbean for Christmas doesn't enhance the holiday, but it's true. I miss sitting in my house, watching the snow, illuminated by the street lights. I miss being in a house that is dark, but only lit by the Christmas lights and maybe a fire in the fireplace. I am anxiously awaiting the time when I can be bundled up in a sweater, and not because the AC is on at a ridiculous temperature. The crunch of fresh snow under your feet...the feel of cold air in your nose and lungs...the joy of being in bed, bundled up under the covers...

All of these are things that we take for granted when we are immersed in them while rushing off to work or trying to get the windows of your car scrapped off or battling the drafts in our houses. (I blame being born in a blizzard for my love of the cold and snow.)

But this is also one of the things that I love best about traveling - that you stop taking things for granted and start appreciating what you have and what you are experiencing. So while I still don't know if I'll truly be able to get into the Christmas spirit, I will be sure to enjoy the warm weather, the beaches, and everything else not cold. I'll enjoy it enough for those back home cursing the cold.

Local Assistance

2008-12-14T08:47:00.000-08:00

Normally I don't really believe in hiring people to do things that you can do yourself. For instance, you can get a relatively cheap cleaning lady here (and many places abroad) to do your house/flat once a week or you could hire one to come every day and she will clean and cook your meals for you too. While that would be nice, and as people say, help the local economy, it just feels a bit to bourgeois to me. Instead I will live in filth until I find it too unbearable to handle and will then go on a two day cleaning and straightening spree (it takes me two days because I just can't clean for more than a couple hours at one time).

But recently it got to the point where I needed to call in the reinforcements. I have a small strip in front of my house of various plants that were completely overwrought with weeds. There was actually one weed that nearly reached the overhang above it (approximately 7 feet up). I knew I was in deep when some pest control people came to spray for ants and they said that I should probably clean it up a bit. I asked what was a weed, I've never been really good at identifying weeds in my native land let alone a foreign place, and they basically pointed to everything except 2-3 plants. I kind of knew it was bad, but was just trying to play dumb foreigner. Now that it was specifically pointed out to me, I realized that I had to do something about it.

There were a number of prickly weeds in there too that they told me to watch out for, so I figured that I would have to get some gloves. Well, that would take at least a week of me procrastinating before I would be able to get gloves, regardless if there is actually a home improvement center a mere 5 minutes away.

I was finally getting to the point where I starting to get uncomfortable about the amount weeds when a little, old Trini man came to my door and said, "Jou need a bit of cleaning up wit d weeds here? I work in d complex an can do it for you." I'm trying to write phonetically so you might pick up a bit on the accent. I said, "Umm, yeah I guess I do need to get on this. How much would you charge?" He said $40 (which when you convert to US, is about a little less than $7). Being a bit of a miser about these types of things (as previously mentioned) I had to think about it for a second or two. After thinking about weeding in approximately 90 degree temperatures, I decided that it would be $7 well spent.

In all honesty, even though I can't prove it, I think my neighbor probably said something to him to ask me because that guy is out there all the time cleaning and sweeping his parking space, washing his car, tending to his little patch of plants, etc. I guess when you pay as much as these folks are for the apartments, they want them to look nice. Even though he has a tree that is planted in a cardboard box, which I never said anything about, I'll accept that my space was getting a bit out of hand.

Anyway, the little Trini gardener said that he couldn't do it that day, but would be back next time he saw my car in it's spot. I week passed and I still didn't see the little guy. Fortunately I didn't pay him ahead of time and I was about to actually go and buy gloves yesterday (the first day of my Christmas break) and I saw him coming into the parking lot. I asked if he was going to be able to do my space and he said that he would do it on Sunday. Whew! I almost thought I was going to have to do some work there.

This morning I awoke to the pleasant hacking sounds of weeds whittled down to size by a cutlass (a machete of sorts) and the digging of pitchforks into the small swath of land I call a garden. I feel good about helping out the local economy. I feel even better that I didn't have to do this work in the heat. But I feel best about being able to play up all the hard work I had to do to clean it up "from the prior tenants leaving it in such poor condition" when Angie comes down and impress her with my incredible gardening skills I inherited from my mother. Now, if I could only prevent her from reading this for the next couple of weeks.

Busy, busy, busy

2008-12-14T06:29:00.000-08:00

I think I can say with some fair amount of certainty, that I have never been as busy as I have since I moved down to Trinidad. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining, but I'm going to (hopefully) use it as a solid excuse as to why I haven't posted anything in the last month or so. Of course, with the holidays, everyone's social calendar picks up a bit, but for me, this was a little silly.

Let's go back about 2 weeks ago, starting on Wednesday, December 3rd. Normally Wednesday nights are "guys night" where all the guy friends who are down here who are married or living with girlfriends, ditch the girls and get together to play poker, insult each other, make bodily noises, and just do the crass things that guys do when they are together with a bunch of other guys. This guys night was a bit different from the others because Mark, the guy who began the tradition and usually hosts, was not going to be able to make it. To make a long story short, he asked his girlfriend to marry him. Not something that one would typically do on a "guys night" but we all congratulated him nonetheless because Rebekah is an awesome girl. So to celebrate, we all got messages to come meet them at this wine bar and have cocktails.

Then on Thursday, there is a standing Ultimate Frisbee game, which has become one of my new obsessions. I love it! It's kind of a cross between soccer and la crosse. You try to get into an end zone to score, but you can't move once you catch the frisbee. Lots of running and trying to get good field position. But I'll go more into that some other time. We (well they) tend to top off the game by sitting in the savannah where we play and drink beers. I of course indulge in water.

Friday was our ISPS staff party. Normally, employer sponsored staff parties are a little stiff. But this was off the hook. Everybody, and I mean everybody - myself included, were dancing and having a blast. At times, it was a bit uncomfortable, as the local dance (called wining) is...ummm...basically rubbing and grinding on your partner, or whomever is nearby. Definitely a bit of a culture shock, but when you see people of all shapes and sizes doing it, you see principals and counselors and teachers all doing it to each other, you realize that it is just a dance and that there is nothing implied by it. An odd concept to get past, but it loosens everyone up because everyone's guards are let down, everyone is invading everyone's space, and you just have a good time.

Saturday rolls around and there is another game of Ultimate Frisbee planned, which is promptly followed by a going away/engagement/birthday party at my neighbors flat. Going away for a student teacher at ISPS who is heading back to the states. Engagement for Mark and Rebekah and birthday for me.

Sunday was kind of a lazy day until about 5:30 when I went over to Katie and Aaron's place and met up with Meredith (Ryan was ill) and had a mini barbecue and played a game of Monopoly for my actual birthday.

Monday I got the day off.

Tuesday was the high school staff party. We went to this place called Sails, which is on a small wharf overlooking the ocean, some of the smaller islands, and as I've found every day in Trinidad, a beautiful sunset.

Wednesday, we were back to guys night. This one was hosted by me and only went until about 11:00 or so. But I couldn't fall asleep until about 12:30. Which kind of sucks because I usually get up between 5:00-5:30 to start getting ready for school.

Thursday was supposed to be another game of Ultimate Frisbee, but I just couldn't go. I tutored some kids after school and that took me up almost to the point where I had to leave for Ultimate. Granted since I was constantly moving, I probably could have made it, but I was just too tired. So I took a nap instead. I felt bad for letting my fellow Ultimate players down, because sometimes it's hard to get enough people for a good game, but it just wasn't in me.

Then came Friday, which was our last day of school before break. Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on how you want to look at it), it was also the day that I had to go to Immigration to get my multiple entry/exit visa so I could leave the country without having to pay every time. So I missed a day that would have been pretty low key and filled with parties and good times in my classroom, but I also got the day off of work. And considering it only took the 4 of us who went 2 hours at the Immigration office, it pretty much was a full day off.

Saturday (yesterday) we had another Hash. They come around every other week and I am really loving these things. It's fun to run through the rain forests and rivers and mud and all of that. It let's you act like a kid, but as an adult. And it's good exercise too. I was also invited to go to a party at the Marine's House, which is where all the Marines who guard the embassy live. But I was kind of burnt from the week and decided not to go.

That brings us to today, which will be filled with a pool party at a friend's place followed by a spaghetti dinner at the parent's of a student's house. They are also the ones who held the 'misfit' Thanksgiving for all the ex-pats who didn't have someplace to go to celebrate.

I think that takes care of most of my scheduled plans now until Angie gets here on Christmas. I'm looking forward to just hanging out around the apartment and just relaxing and enjoying my time off.

So was all that a good excuse why I haven't posted in a while?

There's an interesting dichotomy

2008-11-19T11:30:00.000-08:00

Today there were a mad rush of e-mails as the day started to come to a close after lunch. There were storms coming in from the east and due to the increased traffic, those traveling east were allowed to leave early. Other teachers should try to help cover and supervise the classes where teachers were leaving. Parents were coming in early to pick up their kids to try to beat the traffic.

We've had a lot of rain lately. Normally the skies open up and it pours down rain for about 10-15 minutes and then it's done. But the last 4-5 days, it's been rain like it is up in the states. A long steady rain over an hour or two. So the ground is very saturated, the roads are already crappy and we live on a very hilly/mountainous island. So there is a lot of flooding in homes, on roads, and with rivers. Even a bridge has collapsed and was washed away.

So while those of you back in the states battle the cold and soon the snow as well, and longingly await a snow day (especially the teachers up there), we down in the caribbean await the rain day. Seems so odd, doesn't it?

Take a hike

2008-11-16T06:44:00.000-08:00

This week I was invited to go on a short hike with one of the other teachers at my school, Anthony, and his daughters. Anthony has talked about this hike a couple of times and it really piqued my interest.

It's a hike up in the hills north of an area called Diego Marten (here it's pronounced Dago Marten). The hike has two paths, one for the old men and one for the real men, as Anthony has put it. And the paths are continually watched by "Claws". Claws is the guy who lives in these hills and maintains these little shrines along the paths and also does various carvings in the trees along the path. Claws is named as such due to his extremely long fingernails.

We decided for an early Saturday morning hike and Nick and his girls also joined in on the fun. the day was overcast and filled with sprinkles. We met up around 9:30 and drove off the the entrance of the path. Of course, not being men to back down from a challenge, we took the path for real men, which essentially was hiking up a river, climbing on rocks, occasionally the bank of the river, and often through the river. The most challenging part of hiking up this river, which really was mostly rocks and some knee (sometimes waist) deep water was making sure the girls stayed dry and didn't freak out. Fortunately, all 4 of these girls were very adventurous and didn't mind getting their shoes wet or slipping and stumbling here and there.

We began the trek and it quickly opened to this small clearing where all these painted, wooden statues stood. I have no idea what they mean, if anything, but it was very cool to see these things in the middle of the rain forest, which can be a very tranquil place. After taking a handful of pictures and looking for Claws, looking at us, we decided to venture on. Unfortunately we did not get to see Claws, so we'll have to continue to imagine what he might look like.

Shortly after the little shrine, we came across this thin path, covered with wet leaves. It was getting kind of slick, but what caught our attention more than the wet and slippery path was the many butterflies flying about. There is one particular butterfly that always catches my eye. I believe it is called the Blue Monarch. On the top side of it's wings, it is almost an electric blue color. On the bottom side is it's camouflage to protect it from it's predators. We found one giant Blue Monarch attached to the side of a tree, obviously a little scared of us because it's wings were closed and all we saw was it's camouflage. These wings had to be a little bigger than the palm of my hand.

After the photo op, we continued down the slick path to the first of many river crossings. Here we climbed on wet rocks, covered with moss. It was extremely slippery. And blocking our path was the largest spider I've ever seen in the wild. This thing had to be about 2-3 inches long. Fortunately, the web was kind of high and we were able to duck under it. However, it was low enough that if we didn't see it, it would have been

right in one of the adult's faces. It was a little creepy, but that's what you get in the wild.

Shortly after the spider, I had a slightly scarier moment. We were crossing this relatively shallow part of the river and walking across rocks that were slightly bigger than our feet. Sometime when crossing wet rocks you have to be quick, sometimes you have to take your time. The trick is to know when to do what. This time, I didn't choose properly. I lost my balance, fell on my butt and into the water. Now I can take bumps and scrapes - not a big deal. But the scary thing was my camera was in my pocket. Fortunately, it was in another pouch inside my pocket, which absorbed most of the water and it didn't get in or on the camera. That would have sucked big time. So the next time we had a challenging rock to cross, I tossed my camera to Nick and he took some pictures of me trying to get across the rocks/river.

We continued down the river and finally came across our final destination. There was this big waterfall pouring into this pond. The water was a little dirtier than usual because the night before we had a lot of rain, so there was a lot of sediment in the pond. But Anthony said that usually the water is a clear blue. We stayed at the waterfall for a bit while behind us three Shouter Baptists were doing some kind of baptism or spiritual cleansing. Contrary to what you might think, they were a very quiet trio.

After our stay at the waterfall, we took the old man path back to our cars, which took us barely a 1/4 of the time as the river route. But it definitely would not have been as exciting or adventurous if we took that path up to the waterfall. Then we went to the northern coast of the island, which was only a short 10 minute drive. Here all you could see was the vast ocean. Apparently there is a great path that it about 3 miles long and goes to Chagaramas, an area that we frequent quite a bit for other small hikes. We didn't go along to trail because Nick and I were starting to run late for an Ultimate Frisbee game.

For quite possibly the first time...

2008-11-05T15:49:00.001-08:00

...in my life, I can say that I am proud to be an American. Now don't get me wrong, I have always felt very privileged to be a US citizen, more so now than ever as I have started to travel to new countries and see how other people live and other governments govern. But there is a quote from a song from one of my favorite bands, Endpoint, which probably most people reading this have never heard of before. The quote goes "I love my country but I won't close my eyes." And that is how I have felt for most of my life. I'm not going to ignore the faults and injustices that I see every day.

The United States of America is a great nation, but it far, far from perfect. But now, with the election of our new president, I, like millions of other US citizens, have hope that we can chip away at those imperfections. That we can rebuild our reputation and status across the globe, that we can come together as a people, as a nation, and do what is right.

People don't like to believe it, but there is still a considerable amount of racism in the US, both on an individual level and on a systemic level. Think about if you clutch your purse a little tighter when a black man passes you on the street. Think about if your heart beats a little faster if you approach a group of black male youths when you are out alone. Visit an inner city school and look at the conditions of the school vs. the conditions of a suburban school, or talk to the students and families and see if they truly get the same opportunities and are treated the same way as you are treated as a white person.

I'm not necessarily that if you feel different in these situations if I replace the word "black" with "white" that you are a racist. But I am saying that our society has not created this equal state that we are lead to believe it has. There are things, images, ideas, that are so ingrained in our subconscious by our upbringing and current media, that we still do treat people differently based on the color of their skin, what religion they adhere to, or their family heritage. However, this election is one step in the right direction to close that gap.

As I was typing this and trying to post it, still glowing in the election of president-elect Obama, I saw the results of a handful of propositions that were being voted on across the US, banning gay marriage and banning adoption of children by gay individuals and couples. All of these propositions passed, thus restricting the rights of citizens of the United States who want equal rights to love and care for each other and for children in dire need of a home. So while we have progressed to the point where we are not trying to intentionally discriminate against people with different color skin than our own, we as a nation still find it OK to publicly discriminate against gay people.

Well at least I was proud for about 20 minutes.

The Year of Reconciliation

2008-10-25T13:57:00.000-07:00

Every year, the United Nations puts out themes to raise international awareness of those themes and to try to bring the different nations of the world a bit closer together. One of this year's themes, and the theme that we used at the school was the Year of Reconciliation. Our goal was to incorporate the theme into what we were doing in our different classes, celebrate the diversity of our student body, and come to a close with an international food festival.

Unfortunately, I did not bring reconciliation into my classroom. I wanted to come up with something a bit political and things to really make them think about their perceptions on things and take them out of their comfort zone. But every topic that I could come up with seemed forced and I really try not to squeeze things into my class subject matter if it doesn't fit with what we are doing. Authenticity and honesty with my students is pretty important to me and I think if I used some of the suggestions that I was given, they would see right through it and they would easily tell that I didn't buy into it. And that is an issue as you are building and maintaining a culture in your classroom. I know, I know, mathematicians and people have to reconcile bank accounts and what not all the time. But I felt that was too obvious for my kids and again they would see right through it.

But this is not the reason of this post. The real reason is the ending celebration at the international food festival. At first, I really didn't want to go. It cost me $30 TT (which is only $5 USD) and I heard you only get little portions of food. I also envisioned that there were just going to be these little booths like at a county fair or carnival or something and you just went up to them and tried something new. I couldn't be further from the truth.

The food festival took up the entire gym. The school parking lot was filled and cars were parked on both sides of the street all around the block near the school. There was not much room to walk once you got inside and every country that was represented had their tables decorated with native fabrics, decorations, pictures, etc. All the people working were wearing traditional clothing from their country and the vibe in there was electric. You know how people always gather in the kitchen at parties and that's really where the party is at? Well this kitchen was the size of a gymnasium, so it was a good party. Lots of smiles on people faces, lots of full bellies, and if there were alcohol there, I don't think anyone would have left.

It actually was a really good thing that you only got little samples of things. I ate so much in the 2 hours I was there, I thought I was going to burst. I had food from Pakistan, India, Costa Rica, Panama (you have to try the Sopa de Amor if you're ever in Panama. It's a dessert that may have won top prize in my informal dessert competition), El Salvador, Venezuela (the Tres Leches cake running neck and neck with the Sopa de Amor for dessert first place), Syria, Lebanon, Canada, Russia, China, West Africa, and of course Trinidad. There were also some other places that didn't have vegetarian options and a couple that I found at the end of my tour of the world (the US, Indonesia, France), but there was just no room left in my tummy.

So the theme was the year of reconciliation and at times I think some of these countries were at war in my stomach. But after having some time to rest and think things over (a nice long nap), I think they all found peace. If only it were that easy. Get everyone together and share food and drink and see each other as people, not as images of ignorance, hate and anger.

I think the Hash I just tried could get addicting.

2008-10-19T06:37:00.000-07:00

One of the other teachers told me about it when I first got here and I was a bit intrigued. She mentioned it to me a couple times since then, but we were never able to get together for me to experience it. So yesterday, Katie, Aaron and I decided to try the Hash with a few other people that we know from playing Ultimate Frisbee Thursday afternoons.

We were a bit apprehensive, but curious at the same time. It sounded like kind of a crazy idea, maybe even a bit stupid, but intriguing at the same time. The Hash wasn't in Port of Spain, so we had to travel to Toco to do it (Toco is at the NE corner of the island - about a 2 1/2 hour drive.) There were supposed to be a lot of people there doing the Hash too - kind of a big party, but we were a little early, so we played in the ocean a bit. About a half hour later, people started showing up, a guy gave some quick instructions, we handed over our keys (so no one would get lost or left behind while we were doing the Hash), and we were on our way. Allow me to explain the Hash experience a bit more...

A Hash is something that I thought was created in Amsterdam, but after doing a quick check on Wikipedia, it appears that it was actually created in Kuala Lampur, Malaysia. In a nutshell, when you're doing a Hash, someone runs goes out and creates a path either in the woods, in a rain forest, in a city, or wherever. They leave small markers along this path (which may or may not follow along an already created trail) and you try to find your way from the beginning point to the end. The Hare (the person laying the trail) will also leave false markers along the way to confuse people, which you then have to double back and find the original trail again.

The Hash that I was on went into parts of the rain forest on the island; went up hill and down hills, through the mud, through and up a river, and over many a fallen branch or tree. I was part of the front of the pack, trying to find & follow the trail, until we found a false trail. At that point, I ended up getting stuck at the end as everyone turned around and went the other direction. I then got stuck behind a girl who was sliding down every decline on her butt. After a while I was able to get past her, but one other girl and I were kind of on our own for a bit because we fell so far behind the pack. We eventually caught up with a few other people and we slowly started catching up with other people. (Don't worry, people who helped lay out the course were picking up the rear, helping the people who were really struggling).

We found our way to the end, wet, muddy, sweaty, and with grins on our faces from ear to ear. It was so much fun. Afterwards, most people partake in a lot of drinking (a common Hasher phrase is that they are "drinkers with a running problem"). I enjoyed a carbonated apple juice. These apparently happen every other week in different locations across Trinidad and I have a feeling I know what I'll be doing next Saturday afternoon. For those who are interested, there are Hashers in pretty much every country - just look them up online and you'll probably find one nearby.

Wait, what did you think when I said I was trying Hash down here???

Viewing TT football is a "contact" sport

2008-10-15T15:31:00.000-07:00

After the crushing loss Trinidad received at the hands of the US a few weeks ago, the much anticipated re-match was at hand. However, this was not just a rematch, this was kind of a clutch game for TT. For TT to get back in the running for passing this first round of World Cup qualifiers, we had to beat the US and Guatemala had to lost to Cuba. That won't seal it for TT to pass through, but makes it much more likely. I could get into the why's and how's, but anyone who follows sports knows how confusing these different scenarios get, and I will spare us all of that.

The game began on a beautiful, clear evening with an enormous full moon over head. The TT fans came out in much larger numbers for this game, in comparison to the Guatemala match last month. We got there a little later than the last time, so we weren't in the midst of the really rowdy section. This time we were in the equivalent of the "end zone" and across from the party section. However the crowd in our section was still quite lively.

I won't go through the play by play, because quite honestly, I can't remember when the goals were scored. I do know that we (we being TT - I was rooting for the underdog tonight) scored and shortly after, the US scored with at 3 on 1, the 1 being the goalie. As expected, the crowd went wild, throwing beer in the air and down to the field, and the crowd was subsequently silenced. Later in the 2nd half, there was a penalty by a US player near their own goal, which resulted in a penalty kick for TT. We scored and were once again in the lead. The minutes were ticking down and the crowd was going wild anticipating the win. Over the loud speakers, the announcer announced that Guatemala lost to Cuba, thus nearly ensuring our advancement to the next round of qualifiers. The Soca Warriors managed to hold off the US as the game ended and there was much celebration.

There is often talk about how crazy people get at football/soccer games outside of the US. I kind of expected it here, even though we are a smaller country. But everyone was in good spirits. So there were no fights or anything of the sort. I guess the most contact that we had was from the buzz that we all got from everyone smoking marijuana in the stands. I swear, if there wasn't a slight breeze that night, there would have been a cloud hanging over the stadium.

The Quest To Save Some Turtles - Part III: The Return

2008-10-04T08:45:00.000-07:00

After the turtles and another walk down the beach, we went back to the guest house, had some food (turtle soup anyone? - just kidding), and chatted about what to do the next day. There was a waterfall that we heard was near by and was supposed to have some fresh water pools that we could swim in and all were in agreement that that was what we should do. Unfortunately, it's about a 4-hour hike and you need to start at 6 AM if you want to do it, so you can beat the heat. We found out these minor details around 8 AM, before we even started eating breakfast. So that was out of the picture. Plus it was supposed to be really crowded as this was all happening over the holiday weekend. It was suggested by the folks at the guest house that we try it again another weekend and we all agreed to do such.

Instead, they suggested that we go to a slow flowing river nearby and wade in that for an hour or two. Not really wanting to go back home already and having our minds set on a refreshing swim on a hot day, we all agreed. The lady running the guest house said it was only a 10-minute walk from where we were staying. After about 30 minutes of hiking through some rather thick brush and wooded areas, being led by a guy with a machete, we came across an opening and a beautifully tranquil river.

The water was cool and refreshing and perfect after our hike. We spent a couple of hours here, just relaxing and talking and letting the little girls explore a bit. The rest of the trip back to the guest house and to Port of Spain was pretty uneventful. But there was definitely a bond that was created amongst all of us as we went through this journey. These are some good people and I'm really glad that I'm getting the opportunity to get to know them.

The Quest To Save Some Turtles - Part II: The Rescue

2008-10-01T15:47:00.001-07:00

After all the excitement, we all got back to the guesthouse in time to check in and catch the truck that was taking us to the beach. This picture is looking down the coast of Matura Beach. Where we ended up finding some hatchling turtles was behind me.

We all go to the beach and started walking along it, not really knowing what we were looking for. The guides split up to use their "professional" eye to find some hatchlings. The guide who was wandering with us, got a call on his walkie-talkie and said that the other guides found some lost hatchlings and they needed our help, stat! Ok maybe he didn't say all of that, but he did find some and we were off to do our duty. We hiked back down the beach and found this disgusting pool of water that was an outlet for water from the mountains near by. But apparently there wasn't enough water in it to make it up and over some of the beach hills to get out to the ocean.

In this disgusting pond, we saw little turtle heads popping up and down. The guides were trying to get the turtles with this long, fallen tree branch, but were not having much luck. The little girls looked a little despaired by the situation, so Nick (now dubbed the "Hero Dad") climbed into the pond to start gathering up the little turtles and handing them to his daughters saying "girls, can you take this one for me so we can make sure he gets back to the ocean?" "Yes papa," the girls would respond with joy and excitement. This went on for a couple passes and fortunately for the Hero Dad, no appendages fell off as a result of wading through this pond and to date, no additional unwanted growths have been reported.

We gathered up the hatchling turtles in a small bucket and the guides began to tell us about the whole process of the mothers laying the eggs, predators of the hatchlings, where their food is stored, etc. These things were so cute and they were just barely bigger than the size of your palm.

After our lesson on leatherback turtles, we took them to the beach by the ocean and set them on their way. Apparently they need to feel and smell the sand, so they know where to come back in 20-30 years to lay their own eggs. We had 22 in all. I guess during the actual hatching season, you can find a couple hundred on a tour like ours. But there go our 22 little friends.

I think we were told something like 1 in 500 of these hatchling turtles actually make it to adulthood (which is a staggering 1-1.5 meters in diameter), so chances are, our rescue will still end in death for all of them. At least it was a cool experience. And who knows, maybe one of these 22 little hatchlings will beat the odds and grow up to be president one day.

The Quest To Save Some Turtles - Part I: It's the journey, not the destination.

2008-09-27T07:29:00.000-07:00

You know that I've had internet difficulties, so these next three posts go back in time a bit. The end of August is Trinidad & Tobago's Independence Day, so we were given a 3 day weekend to celebrate. Looking to take advantage of a little time off, a pack of my fellow teachers and I took the time to get away for the weekend and do some exploring.

One of the things to do in TT is watching the leather back turtles lay their eggs and then after a couple months, help any misguided turtle hatchlings back to the ocean. The turtles lay their eggs in the sand along the northern and eastern coast in April and May and the hatchlings come out in July and August. Being the very end of August, we were told by some of the local teachers that we wouldn't find any hatchlings. Even if that were the case, we all wanted to get out of dodge for a bit and see some new scenery.

There were 11 of us going for this two day excursion - leaving Saturday morning and returning Sunday afternoon. Kate and Aaron left before the rest of us because they wanted to run some errands before leaving. The rest of us (Ginger & Charlie, Mark & Rebekah, Nick & Gina and their girls, and me) were going to go up as a convoy. Nick, Gina and the girls piled into their car and the rest of us piled into Mark's car. I guess two cars isn't really a convoy, but we followed each other nonetheless. We were ready for our adventure to begin. I say that now, knowing that truer words could not be spoken.

As I mentioned in a previous post, there are driving challenges in this country. Roads are not always in the best of shape. Drivers are not always the most courteous. Because of this, Mark decided to lead since he had been here for a year and had a better feel for the roads and directions.

We were driving along and we approach a single pass bridge (ie - a bridge that is only the width of one automobile) and as we get on it, we see a cargo truck approaching the bridge from the other side. This truck was not on the bridge when we first entered the bridge, but it did not appear that it was slowing down at all. So Mark put the car in reverse and started backing up. Nick was not immediately on our tail so we were able to get almost all the way off the bridge, but the front of the car was still positioned on the bridge. At this point, the truck was halfway over the bridge and still not really slowing down...that is until he started driving up on top of the hood of Mark's car.

It all happened in slow motion. Rebekah, who was in the front seat, was actually talking to her grandmother as all of this was going down. She started yelling that the truck wasn't going to stop and we all jerked forward from the impact and then back again when we were stopped by hitting Nick & Gina's car. The truck finally came to a standstill approximately a foot from smashing into the windshield. But as you can see from the picture of the aftermath, it was on top of the hood of the car.

Once we came to a halt, Mark sat there for a second in a bit of shock. Rebekah, who is a Trini, got out of the car and started yelling at the driver, and I got out and ran back to Nick's car to make sure that they and the kids were ok (which they were).

Traffic started backing up on both sides of the bridge and people were milling about trying to figure out what happened and making sure that everyone was all right. The truck driver backed up a bit to get off our car and we backed up to get off the road and get out of the traffic's way. The truck driver pulled forward a bit and Nick ran and got his insurance information. Then surprisingly, the truck drove off. Rebekah called the police, who are not the most expedient people in the country, and i called Kate and Aaron to fill them in on the situation. They were already checked into the guest house and were about 2 km from Toco Beach, which is about another 45 minutes past where we were going and is supposed to be a quite beautiful beach. They turned around and started heading back to the guesthouse to wait for us and see how they could help out.

After a bit, it was decided that Nick, Gina, their girls, and Ginger would head up to the guesthouse so at least the little ones could still make it to see the turtles before dark. Aaron was going to drive down and pick up the rest of us and the head of our security at the school, Mr. Ralph, was calling a wrecker to come and get the car and decided to come out to make sure that we were all ok. Oh yeah, Mr. Ralph also got into an accident coming out to check on us.

A short while later, the driver of the truck came back in another car driven by his wife and some friends. He piled our with a beer in hand and waited with us for the police to arrive. While it was a little suspicious that he left the scene of the accident (we think he had too big a load in his truck and was scared about getting cited by the police), apparently it's no big deal if you kill time waiting for the police to show up to a motor vehicle accident drinking a beer.

The police showed up, stories were exchanged, reports were taken, and things started to calm down in general. Aaron arrived and we all piled into his car to continue our quest. Nothing was going to stop us from saving those turtles.

Beer here! Peanuts! Feets??

2008-09-23T15:02:00.000-07:00

A couple weeks ago, the Trinidad & Tobago soccer team played here for the first time in over a year. Apparently there was some political issues with the Ministry of Sports and the team over where they could play, prices, etc. Because of this, over the last year, every "home" game was actually played in the states or at other locations across the caribbean.

But the triumphant return of the Soca Warriors (the name of the TT soccer team) was upon us. And in their re-inaugural soccer match, they were playing the hard nosed competition of Guatemala in the first of a two match game for the World Cup pre-qualifiers. (FYI - each team plays other countries in their region twice - once at home and once away - and the aggregate of the scores of those two games determines who won that match).

So this was the first of the two meetings of TT and Guatemala. We were expecting a huge crowd, so we got to the stadium a little over an hour early. However, due to the locals protesting the issues with the Ministry of Sports, the fact that this was the first of two matches, and apparently that the Soca Warriors are somewhat fair-weather fans, the stadium was barely 1/3 full. It was still a great time though.

As the crowd was getting riled up and excited for the game to start, they came out with this enormous flag and pulled it up over all the people in our part of the stands. There was one faithful Guatemalan fan amongst the TT fans and trouble did not ensue as would be expected based on stories that have been told about how crazy the fans can get. Instead, he was supported by the locals, maybe it was because he had a good gimmick.

As the game began and progressed, we were closely watching the clouds roll in. Fortunately for us, the rain never came and it ended up being a perfect evening - temperature wise.

Almost the entire game was scoreless. (FYI-Soccer matches are two 45-minute halves.) Then in the 85th minute, TT scored and the place, while pretty empty, went nuts. People were cheering and jumping up and down. I can only imagine what it's like when the place is full.

We thought that we had this wrapped up, because scoring is not so easy in soccer. However, shortly after the TT goal, there was a quick penalty kick by Guatemala on the far side of the field. I don't know if the TT goalie wasn't ready or maybe wasn't aware what was going on, but it went straight in the goal without even being touched. You could hear a pin drop in that stadium. The game ended in a tie. Bummer.

But that's not the thing that really sticks out from my first soccer match in TT. Rather it's the vendors that were selling drinks, food and cigarettes. Yes cigarettes. Apparently the non-smoking thing hasn't invaded TT like it has in the states. I will say that the way they were sold was enticing though. The packs of cigarettes were carried around in a big, clear garbage bag. Nice merchandising.

The other thing that stuck out was what people were calling out. Sometimes its hard to understand what is being said with the thick caribbean accent and all. I was able to figure out the beer call pretty easily. The guy selling different types of roasted nuts was hard to figure out until I actually saw someone eating them (they're sold in small, wrapped up paper bags, so it's not as obvious as one might think). But the last thing that I thought I kept hearing was "feets". What the...?? But as the "feets" lady walked by me, I saw on a tray, a bunch of styrofoam cups with chicken feet sticking out of the top of them. Apparently they sold chicken feet soup. Hmm. Who would have thought?

I really wish I had a picture of that.

Boy, I wish I could post a comment on these witty stories.

2008-09-23T14:49:00.000-07:00

Well, now you can!! If you're reading along and feel the desire to post a comment (which I love to see - it lets me know that people are actually reading this thing), then you just click on the "comments" link under any given story.

Apparently is where it is getting tricky for some folks...

1) Type all your great comments in the big box on the right.

2) Type in the funny looking word in the box provided.

3a) If you have a Gmail account, click on the button next to "Google/Blogger" and enter your Gmail ID and password as if you were logging into Gmail.

3b) If you DO NOT have a Gmail account, you can click on the button next to "Name/URL" and type your name as you want it to appear in the "Name" box.

4) Click the "Publish Your Comment" bar and your comment is posted.

Good luck!

New Posts

2008-09-13T05:59:00.000-07:00

I realize that it's been a while since I've posted last. I have lots of stuff to write about and stuff that I've already written down, but I just recently moved apartments and I'm still waiting to get the internet set up there and my school blocks blogs, so I can't get on there either.

So how am I posting this you ask? Well, I'm actually sitting in my car on the street outside my apartment complex, swiping someone else's wireless signal. Since I don't want to sit here and type pages and pages of stuff, I'm just going to say sorry that it's been a while. I'm thinking that I should have a connection in my house in another week or so and then I'll be a bit more regular with my posts.

Your best defense is a good offense

2008-08-29T06:33:00.000-07:00

No truer words have ever been said about the driving in Trinidad. I thought that I was pretty well versed in driving and could handle other aggressive drivers. After all, I lived in Chicago for a number of years and spent considerable time in Boston for work in the late 90's. But I don't think anything can really prepare you for this place.

Basically, the only rules of the road are that there are no rules of the road. Of course I'm kidding...sort of. The roads are quite narrow and usually pretty curvy. You drive on the left side of the road (which is actually much easier to get used to than I though it would be), but apparently you can part wherever you want and in whatever direction you want. There have been a number of instances where I had no idea if I were going down the wrong way on a one-way street because every car is parked going in the same direction. The only thing that told me otherwise was another car on the same street driving in the opposite direction of the parked cars.

Pretty much every street is a two lane street (one lane for each direction), and that is the extent of the street and pavement. Not many sidewalks in the neighborhoods, just some driveways and usually a deep gutter to catch the rain. Oddly, even though on many of the busy streets, people have no issues just pulling over and parking or maybe chatting with someone on the side of the road. So there are frequently cars pulling into your lane to avoid a parked car. They don't necessarily wait to make sure that the oncoming traffic is clear; they just dart out and continue on their way. This is also a frequent occurrence with potholes - even if it's on a blind curve. I fear the day that my parents come to visit because I'm almost certain this will give one or both of them a heart attack.

First week down

2008-08-29T06:19:00.000-07:00

When i first got hired, I was told that I was going to be teaching Algebra 1 and Algebra 2 and possibly one other class. When I got here, my principal said that I was still in for Algebra 2, but my other courses were up in the air. He finally decided that I would have 3 sections of Algebra 2 and 2 sections of Introduction to Statistics. I guess they somehow heard about the infamous "All STAT & A Bag of Chips".

The class sizes are very small. My smallest is 6 students and my largest is 15. There are 3 math teachers and 2 math classrooms. You don't need to be a math teacher to do that equation. Being the new guy, I travel between a few different classrooms through the course of the week, but I do have my own office, which is quite nice. Actually, I don't really mind not having my own room because that's the way it's been for me for the 2 years that I taught in Indy, so I don't really know any different. I also had pretty small class sizes in Indy. I think the only difference is that this is a private school, so I'm getting some extremely high achieving, very motivated students.

Our class sections are split into alternating 85-minute block schedules and the students only have 4 classes each day. On Mondays and Wednesdays I have 2 sections that I teach and on Tuesdays and Thursdays I have 3 that I teach. Then on Fridays, we have a modified schedule where we have an extended homeroom and the students have all of their classes for just 35 minutes. So basically, I get lots of planning time during the course of the week.

I'm still feeling out where my kids are at in regards to their skills and what they have covered in the past. But all of that will fall into place soon enough. I'll probably have to start a study session after school at some point for those who are struggling a bit. But all in all, I anticipate a very good year. Actually, there have been a few times already where I can't really believe that I'm getting paid to do this.

Mr. Marbles?

2008-08-21T14:08:00.000-07:00

I swear, sometimes I really do think I'm Dr. Doolittle. I was a cat whisperer with Poopers, Angie's cat, Rudy (who apparently wants to kill most people) and Jane Ire's cat, Cat (apparently it doesn't have a name and generally doesn't like people much either). I have dogs who bark and everyone, come up and start licking me as soon as I walk into a room. These frogs that keep on arriving on my doorstep. And then as I was typing my last post, a bird jumped up on the bar outside my window and just sat there and watched me for a bit. As I leaned to try to get my camera, it flew up to my roof. Then all I could hear was his little footsteps running up and down the roof.

I think I just threw up a bit in my mouth.

2008-08-21T13:32:00.000-07:00

Anyone who has traveled a bit has probably come to realize that not everyone has it as good as we do in the states. Lots of things are used to their fullest - sort of a waste not, want not attitude.

When I first got here, I had to figure out which bedroom I was going to stay in. Not a hard thing to do since they both had full bathrooms attached to them, but one had more closet space. I'm looking around, really kind of tired from a long flight (side note to those not in the loop, I had a flight from Chicago to Miami, a 10 hour layover in Miami, and then the 4 hour flight to TT, customs, etc.). I know I should be figuring out if I should wash the sheets on the bed before I sleep in them, but after a sleepless night in an airplane and airport, I don't really care. So I climb into bed to rest my weary head and something is poking me. I adjust the pillow a bit and lay back down and get poked again. Ok, what the heck is this? So I reach my hand into the pillow and get poked about 3 or 4 more times. I pulled the pillow out of the case and I realize that the pillow is stuffed with feathers. However, in Trinidad, they apparently do not pull the quills off of the feather before they stuff them into the pillow. I can just imagine frantic pillow makers grabbing the feathers at the chicken slaughter house..."This is great! Can you believe that we're getting this stuff for free? It will be pure profit when we sell these things!" Needless to say that this little vegetarian went and found some other 'not so luxurious' pillows.

Now we move forward to Wednesday, getting my driver's license. After spending 4 hours at the BMV, I'm famished. So myself and another new teaching couple, Ryan and Meredith, decide to go to this little food stand across the street to get some roti - which is a local dish, basically various types of Indian food wrapped in a burrito like shell (utterly delicious by the way). On the chalkboard by the cashier, today special - Cow Heel Soup. Mmmmmm.

Now let's fast forward to the Saturday farmer's market. How cool, lots of local fruits and vegetables. Sounds like a great way to continue to learn what is local to the islands. Aaron, Kate (yet another new teaching couple) set out on a little adventure to find this enormous market. Apparently, this is such a big deal for many of the locals, that they will get there at 6:30 AM. We opted for more of an 8:30-ish arrival. You know, being fashionably late. Anyway, we find this giant market, park the car, and walk into the first building, which is literally a meat market. On the table of one of the first booths is a full, severed pig head. A couple booths down, a stack (oh yes, a stack) of pig snouts. Then there were some entire cow ribs (like in the first Rocky movie). There were a lot of choice cuts of meat, just sitting on the cement counters at these booths. I'm kind of curious how all that is sanitized (that's sarcasm if you didn't pick up on it). There were some live ducks chilling out, probably not really realizing what was going on. Some tiny little chicks that looked like yellow poof-balls, waiting to get executed. And so on. Good times. Maybe that's why everyone gets there at 6:30.

Once we exited the meat market, and left the many, many, MANY, flies, we moved into the next building. This was the fruits, veggies and clothing (which I'm sure isn't stolen and is authentic brand names). The fruits and veggies market was great. No complaint there, other than not knowing what to buy and what different things looked like. Everyone was very friendly and helpful. And I'm sure they didn't charge us silly Americans any extra when we had the conversation that went along the lines of..."What is this?" "Um, that's an avocado, mon." "Oh ok. I'll take one of those." Honestly, the thing was as big as a grapefruit. I've never seen an avocado like that before.

Oh...hello.

2008-08-18T16:15:00.000-07:00

The first few nights as I was trying to fall asleep, there were these constant sirens going off outside. I thought maybe it was Caribbean car alarms (not the DEEE DOOO DEEE DOOO BRRRIIIIP BRRRIIIIP WAAAA WAAAA WAAAA WAAAA alarm that we are so accustomed to but more like a bunch of repetitive tweets). I asked my neighbor Charlie (he and Ginger - his girlfriend, are also new teachers and they live just a couple of apartments down from me) and he said that he didn't hear anything and didn't quite know what I was talking about. A couple nights later, we were out and I could hear it as we were driving home. I kept trying to point it out to him but he couldn't hear it over the roar of the maxi-taxi. So when we finally got back to our apartment complex, I pointed it out to him and he said that he thought they were Trinidadian crickets or locusts or something.

So the week passes and I'm getting used to the crickets (or locusts or whatever they are) and we're over at Nick and Gina's apartment for cocktails and sodas (also new teachers from Vancouver, BC, Canada with their two daughters, Sienna who is 6 and Savanna who is 4). As we leave, I mentioned something about the crickets to Gina and she said that she believed that they were some type of tree frogs. So as Charlie, Ginger and I are walking home (we live only a couple blocks away from Nick and Gina) I'm scoping the trees to see if I can actually pick out a frog from the street lights or moon light, but to no avail.

However, when I get home, I see in the darkness by my front door, a little shape. My eyes start to get adjusted and I realized that it was this little guy...

So instinctively I said "Hello" and asked him how his night was going. He didn't say much so I told him to wait there, at which point I went and got my camera. It was very dark and I had a hard time getting him in the frame but he didn't budge one iota when I took the picture even though the flash was pretty bright. Of course in the back of my head I envisioned him leaping, with exposed fangs, for my jugular and ending my stay in Trinidad with a horrific, bloody scene on my doorstep.

But instead, he just sat there with that "what up" look on his face. (This one was for you Ms. Pearson).

Maracas Beach

2008-08-18T16:03:00.000-07:00

Maracas Bay is about an hour or two away from Port of Spain. The road there goes up through the mountains (which consist of very narrow and very curvy) and then this bay just kind of pops out of nowhere. Then you wind back down the road to get to the beach area. The waves were fairly big and there was some good body surfing. The water was as warm as bath water. Not once was there a "brrr" or a shiver. For those who do eat animals, there is also a place that is supposedly the best "shark 'n bake" in the country. Shark 'n bake is basically deep fried shark fillets with lots of various toppings. Not sure what the toppings were since I did not indulge, but everyone who did have some raved about it. So if you're ever in Trinidad, be sure you get to Maracas Beach and enjoy the waves and the fine local cuisine.

I was going to post a picture of Maracas Bay (or the beach) but I forgot that forgot my camera on that trip. I guess I'll just have to go again and take pictures.

I have arrived!! Wait a...

2008-08-17T16:40:00.000-07:00

I thought there would be great fanfare and parades when I arrived at the airport, but the heads of state must have got the dates mixed up.

I have officially been here for one week. My first week was filled with a lot of new experiences and a great deal of trying to get settled in to my new place. My apartment is pretty nice and is really close to the school (only about a 10 minute walk). It's a two story, two bedroom, two and a half bath condo and is furnished with the fine decor of an early 90's corporate apartment. If you have been to one, you know what I'm talking about. If not, I'll let your imagination run wild.

My first week was also spent doing a lot of waiting. I think the official description is "island time". But the essence is that things don't move quite as quickly as they do in the states. That's cool and all (and actually one of the things that I was looking forward to), but it may have gotten a bit excessive the first couple of days. Please don't take the following as a complaint, because I'm not complaining about living a slightly slower lifestyle, just want you all to get a feel for what "island time" is all about.

We were supposed to have mini buses (called maxi-taxis) pick us up for our first meeting at school at 9 AM Monday morning. Around 10:00, the bus picked me up. We met all the other new hires and got a tour of the school. After the tour, we went to get bank accounts set up. Someone called the bank ahead of time to make sure that they could manage all 14 of us and they said that they could. Six and a half hours later, we left the bank, accounts in hand. We went back to our apartments and about a half hour later, we were on our way to dinner. The place was pretty nice, but they were trying out a new menu, so they said that dinner was going to be half price tonight. Cool. We order. Three hours later, we get our food. The conversation all day and night was great though. We all really started bonding and got a chance to really get to know each other.

Tuesday was scheduled for an 8:30 pickup but we pushed it back to 9 since we were all a little wiped out from the previous day. I don't know why, we didn't really do anything, but we were all tired nonetheless. So around 10:30, the maxi-taxi picks me up and we head out to Maracas Beach. That place was awesome, but I'll get to that later. The last bit of waiting came at the BMV on Wednesday. Let me tell you, I don't think any country's BMV moves very quick. We were there for about 4 hours getting our licenses, and this time there were only 6 of us.

Again, this was not a complaint - just an adjustment. Really, after the bank, it was all a drop in the hat and we just rolled with it.