My Death-Defying Beach Trip and Joyous New Workout Program

You have not experienced a hair pin turn until you climb the mountain road on the way to Choroni in a 19 person bus at 11 o'clock at night.  I must say, I am grateful for the darkness, because it deceived me into thinking that we were not, in fact, inches away from plummeting to our deaths at anytime for approximately two hours of our six hour ride to the beach.  It also helped that we had been drinking for much of the ride down- Caracas traffic and a harrowing mountain road will drive most sane teachers to alcohol, which was certainly the case for the 13 CIC expats and two brave natives that joined us on last weekend's beach adventure.  Ivan and Zeke braved the trip with what we summated was 5/6ths of the expat teaching staff at CIC.  When we asked our principal what would have happened to the school if we plummeted to our deaths, or met some other unfortunate delay in returning to school, she answered only with "we'd manage".  I don't think that the administration has come up with a "all of our expats have gone missing" contingency plan yet, but after last weekend, they probably should.

The ride to the beach was certainly worth it.  The house, or rather hacienda/estate/Latin mansion we stayed at was absolutely stunning.  We all had a bed, copious spots to sit and relax, a pool to enjoy and a wonderful landscape to savor.  We even had two dogs to play with, a band of monkeys to entertain us and a housekeeper to make us breakfast each morning! Saturday morning, we enjoyed an arepa-filled breakfast and headed to the dock on the edge of town, where we caught a motorboat ride to a beach that was 15 minutes from town, and only accessible by foot or boat!  The views form the boat were breathtaking- mountains buffered the shore, with sea caves and beaches around every peak.  The water was just indescribably blue.  A mix of teal, aqua and deep blue, it looked like it must have been colored by a masterful painter.  I have been to Italy, Greece and Australia, but never have a seen a water so lovely, and the beach where were made camp rivaled all the beaches I have seen before.  It was absolutely stunning.  We set up under a few umbrellas, and Gordon and I immediately slathered ourselves with SPF 60.  As the whitest of the white people in the group, people were quite concerned with quality of our lathering jobs, as no one wants to deal with third degree burns when the nearest hospital is only accessible via a peril-filled mountain road.  We all enjoyed the sun and surf, playing frisbee and soccer, swimming and snorkeling.  Ivan took me out for a snorkeling adventure close to the shore.  Not very far out was a whole other world underwater!  Schools or fish, brain coral and even a moray eel greeted us- I never wanted to come back to the dry world!  But alas, Ivan was concerned about my back in the sun, and I was sent to reapply sunscreen and sit in the shade. 

After a solid five hours at the beach, we returned to our hacienda for rest and showering, and then headed to dinner. After an incredibly long wait (especially considering that we were 14 famished adults and one starving eight year old), I was served a fish as long as my arm, fried, complete with eyes and teeth and scales.  Despite Jason and Ivan's attempts to help me find the meat among the rest of the fish, I wasn't able to eat my fill due to my discomfort with the idea of my dinner looking at me. I gave up entirely after Jason made the fish talk to me and then sat the entire head on my plate.  Asshole.

For the first time in the history of my friend group, we all went to bed before midnight that night, which meant we are all up and ready for more arepas bright and early (like 9am) the next morning.  We split into groups based on what we were interested in accomplishing for the day, and Ivan, Gordon, Walli and I set off for a walk through the town up to the main beach, Playa Grande (which, for you English speakers, is creatively named "Large Beach").  As we began our trek, we realized it was hot as hell, which we rectified by a) beers and b) coconut popsicles that were to DIE for.  The town was brightly colored and bustling and separated from the beach by a river that housed motorboats for taking tourists to and from the farther beaches.  Playa Grande was as beautiful as our beach the previous day, just, as the name suggests, larger and subsequently more crowded.  Vendors sold food and drinks amongst the hundreds of umbrellas, and people were everywhere in the water as well. I even spotted a few short boarders in the surf, doing a remarkably good job at not mowing over small children as they tore through the waves. On our return trip the hacienda, we picked up some souvenirs and the native alcoholic concoction call the Guarapita.  Guarapitas came in multiple flavors- passion fruit, coconut and even chocolate- and always in enormous bottles that thankfully encouraged sharing. They were DELICIOUS, which meant that after "sharing" ten bottles, we found ourselves far drunker than we anticipated while boarding the bus for our six hour ride home.  Thankfully I slept most of the way, which meant I missed most of the treacherous road down the mountain, and put off the impending nausea until we were about an hour from home.  We arrived at about midnight, and the next morning was the roughest I have had since I've been here, between the sleep deprivation and the number the guarapitas did on my stomach.  The moral of this segment of my beach story is guarapitas in general=awesome; guarapitas before a six hour bus ride= worst idea ever.  

This week has been as busy as ever at work.  I finished meeting with all of my seniors' parents, worked on a organization program to help the upper grades with organization and time management and pulled off a very successful first college visit. I have massive amounts of stuff to do Monday and Tuesday this week, since Wednesday Friday I will be accompanying grades 6-10 to a team building camping trip four hours away in Valencia!  I am very excited for the trip, as it will help me get to know the kids better and allow me to get our of Caracas again to see more of the country. 

To end this post, I'll share another "I'm clearly not in America anymore" story.  Today, I went with MariaElena to "boot camp".  Instead of gyms in this country, people exercise in mass in public places like parks or school stadiums.  MariaElena frequents one such groups called MTS, which stands for Marcos's Training System, appropriately nicknamed "BootCamp".  Marcos is probably one of the most attractive men I have ever seen in my life, though I have only seen him from the receiving end of a bullhorn as he yells in Spanish to CORREMOS NO CAMBIAMOS!   Today's boot camp was held in a construction site, where he ran 100 or so of us through pools of mud and even brought in a water truck to hose us down as we planked and jumpingjacked our way through a two hour work out.  He even utilized the rocks around the site to make us do clean-and-presses. And if I needed another reason to realize this was not my normal American work out experience, half way through our 200 squat finale, a herd of goats wandered into our group, fairly unphased by the 100 grunting people and blaring music. Monkeys, guarapitas and goats- oh my!  Clearly my Venezuela experience continues to entertain and delight- in fact, the end of my honeymoon phase seems no where in sight!  :)

A Challenge to my Homeland

Please note that this will not be a traditional Tracey blog post.  This is a challenge to all of you, and my impetus for this challenge comes from no particular experience of recent but rather a culmination of many experiences I have had working as an educator for six years.

Do not take for granted the inherent benefits that come with being an American citizen.  Daily, most of us do not fear for our safety or the safety of those we love.  We do not feel want in our homes- most of us neither want for food nor drink nor clothing nor the love of our families.  We can go about our day without fearing violence or scarcity. Employment may be difficult, but not impossible.  And the money we earn we can invest towards better opportunities, better lives, because we do not fear for the insolvency of our government.  We can practice faith, openly, without fear of retribution. We can love whomever we want, and though we may not have all the rights we deserve, we can openly speak out about our want for change. And my friends, in America, we have the right to a SOLID PUBLIC EDUCATION, and the opportunity to seek WORLD CLASS HIGHER EDUCATION.  If we cannot afford higher education, our government will assist us in funding our higher education. These are all, in my opinion, blessings.

Living in Caracas has not blinded me to the amount of suffering in my own country, but it has given me another litmus to measure suffering. Just as there exists a privilege of skin color, there exists a privilege of passport, and an American passport gives you rights that I didn't even comprehend until I moved abroad.  

We are lucky, and I challenge you to keep that in mind as you consider your day to day.  As you consider the immigration issues facing our country.  As you consider our role in world affairs. Be grateful. Question. Seek to understand, as I will continue to do everyday.  

Still Spinning

The weeks are spinning faster and faster, like a roll of toilet paper as it comes to an end.  I realized how long I had been here when I went to get a mani/pedi yesterday and realized that my last one had been a month ago.  A month! I see that I have accomplished quite a bit, both personally and professionally, but I also see I am just starting my journey up the mountain and the peak is still a long ways off, obscured in the haze somewhere....  I still haven't found a routine I am happy with, between being sick and (shhhhh don't tell my Mom!) twisting my knee, I haven't gotten to spend much time exercising.  Also, the schedule at school has been a bit screwy with all the back-to-school stuff, along with less predictable matters like country-wide electricity blackouts.  

Regulation will come, sooner than later I am sure.  This last weekend I was able to finish up getting things I needed for my apartment, learned how to pay my utilities online (so I don't have any Tracey Apartment Blackouts), and remembered again why going out with Gordon ruins my sleep schedule.  Ivan invited me out to a Ska concert on Saturday night, and for good measure, we brought along Gordon and a friend-of-a-friend Anne.  Yes, gentle readers, I have only been here for roughly six weeks and already have friends-of-friends.  Pathological extroversion at it's finest! Anyways, the bar where the concert was held reminded me of a dive bar in the US (similar to the old upstairs of Starr Hill for you Cville folks who may remember!), but unlike the US, the band didn't come on until 1am!  An additional surprise was, after noticing that our table was in fact made of an over-sized red bull can with an advertisement for red bull on the top, I ordered a red bull and vodka to drink.  The waitress said they did not have any redbull in the house, at which time I pointed to a RED BULL REFRIGERATOR WITH RED BULL IN IT and she said that they were "props" and not, in fact, cans of red bull.  Ironically, three hours later, when I was well lubricated and definitely no longer needed a red bull and vodka, the waitress magically found one. That was probably the beginning of the end. The concert was fantastic, and in true Tracey style, we went for late-night arepas after the show and rolled home at roughly 6am.  Thus, another unaccomplished Sunday.  I have a lot of those here.  

My expat friends who have been around the expat block all say that six weeks is when the honeymoon starts to wane, but so far, I haven't seen many signs of that yet. My first real feeling of homesickness did come this week though, when I learned of some troubles that some of my friends were having back home. Knowing that those I love were suffering and that I had no way of physically reaching out to them hit me pretty hard on Sunday night. That was a risk I knew I was taking when I came here, but it is harder to face this fact when it is actually happening. I would love advice on how to best reach out to my friends back home who are suffering.  I hate the idea of just sending an email. Sigh. First world problems in the third world.

Anyways, it's off to the beach this weekend!  Fifteen of us (yes, I have fifteen friends!) are going to Choroni, a three/four hours drive from Caracas in Aragua, Venezuela. Expect a full report (and pictures!) next week:).

Salsa is not my jam.....yet

I am not very good at salsa.  My seeming ease at working the Reggaeton dance floor gave me a false sense of dancing talent, which quickly dissipated on Friday when I went with Ivan, Gordon, Walli and Jason to a free salsa concert at La Estancia.  La Estancia is a beautifully maintained plantation right in the middle of the city.  The grounds are maintained by the government and they have free concerts and events on the property throughout the year.  Friday, the headlining act was an EXCELLENT salsa group from Puerto Rico.  For three hours the group of us, plus Ivan's Mom, Dad and friends hung out and tried our hand at salsa-ing.  Ivan's Mom and godfather were incredible, and on the other end of the spectrum was me.  I was spending so much time trying to get my feet right I forgot about the rest of my body!  And the tempo of the music was so fast, I never really got my feet right, even though there are only a few steps!  The evening was really fun, despite my shameful attempts at dancing, and I really want to keep practicing until I can look half way decent at it, as Salsa is a very popular pastime here in Caracas.

Saturday a large group of us attended Hash #2!  The block of ice returned and I found myself in a middle of the hash circle quite a few times.  Ivan received his Hash name after six years of attending Hashes- he is now, forevermore, Smelly Goat.  I think Gordon and Catherine are next for naming- Gordon because he's, well, Gordon and Catherine because she has been Hashing for four years.  The naming is not a pleasant process though, as you could probably expect from a group that forces binge drinking while sitting on a large block of ice.  They basically douse you in beer and corn flour while making you drink with no hands. If you thought that frat hazing ended in college- you were wrong.  I have found my new fraternity and it is awesome to be mere months from turning thirty and getting to be a pledge again.  

Sunday we did some shopping to complete the stocking of my apartment and hung out by the pool, and these first two days of work have been remarkably manageable.  I realized this was probably because I did not stay up until 5am both Friday and Saturday nights, so for the first time since I arrived, I have kept a reasonable sleep schedule. So there's the trade off- I engaged in planned binge drinking yet am getting enough sleep. Sorry Mom, but it sounds like a fair trade to me!  

Happy Monthiversary to Me!

Oh man what a great week!  Though this was technically the second full week of school, it was my first full week, due to my unfortunate stomach condition last week.  School has really been awesome.  There is a lot to do, and I am still trying to figure everything out, but I am slowly gaining more and more confidence as the days go on.  It's going to be a long building year, but I am feeling like I have more and more of a grip on it as time goes by. Meanwhile, my weekday evenings are turning out to be as full as my weekends.  Mondays after school I have Spanish lessons with dear, sweet Isabel.  Isabel is 68 years old, and though she could be my grandmother, she is as lively and spirited as a much younger woman.  What's more, her spirit is so kind and patient.  I suppose you must be kind and patient if you are going to deal in language acquisition and gringos, but Isabel really has a gift of empathy and is incredibly disarming.  Not like I am EVER self conscious, but Isabel helps me not feel bad when I struggle or make a mistake....like when I was trying to say "I was embarrassed" but instead said "I was pregnant".  Stupid false cognates!  

Tuesday, I went to a birthday party for a fellow new hire who works on the elementary side, whose name is also Isabel.  Isabel was turning 30 and her boyfriend, a local Lebanese restaurant owner, invited Isabel's friends to join them at his restaurant for a celebration.  I was feeling tired and antisocial on Tuesday, so made a pact with my boss to "only go for an hour".  Please note: one cannot just attend a birthday party in Venezuela for one hour.  Also, you had better have on your dancing heels and a hungry tummy, because these people are NOT playing around.  As the restaurant was Lebanese, the courses came out one after the other: hummus, dumplings, stuff stuffed with stuff, salad, things I cannot pronounce or label that were delicious and of course, wine wine wine.  On a Tuesday.  Hey, a birthday is a birthday and this country goes BALLS OUT. After stuffing our faces, Isabel's boyfriend surprised her with- what else- but a belly dancer!  She was beautiful and very talented and wanted very much for us to try out our dancing skills with her.  We obliged, tried our best, and had a great time. One of the things I love about this country is that people are more comfortable with uninhibited behavior, in that, you can pretty safely make a fool out of yourself without fear of judgment.  As long as you are having a good time, people are pretty responsive and supportive.  Speaking of responsive or supportive, I will try to upload a great video for your viewing enjoyment once I get a better internet speed!

Wednesday was my day of rest, though I had to turn down Gordon's invitation to Curry Club in order to get my eight hours of sleep.  Thursday was definitely the highlight of my week.  Ivan and his Mom, Nereida, invited me to a Venezuelan musical trio performance.  The theater was in Mercedes, a larger suburb not far from our little Los Samanes.  The theater itself was quite small, like a black box theater, and the group consisted of a drummer, upright bass and guitar.  The music was amazing. It was a mix of jazz, samba, merengue and what I could best describe as Venezuelan folk.  And all of it had a Venezuelan flair to it, no matter the style.  The whole experience was just what I needed. Just hearing the music and letting the sound wash over me, not having to worry about translating language, relaxing and just feeling the music.....gosh it was just so great.  The concert lasted over two hours, and even featured a few singers who were just phenomenal.  I want to spend every Thursday at the theater!  It's good for the soul!  And even better for my soul- and stomach- were the arepas Ivan, Nereida and I had after the concert. Since it's perfectly acceptable to eat dinner at 10pm in this country, we enjoyed dinner and conversation after the concert.  Nereida is trying to learn English, so we were quite the pair, me asking her questions in Spanish and her answering in English and visa versa.  Ivan (rightfully so) refused to help us, so there was a lot of hand wringing and helpless giggling, but in the end, we realized that we could actually communicate remarkably well!  I learned about her travels, of which she has done a lot, and that our birthdays are ten days apart, so we are both Aries. This gave me some insight as to why we get along so well...and why we both can't sit still or stop talking....classic fire sign behavior!

The fun doesn't stop here- in mere minutes I am off to a free salsa concert at a park in Alta Mira.  And tomorrow, it's Hash #2!  Happy one month in Caracas anniversary to me!