Peru: Day Two - Part One

Before I start on day two, I should share my terrifying moment in the night between days one and two. I had a very vivid dream, in which I looked up at the wall next to my bed and saw a small hole. Through the hole, someone was pointing a dart gun, which held a poisonous dart.  I woke up screaming, which woke up Bergs, who was understandably shaken and asked what was wrong. I looked back up at the wall and realized it was just a dream and back to sleep, but it was so scary! I think it was just me getting out all the nerves of being in a foreign country. It was funnier in the morning,

After a shower in the tiny bathroom (hot water, which I didn't realize I was lucky to have) and a breakfast of half a banana and a roll with jam, we embarked into Lima. This is when it really hit me that I was in Peru, and I was struck with how amazing it was that I was there. It was so great to see the city by day. In some ways, it was just like any other big city in the U.S., but it was also very different. I thought it was charming. I felt uncharacteristically adventurous with my backpack strapped on, walking the streets of Lima. We stopped by an internet cafe to call our parents. The payphones were surprisingly inexpensive, considering we were making international calls. 

From there, we went in search of a bus. Buses in Peru are a lot like taxis in that you sort of flag them down on the street, except they're jam-packed with people and you have to jump on as fast as you can.  If you're lucky, you get a seat. In this case, we stood, backpacks and all, en route to Chaclacayo. This was my first view of crazy Peruvian drivers. All of the vehicles are crowded onto one-way streets. The cars next to you are close enough to touch, and if there's an inch of front of your car, someone will take that opportunity to pass you. It was quite terrifying the first couple of days, especially when we were in taxis, but after that it was just funny. I swear that Peruvian drivers must be highly skilled, because I didn't see one traffic accident while we were there. The other thing I noticed is that the Andes mountains around Lima are not green. Quite honestly, they were like giant mounds of dirt. For someone used to green mountains, it was incredibly odd.

In Chaclacayo, we visited a lovely woman named Rosita.  She was one of Bergs' pensionistas in Peru, which means that she cooked all of the missionaries' meals (the Church gives them money for food, but they donate their time and talents).  On our way to her house, I noticed that all of the houses had bars over the windows, but they're all very decorative bars. A lot of them were in flower designs. Also, all of the houses are right next to each other. I didn't see a single free-standing house. Rosita's house was nice looking on the outside as well as the inside.  Most houses were fairly nice, but simple, on the inside, but were very rough-looking on the outside.

Rosita was very excited to see "Hermana Bergsjo", and was very gracious in welcoming me to her home. She made us lunch: aji de gallina, which is chicken in a cream sauce over rice. Aji is a hot sauce. A very hot hot sauce. Bergs warned me that a little went a long way, and I thought I had done that, but it was still so hot (I have a low tolerance for hot foods). Needless to say, I felt like my mouth was on fire. Many Peruvians were amused by this tale during the duration of our visit. With lunch, Rosita gave me Inca Kola! Inca Kola is like the official drink of Peru. You know how we see Pepsi everywhere? That's how Inca Kola is. It tastes like a cross between cream soda and bubble gum, and it's violently yellow colored. I loved it! 

Before, during, and after lunch, I found that I was able to follow the conversation fairly well. I don't speak much Spanish, but enough of it is similar to French or English (and Bergs has an American enough accent) that I could at least pick out the subject most of the time. This was helpful in me not feeling like an idiot.  I was able to actually enjoy the conversation. Rosita asked if we had boyfriends, and was shocked that we didn't (actually, everyone we visited asked this and was shocked). It was amusing. I also got asked a lot if I would date a Peruvian. 

Since this post is getting quite long, I believe this is a good place to stop. Good news: pictures start in the next post! And the story for why the first two posts had no pictures will be on a future post.

Thanks for reading.

Peru - Day One

So...it's been a month and a half, but now begins the tale of my travels! The good news is that I took notes on my trip.

Why I went to Peru: My friend, Michelle Bergsjo (aka Bergs), served her mission in Peru. She was planning on going back for a visit, and asked me if I wanted to come. It was a terrifying thought, going to another country where I wouldn't speak the language, but it was too exciting an opportunity to turn down.

Our journey began on a snowy Thursday morning. There was snow on the ground when we left, but the snow starting falling again as we drove through the canyon on the way to the airport. It was exciting to think about the warm weather that awaited us south of the equator.

At the airport we ran into two of the account managers from the company Bergs and I work for. Fun fact: one of them flew first class, one flew economy.  We discussed whether the first class account manager flew first class because she was a senior account manager, or if she paid for her own upgrade.

We flew to Dallas-Fort Worth, then to Lima.  It was a very long flight, and to make it longer, the airplane did not play the movies they said they would. Instead the showed a cycle of screens that showed us how far we had flown and the time/temperature in Dallas and Lima. Oh, and the same episode of Parks & Rec twice. Good times.

We landed in Lima at 1:00 a.m. We went through customs, and I was concerned because the person at the desk didn't seem to speak English. But I got through and received my very first passport stamp! It was quite exciting. We exchanged some currency and looked for a taxi driver who could take us to a nice hostel. We found one, Bergs negotiated price, and we were off!

We drove about half an hour to the hostel. I'd heard about the crazy traffic in Peru, but being the middle of the night it wasn't too crazy. We did drive by the ocean, though! I didn't even realize it because it was so dark. Bergs told me that the ocean was on our right side, and I thought at first I was looking at very small sand dunes; turns out they were waves! I've never seen the ocean at night. It was so cool.

We arrived at Lion Bed and Breakfast for Backpackers and got a room. There was wi-fi, so I checked in on Facebook (we planned on finding a payphone to call our parents in the morning). The room was tiny; there was pretty much only room for two beds and a television. The bathroom was very compact. It was a tiny room with a shower head on one end, a toilet on the other, and a sink in the middle. We found an English station on the television and settled in for our first night in Peru.

Peru Preparation Part One: In Which Michelle Endures Stabbings for the Sake of Disease Prevention

Waking up this morning to a right arm free of soreness has reminded me that I never wrote about my vaccinations for Peru!

As many of you know, I'll be heading for the sub-equatorial land of Peru at the end of the month.  A good friend of mine served her mission there and invited me to join her on a visit.  I, of course, said yes.  How often do you get the chance to go to Peru? In my case, never.

So the preparations began.  Eleven-hundred dollar plane ticket: check. Passport: check (thanks to an almost cruise my senior year of college; I got my passport...and ended up spending Spring Break at Disneyland - no regrets). Next on the list? Vaccinations.

I didn't foresee needing much, but I figured better safe than deathly ill. I consulted the CDC website without receiving much comfort, so I called the local health department.  They told me I'd have to make an appointment with a nurse. During my work hours. I decided I could take a long lunch and stay late that night.  I made an appointment for the next day and headed to my parents' house after work to locate my immunization card.  Turns out I hadn't had any shots since 1999. Crazy, right? But really, who gets into immunizations after you've reached the age where they're required for public schooling?

The next day, tiny yellow folded card in hand, I sat in a chair resting underneath a counter that didn't jut out far enough for me to appropriately fit my legs. While I waited for the nurse to print out a stack of papers, I studied the poster on the wall to my right.  It displayed various tropical diseases, with their causes, symptoms, and lovely pictures. Oh, and my favorite part: worst case scenarios resulting from catching said diseases. An incredible variety of ways for an exotic trip to go very, very wrong.

We went through roughly one ream of paper.  Various vaccinations recommendations and travel tips. Don't drink the water. Don't trust peeled fruit. Mosquito repellent must be your best friend 24/7; malaria bites at night and dengue fever in the day.  These were interspersed with a healthy "your friend will know this" or "your friend can tell you what's safe".  Apparently the health department has a lot of trust in my friend. Then came the part where I had to select my vaccinations.  The nurse recommended a tetanus booster (mixed with whooping cough vaccine) and a Hepatitis A vaccine. She also recommended a typhoid vaccination, but that could be taken in pill form.

Then there was yellow fever. That vaccine would not be covered by my insurance, since it's a vacation vaccination, so it would be $110.  A look at the yellow fever map, however, told us that I would not be entering the yellow fever area.  Fun fact: you can't even enter a yellow fever area without proof of yellow fever vaccination.

An hour into the appointment, it was finally time for shots.  Hepatitis A on my left arm, and tetanus on my right. I got some awesome neon yellow band-aids. The nurse told me that I'd feel the Hepatitis shot that day, and the tetanus shot for a couple of days after that. I didn't quite realize that "that day" meant minutes after the shot.  My arm started tingling oddly as I walked back to my car. By the time I got back to work, both arms were sore: the left quite a bit, the right arm only a tad.

That night I took my first typhoid vaccine pill. They had to be stored in the fridge, and I had to take it on an empty stomach with as much water as I could drink. The next morning, I rolled over to my right side and groaned. Soreness on shot number two had kicked in. In fact, I could barely move my right arm without feeling incredible soreness that entire day. The next day was a little better, until today came around.  Now it's only sore if I push on the exact area.

And that's the story of my vaccination.  It may not have been entertaining, but I tried to make it witty. Plus it'll be a nice story to print in future volumes of the blog book.

Thanks for reading.

"I feel the earth move under my feet..."

Actually it was my desk that I felt, under my hands.

I was at work this morning, typing an e-mail on my computer, when my desk started moving from side to side.  At first, I didn't know what was happening. I had heard a large truck drive by seconds before, and the thought briefly crossed my mind that maybe that had caused the movement (like when you're in the turning lane on a highway...I know, it was a crazy thought).  I realized that this was highly unlikely, as I sit on the second floor of a decently sized building (at least large enough to withstand a passing truck).

Anyway, as my desk continued to sway from side to side, reality sinks in: this...is an earthquake.  Up until today, I had never felt an earthquake, hence the slow understanding of the situation.  My desk swayed back and forth 3 or 4 times, and then it was over as mysteriously as it began.  Well, not too mysteriously.  The good people of science were all on top of things, so that mere moments later we were able to find information on the internet, such as the fact that this particular earthquake was a 3.6 and the location of the epicenter.  Pretty nifty.

So there it is.  My very first earthquake.  I know that it's not a very exciting story, and maybe no one will even care to read it, but I wanted to have it recorded because it counts as a historical moment in my life.

Thanks for reading.

Another Crazy Day...

Last weekend, I made a casual remark that sometimes works can be a little slow, because my job is largely based on issues that come up.  Apparently, I cued some kind of Murphy's law, because this week has been insane!

This morning wasn't so bad. Just keeping busy. Noon came, so I headed off to the conference room (I've been giving the data entry team training on business writing). I had been challenged by a team mate to insert the following three themes into my presentation: Mt Rainier, zombie apocalypse, kangaroo pouch.  I did pretty well. I started by saying that good writing can seem like a challenge, like climbing Mt Rainier. I talked about tone, and said they should use their personalities and not sound like corporate zombies. I was all prepared to tell the group to take my tips and store them away in their kangaroo pouches of learning, when I noticed something horrible. I had made a punctuation error on my Powerpoint slide. I had failed to use a close quote around the word "please".  I couldn't help but point it out, and I moved on pretty well, but I totally forgot to mention kangaroo pouch. So close. Side note: the punctuation error came one line before my note about proofreading. Epic fail? Oh well. I used it as a learning example.

Fast forward to 1:30. I'm busily preparing a different presentation for a team meeting at 2:30. The thought that I may not take a lunch is entering my mind. I click send on an e-mail, and it fails. Four times. My internet is down. I crawled under my desk to see if the cord had come out, but it hadn't, so we contacted the IT department for help. Fun fact: I pretty much can't do anything without the internet at work....so I just sat there and waited. I realized that I really wouldn't be getting a lunch, so I pulled the peanut butter and jelly sandwich out of my purse, and ate it at my desk, hovering awkwardly over the IT guy as he investigated...and discovered that my cord has become loosened from the wall. Feeling lame, part two. It was kind of funny, though.

2:27. Scrambling to finish my presentation, since I was sans internet for roughly 25 minutes. Definitely no lunch (good thing I ate my sandwich!). Suddenly, a co-worker approached: I had to take a call. Fighting off a look of panic, I took the call. The dude at the desk kitty corner to mine smirked slightly with amusement (and some pity) at my plight. After the call, I hurriedly uploaded my presentation file. Two different people starting chatting me questions, but there was no time! I locked my computer, grabbed my meeting supplies, and made a run for the conference room, ten minutes late. I tried to sneak in, but the only open seat was at the front of the room.

Good news: that presentation went quite well. As did the four o'clock writing training.  

So then it was 4:30. Half hour before quitting time. I told my boss that one thing had led to another and that I hadn't taken a lunch. He asked if I had things I needed to do. And I did. So I clocked out for ten, ran triage on everything I had left, and went home (well, I got a little way-laid talking to co-workers....).

The end.

Thanks for reading.

Oh, What A Day!

Today was an interesting day at work, so I thought I'd write about it.

It all started at ten a.m. I had scheduled a conference call with an account manager that I work with. I dialed the conference call number. I was the first person on the call. Soon, I heard a *beep beep*, the sound you hear when someone else enters the call.

"Hi, Jason?" I said, expecting the account manager. Suddenly, one of my coworkers, Josh, started laughing. I laughed, knowing I'd fallen for his joke.

30 seconds later: beep beep. "Hi, Jason?" Again, Josh laughed. I laughed, but glared. He said he wouldn't do it again.

30 seconds later: beep beep. "Hi, Jason?" This time, it was Logan cracking up. I continued to good-naturedly laugh.

Yet another 30 seconds later: beep beep. "Hi, Jason?" Nope, still not Jason. Steven started laughing. It was still funny, but I was reaching the end of my rope. Josh sensed this and announced that they were finished.

Later, after running an errand at lunch, I returned to find the office dark. Apparently, the power had gone out while I was gone. I was there only a few minutes before someone came through to announce that power wouldn't be back until 6pm, and that we could go home. However, after standing in the parking for about ten minutes, talking to a coworker, I noticed people heading back into the building. The power had come back on. I told my friend to make a run for it, but decided to go back to work. I had stuff I could do for another hour and a half, and figured I may as well make some more money.

There were about 20 of us in my department that stayed/wandered back in. I did get some work done, plus a lovely game of foosball with my teammates (I'm getting better!).

Afterwards, I drove home in my old car (my sister borrowed my new car to drive to Salt Lake). It was super trippy, because it's so much bigger. It was also very hot, as it does not have working air conditioning.

So that was my day. Hope you found it to be interesting.

Family Reunion! Mostly pictures of Heber

Harrison Family Reunion! Always a good time. Heather and I headed down on Thursday to join the camping festivities. It was fantastic to see my family, some of whom I only see at the reunion because they live so far away.  The low point was the fact that a big, black bull moose was sighted several times around the campground, but never by me! Many of you know that it's been years since I've seen a moose, so it was really depressing that I never caught it. Oh well.

Below are some exciting pictures from the trip. Fancy hair by Heather, fun at the Heber Valley Railway Station and the Dairy Keen, and a random statue we saw while driving around Midway.