Sabbatical hasta Mayo

I learned last week that I will be heading to Timor-Leste for my PeaceCorps assignment. With that comes the need to fill out some paperwork and learn more about the specific work I will be doing in community development, as well as getting myself more emotionally prepared to leave. So I decided to take a sabbatical from Team Eagle for March and April do better focus on these other tasks. The plan is to then rejoin Mike and Stan in Tuscan (sniffle, b/c kate and juicy will be gone) for the remainder of the travels around the west.

I am presently adjusting to the 70-degree bitch slap between Costa Rica and Grayshen. Team Eagle sent me off with a delightful fare-thee-well-for-the-next-couple-of-months at Tranquillo Backpackers, where we supped on queso macoroni a la Schrock, yogurt y fruta, and oreos, plus the best in cheap chilean wine, as suggested by a random person to me and Kate at the local mas/menos supermarket. There was also plenty of reminiscing and I shared my Top 5 moments of each Eagle and overall Top 5 moments on the trip, of which here are a few highlights:

- After a reasonable lengthy busride from Grenada to Managua, Justina was experiencing the worst bladder pressure in her life, which became very evident after our attempts to distract her from the discomfort were prooving entirely vein. Thusly, we concluded our bus ride a little premature and got off at the Metro Centro in Managua (the upscale mall) and proceeded to tear through the mall on a Friday evening, five chelles led by Ben to the bathrooms, which involved shoving a small child or something n the escalator, to find needed relief. Salvifically, the first stall was empty.

- Stan's invention of the sound an Eagle makes, which requires us to flap our arms and exhale as though we are attempting to blow out a large candle several yards away from us. It has been the staple signal of Team Eagle and how we track each other down in large, public areas.

- Early into Latin America, we transfered to our third bus in Mexico in the middle of the night in Guadalajara. This new bus had reclining seats, just as the others did, but an additional bonus, whereby the seat bottom sloped to the floor as the back reclined, leaving the short-legged me and Kate needing to practically stand up to keep from winding up on the floor...though Kate awoke with her head on the seat and her knees on the floor, all inside her sleeping bag as we pulled into Mexico City.

- The morning after Justina arrived, I awoke extremely dehydrated, due to not drinking enough water, but also sleeping in a room with five people that was incredibly hot. After trying to filter myself a nalgene-full of water (I succeeded in only pumping about 400 ml) and breaking into a full-body sweat, I returned to the porch and sat opposite Mike, who knew I looked in a bad way. I proceeded to vomit violently in front of him, unable to respond to his questions of if I was ok. He was moved to come pat me on the back and encourage me as I continued to vomit, which I found really entertaining, so that I am now vomiting and laughing (which was probably impossible to notice because of the vomiting). This one feels harder to describe, but I found the situation halarious.

Honorable mention: when Mike almost stepped on a crocodile (don't worry GCM Mom and Dad, it was only 4 feet long and didn't move much).

My trip yesterday involved downing many free samples of coffee and chocolate at the San Jose airport, while also reading James Baldwin's Go Tell It On The Mountain, which disintegrated into four different pieces, and enjoying the lovely Sky Mall magazine that all airlines carry. Best new finds are: Mock Rocks, "Realistic Boulder Disguies Yard Problems"; Gust Buster (the UNbrella), UNflippable, UNflappable, UNleakable; and lastly but not least the Foof Cube, it's not a beanbag, it just looks like a giant one that can support up to 350 lbs. And then I got home at 3 a.m., big thanks to my dad for picking me up.

Also many thanks to Alfonso and Susy for hosting us at their place in San Ramon de Tres Rios. We had an awesome time and can't express how grateful we are!