The following takes place in the break room at work this morning with an older lady that I never have spoken to but always smile at in the halls:
Lady: "Hello"
Shirley: "Hi"
Lady: "I love your clothes. You always look so beautiful. Are you in fashion design?"
Shirley (smiling)": "No, I just like dressing up".
Lady: "Well, you always look so wonderful, you should be in fashion design."
Shirley (blushing): "Awwww. Thank you so much for that wonderful comment!"
Bless her heart <3
Gonna be a good day
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Designer Duds
Posted by Qori, using mom's account.
Mom was cleaning up my bathroom this weekend (the backyard), and I decided to join her and do a little sun bathing while she worked diligently. She was really into what she was doing, so she barely took notice of me. I soon drifted off into a short nap, and when I awoke I saw my mom was staring at me from the other end of the bathroom with a weird look on her face.
She was staring at the collar I had on. Dad has recently been cleaning out his storage and each day, he brings home trinkets from our past that has been in storage for around 3 years. Today, he had brought home my genuine Coach Collar that mom had bought eons ago, and he even took the liberty to put it on me without mom noticing!
The collar brought a smile to her face.
She started to talk to me. "I remember when I bought this for you! You were too little to even wear it, and I was afraid that I had bought the wrong size, but it was the only size available at the time. Anyway, you shouldn't be wearing that. It's only for special occasions."
Then mom proceeded to ramble instead of cleaning my bathroom.
"You have nothing to be jealous about with those fru-fru dogs and their rhinestone collars!" I have no idea what she meant. I'm not jealous of them. They're scared of me.
"Oh look at you! How is it that you own a Coach collar, and I don't even own a Coach bag?" Can I help it if she thinks of me first? Even with fashion?
Later on that night as I was sleeping on the bed, Dad commented, "Anyone looking at Qori right now, would definitely know that he's a well-kept dog." Once again, I didn't know what he's talking about. Especially since they switched out my usual duck jerky treats, for organic mint and oregano biscuits... yuck!.
Mom was cleaning up my bathroom this weekend (the backyard), and I decided to join her and do a little sun bathing while she worked diligently. She was really into what she was doing, so she barely took notice of me. I soon drifted off into a short nap, and when I awoke I saw my mom was staring at me from the other end of the bathroom with a weird look on her face.
She was staring at the collar I had on. Dad has recently been cleaning out his storage and each day, he brings home trinkets from our past that has been in storage for around 3 years. Today, he had brought home my genuine Coach Collar that mom had bought eons ago, and he even took the liberty to put it on me without mom noticing!
The collar brought a smile to her face.
She started to talk to me. "I remember when I bought this for you! You were too little to even wear it, and I was afraid that I had bought the wrong size, but it was the only size available at the time. Anyway, you shouldn't be wearing that. It's only for special occasions."
Then mom proceeded to ramble instead of cleaning my bathroom.
"You have nothing to be jealous about with those fru-fru dogs and their rhinestone collars!" I have no idea what she meant. I'm not jealous of them. They're scared of me.
"Oh look at you! How is it that you own a Coach collar, and I don't even own a Coach bag?" Can I help it if she thinks of me first? Even with fashion?
Later on that night as I was sleeping on the bed, Dad commented, "Anyone looking at Qori right now, would definitely know that he's a well-kept dog." Once again, I didn't know what he's talking about. Especially since they switched out my usual duck jerky treats, for organic mint and oregano biscuits... yuck!.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Day 23: Silencio
It is my last night in Lima before my trip back to the US. I´ve been hanging out in the city, finalizing errands and of course going out and having a good time. It´s been a very long vacation and I´m worn out. Since I´m pre-occupied packing, I will leave you now with some images of the city:
I found this interesting: That´s not how you spell SWAT. SWAT stands for Special Weapons and Tactics... What can this stand for?
PUH-lease!!! Have they NOT read my blogs!
This is a stand that usually holds a Peruvian Police Woman during rush hour. They are all advertised using Inca Kola. Javier no longer wants to drink Inca Kola ever since Coca Cola bought it. (PS. They use women because apparently women are respected more during traffic)
A famous stadium in Peru. The advertisement is for the Panamerican games which will be hosted in Peru in 2015. (The image of the sun is an ice cream company subsidiary of Nestle, that Javier also does not want to support. He says they are monopolizing the market in Peru... I say, you can´t boycott ice cream!!!)
This is Calle de los Pizzas (Pizza Street). It´s a popular hang out on weekend nights. It´s one short street and all they sell is pizzas. On the second floor of most of these buildings, there are karaoke bars or clubs. We hung out on Saturday night and ate some pizza. We sang Karaoke with Javier´s cousins. I was going to sing Robbie Williams´ ¨I´m Loving Angels Instead¨so that I could have better memories of that song in Peru, but they didn´t have it. Instead I sang the Eagles´Hotel California, missing my roots. It was my first time singing Karaoke other than playing ¨SingStar¨with Will and Stephanie on the Playstation. No windows broke, so that was good...
The construction that I´ve mentioned is an effort that´s going on throughout the city.
The simple slogan for all this construction... (Constructing)
I found this interesting: That´s not how you spell SWAT. SWAT stands for Special Weapons and Tactics... What can this stand for?PUH-lease!!! Have they NOT read my blogs! Silencio my, you-know-what!
This is a stand that usually holds a Peruvian Police Woman during rush hour. They are all advertised using Inca Kola. Javier no longer wants to drink Inca Kola ever since Coca Cola bought it. (PS. They use women because apparently women are respected more during traffic)
A famous stadium in Peru. The advertisement is for the Panamerican games which will be hosted in Peru in 2015. (The image of the sun is an ice cream company subsidiary of Nestle, that Javier also does not want to support. He says they are monopolizing the market in Peru... I say, you can´t boycott ice cream!!!)This is Calle de los Pizzas (Pizza Street). It´s a popular hang out on weekend nights. It´s one short street and all they sell is pizzas. On the second floor of most of these buildings, there are karaoke bars or clubs. We hung out on Saturday night and ate some pizza. We sang Karaoke with Javier´s cousins. I was going to sing Robbie Williams´ ¨I´m Loving Angels Instead¨so that I could have better memories of that song in Peru, but they didn´t have it. Instead I sang the Eagles´Hotel California, missing my roots. It was my first time singing Karaoke other than playing ¨SingStar¨with Will and Stephanie on the Playstation. No windows broke, so that was good...Finally, this is the ring that I made inspired by my mother in-laws first ring. I have now graduated! I don´t know if I will remember everything, but I´ll definitely play around some when I get back to the states.
Ciao for Now!!!!
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Day 19: McPeru
Once upon a time, in a land far, far away from Lima, there lived a girl named Shirley who was addicted to YouTube. She subscribed to many channels, one in particular of a girl by the name of LaurenCampos. She was a quirky girl with a quirky channel, and Shirley found the channel and its editting fascinating. One video in particular that stood out was when Lauren used finger puppets, and she had one of a llama.
I was talking with Mac the other day about Mac laptops. He hasn´t heard of them, but he´s heard of Apple. Then he asked me if they had iPears. I asked him what that was, and he said it was like an apple but longer. ¨Oh! Yes, we have pears,¨ I replied.
Being Peruvian, Shirley immediately wanted a llama finger puppet. She sent a private message to Lauren asking her where she bought the finger puppets. Sadly, Lauren did not know as they were gifts from a relative.
Time passed and Shirley forgot about the finger puppets. She was scheduled to go to Peru for vacation. During her vacation, she went to the Inka Market, a market place where they sold souvenirs from Peru. She was looking for tchochkies (sic), or as her husband called them ¨cachibaches¨, that she could bring back with her for friends and family.
Wandering through the halls of the marketplace, she was suddenly consumed with pure delight. There they were... staring right at her. The finger puppets! She suddenly noticed them everywhere. Had she never noticed them on her previous trips to Peru? She immediately asked how much a finger puppet cost, and was further delighted to find that they only cost 1 sol! Sold! No one would understand her joy at finding her precious finger puppets, but she was over the moon.
She also bought a necklace made of the huayruro seed (or maybe its a bean: pronounced ¨why-roo-ro¨). She was very happy at this too. It only cost her 10 soles. The exchange rate at the time was 3.13 soles: 1 dollar, so this wonderful huayruro necklace only cost $3.20!!! Better than Forever 21 even!
Her husband told her that she is tan, but she still thinks her face is pale... He says it´s the flash. What do you think? I think she should sun bathe more.
..............................................................
Yes folks, I went to the marketplace and bought a bunch of fun stuff. I can´t show you everything because then certain blog readers will know what I got them.
Javier surprised me today with a little Mickie D´s. Oh how I have missed my Mickie D´s. I´ve been gone too long. I´m in the home stretch of my vacation, and I feel like I´ve been gone for months. A little burger and fries in my tummy went a long way, the flavor is quite close to the good ol´US of A. Although the ¨Ketchoo¨ (aka Ketchup) states ¨Hecho en Chile¨ (made in Chile), and it surprisingly contains nutrition facts on the back.
According to the photo and the exchange rate, a Big Mac meal (my fave) costs $3.99. In the US, I usually get it for $4.50-4.99, depending on the McDonald´s restaurant that I´m at.
I also took a photo of gas prices. We usually fill up with 90. Therefore gas here is $3.32/gal. Last I remember, in the US, gas prices were hovering around $2.99-3.20/gal. Another thing I noted at the gas stations in Peru is that there is no such thing as a self-serve gas station. They still do it like in the 50´s with a guy filling up the tank for you. I wonder why self serve didn´t stick...
This photo was taken while Javier was filling up the tank... Yes peoples, Javier has ever-increasingly gotten comfortable driving in Peru, as opposed to me, who has become increasingly tense. Javier honks for any reason and it´s pretty funny. Instead of one big long honk like the norm, he honks in a series of short cutsie honks. No one will take him seriously if he honks like that!
I was talking with Mac the other day about Mac laptops. He hasn´t heard of them, but he´s heard of Apple. Then he asked me if they had iPears. I asked him what that was, and he said it was like an apple but longer. ¨Oh! Yes, we have pears,¨ I replied.
¨For real?¨he asked. ¨I thought they might be fake.¨
Then it dawned on me what he was talking about. On the Disney channel, there is a show called iCarly. She uses a fake Mac laptop on the show. Instead of an apple on the front, it is a pear, so that they don´t have to deal with legal issues. He wasn´t sure if it was a real brand or a fake brand. This must happen a lot in Peru. Poor Peruvians don´t know real from fake or which way is up... I found this interesting.
One funny note before I leave you. In Peru, the cheapest form of transportation is via Combi (Combee). They are like vans or shuttles that hold about 15-18 people like sardines and stop on almost every block. As I walked through the Inka Market, I saw many funny T-shirts. The one that made laugh the most was a fake Ambercrombie and Fitch T-shirt. From far away, it looks real. Then when you get close you notice that the ¨Ambercrombie¨actually says ¨AndoEnCombi¨ or in other words ¨I ride the Combi¨. Too funny!
Ciao for now!
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Amazon Day 4: Lucky Bait
Exerpts from Shirley´s Jungle Journal- Sunday 01/18/09
Last night I´m sure there were bats in our roof. We are protected by the mosquito mesh, but still.
It´s our last day in the jungle and I am finally used to taking cold jungle showers.
We went to visit the other side of the river to see some huge lily pads, drink coconut juice straight from the coconut, eat Amazonian grapes and do some more fishing.
Along the way, we saw some water buffalo and were warned not to get too close. So what´s the first thing that Javier does? He pissed off this water buffalo that was peacefully laying down in some water. It´s eyes were fixated on Javier, and it was ready to charge.
We went fishing again today because both Javier and his dad missed fishing yesterday. This was Round 2: Shirley´s Revenge. First we needed to buy some bait, so while Leo stopped at a spot to buy some bait, Javier, Pierre, and Mac took this as an opportunity to swim in the Amazon river. My mother in-law didn´t want Mac to go out too far, and I thought she was being over dramatic. Then I thought for a second. What if it were Qori out there? Yes, I would be acting the same way, so I took back my original thought.
So we were off to fish again. I caught two fish, one after another using the same bait. It was a piraña and a flat-headed fish. I said I had lucky bait. Sadly the next time I cast my fishing line and reeled it in... the bait was gone. Javier and his dad did not catch any fish. There was no time to take a picture of my fish because a loud thunder filled the air and the clouds went gray. A storm was coming and we were on the wrong side of the river. We packed up our fishing sticks and headed back to the lodge. Along the way it seemed like the storm was chasing us. A wonderful cool breeze came out of nowhere. Though it was dangerous, it was refreshing to be running from a storm. We made it back to the lodge in one piece.
Since we came back early from fishing, there was time for a nap before lunch. Inexhaustable Javier had finally worn out and took a nap. The other boys weren´t tired though. It took about 4 days since the airplane episode, but revenge is sweet...
Alas, lunch was over and it was time to pack. We were off on our motorboats back to the city of Iquitos to hang out before our flight. All in all, this was a very nice trip.
I could have done without the mosquitos though. They were brutal to me. I tried to count all my bites but it was too complicated. I lost count somewhere around 150. I think Pierre and I suffered the most bites. I won´t show my wounds because they´re just too gross, but here are poor Pierre´s legs. I think that Iquitos was originally named Mosquitos, and somewhere along the way, the beginning of the name got lost...
Amazon Day 3: 1 Monkey, 2 Monkey, 3 Monkey, Fish
Exerpts from Shirley´s Jungle Journal- Saturday 1/17/09
Despite the millions of bugs last night, I somehow slept OK. For what I can see I have no new bites, but it´s a little hard to tell considering that I have at least 50 bites (no exaggeration needed). I have to deal with 50 legacy bites that are making me itch like crazy. It´s horrible and frustrating at times. The worst is on my ankles, elbows, and finger joints (anywhere that bends basically). I have forsaken my American Eucalyptus repellant and moved on to a creamy Peruvian mosquito repellant in hopes that the bites will stop coming. I also feel a slight sore throat. I hope I do not come down with something during this trip. My father in-law seems to have the same bug, but it hit him worse. He has a slight cold.
I continued to sun bathe my deceased camera this morning. Near the middle of the day, there was a flicker of hope. It just might turn out OK! But we need to continue to let it dry.
Today we went to Monkey Island, minus my father in-law because he is sick. This time we used a more sturdy boat, so the ride was much better. Javier attempted to rock the boat again, but it did not have as much impact as yesterday´s boat. Things are looking up!
Reaching Monkey Island, I immediately saw monkeys from the river. This island is similar to the show on Animal Planet called, ¨Orangutang Island¨ where orphaned and near extinct species are cared for and then returned to the wild. Walking onto the premises, we were told that all species were friendly but to be careful of the ones with babies because they become over-protective. So what is the first thing that happens? A reddish colored monkey comes along with her tiny baby on her back and immediately begins asking us to carry her. Her name is Rosita the monkey, and she is friendly by nature with or without a baby.
So we carry her. She spends the most time on me with her baby constantly crawling all over me. What a cutie. I even fed the baby some banana. She stayed on me for quite awhile as we toured the island. So long in fact that I began to worry about two things: fleas and monkey pee. Will monkeys relieve themselves on you, like birds? Or are they like dogs that need to find the perfect spot to pee? Thank God I didn´t have to find out the answer. Still each time the baby squirmed around under her mother, I felt its warmth and feared it was monkey pee.
No kidding that this is truly Monkey Island. There are monkeys everywhere! Monkeys at your feet, monkeys on your legs, monkeys on your head! Swinging monkeys, sleeping monkeys, jumping monkeys. All different sizes and different species. They also had parrots, and I collected some of their fallen feathers to make jewelry.
At one point we were asked to gather inside a hut where we would be offered things to buy from the island. Sara and I were on our way to the hut when Sara sadly told me that a monkey had run off with a bracelet that she had bought from the tribespeople yesterday. I told her that we must recover the bracelet and that´s when Operation Sara´s Bracelet was put into play. I found the monkey with the bracelet in its mouth and with one hand offered it my shiney camera. It did not let go of the bracelet and I was afraid of getting bit. I offered it my watch and at that point it chirped and opened it´s mouth, I grabbed the bracelet but now the monkey had hold of my other arm and was pulling both my watch and my camera. Sara was screaming in excitement and I handed her the bracelet because now other monkeys were coming for the goods. ¨Run Sara, Run!¨I screamed and we both ran as fast as we could to the safety of the hut. Mission accomplished...
After monkey island we went fishing. We got back onto the Titanic 4 canoe and began fishing with long branches/sticks and rusted hooks. Believe it or not we caught fish... well not me, but our group. We caught mostly pirañas and Mac caught the biggest fish. I think our guide Leo said it was a Lisa fish? That must have been lost in translation.
We got back to the lodge with a big appetite and our prize fish. I immediate went to check out the state of my camera, which was now in intensive care. I was struck with great news that my camera had come out of it´s coma and was fully functioning again! There were some spots on the screen, but I was sure it was because the inner lens was dirty with Amazonian river dander. It is now no longer my new camera... I have named it ¨Ol´Reliable¨.
Finally dinnertime came. It was dark again, and it was our last night in the jungle. All had calmed down in comparison to the buggy night we had last night. We dined on chicken and then out came the freshly caught fish... fried piraña anyone? Not me. I´m not really that into fish in the first place. Especially the carnivorous, flesh-eating ones. That´s OK... I´m good. 
Monday, January 19, 2009
Amazon Day 2: All Jungled Out
Exerpts from Shirley´s Jungle Journal - Friday 01/16/09
Today has been a day filled with mixed emotions. It´s probably due to a certain luteal phase that I´m going through. Upon taking my shower today, I noticed that 1) the water is cold & 2) it´s not clear. The toilet water is the worst, and I´m definitely NOT brushing my teeth with the sink water. I´ll be filling up my water bottle with filtered water from the mess-hall.
Today we took a long walk through the jungle. Again we needed to use our boots because of the crazy jungle slush. I thought about Qori while on our hike. He would like walking through this jungle... then I thought about it some more....maybe not. The red ants could bite his sensitive toes and I would just be stressed for the entire walk. It was better that I was not sharing this walk with him.
We were on our way to visit a tribe. We reached a small river and got on a different canoe. Our guide, Leo, said it was called the Titanic 4 (because the first three sank). I hoped he was just joking. Looking at the canoe, it was apparent that it had been ¨refurbished¨. As we were reaching our destination, we noticed that the canoe had significantly filled with water. Leo focused our attention to the large seeds floating near our canoe that are used to make jewelry. At hearing this my mother in-law and I started trying to collect as many as we could reach from the canoe. Suddenly, I heard a ¨Plunk!¨ and I wondered what that noise was for a split second....
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! My beloved digital camera had fallen into the murky water that had seeped into the boat and the only sign of it was the small bubbles that were being created as the pouch it was in was filling with water!!! I stuck my hand in the water and searched for my beloved camera and out came a sorry looking camera. I immediately removed it from the pouch, but it was evident that I was too late... It was soaked. I did everything I could. I took the battery, memory, everything out. I tried to dry it. I shook it a little. Within the next few minutes I tried to turn it on. A blurry image of Sara (she was in front of me) filled the screen. I was amazed that it even worked. But then, BLACK, and it died. I immediately thought that those seeds were going to have been the most expensive jewelry I had ever created for how much it cost me.
Needless to say, I was no longer in a good mood when I reached the tribespeople. I tried my best, but I felt like I had lost a loved one.
We sat down inside of a hut where the tribespeople painted our faces with red paint that came from the seeds of a plant. The bench that Javier and Pierre (the 2 chubs) were sitting on broke and they fell onto the floor. I laughed, but it was a hollow laugh. Then one by one the half naked tribespeople took us out of the hut for a tribal dance. Then we tried our marksmanship out with their dart thrower thingy. And finally, they tried to sell us their artifacts. We bought stuff and left.
As soon as we reached the lodge, I laid my deceased beloved camera out in the sun in hopes that it would resuscitate. I would not try to turn it back on until it was completely dry. Unfortunately, drying did not go as quickly as I had hoped.
Before I knew it, we were off to our next excursion, sans my camera. It was OK though, we would just use Mac´s camera. We were on our way to an animal rehabilitation area. As soon as we reached land again, I saw animals! Monkeys, Toucans, these anteater/bear looking animals, cayman, etc,. And all the animals were friendly enough to hold! I was in heaven!
And the excursions weren´t over just yet! Our next excursion was to swim with the dolphins. The supposedly pink and gray dolphins. Unfortunately, I would not be able to swim today... the whole luteal thing. We stopped our flimsy boat in the middle of the Amazon river (the wider/deeper part) and began whistling for dolphins.
This is when Javier noted that with his weight and position on the flimsy boat, he could mess around and give us a scare. From one side of the boat, he yelled, ¨Look! Look at the dolphin!¨and threw his weight to the other side of the boat. This caused the boat to feel like it was going to flip over and the whole ¨Tarantula¨ group screamed for their lives! He continued dicking around like this many times over and I was in no mood for it. I had had enough electronic equipment get wet for one day, but most of all I was extremely tense. One of my biggest fears is falling into deep dark water, whether falling from a bridge or a boat, it doesn´t matter. It´s almost like a phobia, and seeing the joy in his face as he toyed with my emotions, pissed me the hell off.
My mother in-law, who doesn´t know how to swim, was so frightened that she decided to put on a life-jacket which, as she zipped it on, Sara screamed and told her there was a spider on it.
True enough there was a spider the size of a medium cookie standing right on the life jacket she was wearing. When my mother in-law saw it, she screamed with all fury and threw the life jacket down in front of me on the boat. That´s when all hell broke loose. Everyone was screaming, ¨Ahhhhhhhh!!!!!! kill it! kill it!¨ My mother in-law was stomping so hard and screaming, the boat was rocking like crazy, I felt like we were about to tip over... In the madness my screams were lost, ¨Señora! Señora the boat is tipping over.... stop stomping!!!!!!!!¨ But nobody could hear anyone else. Each person was in their own mini terror movie and we were all screaming for our lives. Somehow I know Javier found the whole thing amusing.
And in the end we didn´t see any dolphins... just trunkophins. I´m still skeptical about the whole pink dolphin thing if you can´t tell.
To make it up, on the way back there was the most beautiful Amazonian sunset.
I admired it while on the boat, breathing in the jungle air, feeling the wind against my face.... and something else on my face........ DAMN! A mosquito bite just under my right eye. I could tell just by feeling it that my eye was pretty swollen. This sucks!
That night the Tarantula group was supposed to do a night jungle walk. It´s one thing to read it on your itinerary, and another thing when you are actually there. The short of it is that out of all of us, only Sergio the Spaniard went. This night, I noted a significant increase in nighttime bugs. They were everywhere! The mess-hall seemed to be infested with cockroaches, crickets, and grasshoppers while we tried to eat our dinner. It was by far the worst night in the jungle. Even our room was infested. And it scared me because I don´t know how they even got in. That saying, ¨Crawl out of the woodwork¨ was soooo true in this case. I tried to grab the kerosene lamp that I had left in the bathroom and when I lifted it there were bugs hiding underneath it... Then a grasshopper or cricket jumped on my hand that was holding the lamp. And I thought I saw a mosquito in the bathroom. I was through. I didn´t know what to do. I doused myself in a eucalyptus spray insect repellant and slept under a bedsheet this time. I covered my entire body and head under the blanket. I was dying of asfixation due to the eucalyptus spray under the sheet. But I was torn: Asfixation vs. Bugs. I chose asfixation.
The one cool thing I saw was a lightning bug. I had never seen one before. It seemed to have two greenish lights on its back, then suddenly its whole lower body shined red. I had no idea that they produced different colored light. That was the only cool bug. At this point, I was all jungled out. If you would have asked me at that moment, I would have told you that this was it for me... no more jungles. From now on, my vacations would purely consist of beaches, pools, and tropical drinks.
Today has been a day filled with mixed emotions. It´s probably due to a certain luteal phase that I´m going through. Upon taking my shower today, I noticed that 1) the water is cold & 2) it´s not clear. The toilet water is the worst, and I´m definitely NOT brushing my teeth with the sink water. I´ll be filling up my water bottle with filtered water from the mess-hall.
Today we took a long walk through the jungle. Again we needed to use our boots because of the crazy jungle slush. I thought about Qori while on our hike. He would like walking through this jungle... then I thought about it some more....maybe not. The red ants could bite his sensitive toes and I would just be stressed for the entire walk. It was better that I was not sharing this walk with him.
We were on our way to visit a tribe. We reached a small river and got on a different canoe. Our guide, Leo, said it was called the Titanic 4 (because the first three sank). I hoped he was just joking. Looking at the canoe, it was apparent that it had been ¨refurbished¨. As we were reaching our destination, we noticed that the canoe had significantly filled with water. Leo focused our attention to the large seeds floating near our canoe that are used to make jewelry. At hearing this my mother in-law and I started trying to collect as many as we could reach from the canoe. Suddenly, I heard a ¨Plunk!¨ and I wondered what that noise was for a split second....
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! My beloved digital camera had fallen into the murky water that had seeped into the boat and the only sign of it was the small bubbles that were being created as the pouch it was in was filling with water!!! I stuck my hand in the water and searched for my beloved camera and out came a sorry looking camera. I immediately removed it from the pouch, but it was evident that I was too late... It was soaked. I did everything I could. I took the battery, memory, everything out. I tried to dry it. I shook it a little. Within the next few minutes I tried to turn it on. A blurry image of Sara (she was in front of me) filled the screen. I was amazed that it even worked. But then, BLACK, and it died. I immediately thought that those seeds were going to have been the most expensive jewelry I had ever created for how much it cost me.
Needless to say, I was no longer in a good mood when I reached the tribespeople. I tried my best, but I felt like I had lost a loved one.
We sat down inside of a hut where the tribespeople painted our faces with red paint that came from the seeds of a plant. The bench that Javier and Pierre (the 2 chubs) were sitting on broke and they fell onto the floor. I laughed, but it was a hollow laugh. Then one by one the half naked tribespeople took us out of the hut for a tribal dance. Then we tried our marksmanship out with their dart thrower thingy. And finally, they tried to sell us their artifacts. We bought stuff and left.
As soon as we reached the lodge, I laid my deceased beloved camera out in the sun in hopes that it would resuscitate. I would not try to turn it back on until it was completely dry. Unfortunately, drying did not go as quickly as I had hoped.
Before I knew it, we were off to our next excursion, sans my camera. It was OK though, we would just use Mac´s camera. We were on our way to an animal rehabilitation area. As soon as we reached land again, I saw animals! Monkeys, Toucans, these anteater/bear looking animals, cayman, etc,. And all the animals were friendly enough to hold! I was in heaven!
And the excursions weren´t over just yet! Our next excursion was to swim with the dolphins. The supposedly pink and gray dolphins. Unfortunately, I would not be able to swim today... the whole luteal thing. We stopped our flimsy boat in the middle of the Amazon river (the wider/deeper part) and began whistling for dolphins.
This is when Javier noted that with his weight and position on the flimsy boat, he could mess around and give us a scare. From one side of the boat, he yelled, ¨Look! Look at the dolphin!¨and threw his weight to the other side of the boat. This caused the boat to feel like it was going to flip over and the whole ¨Tarantula¨ group screamed for their lives! He continued dicking around like this many times over and I was in no mood for it. I had had enough electronic equipment get wet for one day, but most of all I was extremely tense. One of my biggest fears is falling into deep dark water, whether falling from a bridge or a boat, it doesn´t matter. It´s almost like a phobia, and seeing the joy in his face as he toyed with my emotions, pissed me the hell off.
My mother in-law, who doesn´t know how to swim, was so frightened that she decided to put on a life-jacket which, as she zipped it on, Sara screamed and told her there was a spider on it.
True enough there was a spider the size of a medium cookie standing right on the life jacket she was wearing. When my mother in-law saw it, she screamed with all fury and threw the life jacket down in front of me on the boat. That´s when all hell broke loose. Everyone was screaming, ¨Ahhhhhhhh!!!!!! kill it! kill it!¨ My mother in-law was stomping so hard and screaming, the boat was rocking like crazy, I felt like we were about to tip over... In the madness my screams were lost, ¨Señora! Señora the boat is tipping over.... stop stomping!!!!!!!!¨ But nobody could hear anyone else. Each person was in their own mini terror movie and we were all screaming for our lives. Somehow I know Javier found the whole thing amusing.
And in the end we didn´t see any dolphins... just trunkophins. I´m still skeptical about the whole pink dolphin thing if you can´t tell.
To make it up, on the way back there was the most beautiful Amazonian sunset.
I admired it while on the boat, breathing in the jungle air, feeling the wind against my face.... and something else on my face........ DAMN! A mosquito bite just under my right eye. I could tell just by feeling it that my eye was pretty swollen. This sucks!That night the Tarantula group was supposed to do a night jungle walk. It´s one thing to read it on your itinerary, and another thing when you are actually there. The short of it is that out of all of us, only Sergio the Spaniard went. This night, I noted a significant increase in nighttime bugs. They were everywhere! The mess-hall seemed to be infested with cockroaches, crickets, and grasshoppers while we tried to eat our dinner. It was by far the worst night in the jungle. Even our room was infested. And it scared me because I don´t know how they even got in. That saying, ¨Crawl out of the woodwork¨ was soooo true in this case. I tried to grab the kerosene lamp that I had left in the bathroom and when I lifted it there were bugs hiding underneath it... Then a grasshopper or cricket jumped on my hand that was holding the lamp. And I thought I saw a mosquito in the bathroom. I was through. I didn´t know what to do. I doused myself in a eucalyptus spray insect repellant and slept under a bedsheet this time. I covered my entire body and head under the blanket. I was dying of asfixation due to the eucalyptus spray under the sheet. But I was torn: Asfixation vs. Bugs. I chose asfixation.
The one cool thing I saw was a lightning bug. I had never seen one before. It seemed to have two greenish lights on its back, then suddenly its whole lower body shined red. I had no idea that they produced different colored light. That was the only cool bug. At this point, I was all jungled out. If you would have asked me at that moment, I would have told you that this was it for me... no more jungles. From now on, my vacations would purely consist of beaches, pools, and tropical drinks.
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