Thinking Travel

1. Upload Caracas and MoBay photos to Flickr.
   –Caracas photos and half of MoBay photos have been uploaded.
2. Finish reading Three Cups of Tea.
   –I’m happily making my way through the book.
3. Bring my lunch to work at least 3 days next week.
   –This is a work in progress. 
4. Re-up my SIETAR-USA membership and find a mentor.
   –Still need to do this.
5. Sort the gazillion dissertation articles in my file cabinet and toss out what I no longer need.
   –I started this on Sunday but got sidetracked by re-reading the cultural training information I received from Youth For Understanding back when I was a high school exchange student.
   
6. Add 5 people to my LinkedIn profile and become more web 2.0.
   –Another work in progress.
7. Gather the photos and pictures I want to hang in our house so I can assess my framing needs.
   –I have one photo so far.
8. Outline an article from my diss.
   –OK, so I have yet one more work in progress. Good thing I have 101 days for this list.
9. Go for a walk with Aaron at least 3x a week next week.
   –I’m not up to a consistent 3x a week but I have been walking more. And the 3 hours of dancing at the Cure concert last week should really count as the equivalent of about a month of walking. (Aaron didn’t buy that either.)
10. Finish this want-to-do list and create a 101 Things in 1001 Days list.
    –So far I’ve got 51 items on my 101 list.

Last night I felt like I was in an episode of ER.

Probably ’cause I was in the ER.

This is what I remember:

Men’s feet in flip-flops. Standing beside his wife injured in the car accident. She jokes with the staff as they examine her, even though she says it hurts to laugh. “Tell the kids I love them.” Later, I want to throw back the curtain and give her a hug when I hear her whimper.

Hot pink crocks, white socks, scrubs.

Cursing woman with a hernia and schizophrenia needs a smoke and a trip to the bathroom. Soon she’s snoring.

Pregnant woman rolls in on a reclining wheelchair. The back of her right hand rests on her glossy forehead. “We’re going to have to keep you here.” Later, she walks slowly down the hall wearing a hospital gown, holding her back.

Deep-in-the-chest-heaving-shoulders-sobs.

Dr: “My mom says that!”
Injured woman: “Oh, she does?”
Dr: “Yes! um, but….not to say that’s an old person saying or anything…”

A crying mother races through security with her 13-day-old who just had a seizure.

Chicken Caesar salad with basalmic vinaigrette, baked lays, water.

Trying not to cry as my husband turns red and puffy and into one giant hive.

The dr. smiles, tilts her head slightly, reaches out her hand, says “I’m sorry that you’re here.”

I have two books and a newspaper to read but I really wish I had my journal. I scrounge through my purse and find the back of a Brugger’s coupon to write on. I pause, then decide that notes are more important than $1 off a Brrrueggaccino.

So many stories I’ll never know the ending to.

But at least I know the ending to the most important one: Aaron recovered from an allergic reaction within a couple hours and was released. He’s feeling better now.

Oh my freaking god.

Last night I re-lived the last 20 years of my life in three loud and sweaty hours.

I screamed and swooned and danced like crazy as my favorite band played 35 songs from the soundtrack to my life:

Underneath The Stars, Prayers For Rain, A Night Like This, The End of the World, Lovesong, A Letter To Elise, Want, Pictures of You, Lullaby, From the Edge of the Deep Green Sea, The Perfect Boy, Hot Hot Hot, The Only One, Wrong Number, The Walk, Sleep When I’m Dead, Push, How Beautiful You Are, Inbetween Days, Just Like Heaven, Primary, Shake Dog Shake, Charlotte Sometimes, One Hundred Years, Baby Rag Dog Book

1st encore: The Holy Hour, Other Voices, Drowning Man, Faith
2nd encore: Freakshow, Close To Me, Why Can’t I Be You?
3rd encore: Boys Don’t Cry, 10:15 Saturday Night, Killing An Arab

I’m still giddy.

And grinning.

I’m so rejuvenated and happy and optimistic. (Who needs a vacation? Just give me a Cure concert!)

How can music that spoke to me like nothing else at 13 still rock me to my core two decades later?

I was excited when they played Charlotte Sometimes.

Cool.

Then I sort of lost it when they played 100 Years.

Wow.

And then I really lost it when they played, one right after the other, The Holy Hour, Other Voices, Drowning Man….

and

Faith….

Amazing.

Transcendent.

Utterly freaking awesome.

I can’t believe it’s been 16 years since my last Cure concert. Why haven’t I become a Cure groupie or roadie or something? Can I switch careers?

A few years ago I feared that maybe I was starting to outgrow The Cure ever so slightly. But last night, as I unpacked our concert t-shirts and then fell asleep listening to Disintegration on my iPod, I realized that I’m still the biggest freaking Cure fan ever.

I’m a little overwhelmed by the 101 Things in 1001 Days project so I’m starting with a  more do-able 10 Things in 101 Days project. I’m posting this want-to-do list online so all three of my readers will keep me accountable.   ; )

Here’s my list:

1. Upload Caracas and MoBay photos to Flickr.
2. Finish reading Three Cups of Tea.
3. Bring my lunch to work at least 3 days next week.
4. Re-up my SIETAR-USA membership and find a mentor.
5. Sort the gazillion dissertation articles in my file cabinet and toss out what I no longer need.
6. Add 5 people to my LinkedIn profile and become more web 2.0.
7. Gather the photos and pictures I want to hang in our house so I can assess my framing needs.
8. Outline an article from my diss.
9. Go for  a walk with Aaron at least 3x a week next week.
10. Finish this want-to-do list and create a 101 Things in 1001 Days list.

Hey. I’m at the Holiday Inn Sunspree Resort in Montego Bay — a quick trip for work to deliver the pre-departure orientation for Jamaican teachers coming to the US this year.

Flying time to MoBay is under 3 hours but the two times I’ve come here I’ve arrived exhausted. That’s probably because my flight left Raleigh at 6:50am, which meant getting up at 4am to catch at taxi at 5am.
Then there was the three hour lay-over in Miami that turned into 4 hours.
And then there was the announcement from the pilot, “Folks, we’ve started our decent into Montego Bay but they’ve closed the airport due to heavy thunderstorms. We’re going to circle for about 30 minutes. Then we’ll re-evaluate the situation.”
Good thing they added extra fuel to our flight before we left Miami!
I wasn’t much looking forward to landing during a thunderstorm so I was a tad on edge. But fortunately, the airport opened and the pilot flew us the long way ’round to avoid most of the storms. The landing was one of the smoothest I’ve had recently.
We visited a private school this morning in Montego Bay. Besides visiting grocery stores and coffee shops, my favorite travel activity is visiting schools and learning about education in other countries. This morning, my colleague and I thought we’d chat with the principal and observe a few classes but we were thrust into a grade six class of 30+ bright-eyed smiling kids as their teacher informed them that “our visitors are her to interact with you!”
If we had known they wished for us to interact with the kids we would have planned a cool activity but as it was we had to make something up on the spot. I taught the kids some German words (stand up, jump, turn around, sit down, very good) we asked them which Jamaican foods we should try. Nearly all of the kids had been to the US and many of them had summer travel plans to the US, Europe and beyond.
I took a few photos of the kids hamming it up and a video of them waving and saying hello from Jamaica. I’ll post them here soon, as well as other photos of the school (and photos of my Caracas trip from a week ago).

Until then, take a look at the photos of the Jamaican school I visited last year.

As I got out of the shower this morning I heard a very loud and desperate meeeooooooooow!!! followed by an even louder and more desperate MEEEEEEOOOOOOWWWWW!!!!!

“I think Otto has to use the litter box,” Aaron said as he opened the bathroom door.

Otto scooted around the barely-opened door and leaped into his litter box. He stuck his butt over the side of the box, pooped onto the floor, and pawed at the bathtub in an attempt to cover it up. Then he silently exited.

Aaron told me that he had been cutting up a tree limb on the deck when he saw and heard Otto meowing loudly at him through the French doors. When Aaron opened the door, Otto made a beeline to the bathroom, frequently checking that Aaron was close behind.

Since we have to use the downstairs shower right now there have been many mornings where Otto is not-so-patiently waiting for me to leave so he can use his litter box.

My family went to Grandma’s for dinner on a nearly weekly basis when I was growing up.  We always hoped Grandma would cook one of our two favorite meals:

1. Fried chicken with mashed potatoes, pan gravy, and home-canned green beans with bacon

2. Swedish meatballs with mashed potatoes

My brother and I always argued over who got to sit next to Grandma at the dinner table. Mom allowed us to drink soda instead of milk. And two helpings of chocolate cake, apple pie, or “pink stuff” wasn’t frowned upon.

Tonight, Aaron and I made our own version of Swedish meatballs with mashed potatoes. Before eating we clinked plates and toasted my ninety-something Grandma who peacefully passed away last Thursday.

What’s new at thinkingtravel.com? Video! Yeah.

This one is from Costa Rica. Zip lines rock.

A few days ago I decided to make cupcakes. Then I discovered that I had no boxes of cake mix. And no eggs. I couldn’t even find the spatula.

But I was dying to use my new KitchenAid mixer, and I craved something sweet.

So I found a from-scratch cupcake recipe online, replaced the eggs with coconut milk and a mashed banana, and used a cool-aid stained wooden spoon to scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl.

My coconut-lime cupcakes with coconut-lime icing turned out pretty delicious, even though they ended up tasting more like banana more than anything else.

Why am I telling you this?

Because this baking experience made me think about the times I’ve reacted poorly to unexpected inconveniences while traveling. Instead of getting creative, I’ve gotten mad when things didn’t turn out the way I’d planned.

But I’ve realized that sometimes you just have to move forward, working with what you have, when you don’t have what you think you need.

Sometimes your restaurant bill turns out to be twice as much as you’d expected. Or your Spanish train takes off without you, leaving you stranded in the middle of nowhere at midnight. Or your husband has emergency surgery the night you arrive in Berlin.

It happens. (The above have all happened to me.) And if you get creative, instead of getting mad, you can have some great stories to tell the grandkids.

The lesson I’m still learning: Enjoy the banana in your coconut-lime cupcakes.

Somehow I broke the FlickrSlidr that created nice little slideshows from my Flickr photos.

Arg.

So for now I’ll have to simply post a link to my Istanbul photos.

Have you been to Turkey? Tell me about it!

Hey! Join the conversation: leave a comment!