Ciao gente!

Well, today is my last day in Venezuela, and then I'll be off on a new adventure.



It has been an amazing experience for me -- very difficult at times, but I learned a lot, I loved my job (most days :), and I met some great people.



I have some pretty good stories.......especially from the last 6 months I spent in the immigrant visa section ("Why did you decide to marry her?" "Well, we got along, she was nice, and I thought 'Eh, why not try it out?'"). But there are too many for one blog post. I'll be in DC for the forseeable future, so look me up and we'll catch up!

But before I sign out (I had to do something to keep me occupied while interviewing those 15,000 visa applicants) here is a list of my favorite names I saw on people's applications:

Gloria America
Virginia America
Birginia
Diva
Missleaddy
July
Hilario

Ciao!

In order to activate your new debit card, please.........stand on your head.

Sometimes it's the little things that are good for a laugh. I almost laughed myself to tears after this latest episode of my life:

[Automated phone response] "To activate your new [Venezuelan] debit card, please enter your debit card number."

"Please enter the first 2 digits of your ID number."

"Please enter the security code on the back of your card."

"Please enter your PIN."

"Please enter your 18-digit checking account number."

"Please enter the last 4 digits of your phone number."

"Please enter the day of your birth."




Anyway, there may have been a couple more "Please enter's," but needless to say, this was not what I was expecting when I called. I actually had to call back a couple of times because I didn't have all the numbers I needed (yes, I do know my birthday, thank you), but then the questions would change each time I called back! It was a miracle I was able to activate it. Except I think it made me change my PIN somewhere in that sequence, and now I have no idea what numbers I used. So I haven't actually used my newly-miraculously-activated card. But I had a good laugh.

Panama Pic

My latest adventure was to Panama City, and I LOVED it!

Here you can see me at the Panama Canal. I know the canal looks kind of small, but it's not. We saw a giant oil tanker go through. Did you know that some of the biggest ships that pass through the canal pay upwards of $300,000 a trip? And did you know that the biggest container ships that can go through right now hold 5,000 containers, and that the 15,000-container ships have to park offshore, unload everything and send it via rail? But sometime in the foreseeable future, they are going to complete an expansion of the canal so those ships can go through. They are GIANT!!! Also, they can fill and drain the canal lock you see there in the time it takes to fill or drain a bathtub, about 8 minutes. But it holds a million bajillion times more water than a bathtub! (Sorry, can't remember that statistic exactly).

Why else you should visit Panama someday: It is amazing. It is up-and-coming, has a beautiful shoreline/skyline with fantastic skyscrapers, there are great day trips nearby, the city has a low crime rate, great restaurants, and their currency is the dollar, so you don't have to figure out exchange rates and such. Lots of history, lots of good food, lots of roads getting paved and skyscrapers being built, AND it's the only latin american country where you can drink the tap water. I'm telling you folks, you really should go.

Bogota Pic

This is the view after riding the tram up to "Monserratte" in Bogota. Wow! What a cool city.

Argentina Pic

Well, this is kind of ridiculous, but at this moment, I am only able to upload one photo, per one post, at a time. So. This is part of the the "necropolis," Recoleta, in Argentina. Eva Peron was buried in one of these "tombs," just around the corner. Sorry, don't have all the vocab right, probably, but it was a hauntingly beautiful place.

Hello, Buenos Aires! (And Bogota!)

So, as my time here in Venezuela is nearing an end (less than 4 months left, folks), I feel like I've been making a mad dash to try and get the last of my South American trips in -- FUN! Traveling around South America is great, I highly recommend it. Just please register with the Embassy wherever you visit, just in case.

Even though my April trip to Buenos Aires and May trip to Bogota only lasted a few days each, I don't even know where to start with talking about the trip! Food was definitely important. Let's see......

In Buenos Aires, I ate: Proveltta (grilled provolone), submarino hot chocolate (steamed milk with chocolote bars dumped into it), beef (of course), medialunas (croissants), and LOTS of ice cream.

In Bogota, I ate: a Curuba batido (Curuba juice, which I have no idea what kind of fruit that is, mixed with milk, it was AMAZING), a street hot dog with a million things on it, including pineapple (I forwent the Cornish hen egg that could have also gone on top), rhubarb creme brulee (I don't have words to describe its fantastical-ness), pan de bono, several typical Colombian dishes whose names I can't remember, LOTS of hot chocolate, oh -- and hot chocolate with cubes of CHEESE put into it! This is something I've been waiting to try my whole life, since I was 8 years old and would put a hershey bar and a piece of cheese into my mouth at the same time, heaven. Cheese and chocolate are meant to be eaten together. But I digress.

Music is also important, I love when my life has a soundtrack. I loved running around Buenos Aires with songs from Evita in my head. And nearly every restaurant and taxi in Bogota had some great song or another playing, you know, a little Avril Lavigne and Cat Stevens here and there.

Um, I can't get any photos to upload to this post. Let me try creating a new post......hold, please.

25 reasons why I love my mother