Falling Up

Fun Fact No. 75: Crying is bad. In the US when you cry, people generally let you do it. In Peru, they always say no no no no no, don't cry! It kind of stresses them out a bit.

Sooo...I'm baaaaaack! I got back yesterday at 9pm and Genevieve picked me up from the airport (greeting me with wine and flowers) and hauled my enormous load home and up the 3 flights of stairs. To greet me and to assist in the 2007 Gigantic Suitcase Hauling Games were lovely friends and neighbors Selina and Erin and then K.C. came over for some wine and catching up. Despite my exhaustion, I didn't want them to go; I think living in a noisy city with roommates has made me a bit nervous about the closed in solo-living apartment thing again. But I really can't even believe that I'm here. It was so SO good to see my girls that I just didn't want them to leave but I really felt that I've only been gone a week. It's been nearly 11 months. I'm not sure how this adjustment period is going to go, but I hope it goes well.

A few things I noticed right away:
1. I don't stand out. It's fabulous: there's a million other white, peachy, brown, black, cream, toffee, coffee and other colored people here. No one looks at me twice!

2. It's quiet. Almost too quiet. My apartment has no noises. At all! No roosters, no motorcycles, no ladies outside my door yelling that they have papaya or fish to sell.

3. It's HUMID. You'd think living 2 degrees south of the equator in the middle of the Amazon would be humid, but Austin humidity is suffocating. And they said it's been cool lately! Back to wimp mode.

4. Too much stuff. I have lived without so much of my stuff (and I'm a packrat by the way) that I can't believe I have so much of it. It was a struggle to not just throw everything out last night.

My apartment is cleaner than ever (Omar and Marcela - you are absolute DOLLS! Thank you for everything!) and they put in linoleum floors yesterday. It looks terrific and it is nice to walk barefoot on the new floors.

The last few days in Iquitos were kind of stressful. I just couldn't wrap my head around leaving and I was in and out of weird moods. My poor friend Nico was so patient with me despite the nuttiness. It was really a strange time.

Friday was my going away party - nearly 100 people in my house dancing like crazy fools until 5am. It was so good to have people from all different parts of my life in Iquitos in one place at the same time - my roommates, my family from my old house, the boys who work at the lumber store, my neighbors, my students, Mario's college friends, my foreign friends, etc. Everyone got along marvelously and danced, danced, danced!

Saturday was just last minute errands and sheer exhaustion. Saturday night my family, two roommates, and Zeudy and Nico and I all went to dinner at this pizza joint near downtown and then went dancing at Berimbau, a local discoteca until 4am.

Sunday was breakfast with my friends Nancy and Fernando, lunch at my friend Gabel's house and then to the airport with my student Scarlett and her family.

My plane was delayed a good hour and so all the people who came to the airport to see me off hung out and talked and talked and laughed. When the time came to leave, I was able to hold myself together, quite surprisingly. Maybe it was because Mario and Dina came with me to Lima and I could hold their hands. The tears were shed but not with the quantity I anticipated.
We got to Lima and had to go to Lissette's house to pick up a suitcase that I already dropped off a few months ago and then to Dina's sister's house on the other side of town. We ended up getting to bed at midnight only to wake up at 3am to get to the airport by 3:30 to wait in the check in line until 5 to hang out until 5:30 to say goodbye to get to the plane to leave at 6:30. It was kind of traumatizing to say goodbye to Mario and Dina, but I survived and I had a remarkable peace about leaving - cheesy but true: I think it's time to go home. I really feel like it's the right time.

And now it's 7:45am, I've slept less than 12 hours in the past 4 days and I'm writing the blog anyway. I was having a hard time sleeping beyond 6:30 in Iquitos and I guess it translated. Or maybe I'm nervous about being back. Or maybe I'm just hungry. But it's breakfast tacos this morning, kids!

Love to all and I'll see you soon.