Hola a Todos!
Well, I made it to Puerto Rico in one piece! And that’s
about the end of my good news of my Puerto Rican travels.
Okay, that might have been an exaggeration… But it’s not far
off. Where to begin? Well, we started in Chitown on Wednesday night.
Our journey began in Chicago with Girodano’s Pizza. Not a
bad start.
Mmmmmm…..:)
The next morning we got the airport in the morning and our
family sent us off. Flight to Atlanta was A-okay. Flight to San Juan was A-not
so okay. After getting in our seats and waiting a while to take off, our pilot
informs us that there is a storm over us, and we have 50 planes ahead of us to
wait for. Hummm…
So we finally make it to the airport and find a cab to the
cheapest hotels we were able to book. Wrong hotel at first, of course, but we
get there.
 |
| Our hotel in San Juan |
 |
| Hotel in San Juan |
After we get settled in our room, we decide to check out the
city of San Juan. It was very different than we expected. We couldn’t really
find any places to go to get a drink and some food (after 12 hours of
unintentional fasting), but finally we find somewhere. We met people, practiced
a little bit of our Español and hit the sack.
Friday morning, we got up at 7, had breakfast and tried to
figure out how we are going to get to the other side of the Island (San Germán)
by 1 for our orientation. Our morning could be summed up in one word:
frustration. After walking for about 2 and a half hours and talking to every
car rental place in San Juan, we decide our best option is to get a cab for a
hundred bucks each.
 |
| Our temporary dorm |
Our bad luck really begins at this point in the story as our
2 hour drive turns into a nearly three hour drive. Countless times, our cab
driver would pull over and yell, “Oye Mami! Como se va a la Universidad
Interamericana?” And once again we would get lost. Not to mention he drove 20
miles past San Germán in the first place.
 |
| My bed |
 |
| The dorm "decoration" |
 |
| Living...space? |
So we finally get to our room. After many efforts, we fail
to find our coordinator, Zulma, so we go check out our room. This is what we discover:
- we begin classes Monday
- neither one of us has a set schedule or books of any sort
- we don’t have a fridge
- it’s about a hundred degrees and humid as a sauna
- we don’t have air conditioning
- we live a pretty far walk from the nearest grocery store
- the lights in our bathroom don’t work
- the shower water is freezing (and barely works)
- we don’t have a key to our room
- we don’t have shower curtains
- I don’t have sheets, blankets (not that I would need it) or a pillow
- we don’t have internet;
- the town is a ghost town.
After several of these realizations, Shelby I sit, staring
at each other repeating “what do we do…what do we do?” We decide to go for a
walk and find something to eat. It has been day two of 12 hours of
unintentional fasting. We walk and walk, trying to figure out the town.
Everything is closed. We finally reach an open restaurant; I can almost taste
the food when I get a call from a Puerto Rican number. It’s Zulma. She has been
waiting for us. She instructs us to turn around immediately and go back to
campus. So much for food!
We finally find Zulma, meet a couple more “estudiantes
intercambios” and she takes us on a tour through campus in a van with windows
you can’t see out of. I still have no idea where the buildings are. She takes
us to a different part of town, where we can get a couple needed things from
the grocery store and we can finally eat! She takes us to “El Meson,” a pretty
good sandwich place. It’s right next to McDonalds, KFC, Payless and Kmart. Who
woulda thought? When we said our names were Shelby and Courtney, this is what
we got:
So we finally got food, got back to our dorms, and passed
out. At like 8. Which is like 7 in Iowa. Oh I should probably mention, when I DID try
to take a shower (after a couple days of sweating), it worked for about 60
seconds, started sputtering and then shut off completely. After this, I think I
just laughed and thought I’d try again in the morning.
So yesterday, we got up (pretty late), and Shelby turned on
the shower, in which yellow water came out, which I’m pretty sure was from our
urine still sitting in the dysfunctional toilet. OYE! Finally a little bit of
clearish water came out and looked something like this:
 |
| Our shower? |
Then we met up with Zulma and she tooks us on a trip to
walmart to get some groceries and other essentials, like toilet paper, hangers,
sunscreen…. Oh and most importante: a coffee pot! I was so tempted to buy a few
of these. They were just too cute:
Oh and side note: They have a guard stand about ten feet
high in the middle of the walmart parking lot for an officer to watch for
people trying to steal cars. Yikes (sorry mom)
Oh and while we’re on the subject, if you go to a bar for a
drink in Puerto Rico, you must be patted down to make sure you have no guns or
knifes on you. (Sorry again mom. )
We also found out that we would be moving to a different
room that had a fridge! And hopefully a functioning toilet. (which we now know
also doesn’t work). After this, we explored the town a little bit. The town is
built on seven HUGE hills. Like crazy incline. This is a little short cut
within the university that goes (part way) up to our dorms:
Another bright side! We found a new pet in our roomJ We named him Patricio.
Don’t know how he got in our room, five stories up. Don’t wanna know.
 |
| Patricio! |
And so we went out and had a couple local beers before
calling it a night last night. Now I find myself sitting at burger king on my
computer. It is the closest place that has internet.
 |
| Us walking to Burger King today! |
SO in conclusion, things are getting better everyday. My dad
sent me an encouraging text that really made me think. He said God has a reason
for me here. The people here live like this everyday, and all the complaining I
have been doing made me realize how spoiled I am at home. This IS going to be a
good experience for me. I can do anything for four months. Prayers appreciated!
Adios!
No comments:
Post a Comment