Happy Birthday to Me!

I could write a very depressed message about the crappy stuff that happened on and around my 23rd. But I’m not going to. Instead I’m just going to tell you what happened because in the grand scheme of things, it’s really not all that bad.

My brother, Tim, came to visit on Friday the 7th. The day he came I was supposed to leave the capital about 4 hours before his flight got in so I’d have plenty of time to get to Santiago and get him. Well, I got a bit held up and then went to catch a bus at a station which had nothing leaving for almost 2 hours. This would make me late to get my bro. So, I took a cab to another bus then was supposed to get dropped off on the highway out by the highway in Santiago. The bus driver forgot to stop so he dropped me off a bit up the road so I got to walk along the side of the highway for a bit. Then I ran across the highway to catch a ride to the airport.

Tim’s bags got held up in New York so we had to miss the bus to my site on Saturday. This meant that I had to cancel an English class, miss the celebration of March birthdays for my women’s group at my site (we were all going to go to the beach on my b-day to celebrate with cake and fried fish and whatnot), and spend more time away from my puppy. We spent the day calling American Airlines every few hours to be told that they had no info on the bags and that maybe they’d be on the next flight, waiting for the hotel to bring us towels (took 3 hours), fix the hot water (took another 3 hours), and fix the air conditioning (still haven’t done that). We went out for dinner and I had the weirdest feeling that we’d be robbed. A few minutes later a guy in a fake Old Navy tee shirt pulled up in front of us like he wasn’t going to let us cross the street before he went through and reached out and grabbed my necklace off of my neck. I was shocked, a security guy pulled up, asked what happened and went after the guy. We chased the both of them and then realized we’d never reach them and stopped, then went back to where it happened, thinking that maybe at least the security guy would come back. He didn’t. So we went and ate Pizza Hut.

So then, on my actual b-day, we called American and were told that the bags would surely be in today. So we’ll see.

But, it’s a good day because 1) I have my brother here, 2) we’re eating good food instead of campo food, and 3) I got to use internet on my b-day and hear from many of you! Hope all is well in your worlds!