It happened. Amy and I had the talk. The elephant in the room, who has been quietly eating chocobananos, beans, and rice pudding (my second favourite treat of all time: arroz con leche. How three simple words can lead to hours of satisfaction is beyond me.), has finally been made explicit. All it took was one simple question. A question that we have been avoiding for the last three months: If your mother were to send you a care package, what would be in this care package? This question is cruel (and has thus been avoided) for many reasons:
1. My mother is the queen of care packages. No one else comes close to the wonderfulness of a Mother Ellen Terstappen care package.
2. I have no address here so care packages are entirely out of the question.
3. People have been getting Mother Ellen Terstappen care packages in my place (ahem, Rebecca Ross) and have been bragging about them via webcam.
4. Thinking of care packages makes me very emotional, as well as very hungry.
Regardless, since the question was raised, an answer had to be given. My dream care package (which mom always gets to fit into a shoebox which is really quite incredible in and of itself) would include: (1) a few cans of tuna (the stuff stamped “FOR EXPORT ONLY” here screams mercury poisoning), (2) Hilde cake (any kind would do. My housemates have also been told about the greatness of Hilde cake but rest assured that I would not even think of sharing. I wouldn´t even let them lick the crumbs off of the table. That too would be my job), (3) dropjes (Dutch licorice. Also not to be shared.), (4) more Nok Out industrial strength odor eliminator (because if a package were coming anyways, I just ran out of the stuff and things are getting stinky.), (5) flavoured Triscuits, (6) Jelly Bellies (the last small pack that I had lasted over a month because of my excellent rationing skills), (7) Cadbury mini eggs (because it’s Easter and the rate at which the Terstappen family goes through these things at Easter time is outrageous. They basically become a new food group in our home for a few weeks) and (7) Sun Rype fruit bars (I took a box of 12 with me. I should have taken a box of 120.). That is all. If you excuse me, I now have to go cry and think of not eating these things.
The good news is that I’m going to Atlanta for a coffee event next week so will be able to make my own care package to take back with me. I imagine that a few items will not be findable in Atlanta (I’m looking at you Hilde cake and licorice), and a few others may be confiscated at customs, but I look forward to trying. In all honesty, though, food cravings have been kept to a minimum and I quite like the food here, especially the fruit, the non-stop beans, the fresh bread and tropical jam (I will tell you about the Doña Carmen Challenge next posting), tortillas, and the sweet treats, but our conversation sure got my stomach gurgling. Though that might be another sick spell coming on…
I am pleased to announce, however, that my last sick spell, the self-diagnosed heat exhaustion (apparently heat stroke is when you can’t sweat. Rest assured that I can sweat. I have a delightful beady sweat mustache that I sport throughout the day. Therefore, I had heat exhaustion, not heat stroke), has been cured. The cure, and subsequent continued treatment, has been an enormous quantity of water that is anywhere between 5 and 8 liters of water everyday. It’s quite wonderful except I can’t leave the house for more than 30 minutes at a time because I pee about 47 times every day, throughout the day. As a house, we go through two of those Culligan water jugs every three or four days. Which means we have to pick up two new ones every three or four days. We’re like a whole troop of Culligan men (and women), except that unlike the Culligan Man, we have to carry these incredibly heavy and awkward jugs about six blocks to our house. In the heat. Past the pile of rotting oranges (which have recently been joined by watermelons). The jugs may not actually be all that heavy but I have been atrophying here, don’t forget. We could also take a cab but who wants to pay a dollar for that?
My saving grace, given the outrageous heat, is that the nights still cool down nicely (another saving grace is that I’ve adopted the belly button pose for in the house. It is not pretty.). We have the doors wide open from about 6:00 until bedtime which is wonderful on every day except for Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday. If you have been following this blog you know exactly why leaving the doors open on those days is unfortunate. Speaking of our evangelical neighbours, I have bad news for anyone who was holding out hope that I could get the code for the weak wireless signal that we sometimes get in our house. That’s right, I’m pretty sure that it belongs to the church. Since we are not on speaking terms, they and I, (the only thing that I will ever say to them will be a public declaration of a feud. It will be like yelling "citizen´s arrest!", only it will signal the start of a feud to the death) the wireless signal appears to be a lost cause. We are still going to try the password “gloria a dios” (because they chant it for about an hour and a half without stopping for a breath), but I’m not optimistic…
Hey, I have a fun story. Guess what I did on Friday? I ate three quarters of a cow and then went to sing karaoke. We (the housemates and a few friends) started the night by getting all dressed up (I only wore a t-shirt and shorts but did shave… so that’s something. It didn’t compare to the layers of make-up worn by our Nicaraguan friends. Outrageous amounts of it. I can’t even make a comparison to anything I have ever seen. They also decided to do Amy and Xochi´s make-up. Amy describes the look as Shotgun Shelly and made me promise not to put a picture up.) and then looking for a classy place to eat. The Tip-Top (a weird, bizarro world KFC where somewhere opens the door for you when you arrive, customers are dressed in business casual attire, and business meetings are happening at some of the tables) was too far away so we went to Hambur-Loco. It, too, was like a bizarro world, with weird Disney paintings on the wall, an outdoor park that had been thrown inside (think McDonald’s play area with a see-saw and tire swing), and a foosball table that the owner was incredibly, incredibly proud of. Being that we were at Hambur-loco, I naturally ordered Combo #5, the Hambur-loco. At this point I had absolutely no idea what the Hambur-loco was, only that it would be my first hamburger in a long, long time. Here is a line-by-line description of the Hambur-loco, beginning from the bottom and going up:
- Bottom of a hamburger bun
- Bean paste / spread
- Mayonnaise and/or mustard
- Meat (beef?) patty
- Meat (beef?) patty (not a typo. There were two.)
- Tomato
- Bottom of hamburger bun
- Lettuce leaf
- Ketchup
- Meat (beef?) patty (that’s right, folks, a third one!)
- Top of sesame seed bun
The Hambur-loco was incredibly, incredibly delicious. I have reason to believe that I gained 5 pounds after that meal. Now, through the magic of the Internet, you can watch me eat my Hambur-loco. As you can see, one of our friends was entirely, entirely uninterested in my eating the burger.
2. I have no address here so care packages are entirely out of the question.
3. People have been getting Mother Ellen Terstappen care packages in my place (ahem, Rebecca Ross) and have been bragging about them via webcam.
4. Thinking of care packages makes me very emotional, as well as very hungry.
Regardless, since the question was raised, an answer had to be given. My dream care package (which mom always gets to fit into a shoebox which is really quite incredible in and of itself) would include: (1) a few cans of tuna (the stuff stamped “FOR EXPORT ONLY” here screams mercury poisoning), (2) Hilde cake (any kind would do. My housemates have also been told about the greatness of Hilde cake but rest assured that I would not even think of sharing. I wouldn´t even let them lick the crumbs off of the table. That too would be my job), (3) dropjes (Dutch licorice. Also not to be shared.), (4) more Nok Out industrial strength odor eliminator (because if a package were coming anyways, I just ran out of the stuff and things are getting stinky.), (5) flavoured Triscuits, (6) Jelly Bellies (the last small pack that I had lasted over a month because of my excellent rationing skills), (7) Cadbury mini eggs (because it’s Easter and the rate at which the Terstappen family goes through these things at Easter time is outrageous. They basically become a new food group in our home for a few weeks) and (7) Sun Rype fruit bars (I took a box of 12 with me. I should have taken a box of 120.). That is all. If you excuse me, I now have to go cry and think of not eating these things.
The good news is that I’m going to Atlanta for a coffee event next week so will be able to make my own care package to take back with me. I imagine that a few items will not be findable in Atlanta (I’m looking at you Hilde cake and licorice), and a few others may be confiscated at customs, but I look forward to trying. In all honesty, though, food cravings have been kept to a minimum and I quite like the food here, especially the fruit, the non-stop beans, the fresh bread and tropical jam (I will tell you about the Doña Carmen Challenge next posting), tortillas, and the sweet treats, but our conversation sure got my stomach gurgling. Though that might be another sick spell coming on…
I am pleased to announce, however, that my last sick spell, the self-diagnosed heat exhaustion (apparently heat stroke is when you can’t sweat. Rest assured that I can sweat. I have a delightful beady sweat mustache that I sport throughout the day. Therefore, I had heat exhaustion, not heat stroke), has been cured. The cure, and subsequent continued treatment, has been an enormous quantity of water that is anywhere between 5 and 8 liters of water everyday. It’s quite wonderful except I can’t leave the house for more than 30 minutes at a time because I pee about 47 times every day, throughout the day. As a house, we go through two of those Culligan water jugs every three or four days. Which means we have to pick up two new ones every three or four days. We’re like a whole troop of Culligan men (and women), except that unlike the Culligan Man, we have to carry these incredibly heavy and awkward jugs about six blocks to our house. In the heat. Past the pile of rotting oranges (which have recently been joined by watermelons). The jugs may not actually be all that heavy but I have been atrophying here, don’t forget. We could also take a cab but who wants to pay a dollar for that?
My saving grace, given the outrageous heat, is that the nights still cool down nicely (another saving grace is that I’ve adopted the belly button pose for in the house. It is not pretty.). We have the doors wide open from about 6:00 until bedtime which is wonderful on every day except for Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday. If you have been following this blog you know exactly why leaving the doors open on those days is unfortunate. Speaking of our evangelical neighbours, I have bad news for anyone who was holding out hope that I could get the code for the weak wireless signal that we sometimes get in our house. That’s right, I’m pretty sure that it belongs to the church. Since we are not on speaking terms, they and I, (the only thing that I will ever say to them will be a public declaration of a feud. It will be like yelling "citizen´s arrest!", only it will signal the start of a feud to the death) the wireless signal appears to be a lost cause. We are still going to try the password “gloria a dios” (because they chant it for about an hour and a half without stopping for a breath), but I’m not optimistic…
Hey, I have a fun story. Guess what I did on Friday? I ate three quarters of a cow and then went to sing karaoke. We (the housemates and a few friends) started the night by getting all dressed up (I only wore a t-shirt and shorts but did shave… so that’s something. It didn’t compare to the layers of make-up worn by our Nicaraguan friends. Outrageous amounts of it. I can’t even make a comparison to anything I have ever seen. They also decided to do Amy and Xochi´s make-up. Amy describes the look as Shotgun Shelly and made me promise not to put a picture up.) and then looking for a classy place to eat. The Tip-Top (a weird, bizarro world KFC where somewhere opens the door for you when you arrive, customers are dressed in business casual attire, and business meetings are happening at some of the tables) was too far away so we went to Hambur-Loco. It, too, was like a bizarro world, with weird Disney paintings on the wall, an outdoor park that had been thrown inside (think McDonald’s play area with a see-saw and tire swing), and a foosball table that the owner was incredibly, incredibly proud of. Being that we were at Hambur-loco, I naturally ordered Combo #5, the Hambur-loco. At this point I had absolutely no idea what the Hambur-loco was, only that it would be my first hamburger in a long, long time. Here is a line-by-line description of the Hambur-loco, beginning from the bottom and going up:
- Bottom of a hamburger bun
- Bean paste / spread
- Mayonnaise and/or mustard
- Meat (beef?) patty
- Meat (beef?) patty (not a typo. There were two.)
- Tomato
- Bottom of hamburger bun
- Lettuce leaf
- Ketchup
- Meat (beef?) patty (that’s right, folks, a third one!)
- Top of sesame seed bun
The Hambur-loco was incredibly, incredibly delicious. I have reason to believe that I gained 5 pounds after that meal. Now, through the magic of the Internet, you can watch me eat my Hambur-loco. As you can see, one of our friends was entirely, entirely uninterested in my eating the burger.
After the Hambur-loco, we went to a karaoke bar. This is me rocking out (this was actually the pre-karaoke dance music. Do you remember the Venga Bus? I sure didn´t until Friday.) I have never been to a karaoke bar so I can’t say with certainty that this was different from in Canada but it was certainly different from karaoke bars in movies. Instead of having one machine with a sort of stage, there were TVs all over the place with the words to the songs that had been requested (and the requesting person stayed at their table with a microphone to lead the charge). Everything went more or less smoothly (sappy Spanish love songs abounded) until a song requested by a man who I can only assume was Satan began to play. That song was Unforgiven, a song whose lyrics you need to see on screens all around you in order to appreciate how frightening it is, and is a song in English. This posed a few problems for those in the bar. Unlike the other songs, no one sang along because (1) they didn’t know the words, (2) they didn’t know the tune, and (3) Satan was scaring them. Let me explain the latter point. As I mentioned, whoever requests the song gets the microphone. Satan requested the song so Satan got the microphone. Are we following? Unfortunately, Satan didn’t seem to speak English and decided to growl (that’s my best description, I can’t think of another word. Perhaps the video below will help.) the tune of the song. Think Darth Vader. Only with some sort of horrible throat infection. And no vocabulary. Or just watch the video. What you think is background noise is actually the voice of Satan. You should also know that Satan and his friends have a special "congratulations on rocking that song and giving everyone nightmares" handshake.
Also this past week, they fumigated our house. A man came to the door, declared himself as a Ministry of Health employee, said they were fumigating because of Dengue fever and, as Stanley Milgram would have predicted, I told him to come right on in. I don’t know if it was because our house is big or because they thought that I might have a weak immune system and therefore might need some extra fumes (I am looking a bit gaunt. And white.), but the smoke in our house took well over twenty minutes longer to clear than any other house on the block (the smell still lingers a bit). The smoke was so thick, I could not see a thing (I was obviously outside when this was happening but went in once to get my camera – I couldn’t find it because of the smoke – and went in another time to open the doors, because the smoke had gone absolutely nowhere after 10 minutes. It was thick, and stopping, dropping, and rolling didn’t help. Neither did my t-shirt pulled up over my mouth as a homemade gas mask. I will let my public health / infection prevention readers give their expert opinion, but I have reason to believe that I may have traded the risk of Dengue for 13 years of function that have now been taken off of my lungs because of the fumes. I hope that I made the right choice. I forgot to close my paranthesis.
I think that that is all that I have to share for now. The town is shutting down for the “holy week” so I may become bored and update the blog then. Or the Internet café might be closed. Happy Easter either way! Enjoy your mini-eggs. I won’t be. Sigh.
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