Miracle of the Snail Silly Band

I’m alive and well, and here to admit that there were no more earthquakes, tremors, or natural disasters last night and I slept very well. I packed up, only zipping my equipaje by straddling it and demanding it close with some brute force. Met Ara for a nice, final lunch, and departed for the three legged race to Arica, Chile.

San Jose, Costa Rica to Lima, Peru, check. An easy flight. Girl sitting next to me gave me her contact info in case I want to visit Vino del Mar, Chile- supposedly a beautiful place. This flight featured the most beautiful view of the sunset that I’ve ever witnessed. It felt like we were flying next to the sun… and perhaps we were, but thankfully, and obviously- we couldn’t have been that close. I had an isle seat so of course I asked some random dude to take a photo for me… he was very nice, took los fotós and then proceeded to try and take his own and was happily surprised when I explained that he needed to turn off his flash to get a proper photo. I then helped two other people figure out how to turn their flashes off on their cameras.

This made me wonder: how many people don’t know how to do the “most simple” things, like turn the flash off on their cameras, and then back on? I have the feeling I might be exploring questions like these more and more as I travel- even as I’m reading suggested materials before my program- access to healthcare, quality of care, cost, it’s this cycle of getting used to little access, finally getting some care and not having great standards of care, and then improving the quality of care costing a ton… and I’m sure it applies not only in the healthcare sphere… but with other technological advances, that I certainly have taken for granted.

Lima, Peru to Santiago, Chile started off rough. A small child was obviously tired, cranky, underpaid, overworked because, WOW, he would not shut up, oh yes AND, he was sitting in the row directly behind me, in the middle seat- I was on the isle- approximately 2.2 feet away from this kid’s screaming face. The flight hadn’t even taken off and I literally wanted to shove my hiking socks in his mouth for a few minutes so that I could just close my eyes. For some reason, the flight refused to take off, only making matters with this forsaken child worse. I pushed the little silver button on my chair to lean back and turned my head to see the face of this little demon.

Hola nino, cómo está?

He looked down, emotionless. Silent.

Bueno, tengo un regalito para ti. (Good, I have a little gift for you)

I handed him a neon green silly band that was previously around my wrist. Shaped like a snail, I couldn’t figure out if he’d ever seen anything like it or not. Nevertheless, without response, he held it in between his two fingers with good force.

Esto es para ti, pero si lo quieres, necesita tener buen comportamiento porque necesito dormir en este vuelo, entiendes?? (This is for you, but if you want it, you have to have good behavior because I need to sleep on this flight… understand?)

He nodded his head. And remained silent for a solid ten minutes. Golden. From then on, I only heard cute murmurs from him. I’ve never been more thankful to have a silly band on my wrist and to have the ability to bribe a child.

Everyone around me gave me warm eye hugs, full of appreciation for the quiet that followed. I can call it the miracle of the snail silly band.

Made it through customs, immigrations, the fruit check department, and re-checked in. My luggage is down now from 3.6 kilos overweight to 2.2 kilos overweight, and by another stroke of luck, the lady was kind enough not to charge me because it was too pesado. I think mostly because I couldn’t understand sufficiently how much she was saying it’d cost for me to pay per kilo. Oh well. I guess I’ll find out next time… because let’s face it… how is my luggage really losing weight? Its exercise regiment only includes using hair product and lotion… this may, or may not cut it.

Vamos a ver.

I’m now sitting in the Santiago airport, waiting for my flight to Arica. It’s 3:51am NYC time, or 5:51 Santiago time, and my flight boards at 6:45. I’m running on less than three hours sleep but don’t feel too crappy yet. The café con leché helped. I’m excited, slightly nervous, and as ready as I suppose I’ll ever be to start this thing- whatever it may be.

As a wise man says: Onward.