55 More Get-Ups

The other day my husband declared that he had only x number of "get-ups" before we leave Bucharest. He explained that when he was a high school teacher, about this time of year with summer vacation approaching, his coworkers would start counting down not just the days, but the times they had to get up, go to work, face the students etc... These were known simply as the number of "get-ups" before the luxury of unscheduled time that is summer break.

This morning, a Sunday with typical spring time partly-cloudy skies, birdies making a racket in the neighborhood, tulips in full bloom and trees leafing out - I counted my own get-ups.  It's 55, down from 475 when we arrived. (That's working days, not counting weekends and holidays.) 

Flowering tree outside of typical house in the village of Comana.

Nothing says "You're not in Kansas anymore" like buying tulips from a Roma woman outside an Orthodox cathedral.

Wisteria-covered Bucharest house. 

That makes it sound like I'm looking forward to leaving, and that's not it at all.  Funny, I recall writing about this very same mixed bag of emotions as we were preparing to leave Juarez. Each time we move, we're not just leaving a job, but also a country, a language, a climate, a style of life, a group of friends and coworkers, AND a job.  This move is going to be harder than the others because we've become far more immersed in Romanian life than we were in Mexico or Colombia. For example: in Juarez, the morning radio alarm was set to a Texas NPR station. We watched 60 Minutes every Sunday night, had US cell phones, Washington state license plates and could pop over to Target when we needed. We were even in living in the Mountain Time zone.  Sadly we were only in Colombia for one year and were only just hitting our stride there we I was called back to DC for A-100. But here - I feel steeped in all things Romanian: the language, the funny quirks of the people, the food, the climate, the driving habits, the cost of living and even the morning radio that wakes us reminds me every day that I'm not in the U.S.  And that's why we're here - to live another life.  

Plus, being a Consular Officer is the best job to have if you really want to live another life and get to know a new country. And by "get to know," I mean understand what daily lives are like, what people do for a living, what their family dynamics are, what they do in their free time and how they view their own country. After adjudicating over 26,000 visas - I've heard a LOT of stories.  As soon as I think I've heard them all - a new one comes to the window that makes me laugh, smile or shake my head. I relish having such a detailed view into the lives of the Romanian "om de rând" (average person - or literally, "person of the line") and learning what life is like behind the lacy curtains in the "bloc" apartments, or in the little cottages alongside the road. 

But now we're going back to DC where we'll be the om de rând, or just plain ole' middle-aged Americans. Not special, not unique, not standing out because of our white tennis shoes or friendly smiles at strangers.  No more, "Wow - you speak Romanian?" astonishment by waiters and cashiers that works so nicely as an ice breaker. No more marveling at new discoveries or trying to figure out what they call whipping cream here or if buttermilk exists or not. Instead, we'll just walk into the store, grab it off the shelf, and then fully understand all questions at the check-out about bags and rewards cards with no confusion about do we/don't we pre-weigh our vegetables.  I mean what fun is that? 

I was assisting a Congressional visit last weekend and one member of the group commented that I must be so excited to be returning home for the next tour.  I don't recall the exact words, but the tone was clear when she said "coming back to AMERICA" as if my parole just came through. There was an awkward pause while my mind scrambled for the best way to respond.  I came up with something about looking forward to the work I'll be doing there (true), but really feeling that I serve the country best while stationed abroad (also true).  

But the overall truth is no, right now we'd rather be on the outside looking in. Ironically, I've learned more about my own country and culture by living elsewhere these past six years.  I've come to appreciate things I'd certainly taken for granted before, while also becoming more critical about certain aspects of American life I'd just grown accustomed to.  Seeing the country through foreign eyes and hearing people tell me it's their life dream to visit, makes me prouder of the country.  I don't think I'd have understood all that by staying at home. 

Like dating more than one person before getting married, or having a bunch of different jobs before picking a career - to know what's right for us, we have also to know what isn't. I'm not yet ready to stop gaining these insights.  I think I'm drawn to the comfort of always being slightly uncomfortable, continuing to learn and see life from different angles. 

Maybe that's what this is all about?  

Dodger

Just days before Christmas, we lost our Dodger. 

He was 18.5 years old and a member of the family since I brought him (and his nearly identical sister Daphne) home in a basket at six weeks old.  In re-reading my post from last year (read here) when Daphne died, I see that I can't explain any differently the pain of such a loss nor the additional difficulty of having it happen while living abroad. Therefore I'd simply like to write about my buddy. 

Dodger and I had grown very close over the past few years. Partly due to his age and partly because since joining the State Department, he settled into the life of an indoor cat with far less independent time outside. I've seen him successfully through radioactive iodine treatment for hyperthyroidism, kidney disease, and in Bogota five years ago, during a routine vet visit, he had an anaphylactic reaction to an injection and I watched what I feared were his last yowl and gasp for breath. Clearly they weren't, thanks to the fast actions of my vet and a veterinary ICU hospital just minutes away. (Trust me, I still relive those "what-if" horrors in my mind.)  Then last September he suffered a blood clot that reduced his control over his hindquarters greatly. Fortunately, he was able to re-gain a lot of strength and mobility over time and moved around the apartment as "Wobbles the Cat," even getting up onto the bed and couch, first with help of steps and then a ramp of cushions. However, he began to depend on us more and more. 

On Halloween, he had another set-back, reducing his mobility even more. Finally, on December 23rd, I came into the living room in the morning to feed the boys and start the day only to find Dodgy on his couch crying and crying.  He was unable to sit or stand on his own and for the first time - he seemed to be in pain. The vet came into the clinic an hour before opening hours to see him and after her exam, gave us various options for tests, possible MRIs or ultrasounds of his heart, and various medications we could try to keep him going through Christmas. Only when pushed to be brutally honest did she acknowledge that the very best result we could hope for would be that he returned to how he was the night before. And that chance was slim. Her best guess was that he had a stroke, perhaps caused by another clot. 

I remembered a time about seven or eight years ago when my beautiful black mare "Babe" was worsening with a chronic disease.  I'd be caring for her through her decline for over two years and in a conversation with my husband about when it might be "time" for her, I defended her by noting that she still had a few good days each week.  When my husband asked me if I wanted to wait until she only had bad days, I realized that she would never become a new blossom again. I was only watering a brown plant. She was never going to GET BETTER, and instead of preserving her life, I was only prolonging her inevitable death out of my own reluctance to say goodbye, out of guilt, and out of fear of my own pain and sadness.  These weren't the right reasons.

So instead of exploring all the options and their accompanying false hopes - I remembered Babe's lesson. The vet gave Dodger a pain reliever and sedative to help him feel more comfortable, told us to take him home and just be with him and then come back mid-day with our decision.  He spent his last hours on our bed with us and with Toby, the sun streaming through the window from a blue-sky winter day to warm his fur and old bones. I talked to him, we looked each other straight in the eyes and I just petted him and petted him and petted him. He was relaxed and breathing easily, but the pain reliever had only slightly muted his cries. With that, we knew our decision.

It seemed impossible to know when to stand up, when to put him in his carrier, when to point the car back towards the clinic. It just seemed easier to sit there and stroke him for one last minute. But eventually we did move. My husband and step-daughter were there with me as the vet talked us through the procedure. When he took his last breath, he was already in a deep sleep and felt nothing. The people he knew, loved and trusted were right with him until the end, which is the most any of us can hope for. For the second time in just over a year, I said goodbye and asked for the forgiveness from someone I loved as much as any human family member.  

I will leave you with pictures spanning nearly two decades of memories. He was our Dodger, Dodgy, D-Man, Dodger-Gee (after we watched "Slumdog Millionaire"), Heavy-D, and briefly for an unexplained reason after watching the History Channel, Robert E. Lee. The man in the gray striped pajamas. 
Our friend. 

With Nutmeg in his favorite spot.

Always the mom-cat of the family, Daphne seeing to Dodger's hard to reach spots.

Dodger (left) and Daphne learning how to heat the house.

The only kind of mouse he ever caught. 

Cool-cat at Christmas years ago with his luxurious ruff. 

Spring time under our blooming plum tree. We sprinkled Daphne's ashes in this garden this summer.  

After a good BBQ, the grill-licking and napping commenced. 

All an old guy needs is a basket and a sunny spot in Mexico. 

I never thought Toby would be the last one standing. The tiny kitten adopted from a teenage girl with a box in front of the grocery store late one night on the way home from work. The one I was "Just going to foster until I find the right owner because, well, I already have two kittens."  

Toby

Signing off for now,

Tabby in Tow

Finding Friends in a Foreign Service Life

March brings our fifth anniversary with the State Department. Including three stints for training at FSI of about six months each, we are living in our sixth home in those five years. While this might sound like I'm about to write about packing and moving, I'm not (this time).  Instead, I've been thinking about the whole topic of friendships while living such a mobile, temporary life.  This is something my husband and I talk about quite a lot, actually.  The conversations usually take place over dinner when we start thinking about our plans for the weekend and where, when and with whom we plan to do something.  

Sounds like normal life stuff, right? Well, it's different in a Foreign Service life - a LOT different.  

After much thought on the subject, I've found that there are four general categories, if you want to call them that, of friends you can have while living abroad:

• American work friends, 
• Local work friends, 
• Locals in general, 
• Other ex-pats. 

Let's start with the obvious - American work friends:

When I first arrived at FSI as a brand-new OMS, my fellow Specialist Orientation classmates provided me with 68 new friends; folks who were exactly in the same boat I was. We had all just given up a previous job or finished an education; we had all just started a new job in a unique work culture; and most of us had just moved away from our familiar lives with friends and family.  Add the fact that the majority of us were living in temporary housing (hello Oakwood!) and the bonding was instant and easy as we all made our way through the transition. It felt just like freshman year in college moving into the dorms, but with salaries.  There were BBQs, happy hours, dinners out, museum trips etc... and I found great relief being with others who were experiencing the same thing I was and who understood how overwhelming finding one's way through the massive machinery that is a new federal career can be.  This period was probably the easiest transition in terms of friends, truly a "just add water and presto" situation.

Arriving at a first posting felt quite the same as arriving at FSI.  There were lots of new people in Bogota's massive embassy to meet. Someone was always planning some kind of activity or outing, there were game nights, dinner parties etc...  There seemed to be no lack of things to do or people to meet and over a short time we began to find our "niche" of friends naturally. 

No doubt, hanging out with other Americans can be very easy. After spending the work day communicating with limited language skills, it feels great to be able to express oneself fully in English; it's fun to share American holidays or sporting events and to laugh or commiserate about living in the new country with its inherent difficulties and pleasures.  However, after a while my husband and I started to question why we were only hanging out with other Americans.  One of the main reasons we joined the Foreign Service was to know what it was like to live immersed in another culture and out of our comfort zone.  

So now the next inevitable dilemma bubbles to the surface: How do we naturally make local friends?  "Naturally" meaning we gag at the idea of making friends mechanically, as if working through a list. "We really need to cultivate more native friends, dear." But at the same time - we do want to do just that. 

We saw the easiest source of local friends in the staff members we work with, who will always outnumber the Americans in the Embassy or Consulate. We've met so many great LES* whom we really like and want to spend more time getting to know. Besides liking them personally, they're also the perfect combination of people who understand American culture, speak English perfectly, yet can also teach us about their country, language, food, traditions etc..  So where's the catch? As in most things in life - there's always a catch. This is where we have stumbled and are still trying to find our way.

We're often the local staff's supervisors, and let's face it - it's a tricky situation being the supervisor and being the friend. And from their point of view, who wants to hang out with their boss after hours anyway?  After a few months in Bucharest, I said to a local colleague, "So when are we going to meet your family? Maybe we could all have dinner some time?"  He politely, yet clearly, responded with something to the effect of, "After you don't work here anymore."  I felt hurt at first, because after I don't work here is also after I don't live here anymore, and so... that kind of means never. I know he didn't mean that he didn't like us nor want to get to know us, he just knew what was best for the professional relationship. 

I've had some great bonding experiences with local coworkers when we've traveled together for work, which I've been fortunate to do a handful of times.  There's the laughing at the airport when we stand in the wrong lines or find ourselves so engaged in the gettin'-to-know-ya' conversation that we almost miss our planes (has happened twice). There's the fact that we are sitting next to each other on the plane or car ride, which makes personal conversation inevitable. We work together on whatever project or presentation we'll be giving, and finally we share meals before and after work as we're always staying in the same hotel - it just happens easily.  So it was in this setting that one coworker who I really like confided in me by saying what I'd always suspected: Why should the local staff invest in friendships when they know that the Americans will be moving on in two or three years, most likely never to see them again? She added frankly that she'd had her heart broken too many times to let herself fully invest in a real friendship.  Every going away party I've been to seems to involve American tears as we realize that we may see our American colleagues again somewhere - but probably not the local staff. We blubber away with promises to return to visit, and they give us a hug and then an hour later change the name plaque on our door. 

Further, particularly outside of Western Europe, Canada or Australia, there can be the awkward economic difference between local and American staff. Besides salary differences, we also don't usually live in the same areas, most notably because Embassy housing is generally in tony neighborhoods and not where the "regular folks" live. We find ourselves talking with coworkers about restaurants we've visited ("Yeah, it was great and not too expensive!") and then hear the awkward silence which means that our Thursday night pop-out-for-a-bite spot may be their only-on-a-special-occasion spot. And frankly it's embarrassing when you realize exactly what it means to accidentally say, "Oh, is it payday already?" to a local coworker. 

What about locals from outside of work?

This might be the best compromise, but it takes more effort to find them.  Last night a young American coworker who lives in our building had a gathering at her apartment. (Side note: Going to a party by taking an elevator or walking two doors down in a compound neighborhood does have its advantages.) It was really impressive to see what a range of friends she'd already made, and in talking to them I saw that it didn't happen accidentally.  There were a handful from an outdoors adventures group with whom she'd gone skiing and ice climbing, some from a German ex-pats group that meets regularly (but they were all Romanians), a handful from the local Toastmasters chapter - but only a few of us from the Embassy. We ended up staying waaay later than I normally would simply because there were new and interesting people to chat with and best of all - we weren't just talking about work. 

Sharing a passion, sport or hobby is an obvious way to make local friends. In Bogota we found a good group through our volunteer work at an animal shelter.  Each weekend when we arrived at the shelter, we'd catch up with the other volunteers while caring for the animals and were flattered to be invited to spend "novenas" (celebrations leading up to Christmas) with one family. We spoke only Spanish with them and they laughed at our mistakes and then taught us how to REALLY say things. Hence my otherwise-inexplicable ability to speak about collars, leashes, worms and the quality and quantity of a dog's poop. We learned about their lives and families while scooping litter boxes and when they came to our going-away party, the tears we shared demonstrated exactly why my Romanian coworker doesn't let herself become too close. 

In Juarez we were fortunate to live in a gated neighborhood that was 90% Mexican families. We were even luckier that these neighbors were stable, professional folks. Meeting neighbors usually just involves working in the front garden a bit, or if you have one, walking the dog in the common area and not being afraid to strike up the typical weather-condition of the roads-pets-or-kids chit-chat. We did this with the family next door and soon enough we were invited to their kids' birthday parties and in exchange, had them over for their first American Thanksgiving. Openness to strangers will naturally vary depending on the culture, but in the typically outgoing Latin American style - it wasn't too hard. (Another side note: Let's just say that some of our coworkers weren't as lucky as we were and had neighbors who kept tiger cubs as pets and had parties with Mariachi bands playing in the back yard until it was time to go to work. I'll let you guess what line of work they might just possibly be in.) 

Finally, there are the other ex-pats. 

Looking for friends from this pool is a bit new to us as in Juarez, the Americans were the only diplomatic mission in town. I imagine this could be the case in other Consulates worldwide. But now being in an embassy puts us in the capital city, and therefore in an environment with a large diplomatic community and in a city full of multinational companies and their employees. We've been invited to Scottish, English and German holiday gatherings so far, which offers another pool of potential friends who are not coworkers or only other Americans.  For the French speakers, there's usually a Alliance Francaise in any large city, and in both Bogota and (surprisingly) even in Juarez  - we'd go to their movie nights.  International schools also attract teachers from around the world, many of whom live the same transitory lifestyle we do.  Like backpackers in hostels comparing notes on the road ahead, we've learned a lot about cities and countries we've considered working in from these teachers. For example, we've now moved Togo onto our short-list of possible West African countries based on a few such positive conversations. 

We miss our friends from home and are sad to see years-long friendships dwindle to Christmas cards and Facebook updates.  (Unless you get posted to Europe or some tropical paradise, which like having a pool in the backyard, seems to bring out every long-lost cousin with designs on your spare room. A true test of friendship is when they'll still visit you in Mauritania or Vladivostok.) It seems that at each post, we end up with one couple who we really click with and enjoy spending time with. But just as with our local coworkers  - we all know that summer camp will eventually end and we'll have to say goodbye. Veteran FS families have learned to maintain these far-flung besties through vacationing at each others' posts, or by re-igniting the friendship while at FSI.  It just means that you get to see that person you really like only every two or so years, which is kind of a bummer. 

So what's the bottom line?

Even given all the above options, however, we still find that we're stuck with a life of rather superficial friendships and lots of time spent with just each other, and trust me - my husband has already heard all my best stories and would probably appreciate some new material now and again. We hope our old friends from home won't tire too much of sentences that start with, "When we were in...," but we imagine they will. The best lesson we're learning is to just put ourselves "out there" and let ourselves enjoy the people who do cross our paths, whether for one conversation or for the entire tour.  

*LES = Locally Engaged/Employed Staff.  Formerly known as FSNs = Foreign Service Nationals.  The title was changed a few years back from FSN to LES because of the presence of third-country nationals working in the posts, i.e. neither Americans nor host-country nationals.  But it didn't take too long for someone to pronounce LES as "less" and a loud, global forehead slap was heard.  So, now we either go back to saying FSNs or use the full term "LE Staff." Sigh.

End of Training and Heading to Post Part III

I recently took an online stress indicator survey where I answered a long list of questions about recent changes in my life. My score resulted in the pronouncement that: "You have a high or very high risk of becoming ill in the near future."  

As if that's not going to now make me MORE stressed.

Let me explain what happens at the EOT and what comes next, and I think you'll understand my stress level. And yes, the Foreign Service Institute uses that acronym. It means "end of training" which apparently is a lot harder to say than E-O-T. 

First - there's the language training test.  
There is no greater equalizer among men and women of all ages and career lengths than the dreaded EOT exam. I've yet to meet anyone who says it was a breeze, a pleasant experience, something they'd consider doing in their spare time, something to look forward to or even something that "really wasn't that bad."  Even those who  scored above their expectations have come out of the testing suite (that's what they're called, the video-taped, painted-blue-to-sooth-the-tester torture chambers) feeling like they really screwed the pooch. 

I went into my test fairly, well fairly "okay" is about the strongest adjective I can use here, and left almost cancelling our airline reservations. See, if you don't pass - you get six more weeks of language, you get to make the call of shame to your post and tell them you won't be arriving on time, cancel all travel reservations, extend your housing reservation, cancel your pack-out etc... It's insult, injury and major inconvenience with some embarrassment added for good measure. 

Somewhere during the test, even faced with my familiar and friendly teacher and language consultant as examiners - it dawned on me that perhaps my grasp on Romanian above the very basic level, was purely based on short-term memory and under stress it crumbled like an old aspirin found under the sink. 

At about the 90 second mark, I started to forget really simple words. Specifically, the verb "to work" ("lucra") and found myself holding my Spanish vocabulary away with a whip and a chair. Let me tell you, there's nothing like that little internal voice saying "Don't say 'trabajar'!" that will make you say "trabajar".  In the end, I was successful; however, I'm fairly confident I earned my 3/3 due to my prior demonstrated work in the classroom, and nothing to do with that two hour sample I provided in the exam suite.  And by "sample," please think of other samples one has to give in life... like in a medical setting. 

Now having passed the exam, the brain cues the little Zamboni that comes in and wipes clean your short term memory. Just watch that new language disappear!  Because now, you've got other hurdles to tackle: namely pack-out.  I will just refer you to this blog post about what that entails. True, the experience is physically demanding in the sense that you have to sort through and separate all your belongings. But mostly it's mentally draining due to the amount of decisions you have to make, the planning of what will be needed when, how much space you'll have etc... It can also often entail multiple trips to the post office to pre-ship things you'll need on Day One that won't fit in the suitcases. In our case, a litterbox, cat food and cat litter.  

It bears mentioning that if you're shipping your car to post, you'll be doing all this running around last-minute junk without personal transportation because the car is already en route, sitting on the deck of some carrier ship headed to the Black Sea (or so our shipping folks told us). There's another itty-bitty stress.

Now it's moving day and there's the worry about clearing out of the apartment, putting out the bag of FREE stuff in the building lobby, hoping your favorite houseplant will find a good home, and making sure you don't leave something in a cubby somewhere.  My clever husband puts that blue tape over all the drawers and cupboards once we've cleared them out so that the obsessive-compulsive one among us won't continually open and check for stray items.  (That would be me.)

Then comes the final shoving of stuff into your suitcases, followed by the hauling of them down to the workout room in the building to use their scale (you've already sent yours away) to make sure the bags aren't over the 50 lb airline limit. But what'll you do if they are? Wear the heavier shoes and tie a sweater or two around your waist, I guess. 

The Tabbies by now have definitely figured out what's going on and will probably be under the bed.  Unfortunately, their stress started a few weeks ago when the movers came. AGAIN with these guys?! was the look on their little faces. One Tabby stopped eating and beyond the multiple vet visits to get their international travel health certificates, she required more visits and blood draws to figure out what was wrong. Conclusion? We don't know, but here are some prescriptions to help get her to your destination. At least she'll be in cabin with us and in reach the whole time.  The third Tabby however, has to go under the plane because there is a strict limit to the number of pets allowed inside the cabin - and that limit is two.  I made their travel reservations six months in advance to be sure to grab the two allowed in-cabin spots.  I'm sure there's a European woman with a purse-sized dog cursing my name as she is unable to book her little amour on the same flight with her. Sorry sis, it's a harsh world out there. And did you know with pets you should check in three hours in advance? Yeah, that makes for a long day to be in a little carrier.

Finally we're on the plane for the long slog east. My husband and I haven't traveled horizontally across time zones like this since 2002.  Moving to Juarez meant a five day drive to gently acclimate us to the two hour change that is Mountain Time - how civilized! Jet lag is a very real thing when you're moving across seven time zones. Don't want to think about moving to Asia. (It took about a week for me to stop waking up at 2:00 am, bright eyed and thinking that a game of Scrabble sounded like a good idea.) 

So now you arrive at your destination - success! With luck there's a sponsor, a friendly Embassy/Consulate driver holding a sign with your name and a nice welcome to your new city. That has been our experience so far, at least.  Next comes my favorite part of all -checking out the new digs. I think it's one of the main reasons I joined the Foreign Service, truth be told.  As the instant excitement over seeing your new home begins to wane, you can't help but start mentally sizing up the storage space.  

Sponsor: "And here is the balcony with a view over the park" 

My Inside Voice: Yes, yes, very nice, but where will we put the Kitchen Aid on that counter?

Sponsor: "You'll find the central AC controls here, very convenient."

My Inside Voice:  Yes, yes, convenient, but I only see this non-walk-in closet in the master bedroom! What about the shoes?!

Sponsor: "And there are two darling restaurants just down the block."

My Inside Voice:  Fercrissake, be quiet woman, WHAT ABOUT THE TREADMILL?!

Truly first world problems for which I have no excuse and only shame, but they need to be expressed as I think just about everyone goes through them.

Your sponsor then tells you to just relax and settle in (sorry, still sizing up closet space), rest up (not happening) and the van will be here at 07:30 to pick you up for your first day of work tomorrow!  If you're lucky, this conversation isn't happening at 10:30 pm, but sometimes it is. 

The van comes on time the next morning, as it always does, and ready or not whisks you off to work. The following days are a blur of meeting new coworkers (only 10% of whose names you'll remember and only because they were kind enough to have nameplates on their cubicles), learning new regulations, new passwords and building codes, where the bathroom and cafeteria are and how to get back to your office after lunch.  

And on top of all that - now you have to do your JOB. The job for which the USG has just paid perhaps more than your annual salary to train you and move you, your family and your too much stuff. 

So THAT'S why my stress meter is in the red.  

My current mantra is something a coworker in Juarez used to say as I was training her on the heavy details of immigrant visa work: Poco a poco, or here, puțin câte puțin - little by little. 

It's all we can do.

Adios Juarez

It's finally here.

I don't mean "finally" as in Christmas morning, but rather "finally" as in that dreaded dental appointment. 

The last work day, the last hug goodbye, the last look around our house and garden, the last time we turn the car north and head for the border, the last crossing over the big sandy depression that is the Rio Bravo/Grande, the last chat with CBP and then we're away and into Texas.

Time is such a mercurial, fickle friend and sometimes enemy.  Time has both flown and crept since our February 2013 arrival. May to January slipped by in a blink, and yet it seems as if I've been aware of the passing of every hour in our last week. Yesterday we drove by the El Paso hotel where in Feb 2013 we spent the last night of our road trip south before meeting our social sponsor and heading across the border for the first time.  I saw the window of the hotel room where we stayed and remembered what I had been thinking as I looked out over the twin cities that would be our home. During the day it was all very beige (very beige!), and at night Juarez spread out beneath El Paso in a rolling, twinkling blanket of lights.  But the skies were so crisp blue (they still are) with the widest and brightest horizon I'd ever seen.  I think that horizon was emblematic of my time here: broad and full of possibilities. 

Professionally, this assignment could not have been better suited to me. Back in Bogota when I was an OMS and hoping to be a Consular Officer, I got some advice from one of the Consular managers that, should I make it to A-100, I should seriously consider going to the border for everything I could learn there.  (Sorry Canada, but when we say "border post," we're usually talking about the southern border.)  I'm sure I smiled and nodded, tucking away her advice, all the while privately thinking that I wanted to go somewhere far more exotic.  But she was right. Cutting one's teeth in arguably one of the most complex immigrant visa sections in the world has been an incredible learning experience for me. 

Personally, our time here has been equally satisfying.  That's such a milquetoast word, "satisfying," for something so meaningful.  The most important elements to a successful tour are often completely unrelated to the actual job. Is your family happy? Do they like their jobs/schools? Are the pets safe and comfortable? How do you like your house/apartment? Do you like the local food? What is the weather like? Are there fun things to do outside of work and friends to share them with?  Everything has come our way in each of those categories.  In fact, I'm a bit worried that we've used up all our Foreign Service luck in that respect. 

I think I've made my point that I've loved it here. And that's why it's so sad to see that the time has come to close the doors on this experience and move forward.  And why I feel so guilty thinking that time is now my enemy, barely crawling by when I just want to get it over with and go. This is by far the hardest part of a Foreign Service life: the departures. Not the technical pain-in-the-butt stuff like pack-out and writing EERs, but the "it's not goodbye, it's see you later" when you're pretty sure it really is goodbye. 

So I'm just going to leave you with a really snappy song and video about our dusty, ole' city and a few pictures that I hope show this place off. It's not a beautiful city, but the soul of the place and the people here make it as warm as it is hot. Our Consul General, in giving a going away speech for a few of us, said that there are some posts worldwide that are "snakebit," meaning that no matter how lovely the setting - they're just full of bad juju that persists year after year. He didn't know what the opposite of that was to describe this consulate, sunkissed perhaps, but he's right.  Through all the tragedy the city and post have endured, the soul and spirit continues to welcome. I'm proud to have been a little part of it all.

With that...

Ciudad Juarez es Numero Uno! Just try to get this song out of your head afterwards. 

A blanket of lights on both sides of the border

Amazing skies and Juarez's mountains to the west.

Best sunsets!

The Equis (X) at the crossing of countries and cultures

La bandera grande, slowly waving in the sun rays

Thank you for everything my friends. It's time to head north.

Road Trip: Day One

Distance: Miles 0 - 360

Location: Falls Church, VA to Virginia - Tennessee border

Appropriate Song: Country Roads

We woke up this morning to a flurry of light snow falling on our moving day. But it really wasn't falling, in the sense of going from up above to down below, because of the swirling winds, the snow was going every different direction other than down giving us our own little inside-the-snow-globe effect. The Tabbies weren't fooled by any of our packing up, and as soon as they finished their breakfast, retreated to under the bed. As if we'd leave them behind...

By 11:30 the car was stuffed to the gills, including the rooftop carrier, and the cats were in their carriers in the back-back of the car. Two hours down the road, we pulled into a gas station for bathroom breaks and to open the carriers for the kitties, giving them free range over the back of the car. I kept an eye on them for Worst Fear #1 - cats diving under the accelerator pedal in the fast lane of the interstate, but nothing near that happened. In fact, it was better than expected, with Daphne immediately making herself comfortable in what I now refer to as the Captain's Seat: her bed on the pile of suitcases, coolers and boxes behind our seats at headrest level. Instead of wild-eyed and freaked out, she was quite relaxed and enjoying the scenery. After not too long, she was even asleep.

To check on how the boys were doing in the back, I had to crawl belly-down over the pile of stuff and scooch as far back as I could to reach them. I could barely scratch behind their ears, but could easily see that they were pretty quietly curled up either in their carriers, or right in front. Awww. Better than expected!

We soon came to realize the one big problem with a six-day roadtrip heading south-west: the sun. As in, driving off into the sunset. It seems the last four hours of our day were spent squinting through our sunglasses, and the last hour wishing we had extra pairs to layer on. See what I mean:

Bright horizons sound good, but this is ridiculous!

We pushed on 360 miles and our nearing our first state border. The five of us are now snug in a hotel room and the Tabbies are no doubt thinking, "So... this is the new house you've been telling us about? Man, you must've lost your job, mom!" But as long as they eat (yup), use the litterbox (yup), drink water (we're watching) and don't howl all night (Toby!) - this trip might just go okay. 

Meanwhile, we'll all watch the scenery unfold outside the window. For now, it's rolling hills, farm houses and barns in frosty hollers, and stands of dead-looking winter trees, huddled against the 23-degree day.

Points of Pride

It feels like I've noted a whole slew of milestones reached over the past year and a half of this blog, but I get to tell you about one more, and it might be my favorite. 
On Wednesday, along with 23 classmates, I graduated from ConGen! 

This means we each successfully completed (with 100% attendance required) six weeks of intensive study for our assignments as Consular Officers. I have a dandy certificate to prove it, a head full of FAM references and binders full of notes, but more than that, I have (now, really!) finally achieved what has kept me motivated since May 2009 when I first heard of what a Consular Officer was. Through an entire summer dedicated to preparing for my first FS Officer's Test, to the disappointment of not making it all the way through the hiring process on the first try, to the excitement of going to my first assignment as an OMS - the spot on the horizon I've always kept in focus has been this job. 

So yesterday was a personal celebration for me. As my first day without an FSI class to attend, I spent part of it in Arlington National Cemetery in quiet reflection. Under brilliant blue skies and crisp early-autumn sunshine, I walked through the rows of headstones and statues and took in the perfect view of DC by myself. Being in that setting reminded me of the importance of service and of creating a life whose focus is outwards, not inwards. Naturally I can't compare my potential service or sacrifice to that of those memorialized at Arlington, but I am proud that it's something, that it's what I can do now. 

To top it off, we just learned that on September 22nd, our A-100 class list was sent to the Senate for Presidential Nomination. To excerpt the Library of Congress website:

Presidential Nominations
112th Congress (2011 - 2012)
PN1880-112

Legislative Actions

Floor Action: September 10, 2012 - Received in the Senate and referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations.

Floor Action: September 22, 2012 - Senate Committee on Foreign Relations discharged by Unanimous Consent.

Floor Action: September 22, 2012 - Confirmed by the Senate by Voice Vote.

I'm not entirely sure what else comes next in the process, but just to know that my name was in some way passing through Congress, well - I think that's pretty cool. 

And today the 169th A-100 class will have their Flag Day, and I will be in the back of the room cheering them on. There should be a few new Ciudad Juarez colleagues receiving their tiny Mexican flags, so I plan to be there to welcome them in, just as I was received on my own Flag Day almost two months ago. Each week, more of my classmates head for the airports and we're already receiving word back from colleagues in Saudi Arabia, Mali, NYC and Paraguay. While we're having lunch in the FSI cafeteria, they're out sinking their teeth into the meat of the work that we're still learning about. By the time I start my Spanish classes, some of my ConGen friends will already be in their interview windows, putting all of our training to work. 

To top it off, my husband was granted a spot in his own ConGen course, and just one week into it is now saying things like, "I'd like to, but I've got homework and case studies to work on today..." when we start making weekend plans. We hope that this training will set him up for a job inside the Consulate, but there are no guarantees. The security and economic situation in Juarez isn't as favorable for work on the local economy as it was in Bogota, so we're hoping this will be a good avenue for him. And who knows - maybe he will be so enthralled with the subject matter that he'll consider making it a career, too?  

Just a bit of sentimental pride to share with you all today. Once in a while I think it's important to slow down and really taste the tangerine.

Towing Tabbies - Part Two

Look who's on the road again

We woke up at 03:00 am yesterday to start the long slog back to Virginia. I don't consider that hour to be "...in the morning" as truly - it's the night before, but it a necessary evil to be in time for our morning flight. Bogota sent us off with a steady drizzle and a suspicion that the "dry season" might have come and gone while we were waiting for the sun to come out. They call it the "dry season," not the "sunny season" for a reason, it appears.

Our friend who we hired to be our "cat coyote" to carry an extra Tabby was previously inexperienced in the subtleties and potential hazards of feline wrangling in large, crowded public spaces. However, even with having to take them out of their travel bags three times to go through security scanners, she handled herself and Daphne perfectly. And despite the lovely folks at TSA and their helpful advice, ("Ma'am would you just take your cat, your sweatshirt, your purse, your laptop and your laptop bag and move from the conveyor belt to the dressing area to put your shoes back on!"), it really went relatively smoothly.

Okay, there was that nervous time when MY bag was randomly selected by the Colombian airport folks to be inspected by the police. There were only two of us out of the entire flight to receive this honor, and of course they chose the bag where I'd perfectly packed all my work clothes to prevent six hours of ironing today. The conversation went something like this:

Colombian Police, as he unzips my bag: "What have you been doing in Colombia?"

Me: "I've lived and worked here one year."

Colombian Police, as his hands begin to pull out my clothing: "Mmm hmm. And where did you work?"

Me: "At the embassy; I'm a diplomat, sir."

Colombian Police, as he suddenly shoves his handful of my underwear back into my bag: "I'm so sorry, ma'am, I didn't know. Have a safe travel."

Woo-hoo! I showed him my passport and headed for the plane.

Many hours later, with two of the carrier bags reeking of cat pee (hmmm... wonder why?), we touched down in DC. Over all, the Tabbies are becoming true frequent fliers and simply curled up in their bags under the seats in front of us. They appreciated the dozens of "Ay que divino!" in Bogota, and the "Look mom, it's a kitty!" in Miami. We got off the plane, collected our baggage and were in a taxi en route to our temporary digs at Oakwood within half an hour of landing, which has got to be a land speed record.

So now it's back to the same Oakwood from last year. We chose this property for a few reasons: I have great memories from the five months I spent here last year and know the neighborhood well; there's a pool with Tim's name on it; there's a BBQ with Tim's name on it; and many of my classmates and folks from the new Specialist class that will start tomorrow are also here. Oh yeah, and they told me it was the only spot available. Details.

We're happy to be here, and just as I'd pictured - they gave us an apartment in the same building, facing the same direction and just exactly two floors higher than I had last year. As we speak, the Tabbies are soaking up the filtered sun on their balcony. Dodger especially. (I wonder if their fur will curl in the humidity as my hair has instantly done?)

After seeing everyone had water and a litter box (cats and humans included), we headed for dinner with our cat coyote and her husband (good friends who we'll be horrible sad to see return to Bogota). Sitting on the restaurant's outside patio, I inhaled my absolute, nectar-of-the-Gods favorite beverage: dry hard cider. With the cicadas in the background and surrounded by beautiful colonial houses with picket fences - it was great to be "home." But I also realized that for the first time, we are homeless. Last year when I arrived, Tim was still in our Washington home. Then we had our Bogota apartment - now we have Oakwood, cardboard and suitcases. Tim finds it exciting and adds that he loves the non-car ownership part, too.

I'm excited for other reasons than sheer minimalism. Shortly, I'll head down to the communal free continental breakfast and begin to meet my A-100 classmates who'll no doubt be trickling in with their families, hopes and expectations in tow, too. Tomorrow it all starts.

Again.

YAY!!!

It's Despedida Season

Despedida: A farewell.

Today marked the first of something that I will have to go through time and again in this FS life: my first co-worker to ship out. Yes, there have been a handful that I've known who have left the embassy this year already, but this was the first officer from my section. Someone I sat 20 feet from every day for the past nine months, who started in the Economic Section the same day as I did, and who I rode in the van with every afternoon in the glorious Bogota traffic. She's headed to Baghdad in a few months with her tandem husband, so naturally there's the extra little worry for safety and all. Tomorrow the rest of us will be back in the office in our chairs, typing away as we were yesterday and as we will be next week, and she'll be on the plane, seeing Colombia through a tiny window.

It seems that a few things have pushed me into a sentimental mood lately.

First, the Summit concluded and we've had some really great talks with the Ambassador lately (the most recent one today) about the meaning of what was accomplished there and the exciting future we're witnessing for Latin America in general and Colombia in specific. Listening to him speak and realizing that I'm a part of it all now, that my daily paper shuffling and keyboard ticking is all part of a huge, global picture - well, that has been making me feel proud... and that tends to make me all watery-eyed. I can better understand the value of all those VIP visits that I complain about, because I'm starting to see the outcome of all that they're working on, the impact of our efforts here on everyone out there. The vantage point has expanded to incorporate the whole world, and I'm understanding that what happens here has implications far beyond this hemisphere.

Second, as I mentioned above, my co-workers are starting to leave. Like dominoes, we're going to lose five of eight members of the Economic Section in the coming three months. They've all been friends and (unknowing) mentors as I've learned to make my way in this new career and life. Each in their own way, both small and huge, they've molded my understanding of the work we're doing. They will have successors, but not replacements.

Third, I just learned that the invitations for the July A-100 class of new FS Officers have started to go out. As you may know, my Consular Officer candidacy is still deferred, meaning that even if my name does come up on the list for an invitation to become a Consular Officer - I will be skipped over until I re-activate my position on the list. So now I'm starting to get antsy. What if I defer for too long and miss my chance and due to budget restraints they don't hire any more Consular Officers? I have my Spanish language test next week and without those extra points, it is possible my name might never rise high enough to get the big call-up. I tried to contact the person who is responsible for re-activating my candidacy with a question of where I'm standing now, and - true to government form - I received an out-of-office reply until next week. I'm taking that as a sign that I need to be patient.

Fourth, I'm feeling itchy to move on. Living close to the equator means we have no true seasons here: just rainy and less rainy, so perhaps it's the sensation of an endless stretch of the same thing ahead of me that has me feeling anxious. Is it because I don't like what I'm doing now? I don't think so, because I'm finally hitting my stride and I am getting fluent in my job requirements. There is a LOT of exploring in Colombia yet for us to do. My husband is enjoying a good work schedule finally (more on that in a later post) and really, this isn't a bad ole' city to live in. I think I need to find a way to just slow down and enjoy what's around me and not keep looking at the horizon. It's just sooo tempting to start getting excited about What's Next! As I've noted before, this is an intrinsic part of this life and probably why we chose it.

Speaking of which, what's next? The results of my Spanish test and perhaps an open Consular candidacy.

Cambiando el tema, otra vez y otra vez

Changing the subject...again and again
That's what I find myself doing in the past few days. As my remaining days in language training have now dwindled to seven, while I'm still definitely focused on continuing to learn (ojala!), I'm also having to divert my attention to the job soon to be at hand: being an OMS. Not just an OMS, but a brand-new OMS in a really, really big embassy in a really big city. Yeah, I think I mentioned this before; can you tell it's on my mind? It's been nearly three months since the end of my OMS training and the time that I learned about all things "e-This" and "e-That." All those important programs that people rely on the OMS to know inside and out. That training feels como un recuerdo brumoso - sorry, like a foggy memory. Like a styrofoam take-out box, my brain and even my life has been divided into distinct sections with no sauce seeping from one quadrant to the others.

• The personal life: wife, daughter, the-cats'-mother, friend, sister
• The OMS life: cables, safes, combinations, classified vs unclassified, dip notes, seating charts, travel arrangements, country clearances, work requirements
• La Vida Espanol: classes, homework, evaluations, hallway chit-chat, EXAM
• The Colombian life - more questions than answers: Housing? What to bring? Car? Cat litter? Cat food? Clothing? Banking? How to get the cats to Bogota?
• The FSO life: exam preparation, oral assessment, registry (Still haven't hit the Consular registry - five weeks after passing the oral assessment. Oh well, I'm in no hurry.)
• The DoS life: diplomatic passports, visas, travel orders, amended travel orders, pack-out dates, vouchers, per diem, check-out procedures  

En pocas palabras: There is a lot going on, and I feel like I'm spinning plates and have to keep running from one life to the next to make sure none of them come crashing down on top of me. Those palabras weren't very pocas, sorry.

I've been so busy being busy that I haven't let myself get excited about my first post yet. But I need to do that.

So to help get my mind off the mental circus, the Washington, DC Folklife Festival was kind enough to select Colombia as one of the three showcased "themes" for their festival this year on the Mall. The other two were Soul Music/Detroit/Blues and the Peace Corps. There were three large areas dedicated to these themes and filled with booths/tents demonstrating various aspects of each. For Colombia, they broke it up regionally, and there were people from each part of the country displaying their customs, work, music, food, handcrafts, produce etc... Everyone was speaking Spanish; the music was great and I was thrilled to notice that I could understand the majority of what each person was saying. I think I learned a good bit about my host country and now I have images of the faces, sounds of the voices and accents, in my head.

Here are a few pictures, although they're not great because I feel awkward taking pictures of people like a tourist sometimes:

These are "llaneros" (plainsmen) and they were playing music that men play when out on the range with their cattle.

Women from Chocos on the northern Pacific coast, singing funeral songs and describing how the funerals are colorful occasions to celebrate the life, instead of the death, of the person.

This saddle took only two days to make (I think - I had a little trouble understanding the saddle-maker guy.)

Seeing his work did make me think of going riding again when we get down there, though.

Today let me lift my chin and look to the horizon again; to stop being busy being busy for a bit and be excited about what brought me to this place to begin with. Besides running from life to life as listed above, I've also been sentimental about the people who are no longer here or who I've moved away from. (And it seems that there are a few flat spots on the globe, too, as some of y'all have apparently fallen off the edges! I guess you're all busy  being busy, too). This life will be one of continual hellos and goodbyes, of getting excited; getting busy, getting nervous; getting comfortable; getting excited again.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

But all those cycles let us feel alive - heck, they just let us FEEL, as I believe a daily routine perpetuated endlessly tends to dull our senses.

I expect that in twenty years I will have a collection of delicate colored glass bottles on a shelf, labeled with names, places, experiences (good and bad), that I can occasionally take down, uncork, savor, and replace.

Perhaps I should let remember to let myself enjoy them in the moment they're created, too?