My Thoughts on Returning

Since our trip is almost over, I'm having mixed feelings.  First of all, we get to go back to Brooklyn!! I'm super excited to see all my friends and family (and enemies).  But it's also kind of sad.  I won't be able to go to any more beautiful beaches for a long time.  I'm actually writing this post at a beach in Thailand.  The sun is always shining and the waves are calm and slow.  It made me realize how relaxed it is around here, and once we get back to Brooklyn it won't be like that anymore.  Here, all we do all day is just hang around and enjoy the sunshine.  Back at home, we do work and organized activities.  I like the flow of not planning anything in advanced and just going with the flow of things.  It's still a small price to pay for seeing everyone again, so it's worth it.

China: Lack of Freedom

When we touched down in China, I soon realized that I couldn’t check my email, post on Facebook or even Google search without using the VPN (virtual private network) to pretend I was in Miami.  The Chinese government is so strict in limiting its citizens, you cannot use many different online tools we might take for granted in the US.  With a VPN, we can access all of these tools we normally couldn’t in China. 

By coming to China I know that there is no freedom of speech, press, assembly and religion.  I recently read 1984 by George Orwell, and I realized that modern day China is much like the world depicted by 1984.  The government is always watching.  Security is tight when trying to get into Tiananmen Square, the most important in the country.  You need to wait in line next to rows of police, then walk through a metal detector and get your stuff scanned.  My mom made me read a couple of articles in the Global Times, the English newspaper run by the government.  I read an editorial that says Beijing is not interfering with Hong Kong’s democracy.  I think that “One Country. Two Systems”(OCTS) is hard to implement.  OCTS means that Hong Kong still has a capitalist economy but is politically controlled by Beijing.   I think it’s hard to have to listen to a city many miles away from yours, and still have your own economy. 

Personally, I wouldn’t want to live in China.  Besides the fact that everyone speaks Chinese, you can’t check Facebook or use Google products.  I would feel constrained with no freedom of speech and press.  The religion part doesn’t bother me as much. 

Hong Kong

"Wow this kinda looks like a big Chinatown," was the first thing I said as I sat in the back seat of an air-conditioned taxi next to my sister and my mom, staring at the world outside.  There were Chinese signs with English translations, bakeries with delicious looking foods, run down shops, and both Mandarin and English being spoken.  So there I was, staring at a whole new continent, and the only thing I could think of was how much it looked like Chinatown.

Almost everything I imagined Hong Kong to be was exactly the opposite.  I thought it would be a poor not-so-modern city, but the tall glass buildings and banks proved me wrong.  I thought it would be crowded with not an inch of space to yourself, but the streets proved otherwise. While crowded, the streets are not uncomfortable.  I thought there would be little to no cars.  But the stores filled with Ferraris, Rolls-Royce's and Cadillacs proved me wrong.

I've only been here for a day and I'm looking forward to the arrival of my American cousins, meeting my Chinese cousins, hiking on Victoria Peak, and taking the bullet train to Changsha.

Dangerous Elephants

A couple of days ago, on our safari in South Africa, our guide told us a true story involving an elephant, a car and a crash.  A couple was driving through the Kruger National Park on the way to meet the fiancé's family right before their wedding.  The man was South African and the woman was English.  She was driving because it was her first time among these animals and her first time in South Africa.  He wanted to make it special for her.  

As they were driving along they came upon an elephant in the road.  Now these sightings are relatively common so they didn't think much of it.  However, the elephant got pissed off.  He started sort of walk/running toward the car and in the hectic moment the woman accidentally stalled the car.  The elephant rammed into them.  The car flipped over three times and came to a stop off the road.  Now you might be thinking, "What did the people watching do??"  Well, the two cars watching took a picture and a video and drove off because, "The elephant was still there and angry."  In the video they took, you can clearly hear the driver of the car watching say, "Wow we can make a fortune off of Facebook with this!"  What an inconsiderate idiot.  The couple in the car was fine in the long run.  Although the woman had her thigh run through with the elephant's tusk and the man was a bit banged up, they still both had a full recovery and got married!  

Now the point of the story was to explain why when we saw an elephant strolling toward us in the road,  Ruby was screaming, my dad was sweating up a storm, my mom was staring in awe and my guide was taking photos.  Elephants shake their heads when they feel threatened so if you paid attention, you would be able to tell that we weren't in danger.   In the end, the elephant just wanted some leaves and didn't want to mash up our car, thankfully.  

Igazu Falls

Our first look at Iguazu falls, one of the natural seven wonders of the world, was through our hotel lobby in Argentina.  On our first full day near the falls, we took a ten minute train ride up to the top.  We got off and saw these weird furry animals we'd soon learn to call Coaties. Coaties are part of the raccoon family, they measure 33 to 69 centimeters and have very sharp white teeth.

Coaties aren't afraid of people

Coaties kept stealing empanadas from people's lunch and my Mom and Ruby were terrified of them. After staring and taking pictures for about five minutes, we started the kilometer "hike" over the river. The "hike" was just walking on a slippery metal catwalk and occasionally stopping for a nice picture. When we reached the end, we were not disappointed.  The walkway stops right before three different sections of the waterfall drop into a cavern so foggy, we couldn't see the bottom.  To add the effect, there were swarms of birds diving down, fly back up and doing all that again.  We spent quite a while there just admiring the sheets of water flying down into the abyss below.  For the rest of the day, we just walked around the Argentina side of the park.  We did some more "hikes" and witnessed a Coatie attack during lunch.

Heading out to the top of the falls in Argentina

The next day, we took a taxi to Brazil.  We checked into our hotel and went to visit the second biggest dam in the world, Itaipu Dam (after the Three Gorges Dam in China).  It wasn't too interesting since we didn't go on the special tour (Ruby was to young -.-).

The following day, we visited the Brazilian side of the falls.  This side wasn't as big but it had great panoramic shots of the falls.  We were wondering about taking a speed boat up into the falls but then decided against it.  None of us wanted to get wet and cold and the fact that it cost almost $300 for all of us to go didn't really help.  In the end, we were all tired, excited and wistful because while we were in a new country, we wouldn't be going to any more Spanish speaking ones on this trip.

Just part of Iguazu Falls

The Tango

As some of you may know, Buenos Aires is the city of Tango.  And last night, we went to an evening show.  The van picked us up at 8:00 and we arrived at the restaurant where the show was being held around 9:15.  The show would then start 1 hour later.  Needless to say, it was a boring hour since everyone else was eating and we had already eaten dinner.  We played a game of family jeopardy (which has become a game we play before and after meals).  Then the lights started dimming and the show started.

As the curtain rose, we saw some shadows of people.  Then the lights flicked on.  There were 3 pairs of dancers all doing the tango simultaneously.  The band consisted of a piano, bass, guitar, accordion and violin.  The music was very loud.  All the leg twirling, fancy footwork and dim lights made it hard for my eyes to follow the dancers around the stage.  Each dance went on for about 5 minutes and after it was over, either one of the two singers would go on, or another pair of dancers.  The show went on like this for an hour and a half.  I eventually drifted off to be woken by the crowed cheering.  I really liked the show so I wish I saw more of it rather than having slept.  After the show was over, we all piled back into our big van and drove off.  As we drove, I recognized some pedestrians.  They were the dancers.  And on the street, they look just like normal people.  Then for the second to last time that night, I fell asleep.

Sandboarding

The wind was whipping my face as I sped down the hill, no, mountain of sand.  As I neared the path, I knew I was going too fast to stop, and that’s when the ground hit me.

Last night we signed up for “sandboarding.”  Sandboarding is basically riding down a steep mountain of sand on snowboards.  When we arrived at 4:00, our guide started telling everyone (two other kids and lots of 20-30 year-olds) to head over to the vans.  The vans brought us into the Death Valley.  The Death Valley looked, as our guide said, kind of like the surface of Mars, with lots of sand and clay mountains around the road.  The road was very bumpy because it was mostly washed away by rain.  As we came around one last rocky corner, the giant sand dunes rose up over the horizon.

The sand dune was maybe 300 feet tall.  We all got out of the van and gazed up while our two guides unloaded the snowboards.  Once they were all set on the ground, we started picking them out and bringing them up the dune.  This was by far the most tiring and hardest part of the tour.  Each trip up took 10 minutes more or less.  But when you’re thinking about what’s to come next, it seems easy. 

When we arrived at the very narrow top of the sand dune, we started strapping ourselves in.  After that our guide gave us a few instructions and sent us down!  After I saw four people go down, I thought, “Oh this doesn’t seem too bad.”  So then I went down.  The first couple of times, I went slowly and thought to myself the whole time, “I’M GOING TOO FAST!!” But the third time, I started to go a bit faster, and a bit faster and then I started zipping down the dune.  Luckily, I stopped right before the bottom. 

The next time, it went a bit differently.  I started out fast and I liked it.  When I started getting close to the bottom, I stopped, or at least tried to stop.  When I hit the flat part, I completely wiped out hitting the ground and rolling down the hill for a couple of feet.  If anything, it felt super fun and I rushed up to go again!

Here's the video of my run:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzB7GFOGDZs

Cholita Wrestling

Last Sunday in La Paz, Bolivia, we all went to an event called "Cholita Wrestling."  Cholitas are indigenous ladies who wear big skirts, petticoats and bowler hats. Cholita Wrestling takes place in El Alto.  El Alto is almost like a separate city on the outskirts of La Paz.  All the rich people live in the bottom of La Paz and all the poorer people live in El Alto.  El Alto is up in the hills of La Paz, two to three thousand feet higher.  It's only been there for 28 years and about one million people live there.  Cholita Wrestling takes place in a run down gym with seats set up around the ring.  About 50% of the audience consists of 20-29 year-old gringos.  The feeling of the place is crazy, dirty and hectic.

If you know what WWF is, it's kind of the same thing, just in Spanish and a lot less realistic.  In case you don't know what the WWF is,  it's kind of like wrestling, except it's all staged and half the time, all they do is trash talk and talk about fighting...  Anyway, Cholita Wrestling is pretty much the same thing, just super super super entertaining and exciting.

The "show" started with "Angela de la Florista" vs. "El Mercenario."  The commentators would introduce each fighter as s/he came in.  They would do some trash talking and then the match would begin.  Angela, the hero, and El Mercenario, the villain would start off equally.  Then the referee would side with the bad guy and start kicking Angela.  After they tossed each other around in the ring, they would take people out of the audience to help with the match.  Angela took two guys and made them take off their shirts.  They then proceeded to beat up El Mercenario.  While Angela ran away to the other side of the ring, El Mercenario grabbed a chair and threatened the two audience members with it.  While this was happening, Angela made a dash back to the other side and poured some liquid on his pant leg and threw a match.  It went up in flames.  This caused El Mercenario to run from the ring screaming.  In other words, Angela de la Florista won.  In about ten minutes,  El Mercenario returned and gave a speech about how he would beat her up next week.  And with that, the next match began.  

Cusco

Today marks the beginning of our second week in Cusco.  So far, I think we all like it.  Our house is two blocks away from the main street, so there’s never any short of cars honking, people yelling, and dogs barking.  Every day, when we go outside on our way to Spanish school, we line up on the extremely narrow sidewalk and try not to get hit by the side view mirrors of the many passing vans and the occasional bus.  When we return at the end of the day, we line up again, until Dad unlocks the two doors leading into our house.  Our house is about five long blocks from the Plaza de Armas, the main square in Cusco.  From there, you can go to the many restaurants, including KFC and Starbucks, my favorites, and admire the view of the surrounding mountains.  Sadly, I haven’t been to either one of those restaurants.  Instead, we are going to all these Peruvian places. 

Even though Cusco is very pleasant, there are some gross things about it.  Many stray dogs live in the city of Cusco.  Some are just scraping by.  One day, when my mom and I were walking home from school, a dog stopped right in front of our house and took a huge dump.  It was so gross.   Something even grosser happened on our way back from school in a taxi.  I didn’t see the sight for myself and I’m glad I didn’t.  From what I heard, someone was crapping right in the middle of the road.  :P

Lima vs New York

Today is our third day in Peru.  We are in Lima and just getting settled.  Lima is very different from New York City.  For one, it’s in the middle of a desert.  So there is never any rain and it's very hot and dry all day.  Another difference is that there are ruins in the middle of the city.  One minute you will be walking by skyscrapers, and the next, by old pyramids being excavated.  We went to visit one of these ruins on our first full day in Lima.  We arrived just as the tour was starting.  Our guide showed us all around the excavated part of the pyramid.  He also showed us all the crops and animals the people who lived there used and ate.  We learned that they sacrificed children to the gods and it was a great honor to be sacrificed. They were called the Lima people, and they settled there ten thousand years ago, before the Incas.

Pocoyo dancing Gangnam Style in Lima's Chinatown

New York City and Lima are also built differently.  For one, Lima has lots and lots more casinos than NYC.  If you take a taxi ride around the main streets, you’ll see a casino about every three blocks.  I've actually never seen a casino in New York City.  Another difference is that there is much more graffiti in Lima.  I know you might be thinking, “but New York has so much graffiti!”  Well, so does Lima.  And the graffiti here is all murals so it’s much nicer to look at.  Last, Lima is poorer than New York.  About one million people do not have running water because they live in slums.  

Multi Sports on The Fu

The river is flowing fast and splashing through the bottom of our boat.  Jaime, our guide, is yelling commands and we are all trying to paddle and not fall out into the cold rapids of the Futaleufú.  During our ten-day trip to the Mt. Everest of rivers in Chile, we did a number of activities, including: rafting (of course), rappelling, hiking, zip lining and traversing (on a Tyrolean). 

THE Tyrolean

Before our long hike up the mountain and into the tree house camp, we had to cross the river.  The only way to do that was to ride a tyrolean.  A tyrolean is basically a way of pulling yourself on a horizontal wire and hanging underneath it. Tyroleans are usually used for crossing cliffs and such.  This one was over a intimidating class-six rapid and freezing cold water.  I was the first one to go.  I was pretty freaked out but once I got all strapped into my harness, I relaxed.  It seemed pretty secure and there was no way I was going to fall.  When I started out over the cliff I thought, “Oh this is not too bad.”  But when I reached the middle, my guide yelled to me, “LET GO!” so I assumed that my hands were going to fall or something.  I thought I would just hang there and maybe rest my hands.  But he had a different plan.  I bounced so high on the cable I didn’t even notice it at first.  It felt like a strong wind was bouncing me on a trampoline.  I only realized it was my guide bouncing it after I got to the other side.  I felt alive!

THE Zipline

After our big hike coming down from the tree house camp, we quickly found out that the only way to get back to the other side of the Futaleufú was to zip line into the freezing cold water and swim.  The zipline was about 30 feet above the water at its highest point, and about 15 feet at its lowest.  It was a steep slope downward into the clear blue water of the Futaleufú.  At the other end of the riverbank, there was a raft, a guide and a photographer.  At first, it didn’t seem too bad.  We walked down a couple of meters to get to the starting place for the zip-line. From down there, things started getting a bit more intimidating.  We had to hang by our hands so I was worried about the timing of letting go.  But once our guide explained that he was going to shout, “jump,” I was fine.  When I started running to build up speed, I thought to myself, “this is actually fun!”  My next thought was, “hmm this is kind of high….” Right when our guide shouted, “JUMP,” I dropped.  My first thought when I hit the water was, “HOLY CRAP THIS IS FREEEEZING.”  And it was.  I couldn’t get out of there fast enough.  

The Van

Getting around in Chile has been very different than Ecuador.  In Ecuador, we always had a driver coming to pick us up, and drop us off at different hotels.  In Chile, on the other hand, it has been our family along with Grandma and Grandpa in a 12-person van, driving between hotels.  Altogether, the experience hasn’t been all that bad, aside from some carsickness and cramps.  

We got the car when it was brand new.  Now, at the end of our trip, it looks like a big trash can inside. We always buy some snacks for the long car rides.  After the snacks are gone, we leave all the wrappers and garbage in the seat pockets, which, from there, make their way onto the floor.  During our long rides, (which usually vary from between 3 to 5 hours) we don’t usually interact much.  The grownups just relax, look for directions or listen an audio book about Tina Fey, while I listen to music, watch movies, play a game in my phone or read and Ruby just listens to an audiobook by herself.  These rides are not the most fun thing in the world, but they are alright if you have a phone. :D

The Galapagos

Our Galapagos trip was a real highlight.  We went snorkeling and hiking almost every day.  But the most marvelous thing about the Galapagos was seeing all the animals.  We saw everything from penguins to giant tortoises, all in their natural habitats. 

We were on a boat called the Santa Cruz with about 80 passengers.  There were two other groups of five or six people in our guided tour and we did all our activities together.  

The first day, after we got settled on the boat, we went through a bunch of safety instructions, so it wasn’t that much fun.  After that, we disembarked on North Seymour Island.  This island was probably the most interesting of the Galapagos because it had almost every animal on it.  We saw blue-footed boobies, frigates, and best of all, lots and lots of sea lions!  Sea lions never get boring to watch because they are always playing.  Even in their sleep, they move around.  We went for a short hike and took a lot of pictures.

The following day, we woke up and went to Isabela Island.  This was our first time snorkeling on the trip.  Before we jumped in the water, our guide, Lola, showed us lots of different animals from the dingy.  We saw mostly sea lions.  The sea lions were just hanging around on the rocks and occasionally jumping into the dark ocean. In the afternoon, we went to Fernandina and saw the Iguana City.  Iguana City is just a bunch of marine iguanas lazing around on the rocks, except there are about 300 of them.

The third day, we went to Isabela and went snorkeling again.  In the afternoon we went on a hike to Darwin Lake and saw a huge crater filled with brackish water.  We also went snorkeling again in the afternoon, this time from the beach.  It was very different because we were in shallower water.  We saw lots of sea turtles and puffer fish.   

On Saturday, we spent the whole day off of the boat and on dry land.  In the morning we went to Santa Cruz Island and saw giant tortoises in the Charles Darwin Research Center.  The giant tortoises were all the name says.  They looked like really really big turtles with leathery skin.  They can live up to 150 years.  In the afternoon we had two choices.  You could either go to look for more tortoises out in the wild, or go to a beach and kayak.  We chose to go kayaking.  The walk out there and back was about one and a half hours and we only got to kayak for about 30 minutes.  It wasn’t worth it.  The beach, on the other hand, was exquisite.  It was calm, sandy and not too crowded.  There were marine iguanas lounging around in the shade of the mangrove trees.  I still wish I were smart enough to go to the tortoises. xD

The next day was our last day of activities.  In the morning, we went to Post Office Bay on Floreana Island.  This was where whalers used to leave letters for each other to be delivered by hand to their families.  Now, people that come to the Galapagos leave letters here to be hand delivered to their destinations.  We took some postcards addressed to New York City, which we will deliver by hand in six months!  In the afternoon, everyone who wanted to could jump off the side of the boat.  It was about four meters high and the ocean was about fifty feet deep.  I was the first one to jump off the side.  It was scary at first but I got used to it after I jumped 4 more times.  :D 

The next day was our last on the boat.  We all watched a ten minute long slide show of our whole trip on the boat.  Then, we left and got to the airport.  Next, we took a bus back to Santa Cruz, which is where we spent three more days before leaving the Galapagos.  I wish to one day go back to the Galapagos and become a Galapagueño. 

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My favorite animal that we saw on our trip to the Galapagos was probably the sea turtle.   Some of them were very big and some were small.  When we saw them while snorkeling, they would just float around and eat seaweed.  It seemed like a relaxing life.  But, being a green sea turtle is a hard life.  Since they are reptiles, they don’t know their parents when they are born.  All they do is wake up, and run into the water.  They also have lots of predators including the Galapagos Falcon, sharks and tuna fish.  Only 1 in 1,000 turtles reaches the age of sexual maturity.  The rest all die from their many predators.  Sometimes fish follow them around to be shielded from the strong current and feed on moss on the sea turtles’ shells. 

This is a Green Sea Turtle