happy birthday, grandma

In other news, happy birthday to my Puo Puo (grandma on mom's side). She turned 90 last weekend and is one of my personal heroes. Puo lived through the brutal Japanese invasion of China and the violent Communist revolution that followed. She then rebuilt a life with my grandpa in Taiwan. Only two years ago, at age 88, she climbed to the top of Lu Mountain (LuShan) on foot. At the summit, a middle-aged man asked to take a photo with her because he had never seen a woman at her age scale a mountain before. She taught me my multiplication tables and how to spell in English (despite not knowing English herself). Here's the two of us on her bday. Love you, Puo!

the return

I miss the blog. But unless you want to hear me complain about how hard it is to learn Spanish (the easiest language taught at FSI?), I figured that I should just keep my mouth shut. But I'm ready to be positive again - Mom, can I come out of my room now?

So yes, we've been in Spanish for 18.5 weeks now and have a mere 5.5 to go. (How many months are women pregnant? 36? Wow. That is some perspective for sure.) The studies have been truly wonderful; I have learned things that I never anticipated like history lessons, how to prepare and deliver a presentation, we've studied the economy, political, judicial, health and school systems both in the US, Central and South America. Not only that but I've learned all, or nearly all, my weaknesses in English (and life?) that are magically carried over to the new language, highlighted magnificently under the painfully bright spotlight of adept professors and a keen-eyed-ever-watching wife. (I love you more!)

The move is drawing closer and closer as well. It's almost palpable at this point. It's drawing on time to start eating all the food reserves (my personal favorite), separating clothes, books and kitchen items to go to storage or post, and lots of good old-fashioned lists. I love lists. At any moment I have lists of books I want to read, exercise plans, songs I want to sing at karaoke, restaurants to try, store lists - you name it, I list it. Buuut, the lists to get ready to move abroad leave a little to be desired. When I see "prepare last will and testament" on a list I immediately put the list down and begin online shopping. Seems healthy and perfectly normal to me.

Anyway, I applied for a job at the Embassy in San Jose - cross your fingers for me! I'll detail more later if I'm so lucky as to nab it.

For now, I need to prepare my presentation for class this afternoon. I'm thinking something special and hardly political: Zombie Ants.

Former Secretary Albright: on being a woman and a diplomat

Like all nerds, I appreciate a good TED talk.   In this one, former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright "talks bluntly about politics and diplomacy, making the case that women's issues deserve a place at the center of foreign policy."    A girl after my own feminist heart. :)


When I graduated from Smith College in 2003, Secretary Albright was my Commencement speaker.   Que suerte!

CEVA in DC.

Aprovechando.

We CA girls met up with some of my best lady friends at Smith for some winter fun.

Sec. Clinton puts women's rights at the forefront

And yet another reason why I have the coolest boss ever.

The secretary of state is on a mission: putting women’s rights at the forefront of a rapidly emerging new world order.

In other news, Spanish is going super bien. Sigo disfrutando el idioma. I got a 2+ on my last two evaluations and am hoping and praying for that coveted 3 at the end of April, when Spanish training ends and ConGen begins. Eva is also continuing to enjoy her Spanish class. She, however, is trying to show me up by studying twice as hard as I am. That's what you get when you marry an overachiever, I guess. I'll stick with being a Type A- (ambitious, but a bit floja - lazy, for you non-Spanish speakers!).

In closing, I leave you with my favorite Spanish song of the week (err, month).

my new bff

This beautiful specimen belongs to another FSO who graciously asked me to look in on him from time to time. I'm pretty sure we will be together most of the day on most days.

walking numbers

After 5.5 weeks, I'm finally starting to wish I had something to do every day. Only 1.5 weeks left before I regret this statement.

Yesterday in an effort to busy myself, I walked to Georgetown and then just kept walking. 5 hours later I was home and had walked almost 8 miles. I finally walked past the White House, enjoyed some delicious Maine Cod, consumed the best local IPA yet (Northern Lights) and was nearly hit by several cars. The bartender at the restaurant told me that one could walk over any of the bridges that connect VA to DC no problem. This is partly true. Sure there is a place for pedestrians to walk over the bridge but what he failed to mention is that once you make it to the other side, said sidewalk will abruptly end. This led me to walk along the guardrail, end up stranded in the median and finally forced me to cross 5 lanes of speeding, insane DC area traffic. It was still a beautiful, rainy day.

Views from the Roosevelt Bridge.

I came from that median.

Walked by the Iwo Jima Marine Memorial.

That's my boss, ya'll.

"Here at the State Department, I am grateful every day for the work of our LGBT employees who are serving the United States as Foreign Service Officers and Civil Servants here and around the world. It wasn't long ago that these men and women would not have been able to serve openly, but today they can because it has gotten better. And it will get better for you." - HRC.

Secretary Clinton, you are a true ally to our community.  I'm proud to work for you and for our country.

UPDATE: I had the privilege of attending an interview with Secretary Clinton the following day, October 20, 2010, and she wore purple in honor of Spirit Day. I'm feelin the love.

do you know the way...

TO SAN JOSE?!

That's right, folks. Cyn and I pooled our collective good karma and landed the tropical paradise of: the Switzerland of Central America; the Hawaii of Latin America surfing; the country with NO MILITARY for the last 62 years known as COSTA-FREAKIN-RICA (Por favor tome ningún delito, Ticos).

No, that's true, we don't speak the Spanish. And yes, it's also true that Cynthia took 3 years of Spanish and still can't ask "where can we get some fish tacos for dinner?" And yes, it's also true that all I can say is "how do you want your eggs?", "bacon or sausage?", and, "is everything ok?" (Is it obvious I was a waitress in a prior career iteration?) Buuuuut none of that matters because we begin full-time Spanish training on November 1st for 6 months, at which time we will be presumably fluent. We depart around the end of June 2011 and couldn't possibly be more excited for our first post.

"But Eva, what will you do?" Hmmmm let me think...surfing, snorkeling, scuba diving, hiking, horseback riding, museums, salsa dancing, cooking classes, bird watching, other animal/amphibian/reptile/flying creature watching, hiking, rafting, reading, hosting myriads of guests (hopefully!), and maybe, MAYBE get a job.

You guessed right. It's better not to ask.

Flag day was, in a word, intense. Even the most solid of species was shaken to the core, taking deep breaths of calming oxygen to get through the ceremony. It was FUN too though to root for the other students and dream of inviting ourselves to visit them in their new homes. Even more fun was happy hour (with free food) followed by dancing like silly, crazy people at another bar.

¡Pura vida!

Flag Day:

Flag Day

It's official: CEVA is moving to San Jose, Costa Rica!

More to come from Eva.