Transitions - via the Hotel Imperial

First Breakfast not at the DFAC.

Not Kabul. 

After six weeks in Kabul, I needed a fabulous breakfast. This is what I got - at the incredible Imperial Hotel in Connaught Place.   The civility of this hotel after the chaos of Kabul was a bit jarring, but I always have needed to ease myself from one reality to another in order to manage all the change I face.

Whenever I leave a country, I need to stop somewhere else on the way, even for just a night, so I can process.  I don't think the mind was meant to switch country, time zone, language and job all in the same time - and with my job, sometimes that happens overnight.  So I have found ways over the years to make those transitions easier. 

When I left Florida to start working in Washington, D.C. at the State Department in 2001, I took the train instead of flying.  I was leaving behind my life in Gainesville, a life I loved, and a person I was crazy about. I couldn't stand the idea of just showing up in D.C. for a new job without taking a little time to ease out of Florida and into the next step.  So I took the overnight Amtrak from Florida to Virginia. It gave me 20 hours to slowly move away from what I knew into what was next.

Good place to think about what comes next.

I did the same thing when I moved from Bolivia to India in 2003. I went to Gainesville to touch base with one of my favorite places in the world (Gainesville always makes me feel more like my best self).  Then I took the train from there to start training in D.C. and think about Bolivia and what was coming next.   

 So coming out of Kabul, I like to go through India.  When I leave Buenos Aires, I like to stop in Florida and see my family. When I go back to DC, I stop in Gainesville.  I have all these places I am attached to now for various reasons, and I use them as anchors, and points along the way to help me make these crazy transitions.  And there are people who help too, people who knew me in Kabul, or India, or Gainesville, or Ft. Lauderdale, or maybe more during an important phase of my life that bridged many places.  But all of these things keep me connected.  It also makes me long for those places and people, but I focus on the connections.  Always focus on the connection.

Teatro Colon - A Reason to Visit

Gorgeous.

I had a fantastic tour of Teatro Colon.  We saw the incredible restoration as well as checking out the rehearsal room of some of the dancers.  It is an incredible building, one of the best known theaters in the world. Built in 1908, Teatro Colon had the best acoustics in the world up until the 1940s.   Prior to the 1940s.  Many of the world's best singers, dancers, and classical musicians in the world have performed here. In my nine months I have seen opera (The Merry Widow), the National Symphony Orchestra from DC (visiting from Washington on tour) and ballet (Carmen).  I hope to see many more because it is really one of the best venues in the world - and it is a serious reason to visit.

No detail left untouched.

One of the windows inside the theater.

The box seats at Teatro Colon.  National Symphony Orchestra is warming up on stage. 

Teatro Colon dance company rehearsing for an upcoming show.

Officially Worn Out of Traveling for a While

I cleaned out my wallet after returning to Buenos Aires from Kabul via India and Germany.   What I found was money from SIX different countries: 

• United Arab Emirates Dirhams
• U.S. dollars
• Euros
• Indian Rupees
• Argentine Pesos
• Afghan Afghanis
• One lone Rwandan Franc

I am ready to live with just one currency.  Please.  At least for a few months.

An Important Lesson - We Have No Control.

Before Friday I had a lovely dining room. It had a ceiling, a carpet, nice furniture, and a little bit of sun shining in through the windows.  I enjoyed sitting there, having dinner parties and dumping my stuff on the table everyday after work.

But around 5 am I heard a huge noise.  My first thought was someone had kicked my door in so I took a moment to freak out.  But then I went out to my living room to check out what happened.  This is what I found.  I just stared.  I would pay a million bucks for a video of my face at that moment.  Then I started to laugh.  Not the reaction I expected, but I have learned that when it truly is impossible to do anything, you might as well grin and bear it.

Nothing caused this.  No construction upstairs, no water damage, no earthquake, nothing. It broke the table, the chairs, put multiple holes in the wood floor and covered everything I have in a thick layer of dust.  And it just happened without any known explanation.  Kind of the way things happen in the world every single day.  
I thought to myself, well, the universe definitely has something to teach me.  Your life can be going along and then suddenly, in an instant, the sky can fall. I actually felt lucky that this lesson came in the form of a ruined dining room instead of a health scare or death of someone I love. Maybe it could have been a little less dramatic, but hey, sometimes I need to be hit over the head.  And thankfully, I wasn't under this when it fell because it probably would have seriously hurt me. 

I have been trying to make my time in Buenos Aires work for me. I had grand plans of having a great adventure here, and instead have found myself working hard just to adjust to a new country, job and lifestyle. I feel like the one thing that helped was feeling settled in my house - and waking up to the sunrise, coffee on my deck, reading on my sofa.  This is how I do the moving - I make the place I am my home.  But maybe there are other ways to feel at peace where you are.

And so, in order to teach me a lesson, the ceiling fell.  So what am I learning?   Adaptability, patience, flexibility, tolerance...and that we have NO CONTROL.




 

Why I can't go to India

This is what happens when I go to India - landing at 6 pm on September 7 and departing at 1 pm on September 8.  Somehow all of these amazing quilts, comfortable sets of pajamas, nice scarves, gorgeous tunic tops, kaftans, and a few dresses...all end up in my suitcase.

But I do L-O-V-E India. 

I also probably should admit I have a problem.  

Killing time in Kabul

I am back in Buenos Aires and killing time in my apartment, watching a lot of Big Bang Theory and enjoying having a kitchen full of my favorite food.  But I am missing all of the awesome hanging out I was able to do with the great people in Kabul.  From ordering Indian, Thai or Lebanese food, and then eating it at the DFAC (Dining Facility) by the pool with white tablecloths, or cooking outside of my hooch with my volleyball teammates Travis and Mariano, meals were the center of socializing.  Because I was in a hooch, I didn't want to be at home so I would leave the house at 6 am, go work out, stop home for a quick shower, and then be out all day, working, going to whatever activity the CLO organized, hanging out during meals, or just talking at the Firepit or beach side. 

I loved all the time we had to hang out, to talk and just ask silly questions and get to know each other.  I kept commenting that I really appreciated the time to just talk to people - we don't do that enough in the "real world."  And as you can imagine, there is so much going on in Kabul, professionally, personally, and all sorts of ways, that there is always plenty to talk about.  I guess after a few months it might get old but for six weeks it was fun.

We also organized silly activities, things you don't do outside of Kabul but there, you fill time with whatever you have on hand.  We had a big pirate themed happy hour (with hats, eye patches, and lots of Pirates booty for treats).  The whole team came out and had a great time.  Of course, the work never stops so I ended up on the blackberry much of the night, but at least I wasn't in my hooch or the office.

Back in Kabul

So things come around. I departed Afghanistan September 17, 2011 and I arrived in Argentina on November 29 after taking time to adjust to life outside of Kabul.  Then in July 2012 I was asked to come back to Kabul for a six week stint as the spokesperson again.  My boss was kind enough to support this, recognizing I needed the chance to see how it was a year later, and knowing that I loved the work I did in Kabul.  She made it happen with my front office (the Ambassador and Deputy Chief of Mission) and so I am now here in Kabul.

A lot of things are different, but, surprisingly, many things are the same.  Different?  I am now living in a hooch.  Yeah, don't love this.  There is always a weird smell and some sort of dampness I can't escape. Despite the fact that Kabul is basically highish desert, I feel like I am inside a Florida gym when I am in the hooch.  That said though, I am very thankful to have my own room and not have to share.
Same? The DFAC food.  The construction.  Helicopters overhead all day long.  Playing volleyball on my day off. And a lot of people are still here.  My first two weeks were spent saying hello to old friends.  I managed to overlap with a lot of people that arrived in my last two months so it was fun to catch up and share stories.  I was at the Duck and Cover, or sitting at the firepit or the beach, talking until pretty late.

Typical Kabul Night

The work is similar but it is a whole new team so I also spent my early days aggressively getting to know the new personalities. As the spokesperson, you have to be on good terms with every section, as well as the military and the other embassies, in order to get all the information you need.

The new team is great, especially the Deputy (who is a friend from Buenos Aires) and I think they are going to have a good year.  I am just reaching the halfway point of my TDY and am just beginning to think through the experience.  It has given me perspective on where we are going and what we did in the past two years. On a personal level, I also just feel really lucky to be back here, to see my Afghan friends, revisit the country, help contribute for a bit.  That is the best part. I plan to compare to my experience last year that I blogged about here:  http://www.weebleskabulbuttheydontfalldown.blogspot.com/

Consumables!

One of my favorite things of the overseas tour (of which I have had four and a half) is the mid-tour consumables shipment.  You arrived at post, new place - exciting! Then your 250 pound UAB (unaccompanied air baggage) arrives - yeah!  Then your HHE (Household Effects) come and you get to move in, make it fit, decorate, and generally make it a home - fun!  If you were smart, you put some of the food you love in your packout. For me, that includes Lucky Charms, Gobstoppers, Craisins, and whatever Trader Joes had on sale.  But 6 months in you realize that there are things you just can't get in your country or things that are too expensive to buy in bulk.  For Argentina it is the following:

• Cadbury Milk Chocolate (from the United States, not made overseas)
• peanut butter
• maple syrup
• spices of all kinds
• good raisins
• marshmallows
• graham crackers
• Fudgie Grahams
• brown sugar
• tortilla chips
• Kashi cereal
• Lucky Charms
• tennis balls

So thanks to my brother and Bonnie, I got to shop like crazy for a few days and fill their garage with lots of fun things (also was lots of stuff I didn't need but couldn't pass it up).   And man, was that a fun few days.  And now, I am waiting for it to arrive so I get the fun of unpacking!

Something you should do every Sunday - Postsecret

Someone sent THIS to Postsecret.com last Sunday.  I start every Sunday by reading the postcards. I imagine anyone who reads blogs probably is already aware of Post Secret, but if not, in a nutshell, people are invited to anonymously submit a postcard with a secret they have never shared - which are then posted in batches each Sunday.  This has been going on since 2004 and it has blossomed into something incredible.  Some of the secrets are funny, some will scare you straight, and sometimes you feel like you could have sent the secret yourself (surprisingly often).

So this particular secret could have been written by any number of my friends in the Foreign Service or those I have met while traveling overseas. All of these people would be classified as successful, generally happy people, with an ache that surfaces once in a while.

It is a vulnerable thing to admit that this kind of lifestyle can be very isolating and lonely.  You have new people around you whenever you land in the next country and support from your community if you are lucky, but inevitably you are starting over.  You have to build a new set of friends, a new identity, seek out people who share your interests and hobbies, fill your time for the months it takes to feel comfortable opening up to new people.  And it is all happening while the life you know back home, if you are lucky enough to be home long enough in one place to keep those connections, goes on.  And you know it goes on, without you there. 

Yes your life is happening in glamorous or exotic places, but often in another language and another culture with its own norms and rules, with the challenges that come from having to shop for groceries in a foreign language, order unfamiliar food in a restaurant, navigate streets and find your way to the doctor or a movie, and still feel like yourself amongst all things foreign.

And of course, besides the obvious benefits to this lifestyle - one thing it has given me is I think over time I have become a more full version of myself.  For me, since I carry my interests and passions with me, and don't have them collect like layers of paint on a wall, I am not defined by all the people who know how I have "always been."  I have had to spend time defining who I am so I can find those things that make me feel like me as soon as I arrive somewhere new.  That means I seek out a volleyball league, get involved in biking and hiking, take a class in something (that list ever evolves) and start cooking - a lot.  I also know that home is important to me, so I spend some of that early free time on making sure my new apartment, whether it is in India, Bolivia, or Argentina, feels like home.  Then I hope friends come to visit.  Because sharing this world with them helps me bridge that distance.

My wise friend always tells me the grass is greener and reminds me that our lives are great - and I know that. But they can also be hard and seeing someone else express that sentiment, well, it made it seem a little less so. 

Tomorrow, you might want to check out postsecret.com.