........and shes off.

Well perhaps this isn’t the most pleasant way to start my trip, nor my blog but I simply have no other choice. After an early wake up and a very stressful check-in at Miami International, I arrive at my flight bound for Panama with all of my luggage and time to spare. I detoured to the bathroom where I was once again confronted with the fact that my oily skin is defenseless against my bodies production of estrogen and other deadly toxins. A few minutes later im walking down the aisles and bound for seat 24C where I see the top of a rounded face with familiar black rimmed glasses. This individual reminds me of my friend Xavier, whom I had plans with on Monday , but had sadly forgot to call in the midst of my packing chaos. As I nudge closer, loosing 1 of 2 hiking boots in the process, my puckered brow became an uncontrollable grin as I realized that IT WAS XAVIER…with two seats next to him to sprare. Qué raro! The people who were assigned those seats eventually came, but it was a wondrous couple of minutes. The airplane food came after round 1 of my nap..nothing that one wouldn’t expect of airplane food.We took off late and due to my 1:30 layover in Panama, I was nervous that I would miss my connecting flight..

Unfortunately, my chances of getting on that flight, from what I was told, were slim to none anyways. Apparently with connecting flights, they overbook more than usual because they expect that flights will not arrive on time and so forth. So now, I and about 7 other people, including an intense group of military men, have been bumped back to a flight that leaves at 8:30pm arriving in Santiago at 5:30am. I have no idea how to get in touch with cate and Amanda who, if all went according to plan, would have been waiting for me at my gate. I asked if the flight attendant could deliver a letter to the gringas that would be waiting at the gate, but no such service could be arranged. I did however get a $400 flight voucher (HELLO BRAZIL!!) and a city tour of panama which I politely declined. So that’s the start of my trip. I knew that cate and I were wingin’ it by not speaking before our flights and planning for this type of DISASTER but at this point, everything is out of my control. My only option is to find a wifi spot at the Santiago airport and hope cate and Amanda are just chillen there.

In other news, I got a new battery for my macbook and im lovin the energy retention.

In other other news, I forgot my Spanish/English dictionary. It might turn out to be a blessing because I’ll be forced to rely on my working vocabulary instead of searching for more complex words, as I did when I first started out in Guatemala. Glass half full thinking……..im all about it.

And lastly, im sorry for the trivial nature of this post.- I promise to make the following ones more cultural-learning based.