The rest of the world

“Yesterday is history,
Tomorrow is mystery,
Today is a gift,
This is why it is called
PRESENT”

-The Kung Fu Panda-

It is 5:30 in the morning and outside the rooster are given their daily “chicchirichi” opera (if you were earing with an English ear, that this would be “kukurudoooluu” or something like that…). I am NOT going to miss this.
But I am going to miss all the rest. The music in the aiga buses, the blue of the coral waters, the bright colors of sunrises and sunsets, my neighbors singing on Sundays, the palagi e-mails, my office mate, my castle, wearing flip flop everyday…. This and more, I am going to miss….

I am getting ready to leave the island.

The decision was a bit immediate, at the same time well planned. It was not worth for me to stay here any longer if I would not have a possibility to grow professionally, and it seemed like all the new agency policies were made against my own interested. I am going to miss them, but it is their loss! I got the rest of the world!!!

Take Plan A out of the list, plan B, C, D and E are still quite valid!

I am leaving late February. The plan so far is quite exciting:

• 3 days paragliding on the big island of Hawai’I (I had to do it, I need to go back on the wing!)
• 3 weeks in Alaska backpacking, helping out a friend running the Iditarod, snowboarding, exploring, maybe paragliding more?
• 4 days in San Francisco paragliding (well, if James Bond is there I may spend a couple of days with him as well…;-) )
• 1 week in Las Vegas for a conference and for some backpacking in the desert
• ???? so far my ticket ends in San Francisco…

I will have to come back on island eventually to finish collecting my data, sort my staff, and hike to the top of Mt. Silisili in Savai’I in Western Samoa and do a head stand there with Lisa, which is still on my “to do” list.

Italy is also waiting for me, it would be nice maybe to be there without pending tragedies. I could see my grandma and family, paraglide some more, cross the Alps east to west (any taker?). I am due for a visit with friends in Spain. Morocco and Egypt… I may as well go there for a while, since I will be on that side of the globe…

It is so exciting, it is all about me. It is sad, this place has been my home for 3 years now.
Stay tuned, because my blog is soon going to be “My life on the globe, sidetracked by few trips to American Samoa...”

...There is light outside now… I need to get ready for a day out on a boat on the north shore… can’t complain, can’t complain… ;-)

Sharks or Barracudas?

(sorry, no pictures.... my underwater camera apparently drowned...)

Would you rather face a shark or a barracuda? I asked myself this question yesterday while snorkeling at airport beach. But to go in order, let’s go back in time to about a week ago, at the hospital.

Me: “Hi, I am looking for doctor B., is she here?”
Nurse: “yes, she is the one in that office”. I walked to the office and waited at the door.
Me: “Doct. B.? Hi, I am Barbara, I was wondering how are you enjoying our beautiful island” (I knew she arrived few weeks ago).
Dott. B: “Hum, yes, it is wonderful”
Me (taking out of my bag an homemade jam, a box of chocolate and a card): “Well, here I have a special present for you to make your permanence sweeter”.
She took the package, looked at me perplex, looked behind my shoulders, either to see if I came with somebody else (“is this a kind of reality show?”) or maybe she was just planning an escape route in the case I turned out to be a crazy woman.
Me: “please, read the card, it is a surprise!” (all excited).
She read the card, looked even more carefully behind my shoulders and asked me if she is in a reality show. Then she hugged me and thanked me. I felt like a very good person… and then I asked her to give a look at my open feet (still bleeding from the glass cut).

Few weeks ago, while a was in Oregon, a friend told me that her aunt was coming to American Samoa to work at the hospital. Well, let’s surprise her! I think there is nothing in the world as receiving a hand-delivered unexpected package. Especially if you are in a small island in the South Pacific and it is homemade jam and chocolate from a relative living far away.

Yesterday I took Dott. B. snorkeling at airport beach. I like this place particularly because it has deep pools and is well protected from breaking waves. Lucy, Oscar and another visiting guy, Ben, joined us.
The snorkeling was great, until Lucy shouted “Shark!”. She was farther out than us. I got to Oscar as a iron nail to a magnet.
Me: ”Did she say ‘shark’?”
Oscar: “Yes”
Me: “Did she say what kind?”
Oscar: “No”
Me: “Did she say how big?”
Oscar: “No”
Me: “Do you want to get out?”
Oscar: “uhm… Yes”.

Very bravely, we stayed on our spot for a little bit to make sure Lucy was fine (and that the shark was not coming for us). “It must be just a friendly reef shark anyway… Lucy knows how to deal with it… yeah, yeah…” Then, all close up together we started swimming to the shore. Until a massive fat silver thing separated Dott. B and me from Oscar…

Me: “Oscar! Barracuda, Barracuda! She is coming for you!”

It was the biggest barracuda I ever saw in my life. My first thoughts were a mental scan of anything silver that I may be wearning… the ring! Covered! The camera? No, I left on the shore, it broke. The earring? Covered! A barracuda bite must not be pleasant, and they go for silver things. Considering the size of the barracuda… (why do they do silver underwater cameras? They should be orange or red or something like that! Don’t they know that there are barracudas out there?).
Barracudas just have that decided predatory look that does not make you think anything like “uh! What a cute fish!”. Plus, let’s face it, I was born and raised in Rome. The bigger alive fish I ever saw in my life were those huge fat red fishes that the Chinese restaurants keep in their aquarium. Barracuda and sharks are definitely still very exciting for me.

I though of the soft sensitive nose that sharks have. I imagined Lucy swimming with a soft cute teddy-bear shark. I missed her, I wanted to be with her…
Sharks or barracudas? If it has to be, sharks please…

Vets in Neverland

Time is flying! … and I am digging it! Stay tuned, because there is air of big changes!

Last week I had the greatest pleasure to host 3 vets in my house. As I mentioned before in my blog, from a western point of view, we have a stray dog problem on this island. From a western point of view, I call my cats “the lucky winners of the pet lottery” but, from a local point of view, they are “my pests control and security system”.

There are many stray dogs around that sometime makes walking challenging, unless you learn to walk with a golf club and few stones in your pocket (not to mention the challenges of planes landing...)

The Vets, like “vets without borders” came here to evaluate the island situation before their return toward the end of this year .With others, they are my heroes, and I was delighted hosting them for few nights.

“I know you!” Byron and I said uni-sound as we were introduced to each other. Byron worked here with another group of vets a couple of years ago; it was great to see people coming back to the rock. And great to have vets looking at my cats and dogs (I definitely learned a lot from them, including that Silvyax is not a permanently pregnant female as we though, but a big fat male... that kind of shocked me as I would have to change her, err, his name to Silvio, which would make me think to much about Berlusconi... not good. Sea proposed Sylvan instead).

(Emma and I after Nala's operation, enjoying her deep sleep to clean her very well...)

On Wednesday they left to check out Western Samoa as well, and I got another full load of guests with Tom and Sea (and later on Tylor as well). Tom (my right) and Sea (your right) always bring positive changes in my life, another exciting story soon to be told…

On Saturday, Tom, Sea and I (after killing ourselves with paragliding video… yes, yes… it is time for me to get back on the air…) went to the beach to soak a little bit, and escape the heat of this warm summer. A killer glass on the coral reef was waiting for me, to prey on my foot. Soon after, the killer glass also got Tom’s finger. Horrified with blood pouring out of our bodies, we decided we needed some medical attention. The idea of long hours waiting in the hospital ER made us tremble… but, ehi! “The Vets and fully functional today!”. I phoned to the clinic to ask if they had time to see us “we have 2 cuts”. Turns out they understood we have “2 cats”. I insist I do not speak with an accent, other people that listen with an accent…Anyway, we made it patient number 34 and 35 of the day, the last ones after 33 between dogs and cats visited, spared and neutered… Thanks Byron, Larry and Emma!!!("Cut, cut! no cat!".
"DOA" on the chair stands for "Department of Agriculture" and not for "Dead On Arrival" as most people may think...)

Useful links:

• http://www.samoanewsonline.com (Article about this visit on the local newspaper)
  
• http://www.ashumanesociety.org/ (American Samoa Humane Society)
  
• http://www.animalbalance.net/ (Emma is with them, they are organizing the next group down)
  
• http://www.veterinaryventures.com/ (the group that was on island 2 years ago. Byron with them)
• http://www.veterinaryventures.com/images/VetVentures_AmSam.mov (I slide show from 2 years ago)
  

Serendipity

Serendipity: “the gift of making fortunate discoveries by accident”.

My life is truly filled with serendipity, but what I am really a master in is “passive serendipity”. People or events discover me just when I need them. I call it “my good star”, and I have faith in it.

This week has been a perfect example of serendipity:

• My dog, Nala, was bitten and had a big cut on her leg: I had 3 veterinary sleeping in my house (the table is transformed into vet clinics, 3 stitches and 1 glass of wine);
• I am having a bad time at work: 2 angles (Sea and Tom) that I love so much came down with Thursday flight and moved in with me to give me support and good advices;
• I had a stressful week and I am low in chocolate: another friend write me an e-mail that is coming down to Pago on Sunday and he is bringing chocolate and good Latin music for me.
• The last week of February is going to be a big confrontational week and will prematurely set the direction of my life: SnowDave chose this week to come down from Alaska and visit me!
• I step on a very sharp glass and deeply cut my foot (and I do not want to go to the hospital and loose 4 hours to have it look at): ehi! The vets are in town! I get a full visit and medicine from them in 10 minutes.

How do I do it, I do not know; maybe it is just a positive way to look at life that makes me believe that things and people will work out in the best of the way. I won’t try to scientifically explain it, I just digging it!

plan D.... & E

Last week, I though I had my next year well figure it out (for the first time in my life I had a plan!). There were 3 possible outcomes, depending on how other people stars would align with mine (I will announce the lucky winner at the end of march, when I am back from the Idiratod in Alaska):

• Plan A: go back to school through EPA. In this case, I would start taking classes on-line while finishing collecting data, and move to Oregon next year at the end of my contract;
• Plan B: go back to school without EPA. In this case I will have to move to Oregon in fall to get a T.A. or G.R.A. to pay my tuition fees;
• Plan C: do not go back to school, quit my job, and travel around the world for a year or so...
  

Then, 2 days ago, I received 3 e-mails, one from Spain, one from the States, one from Japan, all about the same job position. Effectively, the job seems perfect for me. So, I decided to add a Plan D:

• Plan D: be a caretaker of the islands of the Great Barrier.

I would suggest you to apply as well! You can read everything about it at: www.islandreefjob.com
That said, if I make it to the top 50, you will have to vote for me! ;-)
And, why not, let me add plan E, just in case:

• Plan E: you never know!!!

my new roommate

By the way, I got a new roommate Kayla… As you can probably sense, she is fanatical about jigsaw puzzles...

I still have one guest room open and the greenish gecko lodge is still full operational…booked full this month!

craving for adventures

I am craving for adventures; I am craving for new experiences. I am missing that “controlled” adrenaline boosts that make you feel so… present, existing?
The bus in front of me this morning told me not to worry, be happy. I won’t worry, I am feeling positive.

When in Oregon, destiny put me in front of a book called “Hell or high water”, about a whitewaterkayaking expedition on the Tsangpo river in Tibet. It captivated me. Inspired me. I honestly still believe the paddlers are crazy, risking their lives for…what?
But maybe I know what is “what” is. Or more correctly, maybe I know of that “what” feels. I can relate to them.
I never did anything that extreme, or at least not intentionally (I could claim a record flying double on the Dolomites… I was so tense that I could feel –or imagine- even my ears moving to change the body weight distributed on the wing).
But I can still remember my first take off on the Andes in Venezuela. I was 21. Twenty-one ( with 3 years of hard core flying experience). What do I do if I get a daughter like me????

(I am the pink wing in the middle)

What happened to that little girl traveling with her glider by herself, exploring new places or testing new launching places? If life wouldn’t have hit me so hard, would I have become at age 30 like one of those extreme paddlers in the book? How did I become a woman with a stable job and 3 cats? Is it too late to go back?

(my backpack -my glider- and I, hitchhiking to the top of the mountain. I did all the trip sitting on the roof of the van....)

(Turns out that launching at sunset is not a good idea. Especially if you do not know the landing place that well, and if you end up flying on top of a car driving down the mountain screaming to please stop and wait for me. Then I asked them to drive me to a pub in the first town on the way...)

I just watched a documentary ("Encounters at the end of the world") about people in Antarctica. I always dreamed to go there. I was so close to go, got my position on an scientific boat, then my dad and my brother announced their visit in the States. It was soon after my mom passed away, and this would be our first (and last) traveling trip together since. I could not say no to them. And Now I am so glad I did not.

Antarctica is apparently filled with dreamers like I used to be. There are bus drivers and blue-blooded plumbers. In summer, that said. In winter, once the plane stop flying, there is only a handful of scientists and members of the 300 degree club. Still, the Lonely Planet make a travel guide of Antarctica. I wonder if it is bigger than the guide they made for the Samoas. The base of McBurdo remind me of this island. People dreaming of the far south there, people dreaming of a tropical island here. In one of the scene of the documentary, the author was interviewing a geologist. I was surprise to see, behind the scientist on his right, an old creamy phone. I would imagine all new technology down there, rather than old 80’s surplus staff. Then I looked closely at the phone… god, it looked familiar… way too familiar… I looked at my right… ladies and gentlemen, I just discovered that Antarctica and American Samoa buy their phones from the same source (when you get the line, the local phone company informs you that you need to buy a special instrument or your line won’t work… it turns out they are talking about this phone…)!!! Check this out (can you see the phone in the documentary?)

It must be a sign...

Post Scriptum!!!!!
I just came up with a new telephone hypothesis!
A while ago, a woman here was waiting and waiting and waiting for the beds she shipped for her kids to arrive. Finally she went to the post office trying the track the parcel... after looking and looking for it, the post office tracked it down: by mistake, the beds ended up in Antarctica!
So, my new hypothesis is that the phones were indeed meant to be shipped here in American Samoa but, by mistake they were sent to Antarctica (probably together with my friend's beds). The scientists though it was cool to have something meant to be in the warm tropical south Pacific, and never returned them...
This last hypothesis seems more probably to me, as i can not possible think of somebody actually buying such a phone of his own will. Especially if you are going to Antarctica. You would probably look for some sort of North Face or Columbia style phone... If you own one, you probably either were tricked into it, or you received it for free and decided, why not, to keep it.