take-off and land (part two)

Yesterday at one o'clock in the morning, I ate dinner in a plane. I had my left arm in the air, holding the right corner of the seat in front of me, so that the two Argentine men in their 40's who occupied the seats between me and the aisle could have their elbow room. The one immediately to my left was doing the same for the guy next to him. Neither of them spoke hardly any English, but they knew I could mostly understand them, and they made completely sure that if I even thought about having to get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, I was to wake them immediately, or they would have to be angry with me. And every time the stewardess came by with drinks, instead of waiting for her to ask me what I wanted in English, (the majority of the workers from the Miami Airport and its flights were bilingual) they would ask her what she had and then turn to me and repeat the list, as if they were translating. I would tell them which I wanted, and they would ask for mine first, before ordering theirs. Once they even repeated my answer from the last time, assuming I wanted a refill. I didn't, but they were so sweet I could have kissed them. Both of them. I am not even exaggerating. (;
Yesterday at five o'clock in the morning, I was awake once again, after about three solid hours of sleep and lots of eye-closing and eye-opening and butt-shifting, and I was staring out the window into the inky black, broken only by the little bulb on the end of the plane's wing. So, so slowly, there began to be a little light on what looked like a forest. I realized after looking out the window on the other side of the plane that the sun was rising, and I was watching it seep across the tops of the clouds we were flying over. The plane was above the second layer of clouds, and the words kept marching through my mind, "It's 5am and I'm as far above the clouds as you are beneath them." Yes, I was composing the intro sentence for a blog post. That is how tired and bored I was. That is also how much the movies on the plane's TV sucked. So what I am telling you is that I watched the sun rise over Bolivia at 5am, traveling more than 800 kilometers per hour, at 39,000 feet. WHAT. Also it was -59 degrees Fahrenheit outside the plane. The display said so.

Sooooo I got off the plane and did all the boring customs things like pay 15 dollars extra for my $160 visa because I suppose I looked gullible, and the guy said they had a fee that wasn't on the sign for the processing of the papers. I am telling you, I did not believe him for a minute, and I was ill that he did it, but I wasn't sure how well round-house kicks to the face to government officials in South America at 7:49am would be received. If I had been sure, I can tell you this: I would be $15 richer right now and that man would not have a nose. He had really good hair, though, I have to give him that. (:

Sarah (the missionary lady) and Po, my roommate, met me at the airport, a mere hour and a half after I finally sat down on the sidewalk, imagining things like: "What if they forgot I was coming today? No, no way! I talked to them yesterday," and "I wonder if that bench will be comfortable tonight when I am sleeping on it," and "I could take one of these taxis, except I don't know where they live, I don't have any money, and I don't have a phone to call them with to say I'm coming to their house. Also even if I did have a phone, I don't know their number." At one point, a police man came up to me and started asking me questions, but he was talking so fast and his accent was so thick that I couldn't understand anything he said. Also I had tangerine jello and cream cheese on two crackers for breakfast (four hours ago at that point) and only three hours of sleep. (I am telling you, if that Argentine man had been a foot taller, I swear I would have leaned over in my seat and slept on his shoulder. I tried to scooch down in my seat but he was just too short.) So the policeman-who-I-didn't-know-was-a-policeman said, "My friend... English," and pointed into the building. I waited while he went to get his translator, and they asked me if there was any problem (because who sits on the sidewalk unless there's a problem?). I said I was just waiting for a friend to come get me, and they said, Okay, they just wanted to make sure. They smiled a whole bunch and then began walking away, at which point the older policeman-who-I-still-didn't-know-was-a-policeman told his very younger and very attractive translator to please inform me that they were Policia. Thennnn I understood all the questioning. Three hours into Paraguay and the Policia already think I'm an endangered youth. YES. (:
End of the story: Sarah and Po came and got me--everyone else they'd picked up from the airport hadn't come through the pearly gates until an hour and a half after their flight landed, so they figured the'd skip the wait (and presumably the 7:30 wake-up) and meet me when I would actually be available.
Then I moved in to my apartment, laid on the bed for about 25 minutes, walked 20 minutes to the Supermarcado HiperSeis (supermarket) because Po needed some groceries and wanted to show me around the store a little, had a piece of tarta (like a one-inch-thick pie, with literal pie crust, only with ground chicken and cheese and bell peppers in the middle) for lunch, slept three hours, and then got up and made dinner. The lights went out in the middle of dinner-making, so we worked by flashlight, and then we put the food in the microwave for storage and went to English classes. Po taught English to one student, Lo (the 2 year intern whose apartment we're staying in) taught a cooking class to about 8 kids between the ages of seven and twelve, and I joined a bible study with the Pastor J, of the Mi Esperanza church.
The home, dinner, Pinterest date with Po, and bed!
Thus ended Monday. (: