I swear I'm edumacated

Life isn't as fun if you can't laugh at yourself right? With this sentiment I'm going to share with you the reason why I never won nor ever will win a spelling bee contest. (note to self...spell check before publishing post) While writing an email to a buddy of mine today this sentenced somehow managed to slip right pass me. Though even if I had pushed the spell check button (magic I tell you), it probably wouldn't have been caught. And the sentence goes... "you sure you wanna bale on your date for lil' ol' us". Sheesh! Bless her heart for not rubbing that shit in my face...you know who you are. Immediately after reading her email response and seeing the correct word used (through my fits of giggles), I thought to myself, damn....I guess I'm gonna need to find myself a Mr. Big. All you Sex in the City fans out there...ya'll know exactly what I'm talkin' 'bout.

And yet again I'm watching Law and Order...

Addiction

Why oh why am I still addicted to Law and Order. It's a sickness...Last night was the second night in a row that I stayed up till 2am watching this habit forming show. Damn that Bravo channel!

Also, watch out for this girl...she's amazing. I'm also addicted to this song at the moment.

BREATHE ME (Sia)

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Welcome the Dog

Let's hope that the dog's tail is wagging happily this year. Happy New Year folks! Hong bao all around =P

Let Go
To "let go" does not mean to stop caring,
It means I can't do it for someone else.
To "let go" is not to cut myself off,
It is the realization I can't control another.
To "let go" is not to enable,
But to allow learning from natural consequences.
To "let go" is to admit powerlessness,
Which means the outcome is not in my hands.
To "let go" is not to try to change or blame another,
It is to make the most of myself.
To "let go" is not to care for,
But to care about.
To "let go" is not to fix,
But be supportive.
To "let go" is not to judge,
But to allow another to be a human being.
To "let go" is not to be in the middle arranging all the outcomes,
But to allow others to affect their destiny's.
To "let go" is not to be protective,
It is to permit another to face reality.
To "let go" is not to deny,
But to accept.
To "let go" is not to nag, scold, or argue,
But instead to search out my own shortcomings and correct them.
To "let go" is not to adjust everything to my desires,
But to take each day as it comes and cherish myself in it.
To "let go" is not to criticize and regulate,
But to become what I dream I can be.
To "let go" is not to regret the past,
But to grow and live for the future.
To "let go" is to fear less,
And love more.

- Sifu

Lil' asian pimp in training and his singin' sisters

Jinxed!

Damn! Nat, ever since you asked about the fog...it's been non-stop, and to make matters worse....it's rainin'. Oh well, it's good prep for the cold weather that I'm about to endure in Boston. Negative degrees....BBRRR! That's cold for us Californians. Two more weeks. It was great to see you again and meet Eric. Take care!

On another note, I think I'll be heading up to Palm Springs pretty soon for some warm sun...well, either that or a weekend camping trip to Joshua Tree. I miss hiking in the Costa Rican rainforest. Boo!

Last Week in Paradise

In reflection: my memory is horrible, and only getting worse by the minute...

So here is what I remember of my last week in CR as I'm trying to re-live the memories. We got up at the butt crack of dawn (5am) to catch a bus to Mal Pais. It was a looonngg ride...8 hrs. Which not only includes the bus ride, but a ferry that carries our bus across the penisula. The view of course, was amazing. Our final destination is a small (one main strip) beach town called Santa Teresa. The waves here are every surfer's wet dream, and the water is like crystal clear bath water. Our home here was called Point Break...haha, but no Keanu Reeves to be found...damn! Sandra and I were zonked out at 6pm that night, that's right you heard right, after that long bus ride, we were done. But we made sure to lather up in bug repellent cause the walls did not connect with the roof and left a considerable gap for all the mosquitoes to come in for a midnight snack. The next mornin' we were up early and refreshed from our 12 hrs of sleep ;). We had breakfast and then went straight to the beach for some sun, followed by a long dusty walk into town to rent an ATV. Using the ATV to get around was soooo much fun! It also allowed us to go into the neighboring towns of Mal Pais, and Cobano. It's so silly how you get whistled at just because you're two girls on one ATV. Silly boys...tricks are for kids. After doing two days of basically nothing (awesome), we took a tour...destination, Isla Tortuga. The tour included a 2 hour hike through the rainforest, where we got up close and personal (really personal...Sandra got peed on by one of the capuchin monkeys) with Howler and capuchin monkeys. We also got a glimpse of the endangered Macaw. The trek was quite an experience, especially the part through the muddy field, well at first we thought it was mud, but actually turned out to be a field of crap. Yep we counted about 6-9 different types of shit. The poor Auzzie girl with us did it barefoot (which by the way, is the best way to get worms) cause she didn't bring any shoes, just flipflops. The hike was through the forest and out towards the beach where we got on a boat for a ride out to Isla Tortuga for some sun, snorkeling, and good grilled mahi mahi. On the way back the guide, Emilio (who still by the way owes me a free tour, for guessing his ethnicity...friggen Dominicans ;)) passed us by Montezuma. This is where the hippies are known to congregate and where there is a large waterfall with a hugh waterpool to swim in. It was beautiful! Our last night here was relatively calm, especially since the power went out for about an hour. Imagine being in the middle of the rainforest/beach with absolutely no light...lemme tell ya, it was dark. After the power came back on the club around the corner from our hotel was goin' off (it was hip hop night), but Sonnie and I just weren't in the clubbin' mood. Next time we will definitely hit up La Lora Amarilla. Back to San Jose where we did some last minute souvenir shopping and then off to Atlanta for a one night lay over with my parents.

=)

I drink good coffee...every mornin',
comes from a place that's far away,
when I'm done I feel like..talkin',
without you here..there is less to say...

Super Aventuras!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Holy cowballs!!!! Lemme tell you the adventure took at turn for ridiculous and muy interesante from this point forward. First off, there was a misplaced passport, anxiety and rapid breathing from Sandra and I, a missed flight, and a resolution...thank god for I to the NG! After a short rest at home, we´re off to Volcan Arenal. Our hopes in seeing the actual volcano were slim, as it started to rain..Or more like downpour! (Being in the rain and wearing a tanktop I have to say has got to be one of my favorite things.) Since it was so cloudy and rainy we skipped the hike to the volcano and opted for the hot springs and a nice massage. After my nice relaxing message I tensed up immediately as the largest ant I´ve ever laid my eyes on bit me, and man did it hurt...little bastard. It was kinda scary at the same time cause the thing was disguised as a red and black spider...so in the mind of Khanthaly you see....bright red on any arthropod meant that I´m gonna bite you and my bite is poisonous so my foot swelled up and fell off due to all the toxic poison this spider sized ant was carrying in his bite. Despite all the work Sandra went through to try and suck the poison out of my foot....what a pal and the shot of anti-venom the doctors gave me....the foot still had to be amputated....Blink. Blink. Blink. Back to reality, it just hurt like a SOB for a coupla minutes, and I was fine. You know what, in hindsight I think that little episode was foreshadowing to what I had in store for me in the near future. =) Dinner followed, and an early not so restful night of non-sleep. Morning brought us to SkyTram. (Please if any of you decide to come to CR this is a must!!!!) The tram takes you to the highest point you can go, and you are dropped off on a high platform near the top of the Volcan to hear some instructions on how to sit in your harness, and slow down your speed, and if your lucky you´ll experience a 5.0 earthquake on the top of a Volcano while your at it. Geez! But being from California, the quake was nothing more than a little shake on the platform we were standing on, some 3000-4000ft above sea level. (Oh crap I hope Misty is okay at the house by her lonesome). The canopy tour I have to say is the closest I´ve ever been to Mother nature, God and the my teacher, Buddha all at once. We were soooo high up on the mountain that we were literally in the clouds, they call it the cloud forest. The first three runs we couldn´t see any rainforest just clouds and mist.



So as your sliding down the line you can´t see more than 10 feet in front of you, this definatly has to be what it feels like to fly! As we zipped lower in elevation the more visible the rainforest below us became, it´s such a trip to be soaring over the tops of the conopies of the Costa Rican rainforest.



Our guides Ronny and Weiner were extremely nice and very flirtacious with Sandra which made the experience so much more. You go girl! After the canopy tour it was a quick lunch and we hustled home to meet up with MISTY and her rays of light...she has finally arrived to join us in our adventures. Dinner at the Casa del Cerdo was asi asi, for me anyhow. My fish was very salty, that´s what I get for ordering fish at the pighouse.;). It was another early night to compensate for the early morning to follow. We picked up our Terro at Europecar and started the ride to Manuel Antonio. Laurita y Sandra surprised us and stopped for another canopy tour along the way. How nice (we all felt bad that Misty missed the first one). This canopy ride is deemed the most extreme in all of the latin countries, because of one minor change...you actually zipped down the line faced down so that it feels like you are flying. Very Cool! Another one to hit up if every in this country. By the time we reached Manuel Antonio, we didn´t have time to hike any of the trails inside. So the night went: hotel check in, dinner at Marlin´s with our cute waiter, Alverez, and then to a special event party on the beach. Man! Costa Rican women are hot tamales....can´t say the same for the men in these parts =(, and most of them were gay, so that didn´t do us any good. The next mornin´bright and early a van came and picked us up at 6:50am....the package included breakfast, whitewater rafting, and lunch. What an adventure the ride to get to the rapids was...the topper to this was Mystikal! Girlll you are so hilarious...she was panicked from the trail being so close to the edges of the cliffside with out railings, and mud all over that she started to inch her way to the right to be closer to the mountain. She inched towards me, sat on my lap, but that wasn´t enough and continued to inch, inch, inch, so far that by the end she was sitting on top of some lady we didn´t even know. LOL!!!! We got the last part on video, thank god. The ride to the rapids was adventurous enough little did we know it would get rougher. The rapids here are much larger than in the states and their class 2 and 3´s are actually 3 and 4´s in the states. This is what we had in store for us. After the instructions and safety procedures, we were given a paddle and jumped into a boat. It was six per boat and three boats total. In our boat we had our guide Juan Jose, Alvin, Calvin, Ben (their dad), Sandra, Misty and me. Alvin and Calvin are 9 and 12....I was not happy to be paired with kids, I know this sounds mean, but I was concerned because this is my first time doing this, and didn´t feel real safe with kids on the boat. Ya know what I mean. Anyhow, we started down the river and the first rapid is the roughest and longest of the trip. The first boat went and we followed, but the first boat got stuck so we had to veer towards the left to avoid a collision, little did the guide know that to the left there was a large branch, or little tree that had toppled over, and we were headed straight for it! Imagine rafting towards a tree that stuck straight out parallel to the water, and was going to close line all of us on the boat. Here are the mistakes that followed 1. the people nearest to the brach leaned to avoid getting hit by the branch which cause a major weight shift and the boat to topple to the right. All seven of us were flung into the water right before the rapid began. 2. The guide flipped the boat on top of Misty and Alvin, so they were trapped under the boat...shit! There is actually a picture of Misty´s leg sticking out from under the boat. 3. The dad was the first to get on the boat, so he basically left his two kids in the water with us, Misty with Alvin and Sandra with Calvin 4. The river was so rough we had no control over which path to take, I was separated from the entire group, Sandra bear hugged the little one, cause he was not responding to her and thus took all the hits from all the boulders in the river. And lemme tell you, there were a lot of friggen rocks. Misty was being choked from the back by Alvin, who I´m sure was in shock. 5. During the safety procedure, Randy, the head guide explained that if we were to fall in the water that we are to go feet first down the river with your feet above water. Let me tell you why this doesn´t work....(this is according to my path down the river). I have my feet up so I hit any rocks coming my way....check, yes this happen, but as it happen the force of the river would toss me forword and my legs back so that the next boulder would hit my shins, and lemme me tell you...that hurts! So back to feet in the water but not quick enough so the next boulder is all over my ass...as you can see, its a pretty vicious cycle (during the accident we were scared, but now as I´m writing this, we are all laughing hysterically.) In the midst of this cycle of feet, shins, ass,...feet, shins, ass, the river tossed even further so I somehow did a complete roll under the water and landed on my tummy, so now, I´m going head first, holy shit balls! Maneuvering, maneuvering, maneuvering, good...back to feet, shins, ass. Okay the end is in sight...all of my friends are accounted for and are already on the banks of the river, as I´m floating pass them....wait, why am I floating pass them. Hello, someone help me....umm, I see the next set of rough wters coming and start to panic, until finally the little canoe that follows us on the journey spots me and plucks me out of the water. Thank god! 6. The damage is a lot of bruising for Misty and I, complete shock in the boys, and a hemorage in Sandra´s pinky finger...this was diagnosed by our soon to be Dr Richards. Afterwards we find out that Sandra´s finger had two hairline fractures. We're all troppers reguardless, and got back into the boat to finish the river off. Go team go! High five! We didn´t do much that night, relaxed a bit and got ready for our next adventure. Horseback riding in the morning at 8:30am. We were all praying for a mellow ride and we pretty much got our wishes. We met a really pretty girl who turned out to be a somewhat famous singer check her out at http://www.ima.mu/. We stopped at a waterfall along the ride and Misty and I climbed to the top were we encountered leeches, yea..., left soon after that. Back to the hotel, for a nice shower and dinner, a short nap before new years eve. I couldn´t have asked to be with better company this new years....Thanks ladies, I have nothing but love for all of you. MUAH! The next day, is our return back to San Jose to part ways with Misty....damn! I wish you wouldn´t leave, but the grind of Med School calls so we understand, although we could have hid her passport. This brings us up to date and here I sit at Laura´s desk calm and relaxed and writing this blog, but also preparing for surf lesson in Guanacaste, which is where we´re heading off to tomorrow morning. Bright and early 6am!