March was a difficult month at work. The teachers at the other house were having roommate problems, and things escalated to the point where one of them was fired. As she taught US and World History, my favorite two classes, I volunteered to take her two classes and get rid of my sixth grade English classes, who are little monsters. I did manage to get away for a beach weekend with Chris at Kaliko, and that helped, as it was quite nice.
Lisa’s parents, and then Pia’s mom and sister, came down to visit us and had a wonderful time. I was starting to feel pretty lonely so I managed to talk Hunter into coming down for the last weekend in March. He agreed, and we had a whirlwind long weekend tour of Haiti! He arrived, and Chris picked him up from the airport. They met us at the Montana Hotel for drinks, then went to Monica and Andy’s house for drinks and dinner. Later that night we all went out in Petionville to Boucane, MacDoo’s, and Barak.
On Saturday we got up pretty early to drive out to Jean Marc’s beach house. That evening we drove up to Monica’s mountain house to spend the night and have a relaxing Sunday. Along the way we had lots of rum punches, more than one wahoo, bought a live chicken (that was pretty damn funny), and generally had a good time. But I was exhausted by the time he left on Monday!
My homeroom had to sponsor school-wide Easter activities, and that added to the extra class I was teaching, was really starting to take its toll on me. Still recovering from Hunter’s visit, and only four days back at work before I had to leave to go home for Amber’s wedding. Stupid American Airlines cancelled our last flight out of the day, so I had to leave Friday morning, and I got home too late for the rehearsal. I did, however, make it to the dinner, and Amber was so happy to see me. Saturday was her wedding, and by the time that was all over, I was exhausted to the point of not being able to do anything else. I spent all Sunday in bed, and was supposed to fly back to Haiti on Monday. But I just couldn’t do it. Exhaustion, a sinus infection, thoughts of Easter activities…. Combined together, I couldn’t face it. I changed my flight to Wednesday and stayed home an extra two days, in bed, trying to get well again.
In April, Lisa and I were supposed to leave for our Spring Break adventure, a trip to Guadalupe, Martinique, and Dominica. Her boyfriend Vlad picked us up for the airport- an hour late. About half way there, his car broke down. We grabbed a tap-tap and headed the rest of the way to the airport, but our flight was just about to leave and it was too late for us. We changed our tickets to June and we’ll go on our adventure then. For this week, we decided to just plan small fun things for this area. We went to the beach with Tom and Sue and their new baby Jordan, and yesterday we went up to The Lodge and had a long lunch. My friend Yves, who works for a USAID program, asked if I could be UN election observer for the Senatorial elections on Friday. It all turned out pretty interesting.
Before we knew it, the school year was winding down. Tom and Sue are heading to Kuwait for their next teaching job, and I’m going to Nicaragua. Lisa is staying in Haiti another year, and Chris is going to Africa. It was sad saying farewell at the last hashes of the year, but we’re all excited to see what the next adventures bring us. Stay tuned to see what life is like in Nicaragua!
PalmTreeMusings 