Happy Birthday to Me

Ok everyone, Buckle Up! This is going to be a long post!

Joel has been doing really well in his first 2 weeks of school, his first test is on Monday so everyone wish him luck. Last week we had the white coat ceremony, where Joel got to adorn his Short White Coat officially marking him as a Medical student. When he graduates he gets the Long white coat officially marking him as a Doctor. Step one done!

I am also excited to introduce to you, our new roommate. One day we found this cute little guy hiding under our fan. He is seriously so tiny! Smaller than my pinky finger for sure. Him and some ants are the only critters we have found in our house so far. I decided to name him Pico, and I am very excited to say that he has decided to stay with us. Since the first time we saw him we see him about every other day in odd places. One day I came home and almost stepped on him as he went running across the floor. I don’t ever want to hurt him so since then on I have been announcing myself every time I enter the house...”Pico I’m home!!” He for sure pulls his weight, every since he showed up there has been a huge decrease in the number of ants I find crawling around. Thanks Pico!!

Last week I went out snorkeling with the snorkel club and saw some amazing stuff. I didn’t take the camera, though, Sorry! I was super excited with everything I saw, the reef and the fish were amazing! Joel was sad he missed it so on Saturday we went out just the 2 of us as soon as we woke up. I don’t know what was going on, but the waves were huge that day! Normally there are no waves at all here, but it was sloshing everything around really bad so the water was super murky. Poor Joel, we couldn’t see a thing. Oh and something else exciting... I got a job! I had an interview on Monday, got offered the job on Tuesday and started training on Wednesday. They gave me a script with an illness, and I go to the school pretending to be sick and the students diagnose me, they are graded on their interactions with me. Its only like 3 hours a week for 5 weeks.  But still its better than nothing, and it gives me a chance to use my acting skills!

I started my training on Wednesday, which also happened to be...MY BIRTHDAY! Hurray! After my training in the morning, I went with Joel down to the beach. I was determined to do some more snorkeling, its one of my favorite things to do here. We get to the beach and it starts pouring rain. Sad day! There is a restaurant right on the beach, so we decided to just do lunch there. By the time we were done eating the rain had stopped and the sun was shining. I jumped right in the water and started snorkeling. It was beautiful! The water was clear and perfect. Joel was sitting on the peir studying, but I finally convinced him to join me in the water. It was fantastic, but unfortunately I am not very good at taking pictures under water yet! Sorry about that. I promise its much prettier then it looks. There were 1000’s of fish! We kept swimming through school after school! Silver ones, Gold ones, Red ones. I don’t know the names or types, but they were fantastic! We saw a little puffer fish too. 

(Beach Restaurant)

Little Puffer Fish

Once we were done snorkeling, I hoped out of the water and realized I was running slightly late for my Birthday party. That’s right, you heard me! The wonderful women in the branch here found out it was my Birthday and gave me a fantastic party at the pool. I ran from the beach to the Pool, which is only about a 1 min walk and got ready to party down! It really was fantastic! Lots of people came, I got presents and one woman even made cupcakes for everybody. It was one of the best Birthdays ever! 

Present From Jenn

Joel stayed with me to show his support, but he was also worried about the time he lost out on for studying. He decided he could make it up by studying at the party...in the pool. This is Joel with his tablet in a waterproof case. He decided it was too loud to study effectively. Where could he go to study, quietly, while also being a supportive husband? Thats right! Underwater. Yes he put on his snorkel and studied under water Hahaha!! Only Joel!! I sure do love this man!

 

For dinner on my Birthday my friend Kelsey(Picture above with her handsome son Lincoln) had us over for dinner, it was fantastic and was followed by some of the most delicious birthday cookies I have ever ate! And for the perfect end to the perfect day- Joel let me sleep with the A/C on. (We normally don’t because it’s crazy expensive to run it)

This would be an appropriate place to stop blogging for now, but I warned you this would be a long one so I am just going to keep on trucking. Okay so this morning I went out snorkeling again with the snorkel group. Just down the beach from where I normally do my swimming, there is a Sunken Barge. Crazy cool.  On the shore right close to the Barge is an old dilapidated, deserted Hotel. Now as some of you may or may not know- I have a hobby of creating horror movies in my head. I when I am in a new place, I like to think, what is the most suitable monster for this location, what is the most horrible situation that could happen in this location with that monster and who will survive it. In high school, whenever we had an away tournament, I would always do a quick scan of the hotel room and inform my friends which of them would be dying that trip if a certain monster decided to show up. I remember once, in Formost, the school had 2 gyms and since we lived so far away they let us sleep in the unused Gym. Spending the night in that school was one of the best head horror movie situations I have every created and survived...Until now!! Are you kidding me right now?!? Rundown old Hotel on the shore of the ocean...15 feet away from a sunken barge?! I my friends...just struck Gold. Oh the possibilities are endless! Coming up with new horror situations for this place will easily keep my busy for the next year, and maybe then some. I didn’t get any good pictures of it today, but its only about a 20min walk from my house, so believe me they are coming. For now, here is a picture of some crabs hanging on the barge. Oh, I forgot to mention, this is where we did our snorkeling today

 

Around the Barge was really murky so we didn’t get to see too much...until we went further out to sea. We hit a reef that was amazing!!! Absolutely incredible, it was like a whole underwater city, I wouldn’t have been surprised at all if mermaids would have shown up.  I apologize for the pictures do not do it any justice. You can make out any of the brilliant colors, or see ever 5% of the fish. There were Millions! I got to see a Huge Eel, but no picture sorry. I also saw quite a few jelly fish. No picture of them ether, sorry.

 I was lucky enough to get stung by a jelly fish. It was just a tiny one, like the size of my thumb, so it really wasn’t that bad at all. Feels something like a Bee sting, however with my first one I was a little worried, I popped my head out of the water and stated calling to the other snorkeling people that I was stung. They came over to make sure I was okay and reassure me and advised on all the things I could do for the pain. (None necessary, I couldn’t even feel it anymore by the time I got to shore). After a little bit of us all just treading water, Jennifer exclaims “Look Straight Down!” I did as was told and stuck my face in the water and looked right under my feet. It was a HUGE sting ray!! Like 12ft directly below me! I yelled...with my face still under water. Like, the classic “Home Alone” yell. I think I did even put my hands to my cheeks when it happened. Here are some photos, compliments of Liz. I passed her the camera because I was too chicken to follow the thing. I was swimming backwards thinking...thats the thing that Killed Steve Erwin! Crocodile Hunter! This thing killed the man that could literally hold every other deadly dangerous animal on earth. To me this makes the Sting Ray, the King of all creatures and to him I give the up most respect. Well Played Sting Ray...Well Played.