And that my friends, is how you move back from Ecuador.

Aaron, Sammy, and I were in the kitchen at the back of the house while Harmon was napping in his room at the front.  Suddenly we heard a terrible crash and a squealing of tires out front.  I ran out to the balcony and was horrified to see a motorcycle on the ground in the road and a lady on the ground behind it, and a few others gathered around.  Aaron was now out on the balcony and I ran to find phone, blanket, and towel.  When I got downstairs Aaron threw me a bottle of water too.

When I got out to the road the water and towel were quickly put to use.  The good news was that there was almost no blood.  The lady on the ground had been rolled over and the only cut was on the palm of her hand and didn’t look too serious.  However her legs were bent into not so nice positions, so I would imagine she will be leaving the hospital in a cast.  Additionally, I only saw one helmet, so I am assuming the man driving was wearing it and not her.  He was sitting on the sidewalk trying not to freak out and holding his leg.  Another lady put the towel under the head of the lady on the ground and tried to get her to be as calm and still as possible.  Meanwhile a traffic motorcycle cop had arrived and an ambulance was on the way.

After a few minutes it was determined that this motorcycle had been hit by a white car that quickly sped away, hence the squealing tires after the crash noise.  More police showed up, the ambulance, and lots of bystanders.  The poor lady gets put onto a stretcher and put into the ambulance, and after getting his leg checked out, the motorcycle driver decides to go in the car with his friend.  At this point I am just standing by my gate, in case they need somewhere to park the motorcycle for the night/week/whatever.  Sure enough the crowd of my neighbors surrounding the driver and police men turn around one by one to look at me and I know that is what they are thinking too.  I open our gate and garage and guess what?  Now we have a free motorcycle!

Poor people.  I hate car accidents, and especially ones where people end up on the street.  But come on, what is it with accidents in front of our houses with white cars?  Watch out all future neighbors, we are bringing white car crashes to a neighborhood near you…

[Update: The motorcycle driver came with a group of friends to our house last night to reclaim his bike.  He said he was ok, just a few strained ligaments in his foot, and that his lady was going to be just fine, no breaks!  We were surprised that she didn’t have any broken bones, but very very glad.]

Dear “Helpful” Older Lady,

Today we met you while we were walking to the fruit market. It is about a 25 minute walk for small feet, and having already walked half hour to the grocery store several hours earlier I was content with our pace. Halfway there we crossed you on foot and smiled at you. (New rule #1: don’t smile at seemingly innocent ladies.) We turned the corner a minute or two later and suddenly a car sidled up to us. I instinctively pulled the kids away, but when I saw it was you I relaxed a little. I figured you were going to ask us directions, because surprisingly enough I get asked for directions quite a lot. Instead you tell me you have a piece of advice about my daughter for me. I assume you are going to tell me that there are scary bad guys around or something of the like, because as it had been raining earlier, both my kids had warm jackets on.

You proceeded to tell me that Sammy’s crocs are not safe. Similar shoes are really popular here, and so I assume you mean that they will fall apart or something. I perhaps was a little condescending when I told you that mine were from the US and just fine for feet. But then you gave me a 5 minute lecture on how they will ruin my daughter’s feet. What I really needed to do was get some boots with arch support you said! As you will recall, I was pretty polite. I said ok, thank you, about a million times. Then after you decided to tell me that Sammy’s shoes were the worst you took a gander at Harmon’s feet and determined his firefighter rain boots were also awful and that he also needed some boots with arch support. Again I thanked you for your advice. I should now also point out to you that I also ignored the fact that I was wearing the exact same shoes as Sammy (you didn’t seem to be concerned for my feet!), and made no explanation to you about what I felt was proper footwear and what shoes my children actually wear on a regular basis.

I thought our conversation would never end, and wondered how I would get away from you without being rude. Because I only like to be rude when it is really warranted, and although you were pushing the limits, I was feeling kind. But then you had to put in one last plea, didn’t you? Well, let me give YOU some advice for the future. The next time you stop someone on the street to tell them what improper footwear they have on their child, do not use the following line: “but she is so beautiful, don’t you want her to grow up to have good looking legs?”

In case you need further explanation I will help you:
1. My daughter is two. And although I hope she grows up to have legs that are strong and healthy that she likes, I don’t really think that worrying about how good looking my daughter’s legs will be in the future is any of your business.
2. You simultaneously told me how ugly you thought my legs were, as I happened to be wearing a skirt and the same shoes as my daughter. (It was laundry day, otherwise maybe I would have been wearing pants and you would not have even noticed us at all!)
3. MIND YOUR OWN BUSINESS!

I am sorry if my parting words were in an elevated volume, but I do mean what I said: They are MY children. Maybe you were offended by my walking off, but I was done with our conversations. Oh, and beware, because if you see me on the street again you can be assured I will have something to say about your shoes.

From the bottom of my sole,

Kelsey

Our first trip was the worst. After a 20 minute wait (not so bad) we got to see the man in charge of accepting visa papers. I don’t know if he was having a case of the Mondays, hated really cute (but loud) children, his suit was too tight, or maybe the lady right before us spit in his eye, but he did not seem to like us. He quite rudely informed us we didn’t have all the necessary papers, and acted like we were insane for even trying to apply. To be fair I did have all the papers listed in detail on the agency’s website, but apparently there were 17 or so new ones I was missing. Maybe I am exaggerating and it was only 4 (each, so that really is 16). At any rate, he told us that not only did we each need all these new papers, but that we couldn’t apply to be a family unit unless we had translated the birth and marriage certificates and had them notarized, and that we would instead be paying $230/person instead of $50 as dependents. GREAT! Needless to say I cried a lot at home because I thought my head would explode.

I spent the rest of Monday getting the required papers, then spent Tuesday translating the documents from the US, and then back to the notary to get them approved. First thing Wednesday morning we took back our one million documents back and hope for some sort of miracle. I joked that there would be a really nice lady who loved adorable children working, and after waiting for a long while we found that indeed this lady existed and was working! She was very nice and Harmon did a good job of flirting with her, but she then decided we were missing yet another paper that also needed notarized. On top of that the translations were not actually what they were looking for (oh, how awful for all the time/money I spent translating them and getting them certified…), to be a family unit we needed apostilles. Oh what, you have never heard of an apostille? Yeah, me neither. In case you care to read more about it you can do so here. The short answer is it a certification that means that whatever document you have is valid and recognized in any of the countries that accept apostilles according to the Hague Convention of 1961. (This blog is so informative!) A huge problem would be that we currently live in Ecuador and to get the apostilles we need to take or send our certificates to Olympia. And then wait for them to get returned. The time this would take would be approximately two or more weeks to get from Ecuador to Olympia, 5-7 business days to get processed, then another 2 or more weeks to get back to Ecuador, if it arrived. The lady overcome by my distress and the sweet faces of my children decided that she could go ahead and accept our papers as individual units, and if the apostille by some miracle showed up before our current visas expired then we could be a family unit, she could just change it in the computer and save us a significant amount of money. Bless her. I should also add that at the end of our interview with her the guy from Monday came over and was like “what are you doing??” She explained to him what was happening and he miraculously said “oh, good idea!” Phew.

We left still in possession of all our million papers and still stressed (me). At best they would accept our paperwork the next time we tried and maybe by some small chance the apostille would come in time. We came home and I immediately called my mom and left her a message begging her to do my 40 errands for me. I spent Wednesday afternoon back at the notary getting what I hoped would be the last of our missing papers notarized.

Thursday we went back to the visa office again. This time we were there before the office even opened, eager anyone? We went to the usual waiting area, and after 5 or 10 minutes we were escorted into yet another office with another man. This kind man told us the lady from Wednesday had explained our situation and he would be receiving our papers. He explained to us to either come back with our apostilles before the very end of March, or just to come back and he would accept our visas individually. He took all our paperwork, but the pointed out that if we were applying for an 180 day extension (you can ask for between 91 and 180 days more) that we should have tickets for the very end of September, not June. We had originally bought return tickets in June because we thought it would be easy to get a 90 day extension like in 2007 and that would have fallen under the limit. He asked us to get a reservation for the end of September and bring it back before the weekend. I asked him what I should do, because to change the tickets costs $200 each ticket, and what if they didn’t approve our visas? He assured me they would approve it, and told me I could just get a reservation online, and that I didn’t need to have them paid for. I was skeptical, but glad that he was taking our papers and just waiting on that one. And that I could come back alone to deliver it to him. Not that I don’t love my kids, but anyone who has tried sitting in chairs waiting with small children trying to keep them quiet will understand how difficult this is. We were overjoyed that our process seemed to be done (for a month) and that he was so kind and helpful.

I came home and found that you can in fact make a reservation (on American Airlines at least) and it will be held for 36 hours online. I quickly did this for the new date and printed it out. I jumped in the first taxi I could flag down and 15 minutes later I was again welcomed into the visa office. The man took my papers and said they were good. Whew! Finally I could breathe again. Upon returning home I received even more good news, my mom had taken care of all my papers and they were on their way to be processed. Thank goodness for her!!!

So now we wait. Wait for the apostilles to arrive (both in Bellevue and then Ecuador), wait until the end of the month, and hope that everything goes smoothly…

Amid all of my complaining about the ridiculousness of the process Aaron reminded me that it is just like that in the US for anyone trying to come. I thought about my sweet Ecuadorian friends who a year ago had tried to apply for a visa to visit all the volunteers they have served with in the past 10+ years and how after hefty application fees, travel to the embassy, and other ridiculous measures they were denied. Nevermind that at the other embassy in the country other friends were granted visas because they had friends who worked there. It makes me angry, but at the same time inspires me to be a little more fair, a little more understanding, and a little bit more patient. The world is not fair, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t do anything about it.

This was the longest boringest post ever. Sorry. If you are still reading.

And obviously you now know about Aaron’s issues which remain to be solved.

Tonight Sammy was feeling left out and decided to fall off her chair right before dinner.  I ran over to pick her up, and it appeared that her right arm had come out of the socket.  So so so great, exactly what we needed.  She was crying, Aaron was freaking, so we moved it a little bit and then she was able to partially move it.  Since we live across the street from a clinic and emergency room it was hurriedly decided that I would run over there with her.  On the way over Sammy was crying and saying “no doctor!  I feel better!  I happy now!  I feel better!”  When I assured her she would not be getting a shot like her father this morning and would only be receiving a checkup she stopped professing her happiness.

The pediatrician was still hanging around and we were able to see him within 5 minutes.  He moved her arm around a lot, which made her cry, but when I asked her if he was hurting her or if she was just scared, she said just scared.  I am sure it hurt too, but Sammy is not fond of strangers, especially strangers who are touching her.  I would probably add strangers who are touching her on her recently injured shoulder to her list of great dislikes.  He told me that he didn’t see anything (by this point she was able to fully extend her arm every which way) and that to be sure I could go get an x-ray.  Lucky!  Sammy took some medicine for the pain, and has been totally fine all evening.  If she is hurting at all in the morning, we will get her x-rayed, as we happen to be going first thing back to the hospital to pick up Aaron’s lab test and see his doctor again, so why not?  We are just glad that baby girl seems to be ok.

Bad things come in threes, so I am totally safe from serious injury, right???

Like the suckers we are, when we signed up for comcast a bit over a year ago we signed up under a promo deal. I made sure we weren’t locked into some horrifying contract with penalty for early termination. (I know, I’m flighty, have to plan my escape routes at all times) Although there was no contract, our promo rates would expire in 6 months. We determined that was fine, we would just cancel the cable or go to a lower package when the time came. It did, and I called and was offered another deal for 6 months: the same thing we already had for the price we had been paying. I took it.

Fast forward 6 months later when I received a larger than normal bill and realized it was time to call again. Apparently this time they didn’t want to give me a deal. No wait, that’s not true, they had another number I could have called and waited 4 hours for someone to answer who had the power to give me a better deal so I wouldn’t quit. Like I have that kind of time? Anyway, we ended up with a ghetto cable package for more money than the original promo deal. I wasn’t happy, but figured it was life.

Enter new ghetto cable package. Fine, we lost some of our channels, like National Geographic and Military channel (cue Aaron’s crying…) but what we really lost was a working cable connection. It’s like when we turned off the “premium” channels, they also turned down the quality of the signal. So now we get silent gaps along with weird digitization, normally timed conveniently at the most important part of a show or best joke.

Conspiracy? Maybe. Annoying? For sure. Do I love it? No, I don’t love it at all.

P.S. Aaron just asked what I was writing about. When I told him Comcast he said: “oh, how the DVR doesn’t work and the internet is slow?” Oops, it seems I left out the two other important points. Comcast: we’re officially fighting.