Now What?

Now that my Honduras adventure is over, my life is going to sound significantly more boring.

It's not that I haven't done anything and I just sit around all day (believe me, I wish I could!).  But nothing, and I mean NOTHING, compares to dat travel lyfeee.  I mean, I went to my cousin Cody's wedding and got to see all my cousins whom I haven't seen in years (boy, did I miss them!).  I went to Peoria with my family to see Daniel Tosh's stand up show (yes, that is the Kaisershot family's form of quality entertainment).  I even went up to Chicago with Chloe, Katie, and Natalie to see a Cubs game and eat way too much.  But none of that compares in the slightest to my time in Central America.

So what is my life now? 

It now consists of babysitting every day from 8:00 to 5:15.  Coming home to say hello to my family for 2 seconds before they leave for Kourtney's softball game or I leave to do crazy shenanigans with the people I call my friends.  Coming home late way too late and waking up way too early.  Working at Mrs. Fields on the weekends.  Trying to squeeze in time to complete my Honduras assignments and read my common reading book for BGR and taking quizzes about it.  Trying to find time just to breathe.

But in those spare moments I have to myself (driving to work, showering, those rare moments when the kids are still asleep when I get to their house), I've been doing a lot of dreaming.  (No, I'm not sleeping when I'm driving to work. Daydreaming, guys.  Come on.)

I am not dissatisfied with my life in the slightest.  Far from it, actually.  I have no regrets, I don't feel like I've missed out on anything huge, and I'm not disappointed with what I've done and where I've been.  But, as is the American way, I want more.  I had a minor freak-out last night when I realized that there are so many things that I want to do that you just can't do when you're in your 30s and are tied down to a job and a family.  And though my meager teacher salary may not feel so hot when it's getting stretched from all the things I want to do, I want these experiences.  (In case you couldn't tell from my freshman year escapades, I'm all about doing things just for the experience and for the story.  Just ask me about my Things I Would Never Expect Myself To Do But I Still Want To Do Them list.)  Plus, if I don't start thinking about it now, it might never happen, and then I actually will have something to regret.  So, since they have been swimming around my brain recently, I might as well spill these dreams and desires on my blog because, if you hadn't noticed, it's like my freaking diary.

A List of Things Kasey Kaisershot Wants To Do Within The Next 10 Years, aka Before She's 30 And Too Old To Do Them

or

A List of Things That Must Be Accomplished So Kasey Kaisershot Doesn't Have A Midlife Crisis

or

A List Of Things Kasey Kaisershot Wants To Do That May Or May Not Be Realistic

1. Graduate college-that's step one.  It's imperative that this happens first because school has always come first in my life, and I can't distract myself with other things before I have that diploma, yo.

2. Own a jeep-yeah, I said it.  I want a jeep whose windows and doors come off so I can blast my music really loud on a nice summer day and go driving with my hair blowing in the wind.  Ahh, I can see it now...

3. Become fluent in Spanish-I mean really fluent.  Like I can actually hold a conversation without stuttering and pulling out Google Translate every other word.

4. Be a waitress-some may say it's lame, but it's something I've just really wanted to do!  I like people (most of the time), and I like food, and I like money, so why not combine them all together?  No, I do not want it as a career (there's no way I'm blowing thousands at Purdue to be a waitress for the rest of my life), but I want to try my hand at it.

5. Live in New York for a year or two-I fell in love with the city when I visited it with my family 2 summers ago.  There is so much going on and it's so fast-paced and it just really piqued my interest.  I want to figure out where the best hole-in-the-wall places to eat are, I want to hang out in Central Park, I want to become a pro at riding the subway, I want to scoff at the tourists wearing "I Love New York" t-shirts, I want Broadway musicals to be my entertainment instead of just movies, and I want to dance at the night clubs. 

6. Teach abroad-more specifically, at Alison Bixby Stone School in Zamorano, Honduras, because I just fell in love with it there.  Also, interning at Jovenes En Camino, the boys' orphanage there, while I'm teaching down there.

7. Travel-sounds simple enough, but I just want to go everywhere. I want to see the touristy places, but mostly I just want to experience different cultures and meet tons of interesting people and take lots of pictures.  And, call me crazy, but I really want to stay in a hostel.  My mom says that when I'm teaching, I should use the summers as my time to travel since I have them off.  I knew teaching would work out for me ;)

And when all that is over, I actually do want to get married and have kids.  And probably get my masters degree.  And other things along those lines that mean you're an adult.

That's about it at the moment.  Obviously it's not all going to work out how I plan.  That's up to God (although most of the time I'd prefer calling the shots), so I guess we'll see what He has planned for me.

Until next time :)

Photos:

At a grad party

Reunited with my cousins!

Go Cubs Go

Chicago, yo.

Honduras Day 18.

Journal Day 18 May 30, 2013

            Adios, Honduras! 

            We had breakfast early this morning, (pancakes, eggs, etc.) and then it was off to the airport!  And what a pain that was.  Remind me not to travel in a group of 15 ever again!  For some reason, we had to check in as a group, so we handed over our passports and waited “patiently” for the woman to come by and tag our suitcases.  We stood around for awhile when, to our (pleasant) surprise, we saw a bunch of young Honduran men come up behind us.  They were all dressed in periwinkle polos and had duffel bags with them.  Each of them had an interesting hairdo (Mohawks, gelled back, etc.), and each was extremely attractive.  We had Jubin ask who they were, and it turns out they were the 21U National Honduran Soccer team. And they were going to D.C. but were on our same flight to Houston.  What. Good. Fortune. 

            After everyone was checked in and we had filled out our “leave the country” forms, we had to pay our $40 fee to leave the country, so that was another long waiting process.  From there we went through security with no problems except more waiting.  We chilled at our gate for awhile and creeped on the soccer players, picking out our favorites like any group of teenage girls would do.  It was a good way to pass the time honestly.

            When we boarded, there was a woman in my window seat, but I didn’t want to tell her to move, so I was just going to sit in the middle.  However, the guy behind me had seen me talking to Lindsey earlier, so he offered his seat up so I could sit by her and he went up to my row.  It was really sweet of him!  Then Ivy came back and wanted to sit by us, so he asked the guy in the aisle if she could sit with us too.  He was very kind and let her, and the flight attendant joked that she should by him a drink.  She said she would, but he declined. 

            The 3+ hour flight to Houston went smoothly, although we were pretty disappointed that all the soccer players were near the front of the plane.  Some of them walked past us to use the bathroom which was a nice change of scenery.  But here’s where it really got interesting:

            Ivy and I had been napping, and when we both woke up we saw one of the players (probably the most attractive one) come down the aisle to use the bathroom.  Next thing we knew, we saw Laura walking back with him, so we followed her with our eyes to see her sit right in-between him and one of his teammates.  Talk about a heart attack.  We were so confused and proud of her!  I couldn’t wait to get off the plane and grill her for the deets.

            When we were finally able to get off, we rushed into the airport to interrogate her.  She told us that she had been sitting in the back row all alone when the player, whose name is Lesvin, came back to use the restroom.  He saw that she was all alone and said that there was an empty seat up front and invited her to go sit with them!  I was like, you go girl!  So she did, and for the last 30 minutes of the flight, she had a nice chat with him about soccer and other topics.  Apparently the team had a tourney in D.C. and then they were going to come back to Houston and then back to Honduras.  They were here until June 6^th.  Each of the players came from a different team, but this team was the all-star team of sorts and they hadn’t been playing together for long.  He asked her when her next flight was, and she told him not until 7:45.  His wasn’t until 5:45, and it was only around 3:30, so he asked her to get coffee with him at the airport!  He even asked if she lived in Houston and wanted to see their games!

            The sad thing was, as soon as we landed and got off the plane, we were separated from our eye candy because we had to go to the US citizen line while they went to the visitors line.  We all split up between airport destinations (some went to O’Hare, others to Indy, some to Dallas, and even St. Louis), went through customs and re-checked our bags and went through security again, and as soon as those shenanigans were over, we scoped out which gate the team was at so we could find them again.  We found the one we thought was it, and then we went to our own gate to drop off some stuff before scavenging for food.  Even though we were craving some good old fashioned American cheeseburgers, we ended up going to Einstein’s Bagels and Panda Express because it was less expensive.  I was still okay with that, because let’s face it, food is food.  And, better yet, it was American food.  (Yes, I realize Chinese food is not American, but I got a bagel, okay??)  Anywho, we decided to go back to the gate to sit with Jubin and JoAnn because they had been watching the bags and we felt bad.  But after we finished, Laura, Kayla, Lindsey, and I decided that we wanted to go find the guys.  As we were passing the food court area on the way to their gate, we spotted the team eating right where Becca, Lia, and Brian were sitting.  There was our in.  We walked over to talk to our friends, all the while scoping out the males.  Then Laura saw Lesvin and went over and talked to him and some of his friends as we looked on and Kayla took creeper pics.  Before long, they had to say goodbye (but not before they exchanged Facebook information and hugs), and then we went to get ice cream and go visit the O’Hare peeps at their gate.  Turns out their flight was delayed to about when our flight to Indy was because O’Hare shut everything down, and they were livid!  So we chatted with them for awhile, and Kayla told me about how she sat by a Spanish rapper on the plane because she flew first class.  He gave her a CD with his music video on it, so we watched that on her computer. We had never heard of him before, but hey, it makes for a good story!  During our wait, I also caught up on missed texts and SnapChats from the past 3 weeks.

            Finally, after waiting for what seemed life forever, we were able to board our plane to complete the last leg of the journey.  This time I sat by an old man who was really cute, but was, unfortunately, an Illini fan.  I don’t know why I always end up by them; I sat by Illini fans on the way to Mexico too!  But our plane chilled on the runway for what seemed like forever until finally we were able to take off.  I was just very anxious to get home and see my family and friends, even though I was sad the trip was over.

            When I got off the plane, I walked through the airport to see my parents waiting for me!  It was so great to see them and my mom had to take a bunch of pictures of course.  But we got my bag and then headed out.  It was already almost 11 but I was definitely craving a cheeseburger, so my parents, bless their souls, stopped at Steak N’ Shake so I could get a good ole’ American burger and a milkshake.  Heaven, let me tell you.  It was amazing.  Goodbye, rice, beans, tortillas, and chicken!

            We drove home from Indy and didn’t get home until around 2 am.  As much as I liked being back, I already miss certain things about Honduras.  But who knows? I might be back soon ;).

Photos:

My view from the plane!

Soccer team ;)

Breakfast

Espresso Americano, we will miss you!

Honduras Day 17.

Sorry I'm a tad late with putting these last posts up!!

Journal Day 17, May 29, 2013

            Another day to say goodbye!  But this time, instead of saying goodbye to the schools and friends we’d made, we were saying goodbye to the beautiful city of Copan!

            But before we left, we had some breakfast: French toast, fruit, etc. etc.  We got to sleep in a little bit (finally!), and then after we ate we got to hang out in town a little bit.  So naturally, we went to Espresso Americano for our last granitas and mochaccinos before we were subjected to getting Starbucks in America.  Laura and I both got white mochaccinos, just to mix it up a little bit. 

            We left Copan on the bus/van around noon to begin our 4ish hour bus ride to San Pedro Sula, aka the murder/drug capital of the world…or maybe it was just Honduras.  Who knows.  All I know is that we were headed straight for a dangerous city, and most of us can’t speak any Spanish.  So that was good.

            The bus ride was pretty chill; Laura and I just chatted and read and looked out the windows to say goodbye to the gorgeous Honduran mountains.  It’s actually pretty interesting to think about: when I was little, I always had to pack a bag of fun things to do on long car rides, such as books, movies, games, puzzle books, coloring books, etc.  Now I’m just content with looking out the window and stewing in my musings.

            We made a stop at the San Pedro Sula City Mall before going to our hotel so we could eat and shop if we wanted to.  Half of us went to Little Caesar’s Pizza, and the other half Wendy’s.  If you couldn’t tell, we were definitely missing our good ol’ greasy fast food.  I got a delicious calzone and a Coke, which definitely satiated my American food craving, at least for awhile.  We walked around the huge, multi-story mall for awhile, getting lots of looks since we were a huge pack of gringos, but we weren’t really feeling the shopping considering we still had a $40 “leave the country” fee we had to deal with, along with various tipping.  So we picked up Subway sandwiches to take for dinner later, and we were off to the hotel.

            Our arrival in San Pedro Sula was pretty surprising.  It looked a lot like a city in America, although it did seem a little sketchier, but that could have been due to my preconceived notions of the city.  We watched in interest out the windows, trying to see if we could see any sketchy drug deals or anything bizarre like that…but we didn’t.  We were probably better off that way!

            When we finally made it to our hotel, we were surprised to see that it was less of a hotel and more a group of mini apartments, all gated and guarded from the illegal activities outside.  We had the same room assignments as in Copan, so Ivy, Lindsey, and I entered our room (which was on the first floor: hallelujah for not having to drag our suitcases upstairs!) to find a mini living room, kitchen, bathroom, and 2 bedrooms.  I lucked out again and got the single room with the big bed while the other girls shared a room with 2 small beds.  I felt bad for getting the good room again, but they said they didn’t mind.  It was fine with me: I was always up later than them anyways and didn’t want to wake them up when I came back!

            We got settled in, watched a little TV, ate our sandwiches, and showered.  At 8, we all went to Becca, Megan, and Shazia’s room to watch the iMovie video Becca had made on her computer with all the pictures from the trip.  It was really cute!  She had a bunch of pictures and video clips from all the different events of our trip and had it all to music (including Danza Kuduro, the song of our trip!).  It was a good review of all the things we experienced the past 3 weeks, and it made me a little sad knowing that it was over already.

            Afterwards, Lindsey, Laura, Katie, Kayla, and I all went to Laura, Katie, and Lia’s room to have our final dance party.  We pushed the kitchen table off to the side and blasted some tunes and had our last Honduras jam sesh until 1 am.  Katie insisted on pulling an all-nighter, but nobody was really feeling that idea, so we went to bed. It was an awesome way to end our last full day in Honduras.

Photos: (I haven't finished uploading the rest of the photos, but here are a couple from a few days ago that other people took)

Copan

Dancing at Twisted Tanya's!

Overlooking the city of Copan