There comes a time when you realize how cool is a Jelly Fish -- how vibrant are its colors and how out of this world are its shapes. At about this same time you also realize it took you 20 minutes, of driving real fast on a major American highway, to put on your seat belt.
Since my last Blob I got voluntary kicked out of my latin american country of choice. After four intense months in Bolivia, I passed four predetermined, present and profound days in my country of origin. I hadn’t been ready to go back and I wouldn’t have been ready had the Heads decided I must stay. It’s cool that when I return to my country of origin, for good, only then will it become one of my countries of choice.
Quick notes on Miami: Concentrated chillin/calling/pleading/explaining and getting stamped. The Department of Homeland Security, mannn do they have a tough job. Just because every legit office on the Bolivian and American side tells you: “No.” and Officer Hudson of the Deferred Inspections sector of the Miami Airport tells you “"Girl, if y'all did this in my country I'd deport you and definitely not accept you coming back. When yas in the Bolivian jail don't come crying to me.”….giving up hope is not justified. . Gigantic glossy photos of George Bush in the entrance of a sterile office space make any experience extra special.
If you are ever bummed about the world think about this: one morn in Miami I ran into a lady (literally.. i was running around in Village of Palmetto Bay) and I asked her for directions to a park. basically she was pretty stoked to see me and help me. she told me "wow you're a pretty little pod. what a nice complexion you have. where do you come from?" these were nice questions and compliments as I had not been given nor asked such things before. when i actually lived in the states no one EVER said this to me. Oh yes and I think maybe she was expecting the response of “Mars.”
Also old people are great. Go to Miami Beach one day and watch for the wrinkled pot-bellied oldies in their speedos (males) and their onsey’s (pear shaped females). They will be tan. Walking their morning walk. oblvious to the world around them. And. Happy.
Break downs come and Break downs go
I got into Miami at 6 am Thursday March26. I arrived at the plush house of the fam of a friend at 7:30 am. I was on the phone being passed from office to office for the next four hours. Then I visited Officer Hudson. Then I returned home and needed to take a quick nap. I awoke to further bureaucratic directions. Then the business day ended and I took a swim. Finally I took a trip to the Bolivian Consulate to meet one Senor Javier the Consul General and this was rei successful.
I have a new job. (Senor Javier just also happens to be in the the health helping out his poor country business. Of course Javier has a Sillas de Reudas program. He's a very nice guy collecting and sending wheelchairs to his country of origin for those in need. He has a connection in La Paz that sends him name + location +need and he sends them a wheelchair from the states. He would like to extend the program throughout the country. I am gonna work with him through Santa Cruz and hopefully Cochabamba. Basically this means ANYONE needing a wheelchair (if I/we can find them), in due time is gonna get one.
I have an Objeto Determinado visa for 30 days. When I got back to SCruz I promise him I would turn my papers into a lawyer (a LEGIT lawyer, an immigration lawyer) and begin the process of obtaining a 1 yr work visa. He says I can't leave the country for 40 days and need to focus on this tranmites in that time. When I got back, I half did this. Ie. My boss promised me everything will be ok. I believed him the first time…. so now I will bug him every week about it, no tameness accepted.
I have been really illegal for 4 months. The advice that I got to come to Bolivia with nothing, and then to begin to work having only a tourist visa was very illegal. Senor Javier said I was not only enganado (tricked, screwed over) by the lawyer that didnt do the papers, but from the very beginning he said that I and we the foundation were working illegally. You dudes know I’m always happy to help. If this helps the foundation know the process and the Miami contact to do things legally in the future, I can be a happy princess chicken.
Senor Javier at first told me my infraction was large and there might be no helping (it seemed at first that the infraction put the Foundation in danger too). Then we got to chatting and he got on the phone with the Director of Immigration in the USA then in Santa Cruz. We're cleared on both ends. As directed, I acted very calm going through the airport and did not cause any trouble nor ask any questions. If I have any problems before my 30 days are up I was told to go to Senor Altamirana. He’s a dude in S Cruz.
Basically my being and thinking in Miami is one more part to the movie. i jumped in the pool of the mansion where i residing in Miami and then re-created in my mind the Paul Simon sound tracked Royal Tenenbaums underwater scene. I seriously wish my brain were always filming, or my physical would film as I do the directing. The scene in the Deferred Inspections office of Homeland Security (with Office Hudson my new favorite gigantic African American woman who has a really giant gun and could crush me in a nano second) is one of my current favs. and the other in the Consulate office when 4 different phones in 4 different rooms kept ringing in a place where there are only 2 workers and 1 phone line… another great.
cool well i'm stoked to be back. i'm really appreciative of the privilege I have to have such problems and usually come out ok. because i know if i were any other, i'd be jailed, stamped and sealed. talking to people around me in pretty much every office i've been in (people with drugs in their tummy, or emergency medical crises of which that can't afford to fix here), really helps place me in perspective--- not that i usually feel i allow myself to dabble too far.
love is interesting
