It's just a matter of perspective.

I had fully intended to go hiking this morning with some friends, but insomnia kicked in and I didn't fall asleep until around 4:00 am.  When Lauren came and knocked on my door I was barely awake and could barely remember her even showing up after I finally woke up around 11:30 am.  I remembered also that I made plans to go to a BBQ and plans to go to Tumon and ride the Slingshot...

I am never a double booked kind of person, but for once in my life and on Guam of all places! I made plans for the BBQ first so I chose to go there and it was a day long affair as is everything on Guam.  Plenty of food to be eaten, not so plentiful water.  Tide was low and we got there, oh, roughly six hours before the tide was due to come in.  It was hot.  Very hot.  As someone so succinctly said, "weather and food,  the only two topics on Guam."  I did not bring SPF because WHY?  Almost three hours in to eating, playing volleyball, dominating at "throw a baseball into a glove on the ground" and almost fainting during dizzy bat, I realized I had a travel size sport SPF 50, perfect for when you are already sunburned.

A friend that I just recently met just recently had surgery. He is the most positive and upbeat after surgery patient I have ever seen.  I would be a huge baby and demanding someone make me a sandwich..similar to what I did when I broke my kneecap.  No big deal right, being a huge baby and making people do things for you after surgery??  He mentioned how grateful he was that he was to be able to move and that nothing can hold him down.  It made me realize that for 21 years I have been a total debbie downer about my fractured spine and instead of being happy for the things I can do, I should really stop being angry over what I can't do, which really isn't a whole lot.  I just have constant pain.  Not like dull achy pain, but, holy crap I hope I can stand up straight in the morning pain and pain that makes you want to curse at the world and kick puppies.. ANYTHING TO MAKE YOU FEEL BETTER.  

People don't always realize that just because I look fine on the outside doesn't mean everything is fine inside and I have always struggled with that.. having to explain to people why I dislike running and why anything high impact hurts too bad.  I get the shrug off and the weird looks and I know people are judging me, thinking I dislike those things because I am fat..but it isn't that.  I was active up until the day my body started to revolt on me.  I eventually became so defeated that it didn't matter anymore, my health didn't matter, I simply just didn't care.  For some reason, all these years of just living with it and just getting by, I never realized how off my perspective was, how I couldn't see how negative I was about it.  Weird how one simple conversation can totally change your entire perspective on who you thought you were.

Today I made good on my promise to be active as much as possible, I also made good on the embarrass yourself as often as possible promise that I apparently made to myself the day I came out of the womb.  

I just super love this photo of myself.

Ypao Beach BBQ Awesomeness.

Dodgeball, never not appropriate.

Me and Lauren, always.

I think he might have a problem, it's called being Mexican.

Seriously?

Three in a row??

And four, just because he can.  Delante looks like he is going to pass out.

It isn't a day at the beach until someone brings out the guitars and starts singing.  This has got to be the second best part of the beach, aside from just being at the beach.  I am obviously left out in the musically inclined department, so I just listen. 

Some soccer, some baseball, some football..whatever.

Jarrett and Paolo being awesome, like always.

Mexican Warrior Faces.

Two words: 

Fanny. Pack.

Eli and I went for about a 20 minute swim and I kept getting distracted by the fish that were hanging out by the coral.  I kept diving under just to check them out.  I saw some Trigger fish, but I am not sure what some of the other smaller fish are.  Trigger fish scare me even though they are small.  If they feel like you are in their territory, they will attack you and bite you.  They are tiny little buttheads.  After we got back, I took my camera out to try and find some more fish, and I found a small school hanging out and they probably seriously dislike me because I would not leave  them alone for at a good 20 minutes or so.

There was a larger Angelfish that repeatedly swam into the coral every single time I tried to get a photo of it. Jerk.

These fish were opalescent and looked much cooler than the photo makes them appear. 

I don't know what is going on here, I think they were swimming in circles trying to avoid me.

Weirdest underwater video ever.  I still have not managed to figure out how to keep myself from flipping around in the salt water, so this video is basically a seizure underwater...fish make an appearance at some point.. just keep watching. 

Ocean boogers that Jarrett was enjoying a little too much. There is a fish stuck to it.  A dead fish, which eventually ended up in my swimsuit.  It was awful.

Slippers enjoying the sand while I enjoyed the chair.

Your end of the road.

On Saturday we had a wee little potluck since it would be the last weekend that all of the NSE students would be here.  I wasn't able to make it until later in the evening because the same day I had my boat trip for my PE class and I still had to finish up some homework.  There was still delicious food and desserts to be eaten, but I picked up some chocolate covered cream puffs and we ate the entire package because they are the most delicious thing on earth...maybe not the most, but they come in at least in the top ten.  I am the only remaining student from the NSE group that came in January and I still have 65 days left until I return home.  I will have been living away from home for over 6 months.

It was a learning experience for me, which according to my father, is kind of the entire point of being involved in an exchange program.  The things I learned are that I am not good at living with people and having a roommate is difficult and I don't ever want to have to make someone put up with me ever again because I am an excessively difficult person to be around.  I also discovered that people are quick to make judgements against you when you do not follow the typical life course that women are supposed to and that people in the mainland assume that because we have higher standards of living, we should all be given those standards at all times even when they are not available to us.  I am just as guilty of that as everyone else.

I am also guilty of creating immense run on sentences, but I digress.  The point is, people can be awful and wonderful all at the same time, you can offend and hurt people and they will forgive you.  You can also allow the hatred that you have for someone to consume you and pick apart every piece of a person that offends you and turn them into a monster.  I was told that I am selfish, self-centered, a horrible daughter, immature beyond repair, and undeserving of going to China.  Yes, I acted selfishly in some regard, but I paid my penance for it.  I continued to act selfishly because I was furious over what had happened to me and I refused to let it go because I didn't deserve the treatment I had been given.  I guess in the end, I was able to let it go but I will never forget how much it hurt.  I might be selfish and self-centered and sometimes completely unaware of my behaviors, but I have never treated someone as cruelly as I was treated while I was here by some people and I have never made such terrible conclusions of someone over something as stupid as what happened to me.  

On the plus side, I met amazing locals that feed me all the time and let me hang out on their couches with their families, also, their kids love me.  

Maybe at 29 I am immature, but I sure do have a hell of a lot of fun for a 29 year old, sometimes lady.

65 days until I come home.  Only two more months left and one of those months, I will be in China.  The experiences I have had here, I could write a sociological dissertation on it.  Its been worth it.

My Lauren, one of the sweetest girls I have ever met.  She is definitely my island little sister, I certainly love her like a sister.

A really dark and terrible photo of the pool at Delante's condo.

People standing around at night. 

Lauren and I keeping warm or at least attempting to keep warm.  The pool was heated and the air was cold.  Sometimes you feel cold in Guam.  Strange, I know.

Paolo and Delante being cold in the pool.  Neither one of the have enough body fat to sustain heat.  I don't know how they survive.  They also jumped in the pool with all their clothes on, as you can see from the photo.  We were breaking all the rules that night.

You can skip ahead about one minute because Paolo's act of spontaneity involved him removing his socks and his shoes.  I started recording a little to early apparently.

They were actually entering the first stages of hypothermia at this point.

The ONE time I make a stupid face, neither one of them do.  Paolo never makes normal faces in photos and then he does this.  I look like a moron..but thats basically all the time so it doesn't really matter.

Just a big ol' group of weirdos.

Marie kept running away from me while I was taking her picture and when I finally got it she wanted to approve it because she knows I'm a blogger.. don't worry Marie, you look lovely, as always. And so does Leah.

Chilly and tired after midnight swimming.

Making faces.

View of Tumon from the balcony..not too exciting looking from the viewpoint of my camera, but oh well.  You can hear the screams of people as they fly around the in Sling Shot, kind of funny.