2 Days Til Cuba

I’ve been quiet lately on the blog, but there really hasn’t been too much going on. After finishing my last final I had was able to hear Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speak at Georgetown University, went for a tour of the State Department, and then headed home to Boston/Sharon for a few days. I spent a day and a half in the city at my friend’s place, first catching up with my old friend Jamie from Ecuador (an American) who I hadn’t seen in over two and a half years. She’s also from the Boston area and was home for the holidays, even though she still lives in Ecuador while getting her Master’s.

Later, my friend Sebastian, a Paraguayan who is studying at American University, came to Boston to spend Christmas. He spent the night with my friends and I as we went out to a couple of bars, and the following morning we gave him a quick tour of Boston on a cold day. Luckily my buddy Fish knows the city like the back of his hand and gave a great tour, including New England Clam Chowder. My time in Boston was short lived and I flew back on Christmas, returning to Washington with a nasty cold. I whiled away three days in my apartment alone trying to recuperate and enjoying my only real week of vacation before leaving for Cuba. Yesterday was the only real day that I got out for a bit to do something, going down to the National Portrait Gallery Smithsonian. I’ve wanted to go there for a while, but as often happens when I go to a museum, I lost patience and wandered through quickly.

When there are too many exhibits and people I don’t like being in a museum. That explains why I was in and out of the Louvre in 30 minutes. I saw three big pieces and got out. In just two days I’ll be leaving Washington to head down to Miami, and the following morning we’ll be leaving as a group to go to Havana, Cuba. I’m still debating whether or not I want to bring my lap top, and it will probably be a game time decision. I’ve been told that our hotel will have Wi-Fi, but I’m skeptical of the connection speed, especially if 14 other people there are trying to use the Internet at the same time. I don’t want to come home to 200 emails, but I also don’t want to be so connected that I’m online all day long. Part of the joy of traveling is disconnecting.

Check back in just in case to see if I’m blogging from Cuba or if not, I’ll be back in two weeks and will have stories, photos and probably videos as well (though my ability to edit videos together when I get back is cut short by the beginning of the semester and my internship at the Organization of American States).