Sunday, May 31, 2009

Six Miles To Make An Impression

I have two friends that just completed the 2009 San Diego Rock N Roll Marathon. Congratulations Steve and Aurora! Steve has done five marathons in the last 20 some months. My hat is off to you, as I know what an incredible feat just one is. I am not tough enough to even think of pulling that endeavor off!

Steve and I spoke briefly last weekend. He inquired of the "Little Giant's" real name. Aurora Ortiz or the Little Giant was the lady that I was able to escort last year during my marathon journey. Steve said that he would look for her this year and say hi if he saw her for me.

Steve called me today when he was at just about mile 16 to say that he had seen and walked with Aurora for a while. She actually remembered me from last year. To me this is humbling.

I am not someone that will leave a lasting impression on the world. That is not my goal or desire. I only desire to make a small positive impression on those around me wherever that may be. To think that something that I did 364 days ago was remembered fondly is enough for me. Because in reality I only had six miles to walk with Aurora. I was not able to get her to her goal due to my own physical infirmity. I can assure you that she made an impression on my as well. There is a lot of power packed in that small package. She finished this year in 7:37 at age 68!

My feet are happy that I did not do this event again, but my soul is wishing that I had been there again today. My event approaches and I am still preparing for it. I have a small test a week from today. I am running the Buffalo Sprint Tri next Sunday. I will let you know how it goes. I hope to add some value to someones event next weekend as I am sure someone will add to my experience. I'll only have three miles to cover on my feet, so I will have to work twice as hard to make an impression.

Monday, May 25, 2009

Memorial Day Thanks and Remembrance

If I had the opportunity to thank everyone personally that has sacrificed themselves to afford me the opportunity to live the way I do, it would take days, weeks, months, and years and still not even come close to making recompense for those sacrifices. To sacrifice one's self in a belief, is there a more noble endeavor?

For everyone that has served my country, I humbly say thank you. To anyone that has sacrificed their life in service to my country, my thanks is surely not enough. I hope through my actions and my service to others to show my appreciation for your service. In all humility, I know my actions cannot even come close to making restitution to your contribution and service.

To my grandfathers, my paternal grandmother, my father, my father-in-law, my brother-in-laws and to all those that have served my country, I tip my hat, bow my head, and silently praise your sacrifice to a belief in a better way of life for all.

Thank You!

Saturday, May 23, 2009

Welcome Home

I am back home. Returning from a trip like this is always filled with different feelings. Your happy to see loved ones upon your return. Your happy to be around things that make you comfortable, (your favorite chair, your own car and real traffic lanes). In the same breath, you are missing the new experiences you have been taking in. You are missing new friends you have made.

The trip home went well. When departing from Argentina to Brazil, everything needed to be announced in three languages 1) Spanish, 2) Portuguese, 3) English. While interesting, it is very confusing too. When the announcement was complete in the first two languages, those native speakers stopped listening and would resume there conversations increasing the volume in the area. I really had to focus to hear and understand the announcement. Now I think I have learned a little more respect for those visiting my country and trying to get around if they have a language barrier.

The airports Buenos Aires in Sao Paulo are a bit overwhelming when it comes to Duty Free shopping. You must go through the Duty Free shops to arrive at the departure gates. The prices are horrible. A set of Bose noise cancelling head phones for $350 US. You can buy them for $299 from Bose or in the airport in the US. There were a few other products that I looked at and they were again over priced, or essentially including the tax. Duty free is supposed to tax free from my understanding, and then you declare it when you arrive. All of these prices seemed to include the equivalent of the US Tax. Needless to say, I did not make any Duty Free purchases.

Disembarking from the flight from Buenos Aires, in Sao Paulo, I needed to find the United gate and be issued boarding passes. Neither Argentina nor Brazil allow for you to print you boarding passes for international flights. After making my way through security for the second time in one day and another Duty Free Hades, I could not locate any departure monitors to locate the gate I needed to be at. I had about 45 minutes before my flight to Chicago was scheduled to depart. I found a TAM airlines gate, and went over and inquired if they abla Ingles as I was in a Portuguese speaking country. The gate attendant's response was "yes, some small English, but more Spanish." I apologized and asked if there was someone else that spoke more English as I only had a small amount of Spanish. He directed to me to a colleague that spoke excellent English. I luckily by dumb luck had arrived at my departure gate. There was no United signage, and no departure monitors. I was able to get my boarding passes and start relaxing. I was heading home to the United States.

I took a quick trip through Sao Paulo's airport looking for a souvenir, but I could not find anything that was fairly priced. I was going to buy the girls mini Brazilian flags like I got them in Argentina, but they only sold 3' X 5' Brazilian flags for $45 US. I went looking for a bottle of water for the flight home, and the only stores that were selling bottled products were outside of security. Apparently, they have not learned the value of having TSA approve their water purchased after security checkpoints and charging $3.00 or more a bottle, (I am joking here against the US). Not wanting to go outside of security and fight my way back through, I bagged this idea and went back to the boarding area.

The flight home was good. We had to skirt a storm in the Bahama's and go way out over the Atlantic. I am pretty sure I have now flown over the Bermuda Triangle due to this route and from watching the map of the flight path. We arrived in Chicago at 05:30 to 05:45. Disembarked and again I only had about an hour to get to the domestic terminal, after going through immigration, picking up my luggage and rechecking it to Minneapolis.

Upon arriving at immigration, I filled out my declaration form. I had nothing to declare, but needed to fill one out stating that I had nothing to declare. You just have to love the bureaucratic red tape. All the information on this form is on my passport! This was the first time that I really started to get frustrated with all the extra steps international travel requires. I realized that some of it was due to being overtired, and I just wanted to get home. I calmed myself down and got to my turn to speak with the immigration agent. He took the declaration form, scanned my passport, looked up and said "Welcome home." I replied thank you, and felt the security and comfortable feeling that I have always felt when re-entering my home country, even if only from Canada come over me. I don't know why that is, maybe just that I know all the rules and customs here.

My flight from Chicago to Minneapolis was delayed an hour, but I met some Minnesotans at the gate and we had some light conversations and laughs. Arriving in MSP, there was only a short walk down to baggage claim where I received a nice hug from my wife and I truly was home. My luggage came down the belt, I grabbed it and we got the heck out of the airport.

I feel good. I am happy to be home with my wife and children. I thoroughly enjoyed this experience. This was the first time I have been outside of the US to a country that's native language is not English. This was not as overwhelming as I previously had expected it to be. In fact, it has fueled my urgency to learn Spanish even more. I will be hitting the Rosetta Stone CD's even harder now. And I think when I have some mastery of Spanish, I will be getting the German set as well to round out those skills.

Time to go get on the bike, and then to run. Time to refocus on the mission ahead. I look forward to it. With a twinkle in my eye and a smile on my face, it truly is a "Welcome Home" reality.

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Argentina dia Cuatro

Day 4, and what can be said of Buenos Aries that I have not already said. This place and it’s people are amazing!

I visited a future warehouse site today. It is a space rented within another business. The site in incredible. We had to go down 9 (Nuevo) de Julio to get to this site. Nuevo de Julio is the widest street in the world. It is like 12 lanes wide in the midst of Buenos Aires. Nuevo Julio stands for July 9. This is the day that Argentina won it’s independence from Spain in 1885, if I remember what I was told. In the midst of this massive roadway stands an obelisk and a flag pole flying the Argentine flag. The flag and obelisk are in the middle of a massive traffic circle. It is neat to see.

Today is my mother’s birthday, so I called her to wish her feliz compleanos, (happy birthday). She answered the phone, and I said my birthday tidings to her, and she replied “wrong numero”, I said no, feliz compleanos, she said that I had the wrong number again. At this point, I gave up on trying to surprise her, and said “No mom, I have the right number, you don’t recognize your own son’s voice?” We both had a good laugh and had a nice chat. She said she never thought that she would get a call on her birthday from Argentina.

After completing my work in Argentina today, I had to check on a project in Arizona that I have been tracking while down here. Worked through its issues with the surreal experience that I was in South America working in North America. I have worked in other countries on other continents while in North America, but never the reverse. This proves how small a world it is.

When I finished with my work, I followed through on one promise to myself that I made before coming to the southern hemisphere for the second time. I would see the coriolis effect for myself. For those that don’t know what this is, when you are in the northern hemispehere water drains from a tub in a right rotational pattern. The little water tornado you see in a draining bath tub. In the southern hemisphere, the spin drains to the left. If I can figure out how to post the video on this site so you can see it. I filled the tub with a couple inches of water and floated a bottle cap on the surface of the water and pulled the drain plug. Sure enough the water spiraled to the left. You can see the bottle cap circle the drain to the left before it is pulled under by the vortex. The other promise I made was to see the southern cross, (navigational star like the North star in the big dipper) but the buildings are too tall, and the lights of the city far to bright to see it. I will have to make another trip to the southern hemisphere to see it.

I had dinner with royalty tonight. The Boca soccer club is staying at my hotel. I was able to speak shortly with them, and met number 9, 10, and 1. Here is one of them that I could find on the web. He is number 9: http://es.footbo.com/Players/Martin_Palermo.
The people kept streaming by my table to have photos taken with these guys. The neat thing is that one of the people I have been working with is a huge Boca fan. I will enjoy telling him about this experience. The players were very gracious to their fans. When there was a lull in the attention, I got up and asked if they were part of the Boca club, and asked for there numbers. There were interested in an American that knew anything about football. I wished them luck, and let them enjoy the rest of their evening.

A part of me is sad to go home tomorrow, but the rest of me is ready to see my family again. I need to get back into the flow of training. I have averaged about ten hours a day in work down here off the top of my head. I am due for some sleep and need to get back on track with my training. I have managed to get in some walks, but nothing near the schedule I keep at home. I was sent down here to work, so that needed to be my focus. I feel that I have covered that responsibility, but have had to sacrifice my training to do that. I guess that was the necessary priority this week, but I have a feeling, I am going to suffer on Saturday’s brick workout.

I hope you have enjoyed these Argentina updates as much as I have enjoyed living the experience. Three continents down, four to go. I need to get to Asia, Africa, Antarctica (my current southern neighbor), and Europe. On the topic of Antarctica, it is really odd to see it on the map when you fly down to Argentina it suddenly pops up on the map and you realize how far south you have come.

Viva la Argentina!

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Argentina Dia Tres

Day three and more meetings to attend for the project. Today I met with the low voltage cable vendor. Antonio is the largest Argentinean I have met. He is my size and is of Itallian decent. He was a gracious host and we had a very productive meeting at his office, and then we went to lunch.

Lunch again was an amazing event. These people work hard, and they enjoy their food. It was Chorizo sausage, Morcilla (More sea sha phonetically) sausage, Pancetta, Cheese, bread, salad, steak, and I had dolce delache ice cream for dessert. Let me tell you that dolce delache is in a word AWESOME!

We were joined by Antonio’s son, and two other employees. We had fun laughing and trading phrases. I would have to explain the words may, might, some other off color words. They would then return the favor and we would laugh and the next topic would come up without anyone having to work to find items to discuss. I think that when I could not find a document in my file that I was looking for I have provided Antonio with a new favorite saying. I stated that I was organized like a soup sandwich. Antonio burst out laughing and said I will translate that into Spanish and use it for sure.

I have now seen Casa de Rosado – “The Pink House”. It is the Presidential Residence for Argentina. Impressive!



My Chiropractic Angel Leslie told me that I would love Argentina. She was right. Leslie grew up here, and I now understand why she is the way she is. It seems that all Argentineans are genuine and very giving. I have not had a bad experience here. The work days have been long, but they have been so much fun. I am very lucky to have had this opportunity.

Monday, May 18, 2009

Argentina Dia Dos

My first day of business in Argentina was one filled with new experiences.

I am so grateful to not have to drive down here. I don't know if I would have the courage to get behind the wheel of a car. It is a very chaotic road system. Lanes are created at will it seems. At one point today, I looked from my back seat residence to my right and I am facing the driver of an opposing automobile. Both cars were trying to occupy the same space we were about one foot apart before the other driver moved away again, much to my relief. I have learned that it is better to not pay attention to the cars and look at the skyline or the floor.

I had a very productive visit to the new space we are building out. It is about four times as large as the space currently occupied. It will be a very nice office when it is complete. I will be proud to have played my small part in its creation.

The people in Argentina are amazingly patient with my broken Spanish. I am able to ask for what I want, but do not always understand the response in what it costs. I actually overpaid by $10 pesos today, and the cashier was kind enough to give back my funds and repeat the cost in English. We both had a good laugh at my mistake. It cost $4.20 pesos for a bottle of water in a gas station while the hotel charges $25.40 pesos. It was worth the walk.

I had lunch with two of my contacts this afternoon. We were on the Rio La Platta. I learned that this is the widest river in the world. It separates Argentina from Uruguay. It is about 30 miles shore to shore at its widest point. The lunch was amazing. I was asked what I wanted to eat. I replied that I wanted a meal that was distinctly Argentinean. I was told then we will eat meat. We went to a restaurant where we were served carne empanada y queso frito. It was delicious! Next we went to the anti pasta bar and had more queso and vegetables and bread and seafood. After this they started to bring the carne (meat). They brought different cuts of beef, pork, and chicken. About every 10 minutes there was something new to try. There was good conversation and it was very relaxing. I now understand why Latin Americans eat dinner so late. The lunches are huge.

Before dinner, I went for a walk on my own. I bought some cerveza (beer) at a local tienda (store). They were very polite, and asked me where I was from. I stated Minnesota, USA. They very tentatively in English said “Barack Obama, yes.” I said “Si, el Presidente United States.” We had a short conversation in broken English and Spanish, it was enjoyable and fun.

I met my new friend Franz for dinner at about 20:00. We both had difficulty this morning finding our drivers. His interpreter actually approached me and asked in German if I was him. I happened to see Franz and waived him over and introduced him to his driver and Spanish interpreter. I had to wait another hour to make contact with my driver. My driver was calling my room while I was waiting in the lobby. Franz and I had another evening of laughter and conversation.

It is almost 23:00 here. I am tired, but have good memories of the day. Dormir beckons! I will slumber well and will write more tomorrow.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

Argentina Dia uno part dos

Okay, maybe that is more Spanglish than Spanish.

I took a nap. I needed to figure out how to operate my room lights. Apparently you need to insert your room key into the fuse panel by the door to operate your room lights. I blew up my white noise machine even with my power converter, (this will make sleep interesting this week).

Dinner was good. I had Jamon y queso empinadas. They were quite tasty!!! I overheard a request for Jager Meister Ice Cold. I later struck up a conversation with the gentleman that had made this request. Sie sind nach Deutschland I asked, and he replied Ja ich bin von Cologne. His name was Franz, and we had a nice discussion on world travel, and politics. Franz is in wind energy, and travels all over the world. It was a nice evening having light conversation in German and English.

Later Franz and I were joined by Boris when he heard us speaking in German. Boris is in Argentina to provide training for his pharmaceutical company.

It is funny, that I came all the way to Argentina to use my five years of German study. It is even stranger that I was a polyglot this evening. Polyglot: A person having a speaking, reading, or writing knowledge of several languages. I don't speak English well, but I was able to order my dinner in Spanish, Strike up a conversation in Duetsch, and thankfully both Franz and Boris are well versed in English. It made for a fun and engaging evening of conversation.

We will see what tomorrow brings. Hasta maƱana. Necesito dormir esta noche.

Argentina Day 1

Well, I arrived safely! It was an interesting ride from Minneapolis to Chicago, Chicago to Dulles Washington D.C. Would have just missed my flight out of D.C. if not for weather holding all outbound flights as it did all in bound ones. Got headed to Buenos Aires about an hour later than scheduled, but that is okay as I was able to make the flight!!!!

My entrance through customs was smooth. Swine flu is a concern down here and the Ministry of Health required the entire plane to wear masks. Talking with an American Expatriate, he stated that it is more of a public relations move to make the people feel safe. Basically you wear the mask down the hall way to immigration and they look at you and say "you look healthy, please take your mask off and welcome to Argentina."

Went down to baggage claim and got my suitcase after a short wait. Went out of baggage claim and met my driver. Between my poor broken Spanish and his basic English, we were able to have an enjoyable conversation about sports and the weather.

I was amazed to see bicycles on the roads equivilant to our interstate system in America. I asked if the police ever kicked the cyclists off the interstates. No, was the response. Nice flat roads with wide shoulders. Could be an interesting place to ride as you could probably crank up some good speed. I don't know if I would be that comfortable with the traffic zooming by that fast though.

I am going to grab a nap and start prepping for my meetings tomorrow. Hasta Luego.

Thursday, May 14, 2009

Taking Training International

Sorry that I have not posted recently. I have been pushing hard at work. My contract is wrapping up and I am trying to leave them in as good a position as I can before I have to take a 60 day hiatus. For those that don't know there is a law on the Federal books that says you can only contract for 24 months in a row at a company, then you have to leave for 60 days.

Strangely, I am not worried about this break. I have really enjoyed my experience contracting at this job. I am still hopeful that one day they will extend me an opportunity to become an employee.

The cool thing is that one of my last projects before my break is an office in Buenos Aires, Argentina. I leave for Argentina on Saturday May 16, 2009. I will continue to train while out of the country. The hotel I am staying at has a gym and a pool, so there will be no resting on my laurels. I hope to fit in all three of my scheduled workouts while there.

I will have to miss a TEAM BRICK workout, (Bike Run ICK). I will be doing this workout in the morning before I go to airport on my own. 25 mile ride and a 2 mile run. Sounds sick I know but I am starting to like doing both activities. Who knows maybe it will help me sleep some on the 10.5 hour trip from Washington D.C. to Buenos Aires.

I plan on posting while I am in Argentina. Hopefully, I can put a few pictures out here from the trip.

Friday, May 1, 2009

Things Change For A Reason

Today was a good day. Today was a challenge. Today was a chance to see how far things have changed in the last two years.

I went to a farewell party for the Help Desk where I used to work. Unfortunately most of these folks that I used to work with were let go from their jobs. These are all good people that lost their jobs because of "cost savings". Fortunately, they all seem happy! Really fortunately most have found new employment!!

I worked with most of these people for 16 years. I am very happy for them! I miss associating with them on a daily basis.

with the weakness of our current economy, I am thrilled that things at this party were so upbeat. Things change for a reason. Most of us invest ourselves in our jobs. This is a good thing. It means that we are committed to the success of the company we work for. The bad thing is that most of us define ourselves only by our jobs. We don't need to! We are all unique. We all posses gifts and talents. We need to release our gifts and talents upon the world.

For me, I used to define myself only by my job. I luckily found an organization that allowed me to expand the definition of myself beyond what I did for a living. Without the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, I would probably still only define myself by my job. I am more than what I do to put food on the table and pay the mortgage now. I am not superior to anyone, I am just an individual amongst the throng of humanity. I do not diminish myself with that last sentence, but define myself in more totality. I can work to feed and shelter my family, but I can also grow in my humanity by striking down a disease that affects all of us in one form or another with your help.

I was invigorated today when some of these people that I worked with for so long did not recognize me. 60 pounds gone from my frame and no hair could have contributed to that lack of recognition. But in reality, I hope that most of them did not recognize me initially on the fact that they have never seen me so happy.

I was not happy with who I was when I worked with them. I needed to change to grow. I needed to leave my comfort zone to change. I needed to learn that change while frightening is not always negative. Things change for a reason, sometimes beyond our comprehension. Roll with the waves of change. Don't always be resistant to change. I am learning that our greatest experiences can come with change. In retrospect, our greatest pain can come from resisting change as well. Things change for a reason embrace it and move forward.