It began to rain right as I was leaving for work, and I thought, eh, just a little bit of rain, not a big deal. Rolled up my pants, put on a rain poncho, and headed out in flip flops thinking it was better than getting my tennis shoes soaked.
Oh, how wrong I was...
About halfway there, I came across an intersection that was completely flooded on both sides, creating two rivers that had a swifter current than the Tuolumne River during the summertime.
A river, how refreshing! Wade across, cool off your feet.....
No. No no no no no.
Two reasons why wading across is a horrible idea:
1. Tomorrow is garbage day, so everyone put out their garbage on the street today to be picked up tomorrow. But since there are no city trash cans, garbage is either put into sacks or heaped into piles on the curb. That means that everyone's rotten food and bathroom waste is floating in that river....
2. You don't need to guess where all the horse and dog poop is.
Yeah, I was not about to wade across a river of poop and garbage in flip flops. I've done gross things before, but this would be taking things to a whole new level of gross that I did NOT want to explore.
I couldn't jump across either for several reasons: it was too wide, I have really short legs, and if I slip and fell, I would probably just stand there in the middle of the street, screaming, and everyone in the neighborhood will think I am crazy.
My solution was to find the narrowest part of the river, jump onto the sidewalk, and shimmy across until I found another narrow section to jump across. However, the sidewalk was completely blocked by a table, because the family who lives there uses the front of their house to sell food. So I had to ninja crawl along the four inches of curb while holding onto this protruding table, as some people nearby watched me in fascination.
I got across the first river, but the second river was even more difficult. I walked up and down the street looking for the narrowest point to jump across, which didn't exist. As I was doing this, I saw a little girl doing the same ninja crawl as I was doing, holding onto a wall for dear life as she shimmied across the curb. We made eye contact and laughed at each other, realizing how silly the whole situation was.
For a moment, I considered braving it and walking straight across the river to get to work, but thankfully my voice of reason told me it was a disgusting idea and I'd probably get some funky foot infection from doing so.
Abort mission!
I laughed as I walked back home, passing by the same people who watched me struggle to cross the river. After I shimmied across the same sidewalk again, the same people who were watching me the first time told me, "Adios! Que lo vayas bien!"
I called Ingrid and told her I wasn't able to walk to work, and she told me, "Si, si, tranquila Lauren!"
People here understand the struggle.
When I got home, the door was locked....oh no. Paulino and Doña Chilo, my host parents, must have left for work right after I did.
The rain started to pour even harder, and water cascaded down the roof, creating a mini waterfall in front of me. I knocked again, but nobody answered.
Just as I was debating between waiting for someone to come home or taking a taxi to the city center and waiting at a coffee shop (which didn't sound like a bad idea at all), Paulino opened the door. Gracias a Dios!
Hmmm, maybe a pair of rain boots wouldn't be such a bad investment....
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