2500 Meters Closer to the Stars

Hellooooooooo,

 So this email is long overdue and just long.  Consider yourself warned.

 I arrived in Bogotá two weeks ago.  My flight and arrival at my hotel were uneventful.  There are mountains all around the city.  It doesn't really look like the city is really high, but it is.  The city slogan is something like, "2500 meters closer to the stars."  Cute.  I can really notice the altitude when I climb stairs.  Man, I feel like the most out of shape person ever!!  I get to the top of two consecutive flights of stairs, and I'm huffing and puffing like the big bad wolf. 

 My first day at the base, the guys took me to lunch and to go shopping at what was basically a Colombian flea market.  One of the guys wanted to buy a camera, and all the electronics are much cheaper there than the mall.  The market itself is like a labyrinth of booths selling everything from pirated DVDs, to video games consoles (anybody want a Wii Fit?  They're in long supply), to shampoo, to blenders, to baby supplies.  Seriously, you could find anything you ever wanted there for cheap.  DVDs were selling for $2500 pesos (That's like $1.25USD).  Yeah… pretty ridiculous if you ask me.  The funniest part was how the vendors dealt with each other.  My friend was buying some music CDs, and if the particular vendor didn't have the one he wanted, they would run over to one of the other CD vendors and buy the CD from the other vendor to sell to my friend.  I thought it was pretty comical- anything to make a sale.  My first meal outside of the hotel was a typical Colombian specialty- Broasted Chicken.  I'm amazed at how much this country likes their fried chicken.  There's basically a friend chicken restaurant every other street corner.  It was too funny how this chicken was served.  They brought us baskets of the greasy goodness with food service gloves.  The gloves were for us, not the waiters.  You were supposed to eat with the oversized, thin plastic gloves on your hands to keep from getting greasy.  It's not a bad system, except when trying to pick up my plastic cup of Coca Cola Light.  The combination of greasy plastic on plastic resulted in slippery situation.  I resorted to the two-hand, I-feel-like-I'm-three-years-old method. 

 So that first day at the base was a Tuesday.  I found out that day that I would be going on a job on Wednesday.  Welcome to Colombia!  Jobs here are WAY different than in Brazil.  Instead of a quick one-hour helicopter ride to the rig, here we had to drive eight hours in a truck.  We spent all of Wednesday afternoon in the truck: David (the job supervisor), Dagoberto (the driver), and me.  I listened to more hours of Colombian salsa music than I care to count.  Apparently that's all the rural radio likes to play.  It was really beautiful driving along the windy road, through the Andes Mountains.  We had lunch at a little mountain restaurant.  I ate things that I can't name or tell you what they were.  As my friend Bruno says whenever I ask what a particular food in Brazil is, "Just shut-up and eat."  It's a good motto when trying to eat food in a different culture.  After about 3 hours in the mountains, we came out of a tunnel and descended into Los Llanos (that means "the flats/the plains" in Spanish).  The mountains just abruptly stopped and we were suddenly in the South American equivalent of Iowa (minus the corn fields).  Flat, flat, flat.  We drove past a farm growing a plant I didn't recognize.  I asked David what it was, and he told me they were cocaine plants.  I didn't believe him… what a jokester.  He thought he could get me on an American stereotype, but I'm too clever for that. J  Part of the reason we were in the truck for so many hours was because the quality of the roads wasn't exactly ideal (largest exaggeration of 2008).  I would say that about a third of the eight hours were spend on poor dirt roads.  It makes sleeping difficult when the truck is bouncing up and down, and side-to-side.

 We got to the well, and found out that we would be sleeping at a campsite down the road until they needed us at the rig.  Basically, I was sleeping in a trailer that was just big enough for a bunk bed, sometimes didn't have toilet paper, smelled moldy, and had no TV or Internet access.  I guess sometimes we have to sleep in the truck on jobs, or at hotels over an hour away from the well site, so I shouldn't complain.  To get to the campground, we had to drive through a slum, which made my crummy living conditions seem luxurious.  The national police had soldiers there, so there was no real danger; but it was really sad to see the conditions in which these people live.  They were wood structures, wrapped in blue tarps for walls.  They didn't have beds, just hammocks.  They make their living selling food and drinks to the rig staff when they're not working.  It's really hard when you compare the wealth of the oil industry (even with the recession) compared to the bare poverty of these people. 

 At meals, I was stared at ALL the time!!  I thought I drew a lot of attention in Brazil.  Whoops.. I was mistaken.  In Brazil, it was more likely based on my appearance that I was Brazilian.  Here, there's no chance really that I'm Colombian.  At any meal, the whole room full of guys would unashamedly just stare at me.  In my head, there's an acceptable amount of time to look at someone without it being really weird, but these guys weren't familiar with my mental standards for their stares.  Even if I looked back, they wouldn't stop looking.  It almost made me uncomfortable.  There was one guy who was convinced that we would make a great couple.  He barely made it to my shoulder, didn't speak English, and told me that he "liked big girls."  I think that was supposed to make me like him back.  Not even close.  He proposed marriage to me on the drill floor.  I tell people that I have a boyfriend when I'm on jobs to try to diminish the amount of attention I do get.  This persistent guy wasn't swayed in his determination.  He informed me that Brazil (the location of my fake boyfriend) was really far away, and that I was in Colombia now and needed a Colombian husband.

 After the job was over, we drove to the nearest town (1.5 hours away), called Puerto Gaitan (population 1000).  We stayed there for a couple days waiting to see if we needed to go directly to another well before heading back to Bogotá.  The hotel we stayed at was one of the nicest in the town, but had no restaurant or running hot water.  David and I were there with other guys from Schlumberger from another segment.  They started drinking beers at 10am.  Apparently that's the thing to do if you're not working.  I stuck to "La Colombiana," a tasty soft drink (gaseosa, if you will).  We had lunch at a restaurant with a dirt floor and thatch roof.  We ate "carne al llanero," which is meat that is slow-cooked on a stake in a circle around an open fire.  It's only found in that region, I guess.  It was smoky and tasty, and I would eat it again.  After lunch, we headed down to the docks on the river.  There, the guys drank more beers, and took turns asking me to dance.  There was typical Colombian music playing, and they were impressed with my salsa skills. 

 It turned out that we didn't need to go to another well, so we headed back towards Bogotá.  At the point when we were heading up the hill to enter the tunnel that entered the Andes Mountains, the clutch on the truck stopped working.  It was literally 100 yards before we entered a three-mile long tunnel.  Thank goodness that it happened before we entered the tunnel.  We pulled over to the side of the road, and the national police guys told us to head back down to the town at the bottom of the hill and get the problem fixed.  We had to push the car to turn it around, and then coast for 2 miles down the hill until we reached the conveniently located car dealership.  Really, we lucked out.  It took a couple hours to get the part we needed and to get it fixed, but we were back on the road soon enough.  On the way home, we stopped at the geographical center of Colombia.  It was nifty.  There was an obelisk and a small pyramid of sorts.  I don't know why they had Egyptian landmarks, but it made a nice photo opportunity. 

 Since I got back from the job, I've been impressed with the spirit of the Colombian people.  They are really into Christmas.  There are Christmas lights on almost every building from banks to apartment high-rises, to even the houses in the slums.  I think it speaks a lot to their hope and love when people with barely anything spend time and money on Christmas lights to decorate their homes.  The lights are the biggest thing that makes me feel like Christmas is actually here, so I really appreciate them.  They celebrate the Novena here.  It's the nine days before Christmas.  Everyday at work, in the morning, they sing Christmas songs (that I don't know), and there is free traditional Colombian food.  It's like a Christmas party every day, and I love it. 

 I'm also impressed by how many malls they have here.  So far, I've seen five.  These Bogotá residents like their shopping! 

 I'm coming back to the USA in January.  I'll be back Jan 6-18.  I'm coming back for a review with Schlumberger in Houston at the end of that time, and I'll be in Grand Rapids, MI and NYC.  When I finalize my plans, I'll let you know more.  If anyone wants to hang out in NYC with me on the weekend of Jan 9-11, you're invited!!

 Well… congrats if you made it to the end.  You're a trooper!!

 Love,

Happy Turkey Day

Happy Thanksgiving,

 

I'm still on the rig as of this morning.  I may get a flight back to shore today, depending on the weather.  It really doesn't feel like a holiday- there's no unwanted snow falling, no real football on TV, no pumpkin pie.  And everyone knows that those are the things that make Thanksgiving the great American holiday that it is.  Haha.  Well, we'll see what they serve for lunch and dinner today.  Maybe we four Americans on the rig will get lucky, and the cafeteria will serve up some turkey and mashed potatoes with gravy.  I'm crossing my fingers. 

 

Anyway, I wanted to include ya'll in my reflections on some of the things that I'm thankful for. 

• My relationship with God who loves me and pursues me and never lets go of me
• My family who has been through lots of stuff and still loves God and loves each other in authentic relationships
• My friends that are like family to me- loving me, praying for me, asking the hard questions and not letting me take the easy way out
• The ridiculous amounts of grace that I've been shown by God, family, and friends
• My job that has been a blessing in getting to travel, experience different cultures and people, and being stretched in my limits of what I thought I could do
• My safety working in a foreign country, and in a working environment filled with high-risk activities
• The opportunity to go to Colombia and experience a new culture, meet more of God's loved creations, and trust him that I have a purpose there
• My health and ability to run, exercise, and do active things I enjoy
• Financial security and the ability to bless others with what I've been blessed with
• New Life Church in Ann Arbor, MI and community there that changed my life and continues to change it, a continent away
• Being able to see the sunrise and sunset in the same day from a rig, and experience the power and beauty of creation
• The moments each day that are completely priceless
• Belly laughs with friends
• An email list of friends and family who actually care how I'm doing and look forward to my emails :)

Well, thanks for reading this.  I hope you all have an opportunity to reflect on some of the things you're thankful for today.  I hope that most of you are with family, and appreciate what a true blessing that is. 

 

Missing home today,

Everything is more complicated offshore

Hey everyone,

 

I'm still offshore.  At the moment, we're waiting for the sea conditions to improve to continue with the operation.  The forecast is for things to get better by Tuesday.  Today is Sunday.  Ho hum... that means lots of time to hang around the rig.  I slept all day yesterday, thinking that we were going to be working this morning at 4am.  When the sea conditions worsened, it meant that we weren't going to be working this morning and that I could sleep all night.  Oh darn!!  It's rather difficult to sleep when you're completely well rested.

 

I decided to go use the gym to use up some energy and be able to sleep through the night.  I started running on the treadmill, and it was, by far, the most interesting treadmill experience I have ever had.  Running on a treadmill is normally a simple thing- you just run forward.  There's no incline unless you program it; there are no bumps or cracks in the sidewalk, no puddles to jump over or avoid.  Very basic.  Anyway, this is the mentality of someone who's never run on a treadmill on a floating rig with poor sea conditions.  I started running at my normal pace, but despite the fact that the velocity of the treadmill never changed, I was running all over the place.  Because of the action of the waves and the rocking of the rig, I was running in circles and running forward at the same time.  Sometimes I would be almost falling off the back of the treadmill, encroaching on the front, or side-stepping to keep from catching my foot on the edge of tread and stationary frame.  If you tracked my actual position on the treadmill, I'm pretty sure it would look like something a drunk person created with a Spirograph (toy from my childhood... look it up on Wikipedia if you've never played with one).  I thought the whole experience was really funny, and I was really glad I was in there by myself for the majority of my run.

 

Well, that's all for now.  I'm heading off to the Sunday churrasco lunch, complete with non-alcoholic beer.  Later it's the big game (soccer of course) on TV and watching movies on my computer.  Maybe I'll head up to the gym again this afternoon :)

 

Love,

Random topics from a girl who should be sleeping

Hey Fine People,

 

I´m offshore again.  I have more responsibilities this time, and I´m enjoying it.  It´s been ridiculously hot the past couple days.  It´s actually the humidity that´s killing me.  I stepped outside this morning at 6am and I was instantly sweating the kind of sweat that doesn´t dry... ever.  Our operation started this morning, and I´m going to supervise the middle part.  That means that I´m supposed to be resting right now while the other guys are up there working.  The problem is that I´ve already slept all that I can sleep.  It´s rather sad- I know that I´ll have to be awake and alert for hours upon hours later (all night), but there are only so many hours you can sleep when you´re already well-rested.  It´s like I have a sleep cup that I can fill up, but then any extra just overflows and doesn´t get saved.  I wish I had a sleep bank, where I could just keep making deposits and watch the savings grow... with interest.  :) 

 

There are a couple American and Canadian guys that work here on the rig.  It´s pretty cool to speak some of my native tongue with other natives.  Oh, funny story: On this rig, we have little, cloth booties (in Portuguese they´re pantufas=slippers) that we put on over our dirty boots when we come into the living quarters of the rig from outside in the working area.  They help the inside stay nice and clean and hospitable.  You have to take them off and keep them in your pocket when you go back outside.  One of the guys that I´m offshore with, Edivaldo (ed-jee-VAL-do), forgot to take his booties off and walked all over the rig yesterday before someone told him about it.  Okay... maybe it´s more of a "you had to be there" kind of story, but now we´re calling him Ed "Pantufas" (EDGE-pan-TOO-fuss).  And I think it´s really funny (I´m laughing out loud to myself again, alone in the Technicians Office).  I´m glad my nickname isn´t Jessica "Slippers."

 

So I wanted to elaborate on the PS of my last email (for those of you who made it all the way to the bottom- like I made it to the bottom of The Peak).  I´m not sure if I have mentioned it before, but my Brazilian visa expires in December.  At that point, I won´t legally be able to work in Brazil anymore.  I have to leave the country for three months, and then I can apply for a new work visa.  The visa renewal process will take six to eight weeks after I apply for it.  I was waiting for a while to figure out where my bosses were going to send me for the four to five months that I can´t work in Brazil.  The final decision is Bogotá, Colombia.  I´ll probably be leaving for Colombia in mid-December.  If anyone wants to come down to South America for Christmas, I´d be happy to have guests!

 

At first I was pretty nervous about the decision.  All you ever hear in the US about Colombia is related to drug trafficking and kidnappings.  I´ve spoken with various friends who have been there, and they have decent things to say about it.  Apparently it´s become a lot better than it used to be in the 90´s.  Hopefully it will be as good as they say it is.  It will be a much cooler climate, because the city is in the mountains.  I´m sad to think about leaving all my friends here in Brazil.  I think I´ll be coming back for a couple months in Brazil, but to be honest, I´m not totally sure.  It will depend on how soon the guys want me back in Houston, TX. 

 

So, I´m going to go eat dinner now and then try to sleep again.  Maybe I´ll just lay in the dark with my eyes closed for hours.  Sounds like fun!!!  See you there!  Hahaha... anyway, I apologize for the rambling nature of this email. 

 

Love ya´ll,

The Peak

Hey Everyone,

I realize that it has been forever and half since I wrote last. A lot has been happening, and I will try to fill you in on the important stuff.

I was back in the US for a week in October, because my paternal grandmother passed away. She had been sick with liver cancer for a couple months, so we all knew it was going to happen, but that didn't make it any less sad when it actually did come to pass. I found out on a Saturday morning that she was gone after I had slept for just two hours in the past twenty-four. I called my parents and my boss, bought a plane ticket, packed in hurry, and flew back to the US that same evening. When I arrived in the airport in Grand Rapids twenty-two hours after I left Macaé, my luggage didn't. I was jet-lagged, sleep deprived, and grieving, and I almost lost it in the airport. I ended up getting my bag back that evening, so it was okay. My family went over to Milwaukee, WI for the funeral. The circumstances were really sad, but it was really good to be with my family (immediate and extended).

Three weekends ago, I went to Niterói, the city across the Guandabara Bay from Rio de Janeiro and hometown to my good friend, Bruno. After months of invitations, I finally went to visit him and his girlfriend, Louise. I stayed at her house, and they took me on a "passeo turístico" or tourist circuit. It was really fun. We went to to Pão de Azucar (Sugarloaf Mountain) on Saturday morning. It was pretty hazy up around the top of the mountain as we drove over the bridge over the Bay, connecting Niterói to Rio. I rolled the windows of the car down and did my best to blow the clouds away. We arrived at Sugerloaf and decided to pay the fare to go up to the top in spite of the haze. I'm not sure if it was my amazing lung power or some good luck, but as we got to the top of the cable car ride, the clouds had cleared enough to enjoy the beautiful views of the city- from sandy-white beaches, to green mountains, to the pockets of towering, white buildings, with the Christ statue looking down over everything. It was amazing that right when we decided to head back down, the clouds swooped down and completed covered the mountaintop in fog again. It was all in all, perfect timing.

We drove along the famous beaches of Copacabana and Ipanema,had a late lunch at a great restaurant in Ipanema called Gula Gula (pronounced GOO-la GOO-la- which is fun to say, I don't care who you are), and headed back across the bridge to Niterói for naps, showers, and went out for frozen margaritas in the evening. It was fun to hang out with their friends, and I had the best nachos I've had yet in Brazil. They were regular tortilla chips instead of nacho flavored Doritos!! I don't know how some many people can mess up something as basic as nachos, but they manage to do a great job of it.

Sunday, after lunch, we went to a beach in Niterói to hike the mountain/hill (henceforth referred to as The Peak because if it's precipitous nature) that rises above the beach. I somehow missed the memo to bring along appropriate gear for a HIKE. I was dressed in a jeans skirt, white halter top, and cute little tennis shoes that weren't made for anything more athletic than normal walking. I decided that I was up for a challenge, and that we should do the hike anyway. The first part was fine. It was through the woods, along a trail that was pretty well defined. The problem came when we hit the tree line. I came face to face with the face of The Peak. I started climbing up. I leaned forward slightly climb with my feet and hands (it was a pretty steep angle). As I started my ascent, all I could seem to think (or talk) about was, "How the heck am I going to climb down this thing?!?" Climbing up was somewhat of a perilous task, but at least on the way up, gravity was working to keep my velocity steady. I kept picturing myself slipping on the way down and rolling, out of control, down The Peak, occasionally hitting a cactus and changing direction.

At one particularly difficult patch of rock, I really freaked out. I "sat down" on the slope and debated continuing up or turning around. The view was already pretty cool, and I really value my life. Haha. Bruno was telling me that the worst was already over, and that I was going to have to go down the hard part anyway, so I might as well keep going to the top. During my period of mental turmoil, I saw a group of people walking down. They were not freaking out at all. It was rather embarrassing. They were dressing in swimsuits and flip-flops. At that point, Bruno promised that if I didn't make it to the top, he would make fun of me for the rest of my life. Louise told him to be nicer and agreed to let me use her tennis shoes. The combination of the new-shoes-instilled confidence and desire to maintain my dignity encouraged me to keep climbing. Five minutes after I decided to keep climbing, we saw a guy with his little dog climbing down. I got made fun of again because the little dog had no problem on the hike.

I did indeed make it to the top. The view was great, and I felt quite proud of myself. We started to head back down with enough time to be down before the sun set completely. I took my time climbing down. I pretended I was skiing and cut back and forth along the diagonal whenever possible and scooted down on my bottom when necessary. The satisfaction resulting from making it to the top was eclipsed by my joy resulting from reaching the bottom. I conquered The Peak!! Maybe that's a little messed up, but that's okay with me. I never claimed to be normal. Haha.

Anyway, this has become a really long email. Bruno is still telling the story to everyone who will listen and laugh at me. I'm heading offshore this afternoon. I'll give you more info soon.

Love,

Jessica

PS. I'm moving to Bogota, Colombia in December because of my expiring Brazilian visa.

Back onshore and using my new oven

Hey everyone,

 

First of all, I meant to tell you all that I eventually did get off the rig on September 19th.  My flight was delayed by three days, but eventually the weather cooperated and the helicopters met the maintenance checks at the same time- allowing us to leave.  There was a mini going away party for us in the briefing room where we waited for the helicopter.  It was sad to leave, but 24 days was enough time.  I was glad to get back to land, the ability to walk for more than 3 minutes in one direction before changing direction to avoid falling in the ocean, socks with no numbers on them, a selection of clothes larger than three t-shirts, make-up, and jewelry.  Since then, I've been keeping in touch with a bunch of guys from the rig- from the roustabouts (low man on the totem pole) to the tool pusher (big boss).  So far, I've turned down all the proposals to date them or any of their family members.  (You can laugh, but I've had at least five offers, and it's rather ridiculous.) 

 

When I got back, my boss gave me four days off.  Woot woot!  As an international employee, I'm not supposed to get days off.  I think my boss had pity on me, and decided to bend the rules a little to help maintain my sanity.  I spent 3 of the four days at the base anyway, doing stuff on my computer that I don't have time to do when I'm in the workshop all day long.  All the guys gave me a hard time for being at the base, but a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do.  It wasn't enough time to come home for two days, and I don't have people to travel with when all my friends are working.  I could sit at home by myself, but being the extreme extrovert that I am, I preferred to be where I could interact with other humans.

 

I like making guacamole.  Random, I know.  I wouldn't say that I'm the most domestic person I know (massive understatement), but there are certain food items that I really enjoy making (and eating).  Guacamole is one of them.  Anyway, I was at the grocery store with Gabi and Bruno and I was perusing the produce section.  I was thinking about making guac this week, so I wanted to make sure all the ingredients were available for purchase at our semi-sub-par grocery store.  I didn't see any avocados, so I asked Bruno if he saw any.  He pointed me to a vegetable that was at least twice the size of any avocado I had ever seen.  When I expressed that I thought it was really big, he looked surprised and said that he thought they were rather small.  Snap!!  Brazilian avocados are gargantuan!

 

I went downtown with Gabi last weekend.  The shops there are only open during the weekdays and on Saturday morning.  Of course we work on the weekdays, and if we don't work on Saturday, it's rather depressing to wake up early to catch a bus downtown to run errands.  Anyway, Saturday, Gabi and I gathered our motivation to wake up and tackle some things we needed to get done.  We made purchases for our apartment, but they almost didnt happen on account of our multiple stops in clothing and shoe stores.  Gabi loves shopping, so do I occasionally, and the dollar is doing really well compared to the Real at the moment... all in all, a dangerous combination.  The most notable purchase was a mini oven.  Yes... an oven!!!  It's extremely exciting.  We christened the appliance with a frozen pizza, and it was delicious and convenient. 

 

The only other thing to note was the party I went to two weekends ago.  It was a country party, meaning everyone went dressed up like a country person.  Country people are different in Brazil than in the US.  Apparently, all the girls wear frilly mini-skirts in awful, ugly prints and bright colors and matching shirts with puffed, short sleeves.  I didn't have a ridiculous costume, and for this, I felt slightly ridiculous and conspicuous at the party.  It was like halloween, only everyone decided to go as the same thing.  It was pretty funny.

 

Well.. that's all for now.  I'll continue the stories of my life later.

--
Jessica Schulte


jessica.j.schulte@gmail.com

jessica-jordan.blogspot.com
picasaweb.google.com/Jessica.J.Schulte

+55 22 2763 5301 (office)
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Rua Paulo Sérgio C Vasconcelos, 424,
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Macaé - Rio de Janeiro - Brazil

"Oh Lord, You are the God of the early mornings, the God of the late nights, the God of the mountain peaks, and the God of the sea.  But, my God, my soul has horizons further away than the nights of earth, higher peaks than any mountain peaks, greater depths than any sea in nature.  You who are the God of all of these, be my God.  I cannot reach to the heights or to the depths; there are motives I cannot discover, dreams I cannot realize.  My God, search me."  -Psalm 139 paraphrased by Oswald Chambers

Operations and fashion failures

Hey folks,

 

I´m writing again from the rig.  I´m still here- 15 days and going strong.  It´s eight o´clock, and I´ve been up since 2am, after going to sleep at 11pm.  We´re waiting to start the second part of job.  I´ll probably be awake for another 12 hours at least.  We´ll see.  If there´s one thing I´ve learned (actually I´ve been learning tons), it´s that everything takes forever.. much longer than you think it should. 

 

The first part of our job went really well.  We connected our tool to the string of pipes going into the oil well, but then we have to stay there and watch while they run enough drill pipe (generic pipe that the rig has tons of), to get to the correct depth for us to operate our tool.  We had to get to almost 5000 meters (about 3 miles).  Vagner (my coworker) and I took turns sitting in the driller´s cabin while they lowered 180 stands (90 feet each) of drill pipe at about 10 minutes per stand.  The challenge was not the actual job, but staying awake during the boring, repetitive-ness.

 

Toward the end of the drill pipe fun, we had fluid flowing back out the top of the pipe as we were lowering the pipe into the well.  It was more than normal, and the wind was pretty strong.  It ended up blowing the fluid all over the place and making the whole rig dirty.  The poor guys working on the rig floor were covered in the stuff.  The craziest part was when the wind changed direction, and the fluid started covering the windows of the driller´s cabin.  It looked like the windows were covered in melted chocolate ice-cream (nasty smelling melted chocolate ice-cream).  We kept working, despite not being able to see, using just the gauges inside the cabin.

 

I totally dropped the ball on this job.  Haha.. gotcha.. I bet you think I messed up, right?  Wrong!  When we activate our tool, we drop a brass ball down the tubing to create a seal in the tool, so we can pressure up the tubing above the ball.  (Hopefully that makes some sense).  I got the honor/responsibility of dropping the ball down the tube and watching it disappear into the stinky, melted chocolate ice-cream fluid.

 

This morning, we were preparing all our equipment for this next phase of the job.  It was still dark, and from up on the drilling platform, we could see tons of lightning in the distance.  As it started coming closer, I wondered if the rig would stop working in a thunderstorm.  I stood there for a moment and considered that I was standing on a completely metal structure with a massive metal tower sticking into the sky... surrounded by water.  Sounds stupider than Ben Franklin flying a kite...  Electrocution anyone?  Haha.. just kidding.  I´m assuming there are some massive lightning rods on this thing, because the storm reached us and we didn´t stop at all (At $7000 per hour, a rig needs a better reason than silly weather to stop operations).  Anyway... that´s a lot of oilfield engineering talk.  I´m sorry if it´s not as fun to read as other stuff.  (In case my emails gave you the impression that I was permanently on vacation in Brazil/France... be not mistaken... I´m workin, workin, workin).

 

Most of my friends that I made have since left the rig, so I haven´t played dominoes in quite a while.  I´m getting to know a new set of people, but since I work whenever they need me, I have to take any opportunity to sleep and to eat when I can.  My poor natural clock is so confused. It doesn´t know when to be awake or when to sleep. 

 

I have a little notebook that I write all my observations and job notes in.  It´s so funny- as my portuguese gets better, I´ll write one thing in english, the next in portuguese, then back to english.  It just depends on what language I happen to be operating in at the moment of writing whatever it is down.  Anyone who would pick it up to read it would think I´m seriously confused about what language I speak.

 

Oh, I forgot to mention the fashion horrors that are completely acceptable here on the rig.  We all have boots that we wear while working, but you can´t wear them in the cafeteria, common room, or bedrooms, so you have to change into flip-flops in the hallway.  You wear socks with your boots, so when you change, everyone ends up wearing socks with their flip-flops.  It´s so ugly and feels so strange, yet it´s totally acceptable... all the cool kids are doing it.  To make matters worse, the laundry guys write your room number on your clothes when they wash them to make sure you get your stuff back.  So... you have a bunch of guys walking around in shorts, socks, and flip-flops, with a three digit number written in black permanent marker on their socks.  Watch out New York Fashion Week, here we come!

Well.. I´ll stop writing now.. I hope you all have a wonderful day- eating and sleeping on a normal schedule :-P 

 

Love,

Life on a rig: lots of dominoes to play and even more food to eat

Hey folks,

I´m currently offshore. It´s actually rather comical how things have been going so far.

So there I was (this is how all good stories begin, right?) on Tuesday morning. I was supposed to catch the van to get to Rio at 6am at my building. I woke up early, showered, etc. and headed downstairs to be five minutes early for the van. I thought that would be plenty of time. Note: Macae Palace (my building) has entrances on both sides that are equally used. I got downstairs and there was no van to be seen- on either side. I inquired as to the previous departure of the van to the guys working at the front desks on each side, but they both said that they hadn´t seen the van yet. So as time began to pass, I thought it was strange that the van would be late... it´s never late. I ended up calling and waking up the woman from the logistics department for my base to ask what was going on. She told me that the van was already on its way to Rio.

My Response at this point: Oh Holy Crap!! I missed the van, I´m going to miss my flight to my first job... I´m a fricking genius. (heavy on the sarcasm here if you´re reading out loud)

Anyway.. I tried calling my direct boss for 20 minutes and he wouldn´t answer the phone. I had to wake up his boss to approve alternate transportation to get to Rio. To spare you the rest of the crazy details, I was pretty stressed from 6am until 11am when I finally got on anther van to Rio and had a confirmed alternate flight to Sao Paulo. I´m still looking for gray hairs that may have resulted from the experience, but in the end it all worked out. Hopefully I won´t make any other large mistakes while I´m out here and everyone will forget about the van mix-up.

And now on the lighter side of things:

I got to ride in a helicopter. That was pretty nifty. The pilots found out that it was my first ride, so they made sure that I had one of the best seats with the best views. Cool pilots! You have to wear ear plugs and noise-proof ear muffs during the ride, so the ride ends up being really peaceful. The area we took off from was covered in long ridges of foliage-covered mountains. We headed out to the open sea, and the views were really amazing. The windows are way better in a chopper than in an airplane, plus, you can actually open the window during the flight and not get sucked out. Once we lost sight of land, it was really cool. There was nothing in sight but blue sky and blue sea and the occasional puffy white cloud.

Since being on the rig, the operation has been delayed. It´s been five days now and my days consist of waking up, showering and dressing in the dark as quietly as possible (my roommate works nights and sleeps during the days), eating, watching movies in the common room (mostly in portuguese so I understand about 35% of the dialogue), eating, playing checkers, eating, watching movies, eating, and talking a lot of smack about the games that I win in dominoes. I´ve played approximately 84 games of dominoes since I learned how they play on Thursday. I occasionally kick butt and then feel obliged to remind my opponents of my novice-ness. (All smack talking is done in Portuguese, mind you, and I think I can do it pretty well. I actually think that harassing the guys makes them respect me more.)

Did I mention that we eat all the time? The cafeteria is never closed for more than three hours. It´s great, but it´s horrible at the same time. Good news: food and snacks are always available. Bad news: food and snacks are always available. It´s double-edged sword shaped like a messroom, aimed at my midsection. Eating and sleeping all day is a recipe to gain a bunch of weight, which I would prefer not to do.

We should start doing our actual work at the end of this week. Great, huh? It´s been like a week of vacation, trapped on a rig, surrounded by nothing but water. But I´m making lots of friends. I´m trying to be my outgoing, nice self without giving the wrong impression to all these guys offshore. (If you know what I mean.) I´m finding that I smile a lot, and apparently people think I´m a little flirtacious. I try to control it, but most of the time I can´t help it. :-) Most people are impressed with my Portuguese skills- that´s a bonus. I´m still lost most of the time in meetings; people talk all at once about multiple topics with words flying in every direction, and I struggle to catch most of it. In normal conversations, people are always eager to practice their English with me, and I can hold a decent conversation in Portuguese.

Anyway, I think that´s enough for now. I should probably go find a worthy dominoes opponent or something else productive like that.

More later!

Tchau,

Embarking on a new adventure

Hey folks,

This will be a quick email. I promise.

I made it back to Brazil safely. I left Tuesday of last week and arrived 35 hours later in my apartment in Macaé. I've been getting back into the swing of things.. I guess my bosses decided to make it a full swing as fast as possible. I found out today that I'll be leaving at 6am to go offshore!! It's a unique job. There will just be two of us on the job, when normally there are three to four people. The guy who was originally going to go on this job (Bruno) is going to Egypt for a while. That's Schlumberger for you.

Anyway... I will be taking the van to Rio (3 hrs), a plane to Sao Paulo (1 hr), a taxi to another city that I'm working on pronouncing (2 hrs), and a helicopter to the rig from there. It's a high pressure, high temperature gas well, so it's a lot more dangerous than a normal one. Good thing it's my first time offshore, huh? Well.. think of me as I embark (pun intended) on this new adventure!

Talk to you when I get back,

Roma..

Buongiorno,

This past weekend, I headed to Rome, Italy with my friends, Alan, Irshad, Sameer, Lydia, and Leo. It was a fantastic weekend!! Two days isn't nearly enough to see the Eternal City, but it's definitely enough to fill up this email with a mini novel!!

We arrived on Friday night to our hostel (called the Pop Inn Hostel.. clever, I know). We had two rooms of three each. They weren't air conditioned, but they were very colorfully decorated: purple walls with interesting cartoon art plastered all over them.

We started out early on Saturday morning and headed to the Vatican after our free breakfast. I had my first italian caffe latte, and it was delicious! I didn't even miss Starbucks (that's pretty significant). We hopped off the metro and followed the masses of people toward the Vatican. We got in line for the Vatican museum... the entrance was down the block, around one corner, down that block, and around another corner. Oh boy... I was thinking, "We only have two days in Rome and we're going to spend hours in this line.. " But then there was a charming young fellow who was recruiting people to take guided tours of the Vatican, so I asked him about it. We found out that we could skip the line for the museum, get the tour of the museum and Sistine Chapel, skip the long walk around to St. Peter's Basilica, and get the tour there too for a reasonable price. Plus, he asked if we had student IDs (which most of us did.. mine is even still valid!) and we got a 20% discount off the entire deal!

Our tour guide was a very overweight, old gentleman, with salt and pepper hair, and an easy-to-spot straw hat. He was extremely passionate about the art, the history, and the no flash picture policy. He got fired up about all three. It was funny when we had to climb stairs because the tour guide would get out of breath really fast, and we could all hear it through the headset walkie talkie things we wore to hear his commentary. It was interesting to learn about all the art we were looking at. He knew a ton about the life of Michaelangelo and the drama that some of his works caused in the religious community. Apparently, some Cardinal was upset by all the nudity in his painting, The Last Judgement, in the Sistine Chapel. The Cardinal told Michaelangelo to paint clothes on them, but instead the sassy artist painted a portrait of the Cardinal in the condemned person section, with donkey ears and serpent wrapped around him. Haha! The Pope saw it, and sided with Mike... good man!

The Sistine Chapel really is amazing! The entire room is just a masterpiece. Each painting is impressive, and when you put them all together, it's truly phenomenal. St. Peter's Basilica is also quite the sight to see. It doesn't really feel like a church inside to me. It felt more like a museum. It is massive though. It's just cavernous space after cavernous space, covered in gold, works of art, marble, and decorated with flawless, larger-than-life sculptures. It was different than most other cathedrals I've seen here in Europe. There were no real stained glass windows and no church pews. Nevertheless, it was a very impressive site to see.

Outside the Basilica, we encountered our first Roman fountain. I realized that there is no reason to ever be dehydrated in Rome, or buy more than one bottle of bottled water while in the city limits. In every piazza (plaza), there are fountains with fresh water continuously flowing out of them. It's so drastically different than spending two euros every time you want to buy a bottle of Evian in France.

After the Vatican tour, we headed out to go find ourselves some good Italian lunch. We were walking around, trying to stumble upon a nice place to eat, when this random lady on the street, who must have heard us talking about pizza, told us she knew where the best pizza in the area was. We decided to follow her to a little, non-airconditioned, hole-in-the-wall pizza place. It was off the tourist beaten path, and there were only 2 other people in the restaurant, but it wasn't as sketchy as it sounds. We could see the open hearth where they were firing the pizzas, the food looked good, and the lady was a friendly chatterbox, so we decided to stay. Miss Chatterbox proved to be right- the food did not disappoint. We were all very pleased with our first taste of real Italian food. Mmmmm... pizza.

After lunch, we stopped for gelato (DE-LICIOUS!) on our way back on the metro (which, by the way, is 10,000 times less complicated than the system in Paris). We headed to the Colosseum next. We got off the metro, exited the station, and WHAM! it was right there across the street! That kept happening while we walked around. You would turn a corner and get smacked in the face with some amazing architecture or an ancient building, or something else that photo-worthy. I was getting annoyed with having to pull my camera out all the time- I would put it away, just to have to pull it out one block later. Haha.. it was actually great :). Anyway, we got talked into another guided tour of the Colosseum, Forum, and Palatine Hill. This one was actually way better than the Vatican tour. I was eating up all the history- gathering tidbits of information to impress people later :). I won't bore/amaze you with all that history here (for the sake of space, plus.. how would I impress you later if I told you all my knowledge now?)

We went out for dinner in a tour guide recommended location. To get there, we had to communicate with the Italian bus drivers. That was an interesting experience. Imagine a Brazilian guy speaking Portuguese and a guy from Trinidad speaking Spanish with some Italians who spoke neither of those languages. The Romance language similarities proved to be stronger than the differences, because we managed to make it onto a bus that took us where we wanted to go. The specific restaurant we chose had some good pasta, but some bad service. The waiter was rude, but there was a guy playing the accordian that was walking around who played for us. I also sampled some authentic Italian tiramisu.. yum yum! That night, we walked around, drank at various bars, and enjoyed some serious people watching in the colorful, well-lit piazzas. Later in the evening, a random guy walked up to me and handed me a red rose.. for no apparent reason. I was just sitting in front of a fountain with my friends. I guess I looked pretty good.. haha. I started getting teased by my friends that they were going to sell because I could get stuff for free or discounted prices based on my charms. I pretend to be appalled every time they talk about it, but really I think it's hilarious.

Speaking of free and discounts... On Sunday at breakfast, the guy behind the bar who made me my fantastic latte was rather flirtatious. He told me to look at the bus tour brochure and said, "For you, no charge (wink)." I said "Gratzi, but no thanks" and It was all I could do to not laugh about it until I could go tell the rest of the guys who were standing outside already. They just shook their heads and claimed that they were going to rent me out again. Another time, I stopped to buy some souveniers. The smiling vendor said, "Special deal just for you: blah, blah, blah." I talked him into a better deal after that with a smile. Maybe he says to everyone, but I like to think it was just me :).

Sunday, we stopped by the Trevi Fountain, and threw some coins in to make sure we would return to Rome some day. That was one of my favorite sights. We also hit up the Pantheon, which looks way cooler on the inside than the outside. It's crazy that I'm summarizing these major sights in a sentence.. but this email is too long already.

By this time, it was time to head back to get the train to the airport. We stopped at the train station to buy our tickets to the airport on the way to the hostel. We bought them twelve minutes before the train left, and we still had to go get our bags that were at the hostel two blocks away!! We were speed walking through the station and down the street, up the stairs, grabbed our bags, and headed back. We started to run once we got back in the train station. It was a very "Home Alone" moment- you know when they're running through the airport, trying to catch the plane? Yeah, like that. :) Anyway, we made it with 2 minutes to spare!! We got on the train and found it to be un-airconditioned. Now, it was a hot day, and we had just been running all around. You can imagine that we were a bit warm.. sweating bullets to be exact. The train had no windows that opened and no AC!! Can you imagine? It was one hot 30 minute train ride to the airport. Ugh.. we were so relieved to get back to the outside temperature, which wasn't even that cool!

We arrived back to Paris, and the airline had lost my luggage! Seriously... it was all my stuff, my instructor's Lonely Planet travel guide, my friend's bottle of alcohol, another person's souvenier t-shirt, another girl's sunscreen, another guy's shot glasses.. something of everyone's basically. The airline gave me a mini bag of toiletries and told me they would reimburse me 100 euros. I bought some Dolce and Gabbana perfume, courtesy of Air France :). I got my bag back on Wednesday, so that was relieving!!

Alright.. that's all for now..

Arrivederci,

Long overdue update email about Paris, etc (part deux)

Why hello there again!

So here at school, being on the training rig is really fun. The driller and the derrick man are both from Holland and hilarious! As they pull pipe out of the well, the derrick man lets out a big "Yeehaw." You can hear it all over the training center sometimes. I get along well with them, and I think I've convinced them to come country western line dancing at Disney Village tonight! It should be fun. They're constantly making fun of each other (in Dutch), and I have fun trying to guess what they might be saying. Sometimes they tease me too, although as far as I know they do that in English only… at least I hope so.

You really are the same person wherever you go. I have always had issues with waking up in the morning... I just love that snooze button way too much. (Just ask any family member or former roommate about my oversleeping skills- I'm one of the best around!) Anyway, a couple weeks ago, I woke up feeling way more rested than I was expecting to be (That's really never a good sign). I looked at the clock and realized that it was 10:45am, and the busses that take us to school leave every morning at 7:15am. I thought for sure that couldn't be right, so I checked my cell phone and my watch, and they each confirmed the tragic news.. I missed the bus. I had to call the school and let them know that I was alive and on my way. Then I had to call a cab and pay for myself to get to the school on my own. I had to shell out 100 euros for that darn taxi ride!! It was rough! I walked into the classroom after lunch and got quite the round of teasing from my classmates. I ended up getting sick the next day, so I figure that's part of the reason I slept so long. Since my "teachable moment", we've have a call-a-thon every morning to make sure everyone gets downstairs to breakfast and onto the busses in time. It's like a relay of phone calls. They've saved my butt a couple more times, and much to everyone's surprise, I've saved a couple people now and then.

Being sick was no fun at all. I got hit with an intense fever, right when I started studying for my exam the next day. I was sitting in my Lydia's room, in a sweatshirt, wrapped in a blanket, holding hot tea, and literally shaking with cold. I barely slept that night and still felt horrible the next day. I went to school anyway to take my exam. I had to take periodic naps during the exam to stay awake for the rest of it. I would open my eyes to see Lydia looking at me, wide-eyed, freaking out that I was sleeping while I was taking our timed exam. Haha.. it turned out well though. I did pretty well... very well considering the circumstances.

What else is new?? I've had lots of admirers... but that's not too new anymore. My friend, Lydia, used to tease me about the guys in my life, but lately, she's been getting hit on all the time. She's begging me to take my skills back- she doesn't like all the attention. I'm sitting back, laughing, and loving it.

My instructor, Quentin, is nicknamed Jackie Chan by a guy in my class. He's Asian and in good shape. He can pretty intimidating sometimes to some people, because he's kind of intense and doesn't smile much when he's in teacher mode. I really like him- he's well traveled, realistic, and Canadian, so he makes North American English jokes (sometimes subtle ones or ones about Ferris Bueller's Day Off) sometimes, and I love it. Anyway his cell phone periodically rings during class, and it cracks me up every time. His ring tone is "Dancing Queen" by the band, Abba. He answers it with a straight face, not missing a beat, as if there's nothing funny about it. I love it!

We had two exams this week, so Quentin is giving us tomorrow afternoon off. I'm capitalizing on my long weekend with a trip to Rome, Italy!! I bought my plane ticket last night. Woohoo!! I'll be going with five other people on an adventure to the land of pizza, pasta, leather boots, and expressive hand gestures. I've been practicing speaking Portuguese in an Italian accent and moving my hands a lot. Maybe they'll understand me?

Alright.. you're probably sick of reading these emails by now.. so I'll be quiet and save more stories for another day. I'll try to send an update sooner than a month from now. :)

Thanks for caring about my life!!

Long overdue update email about Paris, etc.

Bonjour!

I figured it was about time for another update... Okay.. it's embarrassingly late, but here it goes: (Actually this is going to come in two installments. I think it will make it easier to read if it's in two emails instead of one massive one.)

I don't remember how many weekends ago it was now, but I headed off to Paris once more. This time I went with two girls from my course on Saturday. We went to the Notre Dame and the Sacre Coeur as the highlights. The Notre Dame is beautiful... there is something profound about being in a building where people have worshiped for centuries. Granted, during the Revolution it was turned into the Temple of Reason or something opposite of sacred like that, but it still feels like a holy place even when it's full of tourists. I still want to yell SANCTUARY when I'm inside and pretend I'm in the Hunchback of Notre Dame movie. (Don't worry.. I restrain myself.) The Sacre Coeur is more beautiful from the outside, in my opinion. Inside, they don't let you talk or take photos, so it feels much more like a real church rather than a tourist attraction. We paid 5 euros to climb the 295 stairs (yes, I counted them- they told me it was 300, but they lied) to the top of the dome. The view was awesome! We were able to walk around all 365 degrees and see all of Paris from the second highest point in the city. (Just the Eiffel Tower is taller.) We girls had a blast all day, taking imitation model photos, shopping (and getting free key chains from the store owner that flirted with us), and eating nutella crepes.

That Saturday night, I met up with the brothers Calderon. Luis and Jesus are good friends from my college days at U of M... I say that like it was soooo long ago. :) It was just over a year ago. Anyway, we had dinner at a pub and watched Portugal play Turkey in the EuroCup (that's basically the European World Cup for soccer). I got the run down on players, teams, strategies, and how to cheer properly from Luis. I decided that I'm now a Portugal fan. They speak Portuguese, have the coolest jerseys and Cristiano Ronaldo is my favorite player. (Ladies, look up his picture!) What's not to like? (Since I started writing this email, Portugal lost, and Spain beat Germany in the finals.) We hung out by the Eiffel Tower at night, which is cooler all lit up at night than in the daytime. Jesus was taking nonstop pictures, and Luis was the most popular subject :). One of the highlights was Sunday evening when we went to my favorite bridge (Pont des Artes). We sat down on a bench, and we were talking and munching on some delicious chocolate. Three guys sat down behind us, and started speaking... in Portuguese! They were speaking about personal stuff (juicy gossip).. so after a couple minutes, I turned around and asked them where they were from.. in Portuguese. I felt funny eavesdropping when they probably assumed that nobody could understand them. They just about freaked out when they realized that I could understand them! We ended up becoming friends and talking in Portuñol (Portuguese and Spanish) for about an hour and half until I had to catch the metro back home. It's so cool to meet people from other parts of the world. Every time I meet Brazilians, they are so friendly and cool. I love it! About halfway into the conversation, another girl from the other side of the bridge said hello and apologized for eavesdropping… she spoke English, Portuguese, and Spanish. Who would have guessed: a bridge full of Portuguese speakers on a bridge in Paris! It was great :)

Two weekends ago, a big group of us spent our Saturday at Disneyland Paris. It was fun. Honestly, it's nothing compared to Disney World in Orlando, FL, but we still made it a good time. We made our way from big rollercoaster to rollercoaster, getting as many fast passes as possible, and stopping on the way for overpriced cheeseburgers and waffles topped with chocolate. I paid prices for food that appaled me. The number value would have made the food expensive in US Dollars.. and then I started converting to Euros in my head. I had to stop before that went to far. :) Those darn exchange rates cramp my style... Anyway, it's always fun to run around with other adults and feel like a kid again. Skipping, dancing, and singing Disney songs at the top of our lungs in a symphony of accented English are all perfectly normal activities within the magical world of Disney. The highlight of the whole day was one particular bridge that bounced like a trampoline when you jumped on it. We must have spent a collective hour jumping on that bridge- we crossed it at every possible opportunity. Everyone would be bouncing across, and every couple jumps, you would catch some else's bounce and get launched in the air. It was impossible not to giggle the entire time. The act of bouncing across the high traffic bridge was hilarious feeling, everyone else looked hilarious in their bouncing, and it was just plain funny how easily amused we all were.

There is really so much to talk about... I really need to update more often. Anyway, I'll just summarize the school part of my life quickly. It's funny that's it's what I spend most of my time doing, but really, it doesn't make the greatest stories. I've lead a job on the practice rig, worked as a roughneck (kinda like in Armageddon... but not really.. haha), and taken multiple exams (and done well so far). I've received multiple nicknames, including: Soupy (short for supervisor- from the first job we did), Miss Michigan (apparently I wear lots of U of M apparel), Jessie (despite my efforts to make everyone call me Jess or Jessica, Jessie is apparently the easiest to say on the soccer field), and Double T (my friend called me a Teletubby- those furry, colorful, round-bellied characters as a joke. I was appalled, but I think my adverse reaction made the nickname stick harder.. darn).

Until the next chapter,

Adventure to Paris and breaking my Starbucks fast!

Salut,

Well.. the French adventure is continuing. Friday night, a group of us went dancing at the club in the Disney Village here in Disneyland Paris. It's really close to our hotel, and it was Salsa night. They played mostly latin music, and I had fun making new friends. Unfortunately, a bunch of the guys I really like finished their courses here in France last week, so the went back to their respective locations already.. sad.

Saturday, we went to Paris. It was quite fun. We (Dilan, Muazz, Lydia, Irshad, Cristian, and I) took the metro to the city and walked everywhere from there. We must have walked miles. We started at the Grande Arche and walked to the Arche de Triomphe and on the Eiffel Tower. Besides being overcast and periodically rainy, it was a lovely day. Some of the highlights include: the giant thumb sculpture, laughing at my friend, Muazz, try to give us directions (at one point he decided the Eiffel Tower was in one direction, when in reality it was 180 degrees the opposite direction... yes somehow we kept letting him lead... go figure), eating ice-cream at the Eiffel Tower, and hanging out with my cool friends. At the Eiffel Tower, there are tons of guys selling assorted Eiffel Tower paraphenalia- keychains, light-up crystal Eiffel Towers, etc. I figured out that they weren't the most legal operation when all the guys started running away when a police woman came through on a bicycle. In their haste to run away, one guy left a crystal Eiffel Tower behind. Dilan picked it up and was trying to sell to us to make a profit. He wasn't successful. Anyway, the sellers will barter with you a little bit, but once you buy stuff from one of them, you get swarmed by the rest. A couple guys bought some key chains for souveniers, and five minutes later, we were surrounded by about six of the salesmen. It was a little overwhelming, but funny. Dilan tried to give them marketing advice- we already bought stuff.. go somewhere else! That was pretty amusing. As far as the rest of the walking around Paris goes, you really should just look at the load of pictures I put up online. It is a beautiful city. Most of them have captions, so you'll understand what's going on.

We stopped by the outside of the Louvre, but it was closed already, so we didn't go inside. It derserves a day of it's own anyway, so I plan on going back. One of the highlights of the day was our dinner. We found a grocery store, bought some wine, picked up some sandwiches and ate picnic style on a bridge near the Louvre. It was a pedestrian bridge, full of young people from all over the world. We were sitting next to a group of guys from Tanzania who were studying in Paris. They were playing guitar, smoking a water pipe (who knows what), and have a fantastic time. It was a really cool experience.

Oh.. 15 minutes after we got off the train in Paris, I saw a Starbucks! I hadn't had a Starbucks latte in 6 months, so I was so excited!!! Unfortunately, it was in the commercial district and was closed! I was so sad. I finally found a Starbucks here in the outlet mall near the hotel on Sunday. I knew it was somewhere around here, but it took a while to get there. I paid four euros for my vanilla latte, but it was wonderful.. a little taste of home. My friends, Lydia and Irshad, thought I was obsessed and ridiculous (maybe they're kinda right), but I was one happy camper afterwards. :-D

My course in full swing. Fourteen people, 8:30am to 5:30pm, one instructor, every day. I'm learning lots, but I can imagine that I will be ready to get out of here by the time eight weeks are up.

I'll be heading to Paris again next weekend when I'm done with classes to meet my college friends, Luis and Jesus Calderon. They're brothers on a Euro adventure. I'm quite excited to hang out with them, and I'm glad our schedules line up. Yay! If anyone else wants to come to Paris in the next eight weeks, I would be happy to hang out with you!

Well.. I have more stuff to share about my daily adventures, but I'll save it for another email, another day, when I don't want to be sleeping :)

Love ya'll,

sleeping on the bus and wandering around the mall.. welcome to France!

Bonjour,

I've been in France for about four days now, and I'm having a fun time. I spend the vast majority of my time in the ELC (Europe Learning Center). It's Schlumberger's training facility. I also spend a large quantity of time on the bus. The hotels we stay at are about an hour away from the ELC, so a designated bus comes to pick us up every morning at 7:10am and leaves to take us home at 6:00pm. Class lasts from 8:30 (most days it's really 9:00) until 5:30. I spend most of the hours on the bus sleeping. Surprise of all surprises, I know. :) It can actually be a challenge if I don't have my iPod, because everyone else sleeps too and sometimes it's quite the symphony of snoring. Depending on where the lead instruments are sitting, you can be pretty overwhelmed by the melodies... if you know what I mean. Anyway, the reason we stay so far away from the ELC is because the only hotels that are big enough to handle the number of students coming through the training center are near Disneyland Paris. We're actually staying about 5 minutes away from the magical world of Disney, European style.

This week is my COM1 (Common 1) course. Most of the people will be in my Sand Control School as well, starting next week, but some of them are in other segments. This week is a breeze.. a warm, gentle breeze. We don't really do anything. I'm sitting here in class, waiting for our teacher to come and actually teach us things. I'm not complaining, it's a really nice break. Our course starting next week will be much more rigorous.

There are two American guys based in Louisiana here. One of them actually graduated from the University of Michigan in Aerospace Engineering. What a small world! Anyway, they're pretty funny. It's almost strange to hang out with Americans at this point. They're basically obsessed with getting to a monastery in Belgium where these monks make beer that is supposed to be really good. One guy bought a french cell phone so that he could call the monastery (the Beer Phone, as they call it) and reserve a case of beer to purchase. He came in one morning telling all of us about the dream he had about I think I'll go with them when they decide to make the journey.

I'm also been hanging out with a guy from Brazil. He's the one I knew about before I got here from our mutual friend in Macaé. It's fun to speak Portuguese with him. I guess there is another guy coming from Angola for our Sand Control class, so I'll be interested to see how well I can understand Angolan Portuguese.

I'm sharing a villa with a girl named Lydia. She's dutch.. like really from Holland. Her last name starts with "van," so I knew right away where she was from. Those are my west Michigan skills of dutch identification right there. She's pretty cool. She's working in Norway, so needless to say, our Schlumberger experiences have been a bit different. Mine in tropical paradise, and hers in the beautiful glaciers and mountains of the far north. It's fun to hear other people's stories about different cultures.

There's a mall by the hotel. It's really big. It's all one corridor, and it takes about 20 minutes to walk from one end to the other. It's overwhelming. The supermarket is in the mall too. It's wonderfully huge- one of the biggest I've ever seen, actually. Two stories of endless options. It was really a reverse culture shock. It's been almost six months since I was in an American supermarket, and the Brazilian grocery stores in Macae are much tinier. There is an entire aisle for yogurt, and aisle for chocolate, two aisles of cheeses, and about four aisles of wine. I was wandering around, wide-eyed and overwhelmed. Haha.. it's fun.

We've gone out to eat a lot. I'm loving the bread, cheese, and wine. Stuff is pretty expensive. Well, the wine is the cheapest thing to drink. The pub we went to the other night actually had caipirinhas.. for 8 euros!! They're normally 8 reais in Brazil. That's like $16 vs. $5. I decided to stick with wine for the night. The waitstaff around this area speaks a lot of English. I think it's because all of the Disneyland tourists. It's rather convenient. They do seem to appreciate the fact that we try to speak some French... even if we butcher the pronunciation.

Well.. I should be doing my in-class assignment, but I will send more updates later. I'm sure whatever we do this weekend will generate interesting stories :) and we all know I love good stories. :)

Au revoir,

Bonjour, merci, si'l vous plait...

Good Morning!

I'm writing you all from my villa in Melun, France. It feels like 6:30 am, but here it's 11:30am. I left yesterday at 9am, so it's been about 21 hours of traveling. Saying that I'm groggy is an understatement, and I'm trying to decide whether I should tough it out for the day, or give in to taking a nap. The flight was uneventful. I was able to tell the Air France flight attendant that I wanted champagne with my crackers and later that I wanted "poulet" for dinner and accompanied by a glass of "vin branc" (that's chicken and white wine if you didn't know). I felt so multilingual. I made friends with the Brazilian guy that was sitting next to me. We were speaking Portuguese for a couple hours. I didn't sleep a ton, but I did read half of the novel, The Kite Runner.

Once again, I arrived in a country where I don't know that language. I actually know more French than I new Portuguese when I arrived in Brazil, but it's definitely not much. That quarter of French in seventh grade really isn't helping me out too much. It's funny though, I keep catching myself thinking in Portuguese and wanting to speak it. It's the #1 foreign language in my head, so hearing French makes my brain switch to foreign language mode, but instead of French, my neurons go fetch Portuguese phrases. There is one Brazilian guy who will be in my class. He knows one of my friends in Macaé from college and works in Angola. I plan on keeping my Portuguese polished by having private (but public) conversations.

Most of my first impression of France was the back of my eyelids. I passed out in the taxi on the way to the hotel. The driver got kinda lost, and I ended up paying twenty euros more than i was expecting. Oh well.. it will get expensed anyway. I realized that I missed expressways. Brazil doesn't have those wide, smooth, unimpeded roads. It was nice to be in a fast car and not worry about the driver not seeing a massive pothole or unmarked speed bump. The terrain is about as exotic as mid-Ohio- spring greenery, the occasional rolling hill, deciduous trees... you can imagine. The peasant-looking houses are what makes the countryside look really French as opposed to a not-so-very-exciting-Midwest-state.

Anyway.. I'm gonna go take a nap. Later I'll walk (weather is springy and delicious!) to the center of this little town and see what's around. I'll regale you with more stories as soon as I collect them! I just wanted to let you know that I'm here safe and sound!

Love,