All the Fantastic Things I Learned in Mexico

The Arch of Cabo San Lucas at Land's End

I went to Mexico and I lived. I mean I almost died but mostly I lived. Right now you're thinking, didn't you go to Mexico like six months ago? All I have to say to you people is, yes. Yes I did. Sometimes, however it takes six months to process a thing. Sometimes a life or death experience is just too painful to talk about right away. Other times you just don't get around to writing about it. 50/50. Anyway, the point is I went to Mexico and I said I would write about all the fantastic things I learned in Mexico. Hence, this blog post. It was my first time out of the country and I put this on my New Years Resolution list this year so I actually got to check off every thing on my list (there is a first time for everything. However it was not this time. The first time I checked off everything on my New Years Resolution List was when I was eight and had one resolution: learn to write properly. I held my pencil with my thumb, my pointer finger and my middle finger instead of just my thumb and pointer finger. Once I conquered this, I realized I could do anything.). Before you question why I have never gone out of the country, let me just say this: I had never been out of BC. Oh wait you were expecting me to defend myself? No.

Pretty much the wave that tried to kill me.

Los Cabos is on the Baja California peninsula, and I went with my good friend Katie at the beginning of June. This is what I learned: waves are dangerous. I don't know if you know this or not (not the waves thing, nobody knows that) you may have heard it on the grapevine, because let's face it, people love stories of life and death, but I almost died in Mexico. A lifeguard saved me. It was a blast. Other than almost dying it was debatably the most fun I had on the entire trip. Unfortunately playing tag with the waves is kind of like playing tag with an axe murderer: you just never know when they are going to take it too far. Here I am having the time of my life, letting the waves wash over me - more like hit me - when all of a sudden a giant wave comes by and things get really competitive. You see, what made it so fun was that every time the waves went out again they tried to pull me back with them and sucked the sand out under my feet like quicksand. In my defence this was not a no-swimming beach. There were many other people playing with the waves and there were people out in the ocean swimming. No, I think the problem came when I decided it would be way more fun to sit down instead of stand. Let me tell you, IT WAS. I was laughing my head off, by myself, while Katie stood safely up on shore questioning my sanity. However, it is very hard to run away - you know that crucial part of the game called "tag" - when you are in fact... sitting down. The first giant wave pulled me too far down the shore, still laughing my head off. Unfortunately when you don't go to the gym you become what they call "a weakling," making it really hard to get up on your feet and run back to shore in quicksand before the next wave comes along. Who would have thought. It was the second giant wave that took me out. I will never forgive that wave. It stole my sunglasses. Anyway, thankfully a lifeguard was actually paying attention because he ran into the water and in between waves managed to pull me onto the shore. I was so shocked I didn't notice that I was pretty much flashing him as well as everyone looking and that my bikini bottoms were so full of sand I looked like I was wearing a diaper. Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure Katie was laughing at me. What kind of a terrible person is she? I was still blowing sand out of my nose the next day.

Riu Santa Fe

We stayed at the Rio Santa Fe, which ironically, means the Hotel of Saint Faith. Yeah. That's right. I'm named after a hotel. I mean the hotel is named after me? The hotel was beautiful, it was the perfect temperature and we fell in love with the little town of Los Cabos. We went on three paid adventures: one was dinner and entertainment on a pirate ship, and two adventures with Esperanza Tours including a trip to Land's End with snorkeling at Lover's Beach, and a tour of San Jose. What I learned about these adventures:

• Pirate ships are not very good at adhering to your strict dietary needs
• Not everyone is as good at acting as Johnny Depp
• The Los Cabos area used to be frequented by real pirates. In fact, rumor has it there is a Spanish ship full of treasure at the bottom of the ocean still waiting to be found. P.S. Katie and I didn't find it, or I wouldn't be writing this blog post anymore, I would make my servant (Katie) write it for me
• Land's End isn't actually land's end
• Lover's Beach is sweet until you learn that Divorce Beach is on the other side with waves so violent they will kill you
• Fried bananas with peanut butter and syrup for breakfast are delicious but high-caloried
• What with my allergies to dairy, chocolate and grains, my vegetarian diet other than seafood, and Katie's allergy to shellfish, between the two of us, Katie and I could literally eat everything at the Riu Santa Fe buffet. Together we are a full human being!
• Everyone speaks Spanish in Mexico
• Tourists are stupid
• Okay so I already knew those last two, but this one I didn't know: because Los Cabos is on the Baja California Sur it's over 1,000 miles from the US/Mexican border. That's roughly the distance between France and Russia which means most of the drug cartels and kidnapping don't happen here. Hence, if you are going to Los Cabos to see a live version of  Kingpin, you will be vastly disappointed
• San Jose del Cabo, a section of Los Cabos, was founded in the 1700s by Jesuit Missionaries and we got to see one of the still functioning churches from that time, the Mission of San Jose del Cabo Church
• The place where we snorkeled was in the Sea of Cortez, called "The Aquarium of the World," because of the wide range of fish there
• Apparently it's perfectly fine to drink the water in most places in Cabos as most hotels and restaurants have filtered water systems. However they like to put little signs up in the bathroom just to freak you out saying "Don't drink," and right beside it, a cup for drinking. That is my only explanation for why there was a cup and a "no drinking" sign in our bathroom at the hotel
• Cabos has some of the most highly rated hotels in Latin America. We were not in one of them. However, Brangelina were probably staying at one of the super fancy hotels we saw on the hillside on our boat ride (this cannot be confirmed)

Our tour guides/snorkeling instructors at Esperanza Tours were amazing. We became BFFs with them. They came recommended by the Sunwing representative that helped us book our adventures. On the day we toured the city, our tour guide, Marcos, told us that the next day he was visiting his friend, the woman from Sunwing who had recommended them to us. So the day after our fun tour with Marcos we went to go say hi to her at the hotel and ask how her visit was, which both pleased and embarrassed her greatly, and she proceeded to tell us how Marcos thanked her for sending such nice, friendly girls to him! What a guy. Marcos took us on a tequila tasting tour where we tasted fifteen-year-aged tequila and other delicious desert tequilas, as well as a botanical garden tour with more cacti than you thought existed, and showed us around a glass blowing factory where we saw them make a tequila drinking frog (classic) and for the first time in his tour guide career Marcos broke something. You know what they say, you break it, you run... or buy it. So he bought it. It reminded me of that expression, a bull in a china shop. Only I don't think bulls get so embarrassed when they break stuff. They do it for fun. I was just glad and pleasantly surprised that it wasn't me.

On Lover's Beach, probably not long after the peeing incident

We also made friends with our snorkeling instructor Luis. There is a very funny story there that I'm just not sure I can tell. Wait, who am I kidding, it's me we're talking about. When we came onto the shore after snorkeling I had to go pee and I had gotten so cold in the water I didn't want to go back in. So I decided to climb these rocks, see, just behind the beach area but in full view of the shore. Don't worry, I went high enough that I could hide behind a rock and no one could see me. Luis, however, decided it would be a good idea to follow me. Thankfully he was literally like a fish out of water trying to climb those rocks, so he had his head down the whole time. Just as he was about to look up, I finished peeing, and slyly manoeuvred myself a few feet away as if I was just admiring the view. Of course we then continued to have a great conversation about God and life, became good friends, and a few days after I returned home I told him the whole story. Needless to say there were a lot of "jajajaja's" in his response. (I was really worried after the hurricane in Los Cabos in September, named "Hurricane Odile," and was waiting for two weeks for him to get internet service to make sure he was ok. He is, don't worry.)

In Mexico, hippies are called "cactus huggers"

Another funny story, I decided to take my sleep apnea machine with me to Mexico. Poor Katie got a first hand look at what I like to call my "Darth Vader" mask every night. The mask hooks up to a small machine that blows air into my nose and forces me to breath while I sleep, in case, you know, I forget. If I open my mouth the air comes rushing out. One morning she told me how terrified she in the middle of the night when she woke up and felt her bed shaking (we never heard there was an earthquake but there might have been) and then she heard me talking in my sleep. I was thinking, well that's not so scary, unless I said something like "You're pregnant" or "There is a clown puppet in the corner watching you." (I don't know which one is scarier.) I asked what I said and she replied, "I don't know. You were speaking Parseltongue. It's a good thing you didn't say any real words or I think I would have had a heart attack." And it's true, it sounds exactly like the snake language from Harry Potter. So really, Katie almost died in Mexico too.

The End.

Auxano, or Something

Camp Imadene, Mesachie Lake

I went to Camp Imadene last week for Senior Coed, cabin leading an amazing group of girls ages 15-17. On the first day I thought I was going to die. On top of my chronic fatigue I went up there with a cold and still tired from getting home the week before from Intermediate 2 where I was the Bead Lady! Finally my dream of being the Bead Lady came true! All the kids loved me, which is weird because on the second day I cut myself on the paper cutters (seriously those things are dangerous, note to self: don't put your finger on the exacto knife part) and I didn't realize it until I was helping one girl put her bracelet on and said, "Where did that red come from?" Um. My blood. That's where. "I'm so sorry! I didn't know I was bleeding," I said. She was all, "That's okay," and unconcerned that the crazy Bead Lady just gave her some kind of blood disease (not really). Sorry for the digression. Anyway for someone who is naturally tired all the time (or would that be unnaturally?), all it takes is a laid back week at camp as the Bead Lady to wear you out enough that you get a cold because the walls of your immune system are made of rice paper. The craft was actually paper beads, which is ironic because we're on a lake and all the kids go swimming and no matter how many times you tell ten-year-olds that paper beads are not waterproof they still need to find out for themselves.

That week as the Bead Lady a friend told me about Auxano. What is that you say? A type of acne cream? No! I shall give you the definition because we all know how much you love reading definitions on my blog:

       Auxano (owx-an'-o)

1. to cause to grow, augment
2. to increase, become greater
3. to grow, increase
   1. of plants
   2. of infants
   3. of a multitude of people
   4. of inward Christian growth

So basically it's a greenhouse for growing plants and infants. Sorry, I was thinking of those little screaming baby plants from Harry Potter called Mandrakes. It's actually a greenhouse for Christians, as in an eight-month discipleship program for young adults aged 17-24 from September to April. My friend Erin told me they still needed a female RA, Resident Advisor. I said, "Oh I could never do that, I'd be too tired." She said, "Well you're tired all the time at home, why not be tired up at camp?" You think you're soooo smart, don't you Erin? Actually she is (she has also struggled with fatigue so she knows what it's like. She is probably one of the only people who could say that to me!). Sometimes the best wisdom is the most obvious. At Senior my friend Katie told me the amazing news that she was going to be one of the students. I was so happy for her, going out and doing this thing, whatever it was, that I obviously could never, ever do. Then Andy the director of camp sneakily started asking me questions that I knew were leading to something to do with the RA position and me. Then I thought, "Do I have to actually consider this? What, now I have to physically sit down and pray about it and ask God if I should do it and wait to see what He says and then have an internal dialogue with myself, or not-so internal because I like to talk out loud like a crazy person?" This was asking too much, people. Too much.

Mandrake

I wanted God to make it clear to me by Tuesday morning SHARP so that I could actually give my two weeks notice at work. And then what did God go and do? He left it up to me. He left the door wide open so that I could decide if I wanted to walk through it or not. It seemed like the perfect time to move out. As some might say I needed to fly the cuckoo's nest, I mean nest, although cuckoo is probably the most appropriate bird for my family (sorry family). And God had already shown me at Senior coed that His grace was sufficient for me, that He could use me despite my tiredness. One by one all the obstacles I thought were so huge (health issues, my parents needing to move, financial problems, my dog) they just started to seem more like changes than obstacles. What's a little inconvenience to my parents? By now they were secretly begging me to move out and get on with my life. So what if I can't afford to get a crown on my sketchy tooth? God would give me dentures. What's a dog, anyway, when you think about it? People in China eat them (just kidding, I mean they do, but I love my dog. Unfortunately she loves my mom more anyway.) One big thing that changed my mind? I told my brother about it and He was totally, completely against it. He reminded me that we are not rich kids who can just give up our jobs at a moment's notice. And then out of the blue during a different conversation he said, "I think you should do it. I will support you financially $20 a month." (What a good brother!) So I gave my two weeks notice at work and will be leaving on the 15th of September for eight months up at one of my favorite places on earth! The ten or so of us will be staying in a house in Lake Cowichan and commute to camp every day for the program. I will be an advisor and leader for the students so I have to be on my best behavior = sarcastic, attention-seeking Faith will have to sit on the back burner (she can come visit me in my room when no one is looking). Room and board and food are paid for but I will most likely have to raise money for a living allowance.

Wait a second, who decided that I would make a good RA? Have they read my blog? Do they know me? I think someone has made a grave error. No one must ever know how unqualified I am to lead a group of girls my own age in discovering their inner selves. I write stories about unicorns for goodness sake's. Thank GOD He is strong in my weakness! If the onus is on me this ship is going down in a giant whirl pool, and fast, with a lot of screaming and throwing up. If the onus is on Jesus then we have nothing to worry about! He walks on water and tells storms to pipe down and they do it. (I tell storms to pipe down too but they never do it.) I am going to have to change my name on this blog before they find out it is me and tell me no one who writes this stuff could ever advise young adults about life and God. I've just decided. I shall change my name to Paith Slenkin... Jr.

Convoking a Convocation



We weren't allowed to throw our hats.
I hid behind some trees and did it anyway...

I went to my convocation last week. What in the world is a convocation you ask?

con·vo·ca·tion
noun \ˌkän-və-ˈkā-shən\

a. The act of convoking.

b. A group of people convoked, especially the members of a college or university community who are assembled for a ceremony.

I love when dictionary definitions require you to look up the definition of another word just to understand the first one, like it's purposefully challenging your intelligence. To convoke means "to call (a meeting, assembly, etc.) together; summon." When you are summoned you feel greatly compelled to go to your summonses, otherwise you might end up in court.

After going to the wrong place trying to find my regalia, then going to the wrong classroom for the rehearsal, you would think this would worry me. Au contraire. It was extremely satisfying to know I was finishing just as I had started: not knowing where the heck to go. Five minutes before the ceremony started they told us that if we hadn't paid our fees or there were any outstanding problems, we wouldn't receive our degree. I was dumbfounded. You're telling me, the university is going to let some schmuck get up there in his gown and cap and inform him it was a false alarm? I have to believe that sometime between then and the five minutes before we were going on stage, somebody, somewhere would pull that guy out of line and tell him the bad news. My question is: how the heck did he get this far in the process (and why is he automatically a boy)?

I had been mourning the fact that graduation was not going to be what I had always imagined it would be, what movies made it out to be and what other departments who were with the same people throughout their program were probably experiencing. There were only two people I knew who were graduating with me and I don't think they would have reacted well if I started jumping up and down like a school girl (because that would be the last time I could use that expression legitimately) and giving them hugs and kisses. But I was feeling disappointed and lonely so I prayed and God showed me how to enjoy it for what it was, not for what it wasn't. He put me next to a very nice girl I hadn't met before but who was also in the writing program and this year the Christian chaplain was picked to say the prayer. She called on "the Prince of Peace" and I felt like God was telling me He was with me. I also felt like I was walking into The Phantom of the Opera when the opening music was played and I can only assume the guy playing the very old organ was trying to scare off any graduates at the last minute (university is all about weeding out the weaklings). I automatically "put my hand at the level of my eye" to block any strangling attempts, because if the UVic phantom was going to make his move it would be then people. But no worries, once you had passed that test (I got a B), the guys from Hogwarts showed up in their medieval, wizard looking outfits and played some music obviously inspired by Harry Potter. I turned to the girl next to me I had just made friends with and said, "Do you feel like you're in Hogwarts?" She said, "YES!" The Chancellor, aka Dumbledore, even had a purple Sorting Hat that he tapped on our heads before we got our degrees. Any minute they were going to call out, "Faith Blenkin, Griffindor!"



You can watch me gradauate in the UVic convocation video here but I don't know why you would. It is the longest video in the world and the first half of it is full of ponds and grass. I wouldn't make my worst enemy watch it. I am in it for point-two seconds (skip to 107:34).

The Second to Last Unicorn

I tried to read The Last Unicorn by Peter S. Beagle which was written in the late 60's, probably the best time in history to write something about unicorns, but I couldn't finish it. I'm so mad because he totally stole the title for the book I'm writing. I just hope the title "The Second to Last Unicorn" is still available. I heard about the book from someone in my writing class who asked me what kind of books I like to read (I said I liked fantasy, the classics like Dickens and Austen, as well as pretty much any good fiction). And she recommended it. Who was I to argue? I mean besides the fact that it's one of my favorite love-hate pastimes (arguing). But I didn't actually think the book would be from the perspective of a unicorn. Let me give you a glimpse into the mind of a unicorn. "Hi, I'm a unicorn. I eat grass and sparkles. I'm spiky. And magic!" But maybe I am going about this the wrong way. Maybe if I read it as a kid's book, I would be like, "Whoa, what a good book," like the first Harry Potter book. I know some people didn't like the first one as much as the later ones, mainly because the first is written as a kid's book, and the later ones are more young adult (I think I would pee my pants if I read the later ones as a kid, but so many kids do! I mean read them, but the other also applies). I happen to love the first Harry Potter for its good editing and polished writing. I find the more I develop my own writing, the harder it is to read some of my favorite books, as well as the fact that I'm reading them as an adult. It is one of those sad facts of life, that things you love as a child just don't hold up as an adult. My favorite is rewatching movies I watched as a kid and thinking it was a good thing I didn't understand half the things they were talking about. It's like finding out the trusted mounties are actually just corrupt, sexist cowboys. And that's why I love unicorns. They can't be corrupted. They poop rainbows.

Potty Talk

This is the most uncomfortable post I've ever written, but I feel it needs to be addressed. BE FOREWARNED: the picture below has gotten me many weird looks at work when people pass by. If this happens to you, smile and nod.


Why is the line going to his feet and not the toilet?

Everyone poops; did you know that? No one tells you this, but everyone poops. Jesus pooped.  Dumbledore pooped* (see bottom of the page).  The Queen poops. The Dalai Lama poops. The Pope poops (his name is also close to the word “poop”). And the thing is, it’s actually not being able to poop that is the problem. I’m not sure if it’s because of its unappealing nature or the certain area involved, but it is uncanny how offensive people find the subject of poop. You can make any number of sexual innuendos, say the f word like it’s some sort of intelligent conversation filler, but there is something inherently off-putting about the contents of your bowel. It doesn’t matter that we use the toilet on average 1-3 times a day for just this reason, it doesn’t matter that it is a huge part of our lives and crucial to a properly working body. We absolutely adore talking about food but politely abstain from talking about the fact of life that what goes in must come out. It's science, people. It can’t just stay in there forever. But as much as people don’t want to talk about a functioning bowel, they 126.59% don’t want to talk about what happens when the system quits working (findings taken from Faith'sbook Study on the Colon). Such things are so shameful we either cringe from even the allusion of it or point and laugh at it like adolescent teenage boys.

The Duck Award of Excellence

This post is pure diatribe. Pure, beautiful diatribe.

The Duck Award of Excellence

It's unfortunate but true: a lot of good literature doesn't make sense. It's like to be considered good a book must have attempted to make it as difficult as possible for their readers to understand what they are reading. I'm half kidding because I absolutely love painful old-school stuff like Shakespeare but Shakespeare has a good excuse for being difficult to understand: it's old. If it was difficult to understand then, everyone would have left the theatre frustrated and sent him to the guillotine (it was very violent back then). Many books that win awards are not very friendly to readers, though they may be doing all sorts of wonderful things like pushing boundaries and dealing with important subjects. But if I'm not enjoying a book, which doesn't mean it has to be a happy story or that it can't educate me on something, then what's the point? If I wanted to be educated on important topics only, I would just watch The Onion News. Seriously people. Many of the books I really love have not won any awards, or at least not the really important ones, like Christy, The Dwelling Place, Fortune's Rocks, I Capture the Castle, or fantasy book series like Dave Duncan's books, or CS Lewis The Chronicles of Narnia which do not necessarily have the most amazing writing in the history of the world, but they are the kind of stories that you get lost in. And there is nothing quite like getting lost in a book. Often I find I can't trust those little awards on books at all, I'll get all excited reading a book with an award, thinking, "This book can't possibly let me down, it won an award!" And then find myself feeling horrendously betrayed by the awards people when the books just plain sucks. Sadly, awards just can't be trusted. I believe the awards people are corrupt and give awards in exchange for bribes and personal favors (like those little kazoos in party favors or doing their laundry). I think there should fake awards for crappy books to warn readers. They could have a sticker with a picture of a duck on crutches and call it "The Duck Award of Excellence" and hope the authors don't notice the mini crutches. Only readers would secretly know it was a courtesy sticker that meant not to waste their precious reading time on such a lame book.

Geek, Dweeb, Nerd, Dork

The famous Steve Urkel, nerd, geek or dork?

There is an ongoing discussion I have with a previous coworker who will remain nameless,* about the difference between a geek, dork and nerd. It actually started way earlier last year between my brother,** the nameless person Matt and another nameless person.*** We looked up the definitions and tried to use examples in our own world to put them into context, such as World of Warcraft, but as soon as you think you have it under control World of Warcraft suddenly seems just as dorky as it is geeky, or is it nerdy? Well, don't stress over it because it's probably all of the above. You can be a geek and still act like a dork and do nerdy things. You can be a dork and have moments of geekhood which you will forever look back to as the prime of your life. You can be a nerd with traces of dork and then later in life transform into a beautiful geek-swan. Truth be told they're pretty much interchangeable. Here are the definitions I got from Dictionary.com and I promise you, I did not make any of the below definitions up, no matter how ridiculous they seem. I have added dweeb and spod because I believe it is important to the discussion and necessary to really get a grasp of these terms in all their glory.

* Matt

** Josh

*** Murray