bare minimum

Yesterday was my birthday! Thanks to all the lovely people who wrote to wish me from Amsterdam, Maastricht, Durham, Detroit, Philadelphia, New York, India, Sri Lanka, Bahrain and Berlin… I spent the day doing something pretty magical. First a road trip… with 9 people from the posada to a nearby waterfall where we swam in ice cold water, stood in a rainbow, looked at a giant waterfall for over an hour, ate guacamole and chips, swam some more, gave ourselves spa treatments with mud, lounged on trees branched over the water, acted like wild cats, ate grilled chicken from the market, sang songs and got green coconuts. Then a nice long car ride back to town with the sunset. A nice long hot shower for me and back to the posada for más fiesta.

The owner of the posada sold it recently and yesterday was his last day so he had himself a party and turned it into a joint birthday part for me too. I donated 2 bottles of Jose Cuervo for which I was rewarded with a gorgeous chocolate cake, a big crowd singing happy birthday and eventually a stick with which to break my very first and very own piñata, dressed up like a Zapatista of course. Can’t post pics here due to the slow bandwidth D has in Africa but will post them soon somewhere. I did get that beast. The candy inside was some of the most vile I have ever tasted. As I told all the kiddies last night – every birthday since I turned 30 keeps getting better and better.

vocabulary: owner = dueño; party = fiesta; waterfall = la cascada; cat = el gato; to swim = nadar