Christmas/New Year's Eve: Over Christmas, I went to Germany to visit the family...it was quite a party. It was really great to see everyone again and have a fun old fashioned family Christmas. There were surprisingly few shit-fits and lots of good times. We traveled to Luxembourg and Brussels and built snowmen and went sledding, so all in all it was an amazing trip. Everyone was there...sisters, sisters' boyfriends, Gaby, Joe, Nicole, Klaus, and adorable baby William! I didn't want to put him down! It was a really nice Christmas.
After ten days of freezing cold snow, I was ready to get back to sunny Guam. I spent New Year's Eve on the beach with awesome people and had an amazing time.
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| Banzai cliffs (self-explanatory) |
At the end of January, a friend of mine was in Saipan doing research for her job, so I went there to hang out with her and see another island. It was a really great trip. Saipan has a lot of really cool WWII history as well as it being a gorgeous island. There are literally WWII tanks just sitting in the water off the coast that people swim out to and jump off of. It's so fascinating that there is so much really cool stuff on these islands that people don't really seem to think anything of. I found the whole history of Saipan interesting and was surprised that I knew so little about it despite it being a huge part of history. From the coast of Saipan you can see the tiny island of Tinian, which is where the atomic bombs were dropped off by the Indianapolis then loaded onto the Enola Gay to head to Japan. There are two cliffs on Saipan where thousands of Japanese people jumped and committed suicide after the Japanese lost the island to the Americans. It's just a really interesting place.
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| Attempting to de-tree a coconut |
While in Saipan, we went diving at a place called the Grotto. It's basically a system of caves underwater that you swim through. There was some really cool stuff there- I saw an octopus for the first time! I've been wanting to see one for a while, and have missed opportunities on other dives. But I finally saw one! He was hiding in a little hole and really didn't want to come out, but it was still cool to see him. We also saw a really cool electric plant thing that I can't remember the name of. When you shine a light on it, it makes little blue sparks. Really cool! It was my first kind of challenging dive because of currents and depth, and I was a little nervous but it was amazing. I want to go back and do it again so that I won't be so preoccupied with being nervous and will really be able to enjoy it. It was a really great trip and I'm excited to travel to some of the other islands now!
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| I really like grottos! |
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| Awesome hike to "dry grotto" |
Spring Break plans:
My friend Jackie (she teaches Chinese at the middle school here) and I have finally decided on our Spring Break plans! (we're indecisive people). We are going to be spending 4 days on the island of Palau and 5 days in the Phillipines. Palau is supposed to have some excellent diving (sharks and manta rays, oh my!) and you can see whale sharks in the Phillipines! So if I don't have anything to post about coming up, there will be a post about our Spring Break adventures!
