letter may 17, 2010

I am writing this letter on my netbook, which I have taken with me on my Aikido Puerto Rico junket. It's been fun so far, but first...I am so glad that this was the week I went away. Beyond the fact that the weather in Chicago has been unseasonably cold and wet (sorry Cindy); this was also the week that the main server for the Advocate and Aurora laboratory system decided to crash. This was the single server that coordinated lab results for about 20 hospitals throughout northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin. And when I say crash, I mean they had to fly technicians from Hewlett Packard out, and install new hardware. Pretty serious. This included ALL lab results - - blood work, microbiology, and yes, anatomic pathology. This was a bit of a quandary for me because I was on call the previous weekend (the server crashed early Monday AM). So, I had looked at about 50 cases. About 1/2 of these had been transcribed and signed out, but the rest were in electronic limbo land. The server was still out when I left Wednesday morning, and so I had to leave a pile of cases with the other pathologists. Most of these they only need to electronically sign-out for me, and don't need to look at them on their own, but it will still be a big pain in the butt And meanwhile, since our information system was down, slides from new cases weren't coming out in a timely fashion, new diagnoses had to be handwritten and faxed to clinicians, etc. The server came up on Thursday, and since I am here, I don't have to deal with the backlog! Ha ha ha! (N.b. the cases were signed out).

Meanwhile, on Mothers' Day I went out to Highland Park, and went warbling with Mom. We saw some pretty good birds: warbling vireos, Blackpolls, black-and-whites, Indigo Buntings, the usual suspects. A highlight was a pair of Caspian Terns at the Botanic Gardens. We saw one catch a fish and feed the fish to its mate, along with some courtship behavior. Margo Merrick was also with us. Jasper has his first summer meet tomorrow, where he’s swimming the 'pentathlon' (50 of each of four strokes, and then a 200 IM, the winner has the fastest aggregate time). Lucas is finishing up the tennis season, and Nicola is being Nicola. Lucas won his matches, and the team ended the season undefeated. Jasper had some good times on individual events, but still needs work on his backstroke. He finished 12th overall for his age group.

Anyway, I flew out to San Juan on Weds AM. Everyone else had left the day before, but there was a communication glitch when I made travel arrangements. This turned out to be pretty beneficial for me. The plane was on time and uneventful, and I arrived 2:30, collected my luggage, and went outside to get picked up by Paco Arroyo. Paco is a blue belt in Chicago, but also a transplanted Puerto Rican. He picked me up with his 20 year old cousin Stephanie. She is studying accounting at the University, but she has time off because the students (and the professors, out of sympathy) have been on strike for practically a month now. They are protesting tuition hikes and other financial issues. We drove into Old San Juan, where we met the other six of us: Senseis Bob Garza (head of my dojo in Chicago), Diane Costanzo (head of a dojo in Oak Park), and Lionel Romanzow (head of a dojo in Janesville, Wis.), as well as Roger Allen (aikido student)., Joan Denhert (aikido and iaido student as well as part-time, unpaid office staff), and Chuck Delariva (iaido instructor). They all were just leaving the big fort that like other Caribbean military sites has thick walls to fend off cannonades. The fort was lost several times over the years to the Dutch, French, etc. The Americans took it during the Spanish-American War, and we have had the island since.

We walked through the old city. The streets are cobbled with brick with a blue glaze on the surface. The houses are narrow, with forbidding doors. Occasionally, one is open, and you can look deep into the foyer. All of the houses in the old city seem to have internal courtyards. We walked to a restaurant called El Jibarito (http://www.yelp.com/biz/el-jibarito-san-juan-2), where Archie, Stephanie's father met us. He is a retired civil servant for the arts council of PR, and he traveled and worked on projects in the US and Europe. We had a great late lunch/ early dinner. I ordered mofongo, a PR specialty made of smashed plantain, garlic, and pork cracklings (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mofongo). I had mine with grouper poached with garlic. The meal also came with a small cup of rich chicken broth, which you dip the Mofongo in. To finish I had a coconut flan. Other people had tamales (or pastilles, as they are called on PR), mofongo with shrimp, etc. It was all excellent. They also had pina coladas flavored with a touch of cherry syrup, which appeared to be a common method on PR. After dinner I transferred my bags to the giant van we have rented (would seat 12, but we need something this size for our luggage, which includes swords and other weapons), and we drove to where Bob rented a house. First, though, we stopped at a Wal-Mart in Isabella to buy extra towels, pillows, and air mattress and electric pump, bottled water, and cold medicine - - Joan brought a cold with her on the trip, and she subsequently infected me, Chuck and Roger. The house is all the way on the far northwest of the island near a little town called San Antonio (west of Isabella and east of Aguadilla). Our house is near the ocean, just off of route 4466. http://www.mapquest.com/maps?city=San+Antonio&state=PR&zipcode=00690 This is about a two - four hour drive from San Juan, depending on traffic! I have no idea why Bob rented a house here, other than the cost. It is so remote that Diane remarked 'We are so far out in the middle of nowhere that we are already coming back". The house has a small downstairs apartment that has a kitchenette, bathroom, and sleeps two (Roger and Chuck). Upstairs there are two bedrooms, a kitchen and a bathroom. Diane and Joan are in the bedrooms, while I have a futon. Lionel is sleeping on a mattress supplied by the owners, and Bob on the air mattress he bought. The bedrooms are not air-conditioned, and the quarters are uncomfortable. The web site alleged that the house could sleep 12 - - maybe if they were illegal Chinese immigrants.

Wednesday AM we got up and drove east to Arecibo, where we had breakfast at a well known restaurant/diner 'El Buen Cafe" in a small town just west or Arecibo called Hatillo. Then we drove on route 134 into the interior to see the Rio Camuy caverns (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rio_Camuy_Caves). Tourists are only allowed to see a small part of the cave; we also had to wear green hard hats - - apparently someone was struck by a falling rock with the last few years, and died. This is a marvelous, huge cave (one of many in PR). The cave height is 170 feet, and I no longer know how wide. We had to take a little tram about a 2/3 of a mile from the park entrance to get to the southern mouth of the cave. Then we went on an hour-long walking tour of this cave. It has an underground river, a bat cave, huge stalagmites and stalactites, and another, northern entrance. In 1998, the internal river was so high that it scoured the inside of the cave, and parts of the cave are presently closed because of flooding this winter. The parts we are allowed in are very superficial, and comparatively well lit. This part of the cave is also home to crickets, spiders, snakes, and shrimp. The shrimp can grow up to 12 inches long, and the spiders up to 6 inches (it is called a scorpion spider). We did see some bats and spiders. The walkway of the cave is quite slick, and several people (not in our immediate party) fell. Outside the cave there was a thrush calling, which the naturalist said was a pearly-eyed thrasher. It sounded a lot like an American wood thrush. The park around the cavern is the winter home of many American species

After the cave, Paco met us, and we continued our drive across the island to Ponce. First we had a late lunch, where I had Pernil (roast pork) with yellow rice and chick peas. The road across the island was very narrow and curvy, and quite frightening in our large van, especially on the rare occasions that a truck was passing us the other way. We made a lot of raucous jokes about our experiences here. Our route led us to Lares (the alleged home of the most beautiful Puerto Rican women - - well at least, Miss Universe 2001 is from here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denise_Quinones ), south on (I believe) to route 129, a bit east on route 10 (very scary!), and then 123 into Ponce (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ponce,_Puerto_Rico). Jasper would have thrown up a million times. Sometimes we were headed straight at an oncoming 18-wheeler. The views of the rugged interior were breathtaking.

In Ponce we went to the Castillo Serralles at the northern end of the city. This is on a hilltop and flags were raised here to announce incoming ships to the port. There is a small but nice Japanese garden that we visited, and then we took a small elevator up to an observation deck in a cross-shaped building. We did not have time to see the Castillo, which is supposed to be a good example of Spanish revival architecture from the 1920’s. Just beneath the slope of the Castillo are very poor areas. We tried to drive into the main plaza of the old city, but the mayor was going to give an annual speech, and the plaza was closed to car traffic. We parked a block away and walked to the plaza. It is anchored by a cathedral with two spires coated in some sort of silvery substance. There is also a lovely, working fountain, and a beautifully painted and maintained fire engine shed displaying a vehicle from 100 years ago. A lot of the architecture in Ponce is from the last century, but alas the recession has hit quite hard here (as it has throughout the island), and there are burnt out abandoned buildings with graffiti dotted throughout. Then we drove to the la Guancha boardwalk, which is next to the port. This is a long boardwalk with about a dozen small restaurant/bars on it. There is a very large children's playground, and a nice marina. We saw some giant fish that looked almost like 4-foot long carp (maybe they were tarpon?) by the boardwalk, and the ubiquitous feral dogs and cats. Paco told us that on summer weekends the parking lot is full, and people are out here past midnight. We then drove back to San Antonio by taking highway 2 around the southwest edge of the island, stopping briefly to eat at a Pollo Tropical (http://www.pollotropical.com/home/home.aspx) near San German, sort of like a Panda Express for Puerto Rican food. I had a chicken soup and fried Yucca. We also met one of Bob's cousins. At the end of day we had circumnavigated about ½ of the island.

This morning we drove out to Aguadilla for breakfast, which we had at a small local chain, El meson (http://www.elmesonsandwiches.com/). Like everywhere around here, excellent coffee. The toast is made of some kind of thin loaf, which is buttered, and then smashed on a grill like a Cuban sandwich. I had harina - - cream of wheat or corn with cinnamon and sugar. Then we rested up a bit for the beginning of our seminar. Bob, Joan, and Roger went to the beach wearing sun block for a total of about 20 minutes, and still got burned

This link is the ad for our seminar http://iaido-chicago.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/May-Aercibo-Puerto-Rico-Seminar-2010.pdf . The aikido dojo, though air conditioned, is too small for the number of people (we had about 30 on the mat at the peak), so we are holding it in a mixed martial arts dojo. This is in an aluminum roofed Quonset hut without air conditioning. The floor is cement covered by a thin layer of decrepit karate ‘jigsaw puzzle’ mats (http://www.karatedepot.com/tr-ma-10.html). The mat is filthy, and bits and pieces come off the surface throughout the seminar. Clearly the normal occupants here do not do a lot of rolling and falling.

Lionel teaches the first session. Lionel is an ex-farrier (a horse-shoer). He stopped this job because it was very stressful – he had quintuple bypass cardiac surgery some years ago. Now he has a job building customized vehicles such as ‘control center’ vans for political rallies. I have known Lionel a long time, he was an about a year behind me back in Chicago back in the 80’s.), Lionel worked on variations of a technique called ikkyo (you can you tube video it yourself). After his class I spent 90 minutes on a technique known as kote-gaishe. It was pretty hot!

Saturday, luckily was overcast. The day started officially somewhere around 3 AM, where we were wakened by an earthquake that measured about 5.7 Richter. We were right at the epicenter. But at the seminar, Bob started out the day with an Iaido class (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iaid%C5%8D#Mugai-ry.C5.AB0 Diane taught the next class. Diane is also a professor of English at Dominican University in River Forest. I’m sorry to say that I have forgotten what technique she worked on specifically, but she emphasized ‘tai sabaki’ or the movement’s first body motion. After her class we ran a brown belt test. We took about 90 minutes for lunch, and then Bob and Lionel taught classes in the evening. Afterwards, we drove all the way back to San Antonio to change and then returned to El Buen Café for a dinner. I had eggplant stew and plantain soup.

Sunday Iaido was taught by Chuck. Chuck is about 70, and is a former Chicago police officer. After the Iaido class, we ran a black belt test, then Diane gave a class on knife techniques, and Bob ended with a medley of relatively esoteric defenses. After this Paco drove with us to Hatillo where we had a late lunch at a lechonera (a roast pork restaurant). This stand had fried pork skin that was crackling on the outside and oozing fat on the inside. It was like something you would see on the food channel. They also had rice with pigeon peas, plantain stewed with garlic onions and peppers, tamales, etc. We drove back out to San Antonio to do some packing, and then went to dinner at a restaurant in Aguadilla. This morning we left the house at 2:30 Am to drive to San Juan airport, where we had to stand in the USDA line, the baggage check line, and the security line to get to our plane. The plane left on time, and came in over thirty minutes early.

I came home, rested a bit and went into work - - where I got kicked out after an hour or so because I was coughing so much from my cold. This was a really enjoyable trip. Everyone knew each other, and we had a lot of funny adventures driving around. The roads in PR are just as bad or worse as they were at the Brown family vacation some years ago; PR is a strange place, part third world and part modern. Sometimes you would be driving down the road and pass a center for open MRI, and next door would be a used tire shop, and then an empty building. The people were generally exceptionally friendly and helpful (the worst behavior was in the airport). The food was great, if a bit monotonous. But it was really hot!

Love, H.

P.S. I will direct you to pictures whenever they get posted later