Flashback Friday

Today's flashback takes a different form.

I was graciously invited to take part in one of the millions of neighborhood inaugural events that were held this past weekend here in PoliticsMeccaUSA. It was a lovely event hosted by a couple of my students. Not knowing a soul, a girlfriend and I showed up and ended up having one of the nicest nights we have both had in a long time.

I was reminded how magical it is to get to know new people.

As the male counterpart of the couple I teach took my arm and led me around the room, I realized that all these people knew me, and yet I had just begun to learn about them as my students' abilities have grown to the level of speaking in-depth about their groups, hobbies, sports teams and the other two couples they bicycle tour with. It was flattering; the wine helped me overcome feeling overwhelmed.

I met one lady that night who, in 1974, went to the Galápagos Islands. She had a resident visa in Ecuador at that time, so she got a military flight for $70, she and her husband were weighed before getting on the plane, and then crates and crates of beer was loaded on after them. As they took off, everyone madly started doing the sign of the cross (South American military plane, early 1970s...can't say I blame them!) and they landed about an hour or so later in the Galápagos. They had to take a boat to the main residential island of Santa Cruz, and stayed in Puerto Ayora. Tourists are no longer allowed to stay on the islands, I believe.

During her week there, she met a Norwegian family that had lived there for a couple generations and, from what she said, they became quite close by the time she and her husband had to return to the mainland.

Fast forward 18 years, to December 1992 when I, on my resident visa in Ecuador, got a non-tourist rate to fly a small commuter plane out to the newer airport on the island of Santa Cruz and stayed for four nights in Puerto Ayora. My first night there I met a man about my same age who took me each night to show me the "natives only" side of the Galápagos while my companions slept in their hostel. It was a purely amazing and one-of-a-kind experience and part of why the Galápagos are considered my personal paradise.

Upon my departure on my fifth day on the Islands, I was given a book by this man, with a message written on the front cover to me, written by a Joanna Angermeyer: "My Father's Island". He knew the people in the book; the author was a personal family friend and he wanted me to have it to always remember why the Galápagos are such a special place to those few who have decided to make their lives there.

The woman's eyes lit up on Monday night when I related this to her. "Angermeyer..." That was the family she had met in her time in the Galápagos back in 1974, when my friend would have only been about 2 years old. It was a serendipitous conversation as we stood there, relating, remembering, allowing ourselves to fall back into an empathetic zone of experiences shared and people known, albeit separated by almost 20 years.

This conversation was one of the many highlights on Monday night, and showed me how important it is to continue to extend myself beyond my comfort zone; I never know what treasures await me there.

And perhaps I should go back and re-read that book this weekend.