I'm naming my firstborn Thor, after his father.

Friends you make here on the island are a lot different than friends I made back home...I've gotten a lot closer a lot faster with my friends here than I did back home. With the island being so small, you see everyone everywhere. We're all in this foreign place feeling like aliens who don't belong sometimes, and we bond in that. The disadvantage to this is the turn over. Most people in my neighborhood (which is an 1/8 of a mile from the medical school) are students of the medical school, and their spouses. Seeing as the medical school classes keep them here for five semesters, 20 months, people are constantly coming and going. You meet someone and one of the first questions you're asked is, "Which semester are you in?" because you want to gauge immediately how long that person is going to be here. It's such a bummer when you meet someone and get along really well with them and then learn that they're leaving in a couple of months. I'm still getting over Danny and Katie leaving...

That's why it really is nice that I've become better friends with locals here, that actually stay on the island permanently, you know they're not abandoning you anytime soon ;)

Our friend Kenzie left last week, she was a nanny for our friend Rose, whose daughter Eliaa, or "baby e" became really good friends with Piper. Kenzie and I hung out a lot her last week here, with our nanny babies. Piper's not quite sure where baby eliaa went to, she saw her so much last week, and this week she keeps asking where she is and we have to explain that she left on an airplane...









Kenzie LOVES to bake. Here she is rolling out some dough for these orange rolls we made, so yummy. I had to hand squeeze the orange juice because we don't have a juicer, we only needed a tsp or something, and I ended up making like an entire cup of orange juice, but it tasted good.



Kenzie's last night in St. Maarten was the night of our French class. We showed up at the building and met a Spanish family who just moved here from Miami, FL. They didn't speak a lick of English and I was the only one there who could speak Spanish...yikes. So the entire French lesson was me trying to translate French-English-Spanish. It was such a mess. I'm pretty sure half of the class left me with an expression similar to Raven from that disney show "That's So Raven" when she has her psychic visions and her face goes blank, because I was trying to remember verbs and vocab that I haven't used in years. The more I study other languages the more I realize how incredibly stupid English is. FYI. I pity any who have to learn English as a second language.

After my attempt at being trilingual was over (by the way, FAIL) some friends and I went to see "Snow White and the Huntsman" We got to the theater like an hour early because its on the way home from French and we figured it'd be a waste to drive home and then drive all the way back. The theater has a little ice cream place inside with a REAL COUCH. Most couches in our apartments are either A.) Patio furniture or B.)so incredibly ugly that staring at them too long can possibly cause someone to seize. So Cecily decided to take advantage and sprawl the heck out on that thing.



Kenzie and I went around taking pictures by random movie ads because we had a lot of time to kill, and we're super cool and not embarrassed at all...We went up and down the escalator trying to line up with the giant picture of Chris Hemsworth (aka THOR aka HOTTIE WITH A BODY) he's my new obsession, guys, hands down. I think he's hotter than Jared Allen, which, if you know me, know that's a HUGE deal.

His flawless face and gorgeous Australian accent is physical evidence that God loves us. Am I right?









So Kenzie took a picture of me going up the escalator, and then this random dude asked if she'd take his picture, too. HA. It was hilarious. I don't know which is creepier, that he asked her to take his picture, or that I'm uploading that picture up to my blog. Oh well, he's famous now.





"How do you shoot a bow and arrow?" Hahaha


After almost dying from running up the wrong way on the escalators, and risking our lives to take a picture with Thor, and being asked if we were drunk, it was time for the movie finally.







Last week was also Cari's block week which meant huge important exams, and then a night of relaxation. We went and checked out this brand new gelato place in Maho called "Gio's" we met the guy who owns it, his name is Gio...what a coincidence ;) he gave us advertising t shirts and said to wear them around town and help him out with his new business. Cari was stoked.





After ice cream I went and babysat a little girl of one of Cari's classmates. She was way cute, and showed me her homemade play-doh. We played with play-doh for almost an hour, I got embarrassingly into it.





Last weekend I got a wicked bad sunburn. Cecily, Ashley, Andi and I laid outside for almost four hours just talking, and I don't know why but I guess I figured I didn't need sunscreen because I've lived here five months and have a good base tan...nope. I got charred.

Z

Piper's play group today was...eventful. She isn't used to having to share her toys with having siblings that are ten years older than her and not all that interested in playing with airplanes and toy cars. So she likes to scream at kids who hone in on her area, and use her toys. I hope it gets better with time...she's also at an age where she plays alongside kids, and not actually WITH them. Hence the picture of her on one side, and everyone else on the other side..ha!









Piper still loves playgroup, though, and she likes to list off the names of all of her "island friends." All week she's woken up and said "I played with my playgroup!!" Piper's new thing is this super possessed looking scowl that she likes to do. She'll straight up put her head down, look up, and growl at you sometimes, and I have to try and not laugh at it. Now she knows it's funny so she'll do it and then start laughing right away. Its almost turned into mine and hers special bonding thing because we do it back and forth to each other a ton. Creeps.

We had a pretty relaxed weekend. Since it was the weekend after Cari's major tests, she didn't have too much material to study, so she's able to hang out and do more on post block weekends. She and Casey went on a date and I did her hair and then wanted to take their picture since occasions to actually do your hair here and you're not rockin' the messy bun from constant beach and swimming and sweating...



of course Piper HAD to jump in the picture. She loves taking pictures and videos, especially on the webcam of our iMac. Which reminds me, sorry to all of my facebook friends who are bombarded with webcam pics and movies of Piper and I, but she looks like Albert Einstein in this one and it makes me laugh so hard.



Andi and I came home from a movie last weekend and the screen door wasn't where it usually sits by the front door, and we walked into the living room and Cari was sitting at the table cutting out construction paper letters for a new wall decor...the paintings that usually are up on the wall there bugged the trash out of her and she couldn't take it anymore, so they upgraded to their nice screen door wall hanging. Island decor can get pretty funny, on a student budget, you kinda work with what you have. White Trash R Us. :D




I hope everyone has a good week, i'll be staying busy trying to conquer French, Piano, and all the the hair on the island that I've been doing lately. Staying very busy, it's good! Love & Miss you guys!