The Scene that is Los Angeles

I think I forgot to mention that my latest contract had me living and working Los Angeles. That dream of moving to LA and “making it big” was never something I seriously entertained and living here has made utterly grateful for that. Kudos to those who pursue their passion, but LA is definitely a city that chews up and spits out the less tenacious dreamers and is fickle with her affection toward even the most successful of starlets. Like many, I leave work at the end of the day feeling pretty worn out and then I tend to rally a bit once I get home. Here however, the LA traffic- combined with generalized overstimulation from car horns and billboards and flashing lights- generally zapped whatever energy I had left.  And it is just such a scene. All the time. I defy to find me another city in which people so carefully curate their  coffee run outfits and meticulously match their workout wear accessories.

I lived in West Hollywood, renting a room from an awesome girl named Amy. My work commute was only 3.5 miles but, on my worst day, it took almost 45 minutes to get home. Literally, I can run faster. And the self-entitled Maserati-drivers who feel like traffic rules don’t apply to them just infuriate me. My commute took me through Beverly Hills along Santa Monica Boulevard and the amount of wealth in this part of the world is mind-boggling. When I first arrived, I thought it so foolish that people drive such luxury cars when LA drivers are, to generalize, kind of reckless, and LA parking spaces are, to generalize, kind of miniscule. “Those cars will for sure get dinged, even if the owners valet the sh*$ out of them,” I thought.  But I soon realized that ‘Angelinos’ spend inordinate amounts of time in their cars- they might as well utilize and enjoy bells and whistles and comfy car seats, otherwise those cars might just feel like prisons.

So, I confirmed what I already knew: LA is not the place for me. But I came for the facility- The California Rehabilitation Institute- despite it being in LA. CRI is a joint venture between UCLA and Cedars Sinai- both big names in healthcare. The hospital opened in 2016, so it is still ramping up, but it is already the largest rehab hospital on the West Coast.

                              Apparently this is what I look like with brown eyes and blonde hair

Cedars-Sinai is a fantastic medical facility with loads of specialists at the top of their fields, so people fly in from all over for cutting-edge procedures and rare-disease treatments. If those people need rehab afterward, they come to us.  I had patients from probably a dozen different states, which keeps things fun. We are also the rehab hospital of choice for LA-based celebrities. I had a few VIP patients- one Oscar-winner and a few people with stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, people who are clearly well-known in their respective entertainment sectors, but not quite household names. I hadn’t heard of them before, so they don’t count as true celebrities in my book. If you play that ‘Six Degrees of Separation’ game, however, they do put me within about 2 degrees of separation from everyone in Hollywood! 

I should also say that, with celebrity status and wealth come some very interesting personalities. Most memorable of all were not the VIP patients, but their high-strung bulldog spouses. I’ve said it before but my psychology pre-reqs have proven to be some of the most useful classes of my entire OT degree!

So, CRI was a great place to work but I’m ready for less traffic, fewer fashionistas, more bang for my buck, and a celebration of seasons!

Next stop: Colorado!

                                                            This is winter in LA.

Farewelling 2017 With a Grateful Heart

I actually started this blog entry whilst sitting in the Charlotte airport on Near Year’s Eve- but then I boarded the plane to LA and got swept up into regular life. I originally wrote about how very grateful I was to have time off this year to celebrate Christmas at home with my family on Seabrook. Reading this stirred up the bittersweet feelings that I now associate with holidays. Some part of me still clings to a child-like belief that I deserve those days off- that everyone deserves to spend the holidays at home with family. But my adult self knows better. Holidays aren’t a given for everyone.

Just like the Charlotte airport, hospitals don’t close for Thanksgiving or Christmas. Viruses don’t stop spreading and emergent surgeries can’t be placed on hold. And what about the patients already in the hospital- the ones with whom I work? They still have ongoing needs regardless of the date or the time. I always tell people that my job is Monday-Friday, year-round.

Of course, it isn’t just hospital workers. Police and first responders, pilots and public transit workers, concession stand workers and gas station attendants, and many more, I’m sure, are subjected to the unfairness of this adult reality as well.

A holly, jolly Christmas with family isn’t always par for the course. The truth is that holidays are difficult time for many. That swirl of holiday emotions is often magnified in a hospital setting- one patient may feel exponentially more lonely because she is being cared for by strangers instead of loved ones while her neighbor is just feeling grateful to be alive after a head-on collision. One gentleman is coming to grips with a terminal diagnosis and knows that this Christmas will be his last while the woman across the hall is feeling jubilant and hopeful after a successful transplant surgery. Yet another is engulfed in a bout of hospital-acquired delirium and misses Christmas all together. It can be difficult for me to share in my patients’ emotional journeys- on Christmas and every day- but it certainly helps to put life into perspective and to keep me feeling grateful for all that I have.

Wherever this holiday season found you and whatever emotions it brought to light, I hope you were able to bid adieu to 2017 with a spirit of gratitude. May we all find joy amidst the chaos in 2018! 

Hawaii: A Feral Chicken Story

Any visitor to Maui who has set foot outside of his or her resort complex will likely have encountered a feral (read 'wild') chicken or two. In fact, there's a reasonable chance that you'll see one before you even make it across the parking lot to collect your rental car at the airport.

They say that Kauai has the largest population of feral chickens, but Maui has quite a few! I should explain that the majority of my time on Maui was spent away from tourists and resorts. I lived and worked in the Upcountry, high on the slopes of the Haleakala volcano. Although further from the beach, its a popular spot with the locals; the air is cooler, the views are killer, and there is still a fair amount of small-scale agriculture. Between the roaming cats, the feral chickens, the goats, and the barely weather-proofed wooden shacks interspersed among the more affluent homes, you'd be forgiven for momentarily wondering if your pilot landed you in a 3rd world country.

                       
                                                           One of my domesticated hens begging for food scraps

The hens are fairly quiet. They can stay. But the roosters are a different story. Even with earplugs and a 'white noise' app, I still woke up cursing them during my first weeks on the island.  To be fair, I probably had it worse than most because my neighbor (who, I later found out, is an uncle of one of the maintenance guys at my hospital!)  kept half a dozen roosters in cages in his backyard to be used in illegal cock fights.  Miraculously, over time, I did develop the ability to sleep through their super out-of-sync sunrise greetings- at least for the most part.

                                          Have you heard the one about the rooster that walks into a cafe?...


White people who live on Maui are called 'haoles.'  It isn't really a derogatory word as far as I can tell, but, if your ancestors aren't Native Hawaiians and they didn't come here to work on the plantations, then you're a haole. Even if your family has been here for generations. I'm saying all of this to provide some context for the feral chicken story my 'haole' nurse friend Jade told me the other day:

This friend lives in Haiku, another area of the island with lots of locals and limited amounts of tourists.  As she was collecting her mail, a neighbor stormed up to her, waggled her finger in her face, and said that she wasn't doing her part to keep the neighborhood chicken population under control.

Unsure what this lady meant, Jade was a little taken aback. "I don't quite understand," she said. "Are you suggesting that I'm supposed to kill the chickens?? Because I'm not going to kill an animal. I can barely kill a spider."

"You don't have to KILL the chickens," said the lady, "Just get rid of a few."

"Get rid of them? How?" asked Jade.

"Catch them, drive a couple of valleys over, and let them go again," the neighbor explained.

"How do I even catch a chicken?" This seemed like an impossible task to Jade, who was picturing herself chasing poultry all around the yard, chickens squawking and feathers flying.

"Its easy," said the lady with a hint of exasperation. "Just figure out where they sleep at night. Once they're roosting, they become super slow. You just walk right up, grab them, and throw them in a pillowcase. Tie a knot at the top and you're good to go."

And that was basically the end of the conversation. I don't know how the neighbor kept tabs on who did their chicken removal duty and when. I'm pretty sure Jade's going to let those chickens go on roosting and crowing in peace, but I'm not sure the neighbor will! That's Hawaii for ya.

Hawaii: Hono

'Honu' is the Hawaiian word for sea turtle.  The honu symbolizes wisdom, endurance and good luck and is almost as synonymous with Hawaii as coconuts and Hawaiian shirts.  Encounters with these creatures are less rare than you might suppose for frequenters of Hawaiian waters, but honu sightings retain a magical quality whether it is your first sighting or your fiftieth.

My experience with sea turtles prior to arriving on Hawaiian shores was limited to the female loggerhead turtles that come ashore on Seabrook Island (where my parents lives) to lay their eggs.

I have a wonderful memory of waking up early in the morning and following the 'Turtle Patrol' crew along the beach to the site of a nest in the midst of hatching. Watching these tiny turtles make their way across the sand, their little flippers unfolding more and more with each step, was something I'll never forget.

                                           Baby loggerhead with a faulty flipper (July 2009)

Like many species of sea turtles, once the baby loggerheads hit the water, the males never return to land and the females return only to lay eggs. Here in Hawaii, however, the green sea turtles often come up on the beach and bask in the sun for hours a time. Your chances of encountering them in the water are even greater.

I've had the good fortune to see them both on in the water and on the beach.  In fact, I found myself swimming with sea turtles my very first time snorkeling here on Maui! I had my waterproof camera with me and took lots of photos. Unfortunately, less than a week later, that camera found itself resting at the bottom of a waterfall on the Big Island. The wrist strap broke at the MOST inopportune time and the turtle photos had NOT been uploaded off the camera. *grrr*

When my mom and sister came to visit, I took them to that exact same snorkel spot over in Kihei- we swam around and around- on two different days- and there was not a turtle to be seen.  (Sorry, Mom and Stephanie).

Were my encounters with Hawaiian sea turtles to live on only in my memory? Thankfully not.  Ho'okipa Beach, located on Maui's north shore, is not only one of the best windsurfing spots in the world, it is also a favored place for sea turtles to gather around sunset.  I didn't know about this early on (again, sorry, Mom and Stephanie). When my friend Melissa was here visiting, however, I was armed with knowledge and we planned ourselves a perfectly romantic evening- we picked up an entire pizza from Flatbread Company in Pa'ia, sat on the beach to watch the windsurfers for a bit, then migrated over to the east side of the beach to watch giant turtles pull themselves up onto the sand while the sun painted the sky vibrant shades of orange and pink.  On a 'beautiful evenings' scale, this one clocked in at 'seriously stunning.' See for yourself:

And then! The icing on the cake!

I went with my friend Anders to the west side of Oahu.  We set out in search of dolphins and had to 'settle' for sea turtles instead.  The turtles were hanging out at a 'turtle cleaning station'- a large clump of coral where turtles gather to have the algae on their shells nibbled off by small fish- a sort of  'shell shine,' if you will.  These turtles are amazingly mellow and don't seem to mind if you dive down to say hello. With GoPro in hand, you can get some amazing photos!

 

                                                        That's me! What a dream come true!
                                                                 
          Many thanks to the Hawaiian hono for making my ocean explorations here so magical!

Hawaii: Transportation and Shelter

I feel extremely fortunate because things aligned just beautifully for me during my first week here in Maui. Let me document my first day:

The romantic in me hoped that I would disembark onto the tarmac and have a beautiful floral lei being bestowed upon me in welcome.  We've all seen those movies. It turns out that this classic Hawaiian greeting is now reserved only for those whose friends and loved ones pay for a lei in advance. Alas.

Even without the heady scent of plumeria around one's neck, Kahului Airport still has a tropical feel to it- Baggage Claim is roofed but otherwise essentially open to the air so passengers can catch glimpses of palm trees and lush northern slopes of the West Maui Mountains almost immediately.  I grabbed my luggage and piled myself into a rental car.

As far as I can tell, travel therapists are fairly evenly divided regarding what to do on the transportation front. Some will rent a car for their entire assignment.  A 3-month rental takes quite a chunk out of one's paycheck, as you can imagine, but it does keep life simple.  The other option is to purchase a cheap and cheerful 'Maui Cruiser'- these tend to be older, often imperfect cars (A/C is definitely not guaranteed!) and cost in the ballpark of $1000 to $3000. Driving an old car make you much less of a target for car thieves (yes, car thieves live in paradise too),  and,when you leave, you just knock a couple hundred dollars off the price and sell it on to the next person. Do a quick Craigslist search and you will find an absolute abundance of Maui Cruisers.  They are super easy to come by- but you run the risk that they might break down on you, or at least cost a chunk of change to repair and leave you wishing that you'd just rented a car in the first place.

When I landed in Maui I still wasn't sure which route I wanted to take, so I booked a rental car for 5 days and decided I'd get the lay of the land before making a final decision.  And housing was a higher  priority anyway- I didn't actually have a place lined up to sleep that first night. I did, however, have 3 Craigslist appointments that afternoon, and I was just hoping that one of those would be 'move in ready' so I didn't have to resort to my back-up plan of a bunk bed in a beach hostel.

Option 1 was a room for rent in a lady's house, Option 2 was a cute little studio, and Option 3 was the main portion of a cottage with three separate living spaces.  I had my hopes pinned on Option 3- because I also had high hopes that at least a couple of friends and family members would make good on their promise to come visit me, and I wanted to make sure I had enough space to accommodate them!

Well, the owner of Option 3 (the cottage) had already left for Michigan for the summer and her friend wasn't available to show the property that day. The owner texted, 'Door's unlocked- just go on it and check it out.' So I did. I walked in, looked around, gave her a call, and said I'd take it. Then I brought in my bags, unpacked, and went to bed because it was basically dark by the time I got there. No money actually exchanged hands for at least a week after that and there is definitely not a rental agreement in place.  When I tell people here that story they say, 'Oh, that's so Hawaii.'  So I guess I did get a sort of Hawaiian welcome after all!

And get this-  I ended up buying a car from the travel nurse moving out of Housing Option 2, the little studio.  It is a cute old 1995 Mercedes sedan. I know next to nothing about cars (sorry, Dad!) which is why I was hesitant to dive into the world of Maui Cruisers, but the guy who owns the studio is a 'car guy.' He actually owns the exact same car and helped her pick this one out. When I was debating out loud the pros and cons of renting versus buying a car he said, "I guess you have to ask yourself, 'Am I feeling lucky?'"- but he also basically said that he would help me out if anything went wrong with the car, and that is basically what convinced me to buy the car.

This is my car, The Silver Arrow.

And, as if things hadn't already worked out better than I could have hoped, check out what I saw out of my living room window (and bedroom and bathroom windows, for that matter) when I woke up the next morning.

This is my view (at sunset)!

This is my little upcountry cottage.

Not that life has been totally smooth-sailing since (by Week 3 I was convinced that I had used up ALL of my luck during Week 1), but I completely landed on my feet when I got here, and for that I am very thankful!

Bye-bye Bay, Hello Hawaii

Aloha, dear readers!

The last couple of months have been quite a blur but, as the dust starts to settle and the particularly frenetic energy of the last few weeks begins to dissipate, I find myself carving out a new little space to work and live and breathe here on the island of Maui.  Instead of moving back East, as I told many of you I would, I ended up moving even further West!! Let me give you a little of the backstory...

Reluctantly, after more than a year, I decided that it was finally time to take my leave of the Bay Area. I say 'reluctantly' because it is really difficult to walk away from a good thing! I won't go into detail about all the things that make the Bay Area great- a quick Google search or a flip through a Fordor's or Lonely Planet travel guide can tell you that- but, on top of everything else, I liked my hospital, LOVED my co-workers, and had fantastic roommates. But the cost of living there- and specifically the cost housing- is just unbelievably high. I really want to live somewhere where I can reasonably afford to buy my own home. Somewhere where the traffic isn't so bad and I don't have to worry about my car windows getting smashed (did I mention on the Blog that that happened to me back in January?). But mostly the exorbitant housing costs.

I had also decided that it was maybe time for me to stop traveling as well. Now, don't get me wrong- there are still a million places I'd like to visit and explore. I love the fact that, working as a travel OT, I get to immerse myself in a place for a couple of months, rather than just zooming in and frantically hitting the tourist trail for a few days,a couple of times a year.  But, as I approach my mid-30s, the novelty and the excitement of this lifestyle is no longer really outweighing the lack of grounding and the instability that comes with it. I have been a travel OT now for almost exactly 2 years.  My dad always talks about my 'gypsy lifestyle.' Parts of this lifestyle that suit me really well-  but parts of it don't. I find the in-between times, when I don't know where I'm going or what I'll be doing next, really, really anxiety-provoking. Like, unhealthily so.  And over the past few months I haven't been worrying so much about where my next contract would be, but where in the world I would choose to settle down once my travel OT days were over.

I poured over all sorts of 'Best Places to Live' lists: 'Most Outdoorsy Cities,' 'Top Up-and-Coming Cities,' etc. I would narrow it down to a couple of places- and then start second-guessed all my parameters. Nevertheless I persevered: picked a couple of cities, checked the job boards every day, submitted applications, did some interviews, got some offers.

But Jenny, one of my first travel OT friends, recently took a travel job in Hawaii and messaged me on multiple occasions telling me how much she thought I would love it there. At least a third of my OT co-workers vacationed in Hawaii during my time in the Bay Area (a trip to Hawaii for West coasters is the equivalent of going to Mexico or the Caribbean for the rest of us), and my Hawaiian license was one of the first ones I got when I started working as a travel OT. It was always my intention to get to Hawaii in some capacity while I was on this side of the country so, when a couple of Hawaii jobs pop up on the job board, I submitted my application- then went back to planning my cross-country road trip. When I received the offer to go to Maui, I actually left my recruiter a voice message turning it down, telling myself I was making the 'responsible' decision.  My friends couldn't believe it and my recruiter called back and said, "Are you serious, Merrillee? No one turns down Maui."

That day Itagged along with my roommate, Nachelle, while she took the dogs for a walk. She tends to see things as much more black-and-white than I do and she also has a great seize-the-day/what's-the-worst-that-can-happen kind of attitude. Moving to Hawaii SOUNDS great, but its not the easiest thing to organize logistically. Nachelle graciously offered to store my things in her entry closet and keep my car parked in her boyfriend's driveway. I felt like the Universe was paving a path for me so I gave my recruiter the green light, cancelled my job interviews for the upcoming week, and booked a plane ticket to Hawaii!

Thailand: Bangkok

Another all-day bus ride took us across the Cambodia-Thailand border. Interestingly, our bus couldn’t cross the border. While we stood in line for an hour or so, all of our bags were loaded into a giant wooden cart and dragged across the border by guys on foot- I took half a dozen photos because the whole process just seemed so laborious. I felt like creating a Kickstarter campaign to get these poor guys a couple of oxen or a pair of mules at least! Then we got on a different bus on the other side of the border and took off for the capital.

                                             Transporting luggage and goods at the Cambodia-Thailand border

In Bangkok we went out for a farewell dinner with the group then took quick stroll through Chinatown before heading to SkyBar at the Lebua Hotel. At 63 floors above street level, it is the world’s highest open-air bar- we enjoyed pricey cocktails with exotic fruit garnishes, incredible views of the Bangkok at night, and pretty good people watching too.  We found it pretty hilarious that, while some people were pulling up in sports cars, we made our entrance in a noisy little tuk-tuk!

                                                               Sky Bar at the Labua Hotel

The next day, we played tourist like it was our job.  We chartered a little boat to zoom us up and down to a few of the temples along the riverbank Wat Arun (Temple of Dawn).  I’m pretty sure we got majorly ripped off in the process, but no longer had our ‘Chief Experience Officer’ (tour guide) there to tell us what we should reasonably expect to pay!

Thai King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the world’s longest reigning monarch, passed away in October, 2016, after 70 years on the throne (!!) and the people of Thailand were still in mourning. While we were wandering around the Grand Palace and being blinded by the sun bouncing off all of the gold buildings, people dressed all in black were lined up under the awnings of the buildings, waiting 2-3 days to view their King’s body and pay their respects.

That day we saw an emerald Buddha, we even saw a 5-ton golden Buddha, but of the hundreds- probably thousands- of Buddha images we saw during our trip, the reclining Buddha we saw at Wat Pho that afternoon was probably my favorite and most memorable. He is 150ft long and has swirling mother-of-pearl inlay on his feet!

Thailand is renowned for its silk, and it owes this reputation in large part to an American named Jim Thompson. We visited his home- now museum- and it is completely charming in every respect. The gardens are idyllic and the 6 teak buildings, all over 200 years old, have been beautifully preserved and thoughtfully decorated.

Thailand is also known for its knock-offs and we spent a couple of hours at the MBK shopping center. This place is 8 stories high and has roughly 2000 shops.  For a decisiveness-challenged, shopping-averse, haggling-inept person like me, this place is a sort of living nightmare. After a while my mom and sister just had to leave me at a coffee shop while they had a field day finding the handbag stores with the most authentic-looking knock-off Chanels.

On our last morning, before taking off for the airport, we decided to put the tourists maps aside and set off on-foot to explore the neighborhoods around our hotel.  It was amazing how quickly things changed just a hundred feet from the main roads.  We discovered little dead-end streets with tiny shrines at the ends and glanced into smoky living rooms with bunk beds that doubled as couches lining the walls.  Just a stones’ throw from our hotel, we even found a couple of traditional- and very slanted- old wooden houses. 

Multiple times during the trip our tour guide, PC, commented on how incredibly fortunate we all were regarding our countries of birth (America, Australia, England, Germany, Holland, Japan). Financial situations aside, just being born in those countries gives us rights and opportunities that are denied to millions of other people around the world.

The Vietnamese and Cambodian people that we interacted with during our trip were all generous, friendly, and seemingly quite happy in the moment, yet the wealth disparities and signs of poverty were evident everywhere. Our final walk through the side streets of Bangkok brought us back to that same refrain, “We are so lucky.” 

I feel so lucky that I was able to take this trip and share these experiences with my mom and my sister. I’m also feeling pretty proud of myself for actually managing to get it all documented!