Christmas at the Rig

I know many of you are very curious about what my Christmas looked like. Here it is!

I was very worried about how being away from my family would affect me during Christmas. For my family, Christmas is literally the only holiday we manage to gather for each year.  Breaking the tradition of spending the holidays with my family was a hard reality to face. As it turns out, the worry was worse than the reality.

Part of me was also a little excited. Honestly the commercialization of Christmas kind of angers me a little. Basically a lot of stores spend so much time telling you that unless you’re buying _____ for your _____ then you don’t really love them. This season should be about selfless, abounding, conditionless love. The love that God feels for us. The love that God calls us to show towards one another. Part of me was excited to see what Christmas is like without presents. Without fancy food. Without stuff. 

Here’s how I spent Christmas.

We had a weird tool failure at around 4 am on the 23^rd and I was on shift after getting 3 hours of sleep that night. (Oh and the night before too. I was exhausted.)  We stayed up working to fix it until giving up at noon. I slept and then woke up again after 6pm.  I was on shift again until I gave up at 9 am Christmas Eve morning. I slept for part of the day, and then woke up at around 6 pm.  The new tools we ordered had arrived and so we began to assemble them.

Job Challenges

There are a lot of challenges I face on my job every day. Some are more frustrating than others.

First, because I’m a trainee, everyone assumes I know nothing. I’ve been working for 3 months now, which is about twice as long as most trainees work before getting sent to school. I’m not in school because as a company, we’ve been training a lot of engineers and the schools have been full. I don’t go to school until March. My area is busy so I’ve been thrown into responsibilities earlier. Every time I go to a new job with a new engineer and hear ‘This is a survey frame and this is a utility frame’ for the 10^th time I get a little more frustrated with being just a trainee.

My favorite kind of pipetally.
Beer crosses all kinds of
cultural barriers! 

Second, the language barrier plays in heavily. When my coworkers talk, they speak Spanish and often I can’t follow the entire conversation. Some people remember to stop and explain, some people I bother until they stop and explain, and some people just keep right on going. Even after listening and speaking Spanish for 4 months, it might be surprising to learn that I am not fluent in the language. It’s frustrating for me to have to ask for everything to be repeated back so I can understand. It’s frustrating for coworkers who don’t speak English very well. Sometimes the only explanation I get is “I’ll be right back” or “Don’t worry, everything is okay”.  Usually when I hear ‘everything is okay’ I get annoyed because I know it’s not all okay. I can usually get the gist of a conversation, I might not know the details but often I can tell when something is not okay but my coworker doesn’t take the time to explain it. Ugh.

On this job I’ve gotten to deal with a special combination of these two factors.

Posada!

In the past two months I’ve spend exactly one weekend at the base. The rest have been on rigs. This last weekend however, I got lucky and hit the jackpot. You see, it turns out it is actually December. Which means it’s almost Christmas. Which means Christmas parties. Which in Mexico means Posadas.

A traditional Mexican posada happens in the 9 days before Christmas. Basically it’s a party between close neighbors and family. Every night you go to a 3 different houses and ask for ‘posada’ by singing a song, representing Mary and Joseph trying to find someplace to say in Bethlehem. All the houses turn them down (and join in the search) except for the one designated for the party. The party house lets everyone in.  You eat and hang out. Usually there’s a piñata either in the shape of a seven pointed star (for the seven deadly sins) or the devil so you can take turns beating the crap out of sin/the devil.  Repeat for the 9 days before Christmas, each night with the party at a different house.

Three New Things I Did Today

Have you ever started worrying about something small until it became something so big and scary you weren't sure how to handle it? I realized this week that there are a few things that I've been allowing to build into huge scary things. Last week I started reading about another Katie, about my age who felt called to forgo college and move to Uganda and start an orphanage. So she did.

In her blog she touches on the subject of fear several times. In the end it was this that struck me: For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power, love and self control – 2 Timothy 1:7 (ESV).  I know that God has given me a spirit of power and love with some self control in there somewhere. It just took me a few days, and a lot of prayer to be reminded of that. I’m sharing three things that I've been scared to do. I did them all this week. And it’s only Wednesday.

1. Took a taxi by myself.

This is something that might not seem like a big deal to most of you. So why is it a big deal here? First off, my staff house pretty confusing to get to. After 2 and half months here, I’m finally just starting to figure out where I live. I’ve been worried about leaving the staff house and being unable to get back because I have no idea where it is. While that’s still a bit of a concern, I’m a lot more familiar with the city now so generally I know where I am.

My Apartment

I know when I left the US I didn't have very many definitive answers about where I was going to live. By now I've figured it out. (Don't worry, I've actually been living here since the beginning of October). Anyway, this is my apartment. I share it with one other girl, although there's an empty room so I think another girl is going to move in when she gets back from the job she's on.

It's a three bedroom, two bath apartment. I have to pay for toilet paper, lightbulbs, and food. I can have someone come install the lightbulbs, but I have to buy them. There's also a maid that comes 3 times a week. She does my laundry as long as I buy laundry soap. It's a pretty sweet deal. 

My bedroom. Pretty basic. I haven't gotten around to buying very much, although new sheets and comforter are high on the list.

5 Reasons to Head Back to Base

I realized recently that I haven’t written very much about Villahermosa. Part of that is because I like being on the rig so much more than being at my Company's Base here in Villahermosa. However there are some perks of being in civilization. Here are my top 5 reasons to head back to base:

1. Hot water in a real shower –It’s not that I don’t have hot water on the rig. I just have to choose between washing my hair all the way clean or conditioning my hair. There’s just not enough hot water for both! Also, RV shower. Not exactly luxurious. And, I have to share with boys. Eww.
2. Food magically appears at your door – Some rigs I have to feed myself. Other rigs I get fed. Either way, there’s not a huge amount of choice involved. I eat what’s in front of me, plus whatever junk food I’ve smuggled with me. In town, everything is a phone call and 20 minutes of ‘Por favor, hables más despacio y le dices otro vez’ away from my doorstep.

Another Day in Mexico...

Today I realized I’ve been working for 5 weeks straight. Yes, you did read that right. 5 weeks. No weekends.  Now the fact that I only noticed it today should tell you something. It went by pretty fast. Some days I work a full 12 hour day. Some days I’m hanging out in the camper waiting around for stuff to happen. Some days I’m getting woken up at 6 am to rig down in the pouring rain (more on this later) for 16 hours. It’s really the variety that keeps me from noticing that I’m actually working.

As an example, I give you exhibit A:  Taken at around 8 am. The brown speckles are oil-based drilling mud spots.  That morning, I was woken up at 6 am and told it was time to break up the BHA.

Now, some boring definition. What I work with are MWD/LWD tools. Tools that send me messages in a secret language known only to engineers in the oil and gas field. The tools tell me all kinds of things.  If they’re too hot, if they’re getting jostled around too much, where they are and what direction they’re headed and most importantly what they see and think about their environment. These tools are in the BHA (bottom hole assembly) and are the first thing in the hole and the last thing out.  I need to be present for both situations.

Katie’s Quick Guide to Spanish

As you all (hopefully) know they speak Spanish here in Mexico, meaning that I must speak Spanish here in Mexico. I’d like to give everyone a taste of what I’m learning here and share some of the more interesting language miscommunications I’ve come across. In words of Brian Hogan[1]  ‘There’s really nothing like language learning to build humility into the Man of God.’ This is ridiculously true.

First, everything in Spanish is said exactly how it’s spelled. You just have to know what letters make what sound. There is no ‘Hooked on Phonics’ in Spanish. So your crash course into pronunciation:

There is no “H”. It exists, but you do not pronounce it. Seriously, I’m not sure why it exists.

However, “J” sounds like an ‘H’.  For the first two weeks I spelled ‘jefe’ (boss) as ‘hefe’ because that’s the way you say it, if you’re saying it in English.  In Spanish, ‘Hefe’ (pronounced ‘efe’) is the letter ‘F’.  Confused yet? It gets better.

“Ñ” which most people refer to as ‘That weird ‘n’ with the thingy on top’ is an ‘Enya’. It’s pronounced like you say the Irish singer Enya’s name.

Both “V”and “B” make the same sound (B, like baby). There is no way to tell which to use when spelling. Most people just guess if they don’t know. Like the sign in the cafeteria asking you to use ‘Antivacterial’ soap.

A “P” sounds a lot like a “B”. So let’s just take count, there are now 3 letters in Spanish that sound like a “B”.  In truth it’s a little different, but for my level it’s pretty much the same. ‘Papas’ (potatoes) sounds like ‘Babas’.

Working hard or hardly working?

Hola!
After almost a full month of hanging out in Villahermosa on the base I was finally allowed out into the real world. AKA, a drilling rig. Because I know how many people are curious about what I do and what it's like, I've taken some pictures to show the world. How am I doing so far? I'm loving it. Alright here we go.

My new temporary home. Note the two other rigs in the background. There's another one behind me too. This is how I see the rig 80% of the time because I work from 8 pm to 8 am.

Rest of Guadalajara!

Alright, several weeks later I believe I am ready to write about Guadalajara.... from Villahermosa. It's my creative process, don't knock it.

First, the answer to my question I posed almost a month ago... The finger worth the most, at least according to my company, is the right pinky finger! This is because, this is the figure that allows you to grip objects. When you use your pinky finger, it activates muscles in your back, enabling you to form a stronger grip. Seriously, try it!  Thanks for the guesses and the comments! I love hearing from you guys!

Guadalajara in general was amazing. The city its self is quite beautiful. In October Guadalajara will host the Pan American Games, a lead up to the Olympics. Because of this, there it's a better time to have been there.  Everywhere the government is cleaning the streets, painting the roads and generally getting the city ready to put it's best foot forward.

There was also the most intense police presence I have ever seen. Moving to Mexico in the wake of the Monterrey casino fire had me a little worried. I felt safe the entire time. I took the bus the school and back almost everyday. Honestly the scariest moment of my month was when I took the bus too far the first day and got a little lost trying to find the house. I never once felt threatened.

Knowing how essential Spanish would be to my job, I felt the need to work pretty hard on my Spanish and my training, but I still managed to have a little fun along the way.  I'll throw up some pictures and descriptions because I think that's a pretty easy way to show what's going on!

Tequila!

More adventures from my first week in Guadalajara.

Tequila is a small town about an hour from Guadalajara. Surprisingly enough, they make tequila there. My camera died before we started the tour so I only have some pictures from the town. This is our drive out. There's hills here!

Guadalajara - week 1

Tomorrow will mark 2 weeks in Guadalajara. I've been pretty busy, thus failing to write much about what's been happening. I'm going to post pictures and tell my story that way. Mostly because it's just easier, but also because Mexico is a such a colorful and rich place, I feel like you can't just decribe it, you have to see it. After getting pictures up, I'll write about what I'm actually doing and all that. So first, we have pictures from my first weekend here. Also Picasa does not like me today and a lot of these pictures are uploading super goofy. I'm just going to get something up, and then I'll try to fix them later.

I'm staying with a host family here in Guadalajara. Saturday we went to a fiesta. This is a shot of the place. Mexican time is no joke. We were there for about an hour before many people showed up.

At this point my comprehension of Spanish was still (and is still) very little so I'm not really clear on: why there was a party, what was going on, or how they knew the people.
I think, it was this man's birthday. At least that is what I assume from the mariachi escort in. See them in the back? There were 10 of them.

My favorite part of the afternoon. The food. Everything appears to be fried here. What they're cooking are kind of like sopapillas, but made with corn meal instead of flour.

This is the final result. So you take the sopapilla thing and put some mashed up potato on one and some beans on the other. You fry them (again). Then, add lettuce, pico de gallo, onion, chile, sauce and top it off with lime juice. It's pretty amazing.

And for good measure, some chulupas too. Con lémon. Everything in Mexico seems to be con lémon. Except apparently for the beer. I find this a little ironic.

This is a tamale. In this part of Mexico tamales are often wrapped in a banana leaf. This one was wrapped in a banana leaf and a chile pepper. It's pretty good, the banana leaf adds a little bit of an earthy flavor to the maiz. It's kind of a bananay hint, but not sweet or anything. Traditionally, the filling is meat but in reality it can be anything. This one was filled with steamed chopped vegetables. I had one today filled with cheese and mushrooms. Yes. I ate it. Mushrooms and all. I liked it, just not the mushroom part.

I'm not really sure where the tenth mariachi went, but he's around somewhere. It was pretty cool listening to them. I have a video, I'll try to get it up eventually. Everyone knows all the songs and all the words and sings along.

 

This is about where I get really lost. All the sudden two nuns came out. Apparently bits involving nuns are popular here. I can see that. Judging by the reactions, it was pretty funny. I understood very little of it. Microphones coupled with really fast speaking are a bad combination for me to understand.

Okay, more pictures to come! Enjoy.

For Andres...

Last week a friend of mine passed away very suddenly. He had a seizure in his sleep and just like that, gone. I graduated with Andres. In a class of around 100, news travels fast. I got a call later that day, a voicemail saying that something awful had happened, call back. I stayed off Facebook, tried to concentrate during the rest of day and finally heard the bad news from a good friend.

I appreciate hearing bad news from someone who loves me. It makes the world seem much less harsh. I still remember the completely out of the blue phone call telling me that not only had Julien's cancer come back, but he had lost the fight and slipped away without telling us. I still cry for Julien. For the person he was, the person he could have been, should of been.

Andres was a good person. He was fun loving, kind and sincere. We were never close, but in a small high school, you're never far from anyone either. Most of my memories are of andres trying to make me laugh, and make me feel welcome in situations where he knew I was insecure. He was that kind of person.

It wasn't until I saw a friend of mine comment that even though he's gone, she knows he's in heaven and that gives her comfort. It's always seemed really hallow to me, saying someone is in a better place. Then I started thinking, really thinking about what that meant. For me, it means that even if Andres isn't with us, even if he can't continue to share his joy with the world, even if we don't get to see what he could do here, it means this isn't the end for him. I'll still get to tell him, one day, about how I meet some awesome Ecuadorians in Brazil. How Quito is on my list of places to work now. These things that, just last week I was thinking I should say.

For me, following Jesus has been a choice I made because I believe he has the best life for me. Now I realize that that 'best life' could end tomorrow. But because of the choice I've made, if my life did end tomorrow, I know what's waiting for me. I made my choice for my life but I have never been more thankful to know of the eternity I will get to spend with friends who didn't get enough time. Until eternity, you'll be missed Andres.

Rio de Janeiro

Last Saturday I woke up very early, drove to the airport, said goodbye to my family and spent the next 20 hours flying. It was a long trip, getting off one plane, walking to the next gate, and getting directly on the next flight. Twice. Anchorage - Seattle - Atlanta - Rio.

First, about training, because it's what I spent about 50 hours of my week doing and I genuinely enjoyed it. Our class was 38 people coming from 10 different countries. Mostly Latin America, but also two other Americans, a Chinese girl and a Saudi (and a few from Trinidad which doesn't seem very Latin) We were 33% women. Everyone was an engineer, most were assigned to their home country. Being the minority is something that doesn't happen to me often. I felt like the only one not fluent in another language, one of the few for whom English was a first language. If you like diversity, meeting new people, strange, new and exciting experiences, I would definitely apply for a field position with my company!

I thought the training was very well done. They spent the majority of the time focused on health and safety, which I expected. They flew in a French guy (Norbert!) just for our training. Not only did we learn how to (hopefully) not lose a finger, we learned the reasons behind why we should use our bodies the way the company asks us to. In addition to being terrified of losing a finger, I know my body and the way it works better. This is something I enjoy more than simply being told to do something. 'Why' is important to me.

I had many small experiences in Rio. I'll just write about 3 of them and put up pictures!

Steak!
For the first time the company took a training class to a local Brazilian steak house. It was supposed to be one of the nicest steak houses in Rio. I believe it. It was right on the water and we got to drive past the beaches at night and see them all lit up. Beautiful views. We ate first from the salad bar then waiters brought huge skewers of meat out and slices pieces for us at our plate. At first I just said yes to anything then I realized that I was going to have to slow down and wait for the really good pieces to fully appreciate the experience. Simply put it was the best steak I've ever had. They don't give you steak knives because you can cut it with your butter knife. Yum. We also had the strongest caiparinhas I'd had up to that point. It was awesome!

Samba!
On Friday after our training was finished some people had to leave right away to go to the airport. The airport is on the other side of the city and to get there you must travel on the highway that goes through a favella (slum). My company's security policy doesn't allow travel through these areas late at night. Anyway, so our group ended up split up, but prepared for the field as we are, it didn't phase us. At 9 we went and got dinner all together. Steak, beer, French fries (truly the most international food EVER) taken care of we left for a samba club at around 10:30. It was practically empty when we got there and playing American hip-hop. Upstairs was women only with a free drink until midnight. Truly brilliant. That taken care of, and another strong caparinha later the samba music started.

For anyone that's ever seen samba it is VERY fast. In Angola, a friend tried to teach me but I just couldn't keep up. I bravely attempted again. After almost an hour I think i was starting to get it. Apparently the bouncers agreed. The band asked for three girls to go dance on stage, my friend Cecilia ran up immediately as did two other girls. Okay fun. And then my Brazilian friends started explaining that they were asking for me as well. Very specifically. I'm still not sure if it was because I'm American or because of my bad dancing. I think I prefer not to know. Anyway I figured it's not something you do twice so I went. Cecilia is Argentinian and generally can figure out Portuguese so I figured she could help me translate if I needed it. Somewhere out there a video of this exists, but with luck the rest of the world won't be subjected to my bad samba!

Pan de Sucre
Literally translated, this is sugar loaf! A most famous icon of Rio (next to Christ the Redeemer) This is a large jutting mountain with cable car access to the top. From here, all of Rio is visible. After getting back from the club at 4 am and making it to bed around 5 (after many goodbyes), I was agreeable but less than enthusiastic about a 9 am breakfast and 10 am departure to the mountain, but I agreed. I do it for you dear audience. After checking out and leaving my luggage in my friends' room we set out.

We took a taxi to the base of the cable car. The experience is best described in pictures simply because the view was so amazing.



This is sugar loaf mountain! Look at the tiny cable car!


The first stop. You can see a favela!


More of the city.



The very famous Copacabana. Of course it's winter in Rio right now, and the beach is not very appealing. Thus why it's empty.



And my favorite picture from the top. I actually have better ones. Just not anymore awesome ones.

Anyway I have more pictures, I'll be putting them up in a web album is anyone is curious.

Now my interactive question of the week: if dismembered, which finger is worth the most (in terms of company payout)?

The US

Things I will miss about living in the States
Starbucks
My iPhone
Cheeseburgers
Personal space
Understanding everyone
Police you don't bribe
Driving myself around
Reeses peanut butter cups
American Tv shows or Hulu
Pride in being an American

Things I will not miss about living in the States
Understanding everyone
Constantly being in touch
Regularity/familiarity
Materialism
Republicans
Democrats
Personal space expectations
The single focus on the US

Purpose or why the heck am I starting a blog...

Why am I starting a blog? What do I hope to accomplish with this? What are the changes in my life that begin in less than two weeks? After 4 years of InterVarsity leadership, there's one thing I've learned (yes, just one) and that's how important it can be to ask the right questions to get where you want your audience to go. So with that, this is some of what my life will look like for the next two years.

Basically by accepting a position with Schlumberger as an international mobile field engineer I've signed away the next few years of my life to the will of the company and God. I was offered a choice initially between Mexico and Siberia. I chose Mexico the way I make more important choices. I weighed the options, allowed people I trust to have input, prayed about it, and then one day I just knew the answer. I'll have many more choices to make down the road, often without the benefit of time to make those choices in.

Over the next year I expect to have my butt kicked by pretty much everything. The hours of my job (scheduled for 12 hours a day, probably working 14-16 hr/day), the culture I'm submitting myself to (likely the only white girl on a Mexican oil rig), the language barrier (I took French in high school) the travel (I'm living out of two suitcases for the next several years of my life) and the million other factors I haven't even thought of.

So why am I doing this to myself? Good question (tune in next time) I'm slightly terrified if I allow myself to think though the various possibilities. Which brings me to why I'm starting a blog at all. Now more than ever, I'll need the support of you, my family and friends.  I'm not sure how much I'll be able to update. I'm not sure how much I'll be allowed to share about what I'm doing and where I am. I ask only that you bear (yes BEAR, haha) with me as I make bad puns, ramble on, and all the other annoying habits I have that will translate over cyber-space. And for this, all I have to offer in return is hopefully what can be assurance that I'm still alive, that I'm happy, that the adventure has been worthwhile and that God is good.

My schedule, as I know it, for the next few weeks:

August 20th- September 1st -- Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Why? Two weeks of on board training. I'll learn about the company, my benefits, get my coveralls, and (best of all) skid a car around as part of driver training.

September 1st - October 1st -- Guadalajara, Mexico
Why? Four weeks of intensive language training to beat the French out. Kidding, but I will be living with a host family (who I secretly hope is a Mexican version of the Rowlettes) and taking classes during the day.

October 1st -- the next 1-3 months -- Villahermosa, Mexico
Why? This is my job and what I agreed to. Why the timeline? After observing for a while I'll get shipped out to a second training facility so they can teach me my job and I can finally start making some money for the company. My job is not actually to stand around and make sarcastic comments. That may surprise some of you.