Engaged!

Yesterday Carlos asked me for a forever together, and I was all like, yes.

He picked me up for lunch with a bouquet of flowers, which was suspicious. I asked him why he had the flowers and he said, “just for being you”, which was highly suspicious. We went to get Thai food and he announced, “we aren’t staying here”. “Where are we going?” I asked, and he kept asking, “Where do you think?” It soon was clear that we were headed a local beach for a picnic, the same one where I first told him that I loved him. We ate lunch with the vase of flowers standing in the sand. Luckily, I coincidentally had a vase in the car that I was planning on giving away at our going-away party that night!

After we ate, we sat enjoying the water and the beautiful day. Carlos repeatedly started a sentence, shyly repeating, “Hey Elizabeth*, Hey Elizabeth, Hey Elizabeth”.

“Yes Carlos? Yes?”

“I didn’t just bring you hear for lunch, you know…”

“Oh?” (as if I didn’t know)

“I have something to give to you”

“OH??” As he fished around in his pocket I asked, “Should I stand?”

“Oh yes, yes, you should stand!”

And then he proceeded to get down on one knee (“just one” he likes to add when I tell the story) and ask the important question as my heart pounded and I covered my hand with my mouth with feminine instincts that I didn’t know I possessed.

The rest of the afternoon was spent calling relatives and spent with friends at our going away party.

Oh and one of the best parts was that he bought a special box that has a light that turns on when you open it. I can use it for a flashlight when I go to the bathroom at night!

I’m wearing my ring on the right finger because that’s what they do in Chile during the engagement. Carlos sneakily figured out my ring size for my right, not the left. After marriage, Chileans move their rings to the left. It’s typical for both the men and women to wear engagement rings, which fits my egalitarian sensibilities. Carlos has one, too!

 

*name changed cause some details are too sappy to share.

The door behind me

I will miss the crazy hungover dash to Penn Station, suitcase in tow, weaving through the tourists. With a single word we divide. I run to get tickets and reflexively and rapidly tap through each screen of the machine while Carlos finds the track and waves to me from afar, “over here!” I run to him and soon both of us are sprinting together and jumping down the flight of stairs, landing breathless on the train just as the doors close and it pulls out of the station. I will miss this unique slice of New York insanity, this particular type of celebratory kiss, the exact sound of the doors closing behind me.

Milestones and Moving

Last week I finished reading Harry Potter y la piedra filosofal. It’s the first book that I’ve read in Spanish! It felt like a huge, wonderful milestone to finish a book in another language. The next step is listening to the audio book on my ipod while reading the book simultaneously. That’s much harder than just listening because the audio book goes so fast. Frequently, I need to stop the tape and reread. Once I finish the book that way, I will try just listening to the audio tape alone. It has a formal Spanish accent, which is hopefully better than nothing. I like to tease C. by telling him that after listening to these Spanish tapes I will say “cabethsssa” in Chile instead of “cabeza”. I’ve already ordered Harry Potter y la cámara secreta! Also on my reading list is a novel, Daughter of Fortune by Chilean writer Isabel Allende. I read it in English last year and I’m eager to visit Valparaíso, Chile in the 1800s again, this time in Spanish. It certainly helps to start with books that I’ve read before; a familiar plot helps me infer some of the words.

My Spanish conversations are becoming smoother. Today while meditatively shaping scallion hamburgers in the kitchen, I told a story in Spanish. I was able to convey to C. the context of the story (the lecture about dopamine signals) and to retell the conversation we had in class. It was heavily seasoned with corrections and pauses, but at some points it flowed easily. We are still finding the right balance between stopping for corrections and continuing for the sake of fluency. I think it’s harder to unlearn a mistake that has been reinforced in a conversation, but it also can be tough to be constantly stopping to correctly (re)conjugate.

Things are heating up on the moving front. We just found out we have 10 fewer days in our apartment than we anticipated (despite contacting them months in advance about it and getting it in writing, but whatever). We have three weeks left to sell and to pack. I feel like a used car salesman, “Everything MUST GO!”

Last week two of our friends who live in Chile visited on their way back from Ohio. They took a big bag of all of our vacuum packed winter clothes down with them.  We adore space bags for packing – they’re probably the best invention for moving one’s wardrobe to a different hemisphere. It’s so strange to think of all of my winter clothes  in a country that I’ve never seen, just waiting for my arrival. It is starting to feel real. I’m sure it won’t feel really real until I’m on the plane thinking, oh my god, I’m moving to South America for two years.

We’ve also been shopping for things here that are harder to get in Chile. Shipping is expensive, so the more we can take with us, the better. The larger demand here in the U.S. drives down the price of a lot of things like electronics and clothing, so we’re buying anything that we will need in the next few years. There are so many small decisions and loose ends, so many little pieces of life to stop and restart.