Puerto Rico

As I eluded in my last post, I am writing this evening from Puerto Rico!  I am here for work, evaluating fields, spending all day walking in the glorious weather looking at corn.  Travelling here went well--I had one tight connection in Atlanta, but both my bag and I made it safely.  I have a ton of somewhat random things to share, so bullets may be the best way to go.

• Driving: I was warned before I came that Puerto Ricans are crazy drivers, and to be honest, I was apprehensive about driving.  To compound matters, the airport is an hour and a half away from my hotel which is half an hour away from work.  The signage isn't great, and it's in Spanish anyway (my Spanish is mostly non-existent).  My boss lent me her GPS and remarkably I did not take a single wrong turn from San Juan to Ponce.  I was so excited to see the PONCE letters stretched across the highway (think the Hollywood sign) as I rolled into town late Sunday night.  There are also a lot of tolls which I don't have a pass for but the people at National told me to drive through them and they'd charge me when I return the car.  So at least twice a day, I drive through the tolls, don't pay, a picture is taken of my license plate, and the lights and sirens go off.  Excellent.  But my little Suzuki and I are getting along well, and the drivers aren't that crazy, just some darting vehicles.  Drive confidently and you'll be fine.  One thing I find interesting: they measure distance in kilometers, but speed in miles per hour.  Seems strange to me.
• Hotel: I'm at a Holiday Inn overlooking the ocean (pictures to come later) with a small restaurant, nice pool, and casino.  I was upset when I found out I had a smoking room and was told there was no way to move me since all rooms were booked for the foreseeable future, but the room does not have any odor (and I'm pretty sensitive to smoke).  I do have a lingering dull headache, but I'm chalking that up to squinting (not used to all this sun!) and not smoke.  I have a refrigerator which is nice; I picked up some food yesterday so I wasn't eating fast food all of the time.  The room is fine, but I noticed that the bathroom mirror has some spots on it which is a pet peeve of mine.  I wouldn't bring this up, but the person who cleans my room takes the time to organize all of my bathroom items every morning, including putting my comb in my brush and resting my toothbrush and flosser off of the counter top (but put the flosser on the ashtray...eew) but the mirror remains dirty.  Just kind of funny.  They also turn on my AC every day and I turn it off when I get back--I don't really like it cold.  The TV channel I watch the most features a weatherman who is generally wearing a Hawaiian shirt, but always has a puppet on his right hand, Bob the parrot (who also sports a Hawaiian shirt).  So bizarre.  Found out tonight the parrot has a blog.  Go figure.
• People: The people have been very nice.  I was nervous about my lack of Spanish skill, but so far communicating hasn't been much of a problem.  I have ended up with a Coke at both McDonald's and Wendy's that I didn't order (don't even like Coke), but I did get the Frosty that I kept asking for, so I can't complain too much.  Everyone at the hotel has been bilingual and most of those I've interacted with at work have had pretty good English, though they apologize profusely.  I keep telling them it's way better than my Spanish!
• Work: That is what I'm here for, after all.  Monday I headed to the station which is 30-45 minutes away (depends on traffic and construction) and didn't take the correct turn and ended up taking the scenic route but found the station just fine.  After my safety briefing and checking my email, I got a station tour and then one of the staff members hopped in my car to show me the fields.  We drove 30 minutes back toward my hotel to the fields, then drove another 30-45 minutes to the other field, then 20 minutes back to the station.  My whole morning was spent driving.  I talked with the staff at the station and we agreed it would make more sense for me to head directly to the field each morning and save myself the drive to the station, so instead of driving the 30-45 minutes, I now have about 10 minutes to the field.  This was almost a problem since I wasn't able to get my work computer to work with the wireless in the hotel, but the third tech guy knew what to do, so now I can operate completely out of the hotel and field, no need to go to the office.  Another bonus of the field location: 5 minutes away from Burger King, Subway, Pollo Tropical, Church's Chicken, Wendy's, and some taco place.  Nice break for lunch and nice variety!
• Misc: I was discouraged from roaming around on my own, and to be honest, between being tired and the difficulty of driving and the language barrier, I'm not eager to wander.  So far (and with all of my techy toys), I'm only lonely and not bored.  Since I'm taking notes all day by myself and I don't go to the station and don't know anyone else visiting staying at my hotel, I'm kind of lonely.  I have the name of another guy here from Nebraska, so I may try and meet up with him for supper for a change of pace and some human interaction.  It will be a long 10 days.

That's all for now.  Puerto Rico is 2 hours ahead of Iowa and I'm supposed to be out of the field by 4:30, so I have shifted my whole day earlier.  Granted, the time change is pretty negligible, but I'm still worn out by the end of the day and sleep like a rock. 

More to come soon!