I’m still really fatigued, which is amazing because I slept about 14 hours yesterday in the car and at the hotel. But still so sleepy.
Food Poisoning: We left Corvallis around 6:30(?) in the morning, and stopped at a convenience store for breakfast and gas… I ate a breakfast burrito there, and a mere half hour later, I started feeling symptoms of food poisoning. This battle with food poisoning was wierd. I had symptoms that I’ve never had before, and I have had food poisoning pretty often. I won’t go into the details of my symptoms, or how I dealth with them… If you really want to know, then you’re just fucking sick. Anyway, food poisoning symptoms came and went throughout the trip, peaking on Saturday morning when I considered coming home early. (I may possibly have a mild allergy to eggs, which might be what keeps causing my food poisoning. dunno about this for sure though.)
Thursday in Seattle We met Nimm at our hotel (weee!!) and I introduced him to everyone. We went out to eat Chinese food, and had bubble tea, and then he went home for dinner with his family. Soooo happy to see him. yay.
Just as it was getting dark, we drove to University of Washington and wandered around campus. No one had a camera that could take decent pictures in the dark, so there aren’t many of those in my little gallery. The campus is beautiful though. I wish I had been able to take more pictures and/or see more of it in the daylight.
That night at dinner, we met up with some more friends from OSU and had Chinese food again. I started to feel really sick at that point, and opted to go back to the hotel instead of singing Karaoke. That was a hard decision… I must note here that at one point, I did drop my chopsticks… (see the “Car Accident” section below)
Friday Seattle/Vancouver The next morning, a group of us split off and went to go shopping and check out the space-needle. (some photos) I wanted to go inside the EMP (Experience Music Project) building, but it was closed, and we didn’t want to wait around.
later (around noon?), we all met up again and headed for Canada. Crossing the border was so insanely painless it was almost laughable. We get more hassle from speed-trap-cops at the border between Oregon and Washington. But we did get scolded because about 4 of us got out of the car and dug through trunks and bags looking for passports (she didn’t even ask for them!)
Canada!! Something about the road markings seemed different, and the way other cars liked to use their horns for more than just “You asshole!” (we heard lots of horns) Nothing looked really foreign except for the lack of American flags everywhere. but this was cool. I’m sick of the US flag waving at me from every fricken street corner.
Car Accident: It was my fault, because I dropped my chopsticks at dinner the night before. But… well, for some reason Canada decided to close three of the north-bound lanes on our freeway and open them to south-bound traffic. First of all, this was Fucked Up. All lanes were pretty full, going in both directions. Three lanes of northbound traffic all trying to merge into one lane simultaneously makes for some confusing driving conditions. Anyway, at one point, traffic ahead of our lead car came to a complete stop, and Ethan was unable to stop in time to avoid a minor collision. Everyone was pretty shaken, especially Yuu. But no one was hurt. I may have pulled a muscle, but I don’t feel it now. Jieyoung says she may have bumped her head, and Yuu got a friction burn on her cheek from where she bumped the seat in front of her, but everyone else was fine. The cars were both fine too. Just a bit of a dent on both bumpers. We were mad-lucky because it only involved our two cars. If anyone else had been involved, it might have been the end of our trip.
Vancouver: Arriving at the hotel, everyone got really quiet. We all waited for Chris (our friend and owner of one of the cars we were driving) to arrive from elsewhere in the city (he’d found an early ride the day before). No one wanted to tell him what had happened… so everyone mostly went to sleep. And waited. Finally, Chris arrived and surveyed the damage. The rest of this day is a slight blur. I can’t remember if we went shopping at the Metropolis immediately after this point or not. I remember feeling slightly sick, and carrying crackers around with me. I also remember playing hacky-sack with self-described Canadian “spooky kids”.
We went out for sushi that night, and I attempted to eat salad and cucumber rolls and different vegies. It was difficult, but I managed. At midnight, we walked to a GIANT Karaoke place. sooo much fun. Most of the songs were Chinese, so I couldn’t sing much. I learned parts of a few songs, and practiced reading hanzi and guessing the meaning. There were a few Japanese songs and a few old English songs I could sing, which made it sooper fun.
As we were leaving around 4am, there was a guy singing in the main lounge area. I remember glancing at him, and then at the guy in the music video and thinking “God, they look identical”. A few minutes later as we were walking out, one of us (Ethan?) suddenly exclaimed, “Dude. That was [musician’s name]!” I have no idea why this guy was singing his own songs in a Karaoke joint in Canada, but he was. And everyone (except me) knew who he was. We got into the car and Chris put the guy’s cd in and we listened to it on the way home. weee.
Food Poisoning Part Deux: Saturday morning, I woke up very early and very sick. It was so bad that I could barely walk at first. I stumbled everywhere. I had nothing in my stomach to throw up, so I tried to eat crackers. I was so sure of my own death that I actually went down to the lobby and got brochures and phone numbers for the bus services so that I could get a bus ticket back to Seattle, and hope that Nimm would be willing to pick me up and (take care of me). But as I continued to eat crackers, I felt slightly better, and after Ethan promised to take me to a doctor in Victoria Island after we got there, I decided to stay with the group and hope it got better.
Saturday: Ferry to Victoria Island. The ferry was probably the most memorable part of our trip. I’ve never been on a ferry before. The whole concept of driving onto a boat is still just totally wierd. But it was fun. We took a ton of pictures, and acted like silly loud tourists the whole time. The activity seemed to distract me from how sick I felt, because I managed to run around and be happy just as much as everyone else. (SEE PICTURES!)
Victoria Island SO PRETTY. I wish we had arrived earlier so that I could take more pictures. After we located our hotel, George, Ethan, Yuu and I went on a mission to find a hospital. We walked into the emergency room area, and FOR SOME REASON, I was surprised at the huge group of people waiting. I realized that it would be a few hours before I could be seen… coupling that with the fact that I have no idea how to handle my health insurance information stuff in the US, let alone in Canada, I decided that I could take care of myself on my own and we left. I was still pretty nervous about the symptoms I was having (again, if you really want to know, you’re just sick.) but I also felt like I was getting better quickly.
We left the hospital and rejoined the group downtown for shopping, photos and food. After dark, we took more photos and wandered around town (I saw a sign that said “Birthplace of Emily Carr –> “!!!). Later that night, I suddenly felt hungry. Like, really hungry. for fruit, and George, being the most AWESOME friend decided to take me (and part of the group) out to go find a grocery store so that I could find some fruit. weee! adventures adventures. we got lost, but that was ok, because I had mellon and generic wheat thins.
Returning to the Hotel with fruit (they had beer too), we ended up deciding to split up the next morning, a group of us taking an early ferry back to Vancouver for more shopping and touristy things. Ethan, Jon, Chris and I decided to head straight back to Oregon and take the ferry that runs between Victoria Island and Seattle. Unfortunately, the next morning we were shocked to discover that the Victoria/Seattle ferry was full 2 hours before it was scheduled to leave. Chris was then forced to drive about um… double the legal speed limit to make it to the other port about 40? km away in time for the next Vancouver ferry.
The Drive Home: Chris’s driving is insane. He wanted to get home… so he tried to keep a steady 80-110mph pace all the way from Vancouver to Portland. I felt really scared, and spent most of the trip with my eyes closed. Ethan tried to distract me with Japanese homework, but that required me to open my eyes… many scary scary cars. Weaving in and out of 60mph traffic at 80mph is scary. However, it seems that because we were speeding, we avoided some really really serious accidents in Washington on I-5 (there were at least two, right?).
Before continuing to Corvallis, Ethan and I were dropped off at Ethan’s mom’s house in Portland for a few hours while Chris ran errands. I like Ethan’s mom. I also love her cooking, although I couldn’t eat much because my tummy was broken. She gave me oranges to take home too. weee. :) We studied Japanese, and then I did writing homework while Ethan discussed school related things with his parents.
The rest of the drive home was eventful, but not full of interesting events. The horrible accidents that had happened on I-5 caused the freeway to get shut down, and we had to take backroads (through my hometown!). We met with some friends in Portland (including the girl Ethan’s apparently “supposed” to be dating or something)and ended up switching cars and shuffling around. I had to navigate, which made me feel useful and stuff.
We arrived in Corvallis around 11:30pm, but we didn’t sleep until around 1am because we decided to study. The group that stayed in Vancouver didn’t make it back until around 1am…
Food Poisoning Conclusion: I almost feel normal. I could eat things that smelled like meat today, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to eat eggs again. I’m dissapointed that I wasn’t completely healthy during the trip, but it could have been much worse. I’m so glad I went. And I’m so glad that I stayed even when I wanted to come home.
So, that was my trip. I’m exhausted writing about it now… and I should have been reading shakespeare this whole time. Oh well… I can do that tomorrow. When have I ever read required reading on time anyway? :)
