Day 9- Day of rest!

Waking up on the floor of a large open room was quite a site. It wasnt comfortable, but it was free. This morning was nice because i knew i didnt have to go anywheere or do anything. We actually couldnt. Natually waking up early, around 8am, we went down to get our fre breakfast. Hot chocolate and bread roll. I went off to use the internet, and aftere probably 30 minutes of waiting, then extremely slow connection, i was in the middle of an email to home to let you know i was safe, that the power went out. That was the end of the internet for awhile.

I walked back to the food stand on the train tracks to hand my cup back in for them to reuse it. There were people washing out the styrofoam cups they did get back. Andy helped woman drain out a huge pot of lentils as news reporters started to swarm around. I turned around to see a woman dump out a bag full of onions on the table, along with a few knives. I went to grab a knife to start chopping, as others swarmed around to peel the onions.

A woman came up to me with a microphone and a camera in my face. She startd talking to me in spanish, and i had to tell her, i didnt speak that much spanish. So she started asking me questions in english, like where am i from and what i think about this situation. Also something about nationalitiees. I dont really know, but i told her, that it really didnt matter what nationality you were, people from all over were trying to help each other out since we weere all here together. Then she asked if the onions bothered my eyes. ha ahh no.

I looked up to see where the boys were, but they had disappeared. Later i found out that they went off to help sandbag. I guess they had an amazing experience working with the locals and other guys from all over. They couldnt stop talking about how awesome it was to help, and then the most amazing soup they had when they were finished.

I decided i should try to do some laundry since all my clothes were so dirty. I found a place i could wash them myself in a bucket and i found a big stick that i could scrub at the clothes. It was hard work, i was sweating. I coulndt imagine doing this evryday, and washing big sheets for the beds in the hostels.

At 2pm, we met with JJ who is one of the US embassy representatives there to give us updates of what is going on and when he thought we would get out of there. Most of the elderly, woman with children and injured were out, so now instead of continuing to follow the orderly process they set up, The police stepped in to take over and all order flew out the window. Now people were just waiting in line to get onto the chopper. It was still chaos down by the trainstation, so we decided to stay away. He told us how he tried to get the 2 teachers and college students from Gaustavus out of there. I laughed and told him i was from MN.

I guess today they sent out around 1300 people in the choppers. They kept the last couple of hundred that were waiting inside the train station and were going to sleep on the cars. They were to be the first ones out in the morning. We decided to keep our nice, open, free room and enjoy the festivites in the plaza.

After our meeting, Andy, ike, and i went to the hot springs. Andy and I started to talking to another guy who did the sandbagging. He has been in AC since the friday before and witness all the chaos, so he explained to us, what really happened before we got there.

It turns out, that on Sunday the road collapsed sometime in the night. In the morning, instant panic went through town. People were told helicopters were coming and they all gathered at the soccer fields. But then were told, it was an unsafe landing zone and were moved to the train station. I guess this happened a few times, moving back and forth when actually, no helicopter even showed up. Then rumors started that Americans were paying to be the first people out of there. Hotels and hostels started to raise their rates, and the people that had checked out that morning, now didnt have a place to stay because all the rooms had filled up.

This is why, when we walked into AC that evening, people were chaotically running around town. As we got back to the main plaza, they were handing out more lunch bags full of food. Nothing healthy, but it was free again. We have no idea where those lunch bags came from. They were also making 3 meals a day on the train tracks. So we had plenty of food.

In the evening, i stood in the plaza watching what people that were left, playing volleyball, soccer, music. The boys joined in on a circle that kicked around a soccerball. We all new it was going to be our last night, so we stayed out to enjoy the activites and energy of Aguas Calientes.