My trip to Bolivia is almost over. This is my last night and my stomach is aching as it always does when I travel. My coworkers looked at me suspiciously as I ordered skinless tomatoes and bottled water; still I´m sure I´ve caught some kind of bacteria. Today we met with Marcos, the scriptwriter of the radionovela we are producing and that will be broadcasted across Bolivia next year. I got excited as we talked about production matters: selecting music, dealing with copy-right issues, hiring a local producer, casting non-actors from rural communities and putting all the pieces together for the recording sessions. I miss being part of the creative process and not just managing the people and resources to make things happen.

An old lady approached me on the plane in Miami and asked if I could hold her bag during the flight. ¨Inside are my son´s ashes¨ she said in the most solemn way. The flight attendant came rapidly and asked me not to hold the bag and left me feeling that I could have help the woman anyway. I´m now in Bolivia for the 2nd time this year and the 3rd in the last 7 months. Probably that´s why when I landed in La Paz after being in Santa Cruz for a few days I felt as if I was returning home. A few days ago we were travelling south of Santa Cruz, near the border with Argentina and Paraguay. The driver explained how most accidents happen when drivers hit cows, sheep or goats. I´ve never seen so many vultures eating dead animals by the road. The clouds in Bolivia are closer to the ground, or so it seems, and it always gives me the feeling that I will be able to touch them if I try really hard.

Today is a typical humid and sunny summer afternoon. I'm at my place resting my mind before packing for my trip to Bolivia and Peru tomorrow. I feel absolutely saturated, my life has been spinning in many directions lately, and even when a long trip to South America seems like a good way to get myself back together I don't feel like going. I'm not the adventurous kind. I rather enjoy the NY summer, watching Kronos Quartet in Prospect Park, than traveling to 4 Bolivian cities in 4 days, riding on winding roads and flying on 10-passenger (and very old) Cessna planes.
Brenda "dreadlocks" is staying at my place. She will be here all the time I'm traveling, keeping the "Brenda" presence while I'm out. We met with Sandrita last night in Brooklyn for dinner at a cozy Italian place. It's funny how you can feel so comfortable with friends you haven't seen in so long, and for a moment pretend you've never left your hometown. "It's been my lifelong dream to be in Machu Pichu" Sandrita told me while taking a bite of her prosciutto, and I wished my trip was not a business one so I could take my friends with me.

These have been strange times. Natalia and Pepe, two of the most important people for me, left New York for good the past weekend. I'm now in DC participating at a conference on International Development, working on a proposal for a media project in India, and silently watching the Michael Jackson memorial on CNN.  My mother came to visit me along with her boyfriend. He is a man of few words and soft temper; I wish she was with someone with an opinion, or at least with the ability to hold a conversation. Still, she looks beautiful and happy.

Capuchi complained that I haven’t updated my blog in a long time, so here I am, writing so he can follow me from Tijuana. I might have told you already, but yesterday was my 7th anniversary in New York City. Lots of faces and names passed in front of me. I moved into the city with Javier, to whom I married and later divorced; and since then my life has changed several times in lots of different ways. Back then I couldn’t afford to spend more than $10 dollars a day, but I was producing biweekly documentaries for the local TV station, and many doors opened for me. I first fell in love with New York at the opening party of the MOMA in Queens. I went with my friend Diego. I was surprised about how such a diverse crowd of graffiti artists, art philanthropists, financiers, and undocumented immigrants could break-dance to Michael Jackson’s Billie Jean at the same dance floor. I came very young, a post-teenager wearing stylish t-shirts and converse; now I look like more like a grown-up, with red nail polish and black high heels.

Mr. Lupercio was talking last night about how he risked his life while researching about a prostitution ring in Guadalajara. He seems like the perfect man, someone that has rescued more than 800 young women from sexual violence, providing a shelter, a home, and a way to move on with their lives. People with high moral standards impress me. I somehow believe we all have a dark side, which we either learn to live with, or we endlessly fight. Who is incorruptible? We all live up to our standards, hoping to avoid anything that will give us a reason to be untruthful to ourselves.

Tuesday night Oscar, Pepe and I met at Joe’s Shanghai on 56 Street for diner. Chinese restaurants are kitsch by nature, several golden real-size animals, green velvet seats, plastic flowers, mirrors, a red shrine with Christmas lights and palm trees. Adding to the atmosphere, they played a wide selection of music from the 80s and 90s, Pat Benatar, Brian Adams, Toto, Sade, Billy Joel. We ordered clam and pork soup dumplings as we talked about our uncertain future (Pepe is moving back to Mexico in a few days as he was unable to get a new job). By the time we finished the two orders of dumplings and a plate of pan-fried noodles the three of us were exhausted, and we sat in silence for 20 minutes. It felt like a scene in a movie.

We ended at Happy Endings in the Lower East Side dancing inside an old steam room while the DJ was playing well-known songs broken into unrecognizable beats. I haven’t danced free-style for a long time, and it was certainly a good way to “officially” enter my 30’s. That is if you are official when you are over 30 and turning 31. My birthday wish/resolution is to stop the inertia to control everything in my life and just let things flow. Enjoy more, complain less.
My longtime friend Arloinne is getting married in less than a month even when she has always being opposed to the idea. She doesn’t believe that love comes in the shape of a sole partner for life. In her own words “you could fall in love with almost anyone; you can always find something to share, in common, or of interest in whomever you meet”. I find this is idea truly optimistic and good to share with all my single -but looking for someone special- friends.

Witnessing acts of courage always makes me cry; I get mixed feelings of beauty, sadness and confidence. I cry when I see old, sick or overweight people running marathons. It’s even stronger when these acts are performed on smaller everyday activities such as disabled people carrying their own groceries, old people making their way to the movies or the homeless man in my neighborhood giving out Chirping Chicken flyers to the passersby. Some days you need certain nerve to take small decisions, the same you need to change your life dramatically. My boss is moving to Rome with her boyfriend in a month, leaving behind her job, apartment and lifestyle in New York. I guess you wake up one morning knowing it is time to move on and modify your destiny.

The flying cockroaches appeared early this year, we killed one in Oscar’s bedroom a few days ago. One of my old roommates used to have the insecticide along with her sex toys on top of her desk; we joked about the possibility of spraying herself by mistake. Maria, who is the new roommate, has religious icons, folk art and flowers instead. I should make a wall with pictures of all the people that had lived in the house, from a Cypriot lesbian to a Science Christian and a British fashionista our place has hosted a diverse group of people in the last 5 years. This sounds like an interesting project for the summer.
I’m going to Ariana’s rooftop tonight to have a drink before she leaves for Spain for the entire summer.

I laid on my lama skin bed cover while Gabriela was leaving me a cup of tea on the bedside table and telling me her story of domestic violence.  I felt too privileged for a moment, almost ashamed, but she didn't seemed to notice. Here it was me, taking a sick-day off from work and reading the Wall Street Journal while playing with my soft alpaca skin; and there she was, tired of cleaning the apartment and ready to take the 1-hour train ride to Bed-Stuy in Brooklyn. She stood by my bed and talked about her boricua ex-husband, her three kids and how she manages to pay for the bills working night shifts at Penn Station's Kentucky Fried Chicken. 

I’m sick at home today, a common cold that makes me want to stay in bed. I walked to the Japanese restaurant and had Gyoza Dumplings, Miso Soup and a Shrimp Tempura Roll for $11.60. Now, I feel so bloated I wish I had stick to a chicken broth as the doctor recommended.
Somehow I feel uncertain and excited about everything coming. I knew this year was intended for new things, but the smell of the changing weather makes it evident and gives me goose bumps. If you ask me today, I will with you go anywhere.

I took an afternoon nap for the first time in years. Weather is getting hot and humid, and even when this is what I've been waiting for, it is always hard to avoid feeling tired.  I'm sitting in the living room and I can barely hear Oscar's music coming from his bedroom. This evening we are going to Saint John the Divine to listen to the New York Philharmonic; they organize a free concert every year on Memorial Day, and we are hoping to get a good spot, at least in the garden outside the Cathedral.  

I have writer's block. I can't think of anything to write about.

I'm in the kitchen writing down a wish list of at least 100 things I want to to. I'm supposed to let ideas flow without any constraints on whether they will be possible to achieve or not. A mouse is spying me from below the oven and I pretend not to see him, I don't want to scare him. Writing this list is harder than I thought. I start to search for old poems on my iPhone, The Road Not Taken comes first, then I jump to Whitman to finish with Annabel Lee. I take a bite of my ham and melted swiss sandwich, and play a 90's song on my phone while I decidedly continue with the so-called list. Trips, classes, new languages, lots of love, some discipline, my own business, a life filled with art and dance, family, health, the perfect job, time to spare. By item #56 I start being repetitive, now a trip to Turkey leads me to drinking a coffee at a coffee shop in Beirut, and from there I jump to participating in a film production. Suddenly I go back to a recent comment left on my blog that still strikes me: What are you planning Brenda? What is there beneath the surface? The truth is I don't know. It's not what you have, but what you do with it that counts. I stop writing and take another bite of my sandwich before it is too cold.

I used my iPhone as a ghetto blaster listening to a salsa song as I walked past an Irish Pub in Queens. A friend says that every house needs someone to play the music, so I guess that’s the reason I always bring mi iPod to all parties; everyone needs to have a role. When I was younger I hated when people answered “all kinds” when they were asked about their favorite type of music. Well, I’ve become one of those who like music for many other reasons than what it sounds like or what it represents in terms of “good music”.
Growing older is a humbling experience.

I’ll be 31 on June 10th and 7 years in New York on June 25th. The two anniversaries both excite and scare me. Who you wanted to be at 30? Who you want to become at 35? My friend Rodrigo laughed when he told me he finally understood why his dad gave up his ideals and relaxed, “we are entering the years of broken dreams”. On the other hand, Adriana believes we are in our peak, stating that women at 30 are at the best of their intellectual and sexual capacities. Either way, I believe this is a good year for taking decisions and moving forward. Stop blaming the economic crisis, the working visa, the longing for the family back home, the unstoppable tic-tac of the biological clock, the long-distance relationship and just focus on what I want and can realistically achieve. In the meantime my roommates are facing their own stories, Maria is in love with someone she shouldn’t be and Oscar met the guy that makes him want to commit.

As I walked uptown on Third Avenue I saw an Afghani turning off the lights of his newspaper stand, a recently homeless woman sitting on a bench eating a chili dog, a bank executive getting into his limo while sending an email from his Blackberry, a mentally ill man shouting “this is just like New Orleans”, German tourists discussing the best way to the Chrysler Building and countless of other unrelated stories in just one block. This is why I came to New York; as a story collector there is nothing else to ask than a walk during rush hour.

A girl from Morocco is staying 3 weeks in my apartment; we are having intensive French, Spanish and Arabic lessons and are already planning a gourmet fest of chiles rellenos and cous-cous. It’s her first time in America and she landed in a house full of Mexicans, which in a funny way, I think is very representative of this country.

Francisca’s father died this morning. With watery eyes and elegance she performed at Café Frida, singing her pain away. Her father taught her how to sing, or so she said, before dedicating a mariachi classic song to his memory. Meanwhile fajitas, enchiladas, tacos and guacamole were served at the tables, to customers avid of drinking hibiscus margaritas and breaking piñatas on Cinco de Mayo. Carlos’ father died in Paraguay two days ago, as Francisca, he cannot go back to his country; all prayers must be heard from a long distance. When Maria and I took a cab back to Astoria, we could see Oscar hugging Carlos under the rain, a metaphor to the catharsis he was experiencing after holding his breath for a couple of days.
As we crossed Central Park, Maria showed me a text message she had sent JD, a love song, an impulse after drinking a couple of margaritas and letting the passion rule over what she will commonly call a mistake.

I brought a stack of Mexican Luchadores from my last trip to Mexico and now everyone in my office has a kitsch figurine on top of their desks. Mine is wearing a pink cape and is standing between the post-its filled with pending matters and the pile of unread reports. My desk is filled with postcards and pictures of Bolivian landscapes, wedding dresses made out of condoms, Chinatown squids, art exhibitions, mariachis, strange beer labels and an “Arrest Bush” postcard. The last time Victor came he laughed at me, criticizing my accumulation of random things. I like having an eclectic collection and he is the kind of guy who only owns a mattress and a wooden table with stacks of The Economist, or even worst, a half-read copy of Greenspan’s The Age of Turbulence. In any case, I need to do spring cleaning this week and throw away all the unnecessary and never-to-be-read documents to give room to more new postcards.

Thursday: By the time we decided to go the movies it was too late. We tend to forget how crowded a movie during the Tribeca Film Festival can be. I’m now eating salted cashews and drinking a glass of Micante while listening to Drinking in LA from my iPod shuffle. The memories of being 19 and with a huge crush for Hayyim made me laugh. He was an excellent break-dancer, bassist player and graphic artist, with blond curly hair, green eyes and a stack of hard-to-find music; all the coolness in one cute skinny guy from San Francisco.

Saturday: (Sunday) Sitting on my bed drinking Micante and eating cashews. I just got back home after wandering the city without finding anything interesting. We had diner in Williamsburg, and then went to the G-Lounge, a gay bar on 19th street, where Oscar was meeting with some friends. Gay bars are good to be anonymous and dance shamelessly, but at the same time they make you feel everybody is getting something except for you. That’s how I’ve been feeling lately, that everyone has a somebody except for me. Victor is still in Mexico and after two years of a long-distance relationship I’m not sure if he will ever come back.