A Thunderstorm, Whiskey at the Grocery Store, and Island Politics

Woke up yesterday morning and there was a real thunder and lightning rain storm going on! I didn't know they did that here. With the normal 25 mph wind that is always blowing, it was raining sideways. I went into town and by the time I got there, the rain had stopped. It probably rained about 1/2-inch...but there was water in the streets at low spots that was 3 or 4 inches deep! The problem is that they don't have storm sewers here so water just runs down the street in torrents until it finds a low spot (mostly parking lots). Sometimes the low spot is in the street.

I got to Burger King (I habitually get coffee there on weekend mornings) and as soon as I parked some drunk guy started tapping on my window with a half empty beer (it's about 9 a.m.). He wanted to wash my car so I gave him a couple of florin to get out of my way. When I got out of the car I noticed the only people I could see was 3 or 4 town drunks. Then it occurred to me that everyone else had gotten in out of the rain so the only people left outside were the gung ho beer drinkers.

Speaking of drinking, I went to the big "wesern-style" grocery store (i.e. one that doesn't stink and has meat without flies) and at the entrance there was a big Heineken display where they were showing off their new mini-keg and the $350 cooler that goes with it...they were giving away free cups of beer and had quite a crowd, mostly tourists. So I maneuver thru all that and look up and see another crowd...only bigger. Some wine company was giving away free glasses of wine. Just past that crowd was a BIG crowd that was having a party. Johnnie Walker was giving away FREE SHOTS OF SCOTCH WHISKEY in the grocery store. That's unfathomable to me. They just do things differently here, but I couldn't help but think that unless some taxis line up outside, the trip down Highway 1 is going to be a little iffy on the way home for these folks and a few thousand other people.

This morning (Sunday) I went to the flea market. Remember the Hwy 1 is the main road from one end of the island to the other. It can be compared to any county road in Texas as far as width and maintenance (more on that later) are concerned. Something else I need to say is that the national (is there anything else here?) elections are coming next month and these people take their politics seriously.

There are three parties from what I can tell and each one has its own color...the MEP is yellow, the AMP is green, and the red party is something else that I can't remember. People wear those colors this time of year to signify the which party they align with...and it's serious. Last week, I was with some Arubans at a nice restaurant and the Minister of Health (he appeared to be swine flu-free) came in with a couple of American doctors, I found out later. He sort of worked the crowd but only shook hands with people dressed in yellow...his party colors. The MEP is in power now and since it's election time, they are putting down new asphalt from one end to the other.

Anyway, there is a big political rally in a parking lot along Hwy 1 by MEP (I don't know what any of the acronyms mean) and they are selling raffle tickets and giving away t-shirts. So everything stops there while people in cars buy tickets and collect t-shirts from their cars in the middle of the highway. (They wouldn't give me a t-shirt because I'm obviously not Aruban). Took me about 30 minutes to drive about 1/4 mile thru that thing. Then about a mile down the highway, they have the same thing going on for people on the other side of the highway...meaning I have to get thru that on the way home.

Sure enough, on the way home I get to the other MEP rally and I notice that there is a motorcade of about 15 cars with yellow flags and banners pulling out onto the highway. I fall in about 2 cars behind them. Down the highway a few miles, I see an AMP motorcade coming the other way with green flags flying. I didn't pay much attention until the two motorcades met going in opposite directions. Literally, everyone in each motorcade rolled down their windows and started using hand signals to express to the people in the other motorcade that their party of choice was, well..."number one" in that truly international middle-fingered hand gesture. I was laughing so hard at this that I had to slam on my brakes at one point to keep from running over the car in front of me.

I just love these people...

OUT

oops...confession time!!! i have passed this combination Little Caesar's/Baskin Robbins store a million times, but yesterday I noticed that it was also a DUNKIN DONUTS!!! The only problem is that with the language issues I think I got a pepperoni filled donut and some kind of sherbet in my coffee...but it was Dunkin Donuts coffee!! My confession is that I have eaten 8 donuts already this weekend.

OUT again

This Place Still Strikes Me as Odd

• My short timeframe here has forced us to work longer hours. The guys have figured out that if they martyr themselves and act like they don't have time to eat lunch that I'll go to my bungelow and make lunch for everyone and bring it back. At least that's the way it has been working for most of this week. My only problem is that I don't have a cost center to charge my cooking time to.
• Medical care here is pretty sketchy. Last time I was here, a guy down the hall had a stroke in his office. It was so bad that he couldn't talk before they got him out of his office. They took him to the hospital and the next day they sent him home with baby aspirin!!! That seems bad enuff, but something happened yesterday that I still don't believe. One of the new operators who is in class down the hall [those guys have been in 'school' here since February] came to work with a little bit of a limp. We asked him what was up and he said he had a sore toe from an ingrown toenail. I took him to the first aid clinic here in the refinery so he could get some Motrin and the 'sorta EMT' took a look at his toe. Next thing we know, this dude [and he isn't even trained to EMT status] grabs a can of liquid nitrogen and sprays the toe for a while with the nitrogen. Then he breaks out a scalpel [or it could have been an exacto knife] and cuts around the toenail and then pulls it out with some forceps. Meanwhile, my guy is just watching him cut his toe up like there was nothing going on!!! I was [still am] horrified!! Where did first aid boy learn that trick? How can they get away with that? The answer...socialized O'bama-style medicine. Both guys said that a doctor here would do the same thing but it would be a week or so before he could get in! I couldn't help but wonder what would happen if you went to that first aid station with a toothache or constipation.
• Got some bad news from the other end of the island. The Marriott luxury high rise laid off 200 people Wednesday. With the refinery in jeopardy, tourism is all they got. People are getting a little morose.
• OH...I think my giant iguana is back [the one jumped out of my garbage can a couple of months ago in the dark]! This morning there were some huge tracks in the sand just outside my gate by the car. The tracks are pretty obvious. The feet overlap each other on each side and the tail makes a groove between the foot prints. These feet are about as big as a chicken foot and they're about a foot apart. Can't wait to walk up on this guy in the dark again. I'm guessing his head would be close to softball size.

Of course it could just be a chicken...

OUT

It's Just Work

Things have been mighty quiet...exactly 180 degrees from where we were the last time I was here. That was a long 4 weeks. People here have told me that I look a lot better now than I did when I left last month. Plus, when I picked up the boss at the airport in week 3 of my last visit, he commented that I looked haggard. But, I thought I was doing just fine. The fact that I burst into tears like a girl when Paula picked me up at the airport with a backseat full of daughters and my grandson notwithstanding. Lets just say I had the best Father's Day [the next day] that I can remember.

Swine flu is a BIG deal here. They've had 35 cases develop in 6 days. That's 35 people out of 90,000 or about 50 or 60 times the infection rate that we have in the US! Not many swine flu jokes around here any more. They're taking it pretty seriously, now.

Went to lunch today and had a mushroom and escargot soup and a conch salad [basically a Caesar salad with some grilled conch on it]. It was all, remarkably enough, pretty good...but it still needed salt. They just don't get it. Salt is a flavor enhancer...it makes food taste better and 'brighter' [but if you can taste the salt, you have too much].

The people here in the refinery have taken a resolute attitude to the condition they're in. The conventional wisdom is that Valero is not going to start it up but will leave it down until they sell it. That is bad news. It could take months or even as long as a year to sell. There is a lot of concern that PetroChina will buy it. Everyone knows that those guys aren't particularly interested in safety, training, and investing back into a place for maintenance. They believe the place will deteriorate quickly [and I agree] if PetroChina takes over. It's not exactly a picture of health at this point.

My only concern is that I may not get anything ont his trip for my "As the Refinery Burns" screenplay that I'm determined to write. Think I'll stir something up tomorrow.

OUT

Here I is...

Got up this morning about 3 a.m. to get to the airport by 4. The only problem with that was that the TSA people didn't show up to clear anyone thru until almost 5 a.m. Huge line at the airport. My flight was at 5:30 but I got there in plenty of time...and I think I'm gonna kill our travel agent. He did the right thing, I guess, by getting the best fare available, but because it was so low, I couldn't upgrade to 1st class. They had 6 empty seats in 1st class and wouldn't sell me one. Somebody tell me the logic behind that. I'm gonna tell the agent to make sure we pay enuff for the ticket so I can upgrade [uh...where's the logic in that?...D-OH!!]

We landed at 2 o'clock and I went to the grocery store to get some food. I am AMAZED at the price increases. I buy some of the same things every time I come here and some of the prices have gone up as much as 50%. Everything is a lot higher. Don't know what that's about but it was a bigtime subject at the checkout lines. Haven't checked the price of gas yet. Last time it calculated to about $4.50/gallon. I don't know where all this inflation came from.

Got to my house about 5 p.m. and my day is catching up with me. I didn't get much sleep on the plane and didn't really sleep much last night. Didn't even get to bed till after 11 p.m. Time to man up, I guess...or just crash. Now there's an option.

BTW...they only say it's hot here. It's 85 degrees with a constant 20 mph wind. That's the way it is all the time...24/7/365.

Big day tomorrow...

Out

ADDENDUM...
I forgot to mention that everything on the island is on a cash basis. Something has happened to the credit card/ATM network and no one can use credit cards, debit cards, or ATMs. I hope it doesn't last long because I don't normally bring a lot of cash with me. I live off of ATMs and the company AMEX

Back to the Rock

Headed back to Aruba Monday. But, I'm only there for two weeks this time...alledgedly. I originally thought this was going to be my last trip but if the refinery actually re-starts and we continue with our other work there, I'm going to be stuck in Aruba until it's all over. D-OH!!!

Like I said before, I really don't expect the current owner to ever re-start that relic, but someone will...eventually. And if I play my cards right, I won't have to go back until mid-September at the earliest. But...enuff of that.

Uh...I don't know how the planets are lined up but something has happened today that proves there is some kind of mis-alignment. I have to come clean with this...

Today I agreed with something Nancy Pelosi did. That cold wind you feel blowing up the back of your neck is just the remnants of the cosmic wind that makes things happen like me agreeing with Herr-ess Pelosi. Here's what happened...today she stopped a resolution in Congress to honor Michael Jackson. What is the world coming to?

I don't know if I'm disturbed by the fact that some member of Congress [i.e. Shiela Jackson Lee (D-Houston)] actually brought that resolution to the floor of the Congress or that I am aligned with Nancy Pelosi, if for only a few minutes! You decide...

Meanwhile, I'm going to Aruba.

OUT

...aaahhhh...home at last...

It has been brought to my attention that I ran out of Aruba so quickly that I haven’t updated the blog. I ‘escaped’ Saturday morning in spite of all the hysteria about my leaving…but it got to the point where I actually had to stand firm and tell my boss and the client that my departure on Saturday morning was absolutely, positively not negotiable. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

For some reason, I figured that when the boss got to Aruba things would smooth out and some of the distractions would go away. Actually, it was just the opposite. We wound up sharing my office and all the issues he was working on (and even some issues from other projects around the company) just came pouring into my bubble. On top of that, the union decided they were going to ‘audit’ our work and started ‘lawyering’ every word we have written or presented or spoken.

Then the two guys that I was spending a great deal of time training to be trainers ‘spit the bit’ Thursday afternoon. They just walked in to their boss’s office and told her they weren’t ready for presenting the classes that were scheduled for this week. Over the past two weeks, as we worked on getting them up to speed, they assured me that everything was fine and that we were on track and would be ready to do the training beginning on June 23. The truth was that they didn’t want to do it at all. The plan had been all along to say they weren’t ready at the last minute with the idea that I would stay and teach their classes. They had no regard for the damage it would do to our company or me personally. Either they didn’t care or were too dense to ‘get it’.

Great panic ensued throughout the land when those guys started whining. I was in a ringer trying to cover my ass and not throw rocks directly at them. So now we had to call their bluff and work out a plan to fill the gaps. I forced them to tell us what part of the process they needed ‘help’ on and then showed them where they signed the training plan stating that they were trained in that area and understood what they were seeing. That didn’t do much good, believe it or not…other than the fact that their boss told them that if they failed they would be fired.

It was at that time that they asked me to stay. But since my 30-day clock was almost run out, I would have had to fly to another country and re-enter Aruba to restart my clock. I just flat out refused. So far this year, I have missed every holiday and family birthday and I wasn’t going to miss Father’s Day. Then the plan was for me to go home for the weekend and come back on Monday. Later on, though, cooler heads prevailed and I am returning on July 13 for a couple of weeks.

Oh…and those mangy cunucu dogs did just fine teaching their classes.

BTW…the boss is a terrible roommate. He doesn’t sleep. One night our agent in the Middle East called about midnight to tell us we have been awarded a contract over there [a 3-year project]. So the boss and me were up the rest of the night trying to figure out how we're going to ramp that project up with 11 people by the end of the year. The main reason I participated was so that I wouldn’t wind up over there living off of camel (the guy we sent to Algeria a couple of weeks ago wound up living off of camel and monkey). It appears that I'm going to move to a project in Utah at the end of the summer. One that won’t take so much travel.

Any way, I have been privy to some pretty blatant, high level corruption here that my naiveté would not let me believe 3 months ago. I really don’t know how they run this place. This bunch of keystone cops can't use computers, can't 'read' a spreadsheet, and get in a panic when a consultant leaves (I’ve checked it out with other consultants…they see the same thing when they get ready to leave…meaning, it ain’t just me).

As my departure date closed in, people started coming in to my office and saying 'we need to go do this before you leave'...yada, yada, yada. Meanwhile, I'm just giving them my best dumb blonde look. If they need me to come back, I'll do that on a separate purchase order against a different project. Every dollar and every hour that I have left in my budget is already spoken for about twice and there is no more milk in the cow.

But let’s not forget that they are shutting this refinery down in a few days until the economy improves. I have my doubts that Valero will ever start it back up. My guess is that someone like Petrobraz (Brazil) or PetroChina (China) or Ecopetrol (Colombia) will buy the place cheap and bring it up…later in the year. Or the government will nationalize it and hire a company to come in and manage it until Valero can sell it.

I’m so glad to be home I can’t stand it. I think I'm going to talk a friend into getting into the cheese business. Maybe I can make a meager living making meager cheese.


OUT

It's everywhere

Things have quieted down a little. Friday is most unproductive day of the week in Aruba…at least in the refinery. Everyone is acting like nothing is going on and gallows humor prevails. Believe it or not, the most common phrase I'm hearing here on “Mahogany Row” (the nickname for the executive wing where we all are) is, well,… “We’re f_ _ _ ed!” That’s the mantra that men and women are both using when anyone speculates about the immediate future…followed by a big laugh by everyone in hearing range. But I ain't laughin’. They’ve changed their minds about “business as usual” for projects. Everything will have to be re-justified at a series of meetings that start Monday morning. (Glad the boss is going to be here to fade that heat).

I do know that the intensity to work, work, work has been blunted a little while my project is crumbling while I watch. This is probably the end. When I leave next Saturday, I probably won’t come back…unless PetroBraz buys the place and they jump start our projects. The worst part is that we have a big project coming up in Saudi Arabia. Worst case would be that one landing in my lap. Traveling back and forth and spending weeks in Saudi could even be a deal breaker for me. (My, I get pessimistic quickly, don’t I).

The political situation is quietly tense. Drove by the cruise ship harbor this morning and there are naval frigates docked right behind the giant cruise ships. Can’t tell where they are from because they aren’t flying any flags (is that normal?). When they bring them around to the refinery docks, I'm going to get a little antsy. Meanwhile, one of my best friends told me it’s time to get a “bug-out bag” going. That idea, plus the fact that we were told by the refinery to be ready to leave at any time, made me take it seriously. I'll live out of my suitcase for the rest of my stay, and keep my passport and itinerary in my pocket. I also exchanged all my florin into dollars. But I do have a small bag with absolute essentials with me all the time in the trunk of my car (laptop, passport, change of clothes, flash drives, paper files, a snack or two, two bottles of water, a couple hundred bucks, etc.). I think I'll start sleeping on the roof of the house with a big signal light handy so I can zero the choppers in when they show up from the aircraft carrier. There really isn't one out there, but I keep looking.

I made my normal grocery store trip today and a guy asked me if I was nervous about being here. I asked him how he knew I was an American contractor to the refinery and he said, “You all look alike. It’s the starched long-sleeved shirt tucked into blue jeans. The shoes give it away, too.” Come to find out, this guy is a Euro who has lived here for about 10 years. He didn’t look Aruban. Obviously, there are as many Aruban variations as there are with Americans except the Arubans that go back many generations. The multi-generational Aruban women are short, big-breasted, and round-bellied. The men are darker, short, and very stocky…almost swarthy.

Oh, and Chavez down in Venezuela is having a blast (no pun) with this. He’s talking about all the Aruban government has to do is kick the American capitalists out and he’ll take the refinery off their hands. I don’t think socialism or communism will go over too well here. You know what they say the difference is…with socialism, the government takes both of your cows and gives the milk away to your neighbors. Communists don’t really take the cows but they make you sell the milk to the government at a fixed break even cost (low enough for the government to re-sell it at a profit) and require a daily quota from you. If you don’t make quota, they take the cows and feed the to your neigbors and double your quota.

I can’t wait for next week. No one could write this is in a script…but I might after I get home.

OUT