Weekend in the West - Part II

I won’t go through the details of Reunions but I will go through some of the highlights as they relate to my experience here. As I said from Morocco, Princeton Reunions is its own form of culture shock or alternate reality no matter where you travel from to get there, so the fact that I came to it from Armenia didn’t matter. I spent most of the time with friends, went to the Band concert, marched in the P-rade, and enjoyed the orchestra al fresco, and was wowed by the fireworks. All too soon it was time to say goodbye to people; it wasn’t too difficult, knowing that I’ll be back in the U.S. soon.

On Saturday morning, I went to an exhibit of JFK at Princeton (he was there for a few months as a member of the class of 1939, but when health problems caused him to miss so much school that he would have had to start over, he transferred to Harvard). I might have gone to see this anyway, but I thought it was a must given that I was here from JFK’s Peace Corps. I also saw a Kurt Schwitters exhibit, mainly because a friend of mine had lent an artwork for it, and even though I didn’t go with her, I did so in spirit. I saw one of the Armenian-American Princetonians that I know and had a chance to speak some Armenian with him (though I learned Eastern Armenian and they Western, and the two are different). Another highlight was meeting jazz-fusion guitarist Stanley Jordan, back for his 30th Reunion. I rushed to the tent when I heard he was going to jam with the band, and I bought one of his CDs. I just looked at his web site and he is playing in Georgia (the country) on July 23! If it were only a couple of weeks later, I could go! I hear he’ll be playing in New York in the fall – maybe I will see him then. Until then, check out one of the youtube or other videos to see how original he is and why this was a treat. My friend Erica (she of the Schwitters!) took the picture of him autographing my CD.

I didn’t feel I had to eat anything in particular (I had sushi for dinner, but that was more because I wanted to eat something light, and something quick – I had just had sushi in Yerevan, though it was too expensive for me to have it again while here). I did go to PJ’s for breakfast, but that was more out of tradition than a need for pancakes, and I never made it to Thomas Sweet (note, the earth still spins). It didn’t feel weird to be back – maybe because I had already come back twice from Morocco and maybe because Yerevan is a capital city and maybe because I’ve been in touch. What was more amazing to me was that I never felt the jet lag – I was able to stay awake when I wanted to and to fall asleep when I wanted to; I never felt as out of it as I was afraid I would (sometimes I have felt worse coming from much closer!).

Notable, though – I realized I had missed using the 3G on my iPhone to text friends and check email. I had resisted (if not avoided) becoming dependent on it before I left, but I sure enjoyed using it for the weekend! And I loved the music – mostly classic rock and roll, but just hearing a variety of American music was a joy – not that I don’t get variety here, with Armenian, Russian, classical and the same few American songs that play on Armenian radio, but it was nice to hear something than the same few American songs – more of a joy than I anticipated. I’ll schedule an infusion of music for when I get back (maybe some streaming radio or Pandora or last.fm or whatever the new thing is now – I’m out of it!).

On Sunday, my friend Carol drove back to New York City and I went with her; it was nice to get a ride! We then went to Citi Field for the Mets game, though I knew she would rather have just had a nice lunch. Going to this game was more important when I thought I was going to be in Armenia until September 30 and it might be my only game of the season, but the post-Reunions Sunday game is something of a tradition, so I still wanted to go. The tickets she bought got us into the Acela Club; we checked out the menu and decided to have lunch there – so she had her nice lunch and I had my ball game! Best of both worlds.

I then did some power shopping – a few toiletries that I had planned to replenish (mostly eye stuff) and fulfilling requests for PCVs, the health food store for something healthy for the plane ride back, some blank CDs. My friend Gary offered to get me anything I was running really low on, and I asked for Excedrin Migraine – as it happens, I took my very last one on the plane on my way over. I hope I don’t regret not buying an additional bottle – so far I’ve taken two every day since, but I hope that’s just readjustment; I have more than 50 days to go and there were only 100 in the bottle…. I also bought enough Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups to put one in the mailbox of every PCV in Armenia! Why are Coca-Cola and McDonald’s all over the world and not Reese’s? Well, it makes the PCV heart for them grow all the fonder. And then it was time to go to JFK – a much easier trip on the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend!