International Epiphany

I met a friend of a friend in Corpus yesterday. Her name is Vanessa, but she loves to dance and is so exuberant people call her Cha-Cha. Cha-Cha has long dark hair and big dark eyes and her eyeballs dance when she laughs. Last night she wore a Mexican embroidered dress and red sandals.

She is Puerto Rican and has traveled to Italy, Britain, South America, and elsewhere. She had plenty to say about how they do things in other countries. She says she has another nickname besides Cha-Cha and it is CPR. "No, I'm not a medic," she told me. "That stands for 'Crazy Puerto Rican'." Cha-Cha used to smoke and when she was in Italy she asked someone to light her cigarette. "I said it wrong though," she giggled. "It came out really bad in Italian; I ended up saying Light My Fire."

Cha-Cha just got back from Cuba. "They don't celebrate Christmas in Cuba. They celebrate Three Kings Day. On that day, children put a shoebox under the bed with grass in it for the kings' camels. When the kids wake up the next day, the box is gone and there are gifts under the bed in its place." The father of the household in which Cha-Cha was staying told his children that year, "Don't put grass in the box. The camels will be okay. But those three kings will be thirsty when they arrive. Leave the shoebox under the bed with three shots of rum."