if this is paradise, why does it rain so much?
i forgot about you, dear blog. for better or worse. i am here in rarotonga, the edge of the world, the last time zone of the day, the middle of nowhere, a rainy paradise. this is my second fully day on the island and my third rainstorm. it was quaint yesterday when i was on my push bike, touring the island. (it's about 20 miles and my bum hurts a lot.) today, not so cute. but still, it's amazing here.

i'm in avarua, the main town in rarotonga, though if you were on a highway in kentucky, this place would be a blink-of-an-eye village. the mosquitoes are fierce, as is the sun. i'm quite burned even tho' it was thoroughly overcast yesterday. monday, i'm off to aitutaki, what i suspect from pictures to be an even more idyllic place. i love swimming in warm, clear waters, though it's a little freaky to do it by myself. it's not hard to find a lonesome swimming place, and then i worry about sharks and random spiky poisonous creatures. in reality, i don't have much to worry about, but sometimes standing on the beach, thinking about how vast the pacific is and then how small this blot of land is ... well, it's just a little scary.

my voyage to rarotonga was a long one. from newark airport to LA for five days or so, then a 13 hour flight to auckland. then the next day, a four hour flight BACK EAST and over the dateline to the Cook Islands. It was Wednesday then it was Thursday, then I woke up and it was Friday and I hopped back on a plane to Thursday and woke up on Friday again. There really isn't much jet-lag because the hours are so close, but it's just plain weird, damn it.

So ta ta for now.