Unmentionables on Display

I love to travel and adventure. There is nothing more exciting for me than to go to a new destination. I got a chance to go to Nicaragua for a Spring Break trip as part of my journalism studies in grad school. Every trip brings something unexpected and this one was no exception.

My class didn't travel to Nicaragua as a group, though. Each of us was responsible for booking our own flights and our professors arranged individual transportation from the airport to the hotel. I traveled extensively when I lived abroad and I learned to accept that there is no such thing as a smooth trip. Such was the case for this trip.

I left out of Chicago. This required me to take the elevated train or "El" several hours as I had to go into the city and then switch trains to go out of the city to the airport. I did make it to the airport in plenty of time to make my flight. Good thing I did. I got in line for airport security. I can spot someone new to travel pretty quickly. This time the person was in front of me in line. Normally, you put your items like shoes, purses, jackets, carryons, wallets, keys, etc. into a bin and run it through the X-ray. This person emptied out their carry-on and put all the items in their suitcase into the bin. So, I got an eyeful of all of their underthings, which somehow ended up on top of the pile. This was also a nightmare for the TSA agent to sort through and held up the line considerably.

I made the flight, but the flight didn't make the destination. Bad weather meant we couldn't land in Nicaragua so we were redirected to Ecuador. We arrived very late at night and the airline put us up in a hotel and rebooked us on an early morning flight the next day. I didn't really mind. After all, I got to visit another country and get an extra stamp in my passport.

My professor did mind very much, though. I had to let her know that I was not arriving that night, so I texted her. She responded with: "Are you alone?" Ummm....well, we clearly were not traveling as a group, but I was with other passengers on the flight. So, I let her know that I wasn't with anyone else in my class but I was with other people. Note that the weather situation was out of my control, but my professor was peeved I didn't give enough notice to cancel the airport transfer to the hotel. Might that possibly be because I was in the air flying to Ecuador with no way to reach her until we landed?

The planned itinerary once we all arrived in Nicaragua was uneventful. We did some sightseeing. We worked on our journalism project. I thankfully had a contact who used to work in Ecuador and had a famous Ecuadorian journalist he connected me with. So what does a young journalist do when faced with an opportunity to learn more about reporting abroad? I snuck out of the hotel on my secret mission to actually get something useful out of this trip.

The instructions I received were to take a cab to the university and meet the journalist at a certain time in a specific building. The cab dropped me off and I took maybe five steps away when I realized this might not be a good idea. I had no way to call a cab to get back to the hotel. I had no idea where this hall was. I didn't speak Spanish. No one in my group actually knew where I was because if I told them, I they wouldn't let me go or all 20 of them would try to go. What could go wrong? I turned to chase down the taxi but couldn't catch up to it. I was now committed to the mission.

I somehow managed to ask someone where the hall was and find it. It was packed. There were so many people they were spilling out of the building. It looked like the journalist was giving a speech. I stood out from the crowd clearly being American, but for reasons unknown to me, I was immediately identified as the "person meeting the journalist" by the people outside the door. Minutes later I connected with the journalist and we went to a restaurant to talk.

It was fantastic. Truly the best part of the trip. I learned so much about investigative reporting including how to smuggle items out of your office as the police try to raid it. Hint: It helps to have a pregnant coworker who officers are hesitant to frisk. The journalist drove me back to my hotel. I snuck back into my room. My professors never knew of my "adventure."

Getting back to the U.S. was just as eventful as leaving. The flight made it back to Chicago with no issues, but I had to go through customs. Of course, they asked where I had been and why. Apparently visiting a Third World country known for its drug trade during Spring Break is a red flag for customs agents. The agent said he was going to search my bag and I needed to tell him now if I had any drugs in it. I said it was not that kind of Spring Break trip. I went with a university for study purposes not a group of party people. He didn't seem convinced. He said he was giving me one last chance to come clean because I was going to be arrested if he found drugs. I don't how it works having never tried to smuggle drugs into the country, but I had a feeling I was still going to get arrested if I admitted to smuggling drugs. An admission didn't seem like it would just be a free pass. The search commenced. Now it was my turn to have all my items laid before other passengers as he dug through my bag and took everything out. He didn't find any drugs but he did find all my unmentionables.