Boricua en la Lima

It's that time of year again! The time where I visit the center of Lima multiple times per week and scream at government workers for not clearly explaining the process to renew my residence yearly.  The time where I scream at my husband every time I walk out of the Immigration Office and tell him I hate this country and that I want to leave! The time of year I make so many excuses for arriving late to work that no one actually believes I'm doing the same thing related to my residence permit. Except it isn't. I went at my allotted time of 8 am this morning and somehow, miraculously, I was out by 8:45 am with residence permit in hand, LEGAL for another year in Peru! Yes of course I had pre-work, some of it which is totally stupid. Like every year I have to go print out a NEW marriage certificate that shows I'm still married.  And every year I need my husband to notarize a letter that says he's responsible for me (so demeaning!), and every year I have to stand i

Creativity, Inc. by Ed Catmull In between the lull of catching up on Hulu on the last bit of summer shows and the beginning of the Fall line up (alas it came too quick!) I have been catching up on Kindle and iBooks reading.  Last week I finished Creativity Inc ., which is honestly the best non-fiction book I've read in a long time.  As a parent (and Disney and Pixar enthusiast) I loved reading about the creative process that went into all these famous kids' movies. As a business person and marketer I loved the author's perspective about management, leadership and strategy development. Key learning for me was giving people the freedom to excel at what they're really good at in order to achieve excellence.  And finally as a Steve Jobs junkie I loved getting additional glimpses into his life and mind. The chapter specifically dedicated to Steve made me cry, I felt it rang more true than all of Walter Isaacson's biography. If you're looking for a great read I

Yesterday was a rough day for me. Probably because I'm too sensitive and if there is such a thing, too empathetic.  One of my dear friend´s 20 month old daughter was undergoing planned open heart surgery.  She was born with a heart murmur and they waited all this time to see if it would shrink, which it did, but not enough for her to be able to live a healthy life without the risk of problems later down the road. So they made the tough choice of having the 5-6 hour open heart surgery.  At the same time as I was sending positive vibes her way I start finding out that in one of my previous jobs everyone except for 5 people are getting fired.  So my heart starts breaking little by little. The fact that my friends were getting fired was tough enough, but waiting 5-6 hours without hearing news about my friend's daughter was heart breaking to say the least.  I couldn't even imagine how my friend must have been feeling.  My dear Sebas had surgery when he was about 15 months old

I am spending a lot of time in traffic these days so I take that as an opportunity to catch up on podcasts. What's on my listening queue (which is getting too long by the way thanks to NPR!)? The EntreLeadership podcast (not quite sure I will stick with this one long term) HBR IdeaCast Fresh Air Slice of MIT Hay House Meditations Latino USA (love love love!) This American Life (can I love anymore?!!?) The Moth (ditto) TEDTalks (who doesn't love?) Another Mother Runner (#bamr) Tara Brach Coffee Break French (gotta practice in case I ever move back to Europe!) This one podcast on Pope Francis' policies and how they have changed the Catholic church is soooo interesting. I am really intrigued by the balance he's trying to strike between being a Catholic (and inherently Conservative) and being a "Liberal" in several aspects.  I guess any topic lately which illustrates this struggle to strike a balance between two seemingly opposite themes is rea

In my new line of work everyone is always telling me (well not just me, everyone!) "you have to write all the time", "you have to produce online content, not just share content", "you have to build your online professional presence", etc.  Well, I got kind of tired of hearing it and decided today was the day to get back into the good old forgotten blog. I’ve got a few topics I’m going to write over the next few weeks (time permitting which is scary!) but I’m going to start with an update on where I’m working, why I’m working here, and why it might be the place that just might stick... Well, here's the update. After working in Asia Sur for about 1.5-2 years (cannot remember time anymore now that I'm 41, ouch!) I left the magazine at the end of March and decided I would re-group and try to find a job that would be a much better fit with my skills and my need to balance personal and professional life. After almost 3 years of living in Peru I f