Saturday, April 10, 2010

Day 9 – Tucson, AZ (0 miles – rest day)

Friday April 9, 2010

Today was our first official “off day” of the ride, and I think everyone was very grateful for the day off. Even though the support teams have every fifth day off, on “off days,” we don’t travel anywhere. No one is on support and everyone gets to relax and enjoy the city.

Unfortunately for us, the maintenance crew at the synagogue was not very happy with our presence; therefore, we were not able to sleep in this morning and were instead awakened by all of the lights turning on at 6:00am. We had to be out of the synagogue by 7:00am so that they could prepare for a service. We all piled in to our vans and headed over to Einstein’s bagels for our free bagels, orange juice, and coffee. Delicious. Einstein’s rocks. When we came back to the synagogue to quickly drop off our left-over bagels and cream cheese (we get lots of bagels donated), the only thing the maintenance crew had done in our room was cover EVERY SINGLE table with aluminum foil?!? We were a little confused, but decided it was better to just not ask…

We had an event scheduled at the University of Arizona for today, so we went over to campus and set up an information table in the middle of the U of A Mall. We had quite a few interested people stop by to hear about the Ride, as well as many people who simply pretended to be interested so that they could get our free coffee and bagels. Free coffee and bagels are a great incentive for hungry college students.
During our down time, Maggie and I wandered and bought sweet new sunglasses. We were the coolest kids on campus… At noon, we gave our lecture to a group of medical students during their lunch hour. There was a pretty good turnout and our lecturers (Roshan, Katie, and Tim) did a great job. The highlight of the hour was, however, the free Thai food. Very exciting! (Food always makes me happy!!)

We had a free afternoon, so a bunch of us decided to head over to the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. We had heard it was a pretty cool place to visit. Even though we all tried our best to decrease the admission price, we could only get a minor discount. We worked our magic, but without much success. C’est la vie. It was still fun. We saw some beautiful vistas, interesting animals, pretty flowers, and lots and LOTS of cacti.
I also got to pretend to be a bat. It was an adventure...
We finished up the evening with a meal on our own. Since no one was on support, we decided everyone could cover dinner on their own. A group of us went to this amazing vegan restaurant. I had a bacon cheeseburger. And yes, it was all vegan. That means no meat, no dairy, no animal products whatsoever. Do not be skeptical, please. It was incredibly delicious.

So now I have a full belly and sleepy eyes. Tomorrow we ride again.

End of the ninth day. And it was relaxing.

P.S. I got my contract for my pediatric residency in the mail today. It’s very intimidating. I don’t think I even understand 1/3 of what is written. Plus, I have to complete everything and turn it back in before April 30th. That’s 21 days from today. And I don’t even know when I will next have internet. Oh, the joys of traveling through Po-Dunk, USA…

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