[Above: Nancy Olson stuffs the Drive Around the World Christmas turkey in the kitchen of the Taxo Hostel in Quito, Ecuador.]

Journal By Nancy Olson

I went to sleep last night as visions of sugarplums danced in my head. When I awoke this morning to a “knock-knock-knock” at 9:30, it was to visions of television cameras and microphones wielded by Adam and Neil. Those meanies interrupted what I wanted most this Christmas morning -- good, solid, blissful sleep.

Whatever happened to the little girl who used to conspire with her older brother to sneak downstairs as early as possible -- sometimes even beating Santa himself to the punch -- to peek inside stockings and shake inconspicuous packages for a guess at their contents? Then we would plead with Mom until she gave us the go-ahead to get Christmas rolling with a traditional “hop on Pop.” We’d run in and jump up and down on Dad’s bed screaming “Hop on Pop! Hop on Pop!” until he agreed the hour was acceptably late enough to start opening presents. Man, those were the days.

Now, it seemed, I had turned into Pop, and Neil and Adam were a more civilized version of my brother and me. Huh. What a weird concept. Oh, but who am I fooling? I was almost giddy with excitement for this Christmas morning. I had a stocking full of gifts for each teammate, and one for my "Secret Santa" buddy. The main difference between Christmas as an adult and Christmas as a kid is that there is excitement in the receiving as the latter and immense pleasure in the giving as the former. Shucks, I hope that doesn’t mean I’m finally growing up!

My team and I were staying in Quito, Ecuador, in a hostel called “El Taxo,” and, as homesick as we all were for our families celebrating Christmas back home, we felt lucky to have each other, as well as some expatriates we had met in Quito.

I managed to get Neil and Adam to take there camera out of my tired and puffy morning face, and I lay in bed long enough to savor the last few minutes of sleepy comfort. The knowledge that we had a turkey to stuff, potatoes to mash, and stuffing to make is what actually got me out of my rack and into the shower. My replacement family and I would have a long day of Christmas cooking ahead of us.

Each of us had drawn a name out of a hat about a month ago, and we had a “Secret Santa” gift exchange planned. I had drawn Justin, and he had drawn Chanda. I bought him a linen shirt in Costa Rica that I was just dying to present to him, since he’d been looking for one every day for, like, well, since we left the U.S. I also got to help him pick out Chanda’s gift, and I was as excited as he was to see if she’d be pleased with her new shoes -- a sort of high-heeled, platform, blue, super-hot sandal. (Just last night, as we walked past yet another shoe store, she squealed, “I hope my Secret Santa brings SHOES!”)

Before the gift exchange could occur, we had to get the 28-pound turkey into the oven. Before the turkey could go into the oven, we had to stuff it. Before we could stuff it, we had to bake some breadcrumbs; cut the celery, onions, and garlic; and make the doggone stuffing. That was the job I opted for, because a turkey dinner just wasn’t a turkey dinner without my mom’s stuffing.

Todd expertly crumbed (my made-up word for “cut into small pieces”) and broiled a loaf of white bread, and I added what I could remember Mom adding, and we came up with something suitable. Basically, it was breadcrumbs, a ton of celery and onions, some crushed garlic, a couple of eggs, and some chicken broth. We stuffed the pasty substance into the neck and the butt, and Nick and I, like surgeons, sewed it all shut with a fishing hook and some dental floss. Mom, you should be proud. What a job we did!

With the turkey finally in the oven, we got down to the business of opening gifts. (Actually, this is slightly out of order, but who’s writing the journal here, anyway?) With Colin playing the role of “Head” Secret Santa, whose job it is to collect and hand out the gifts, we all took turns opening our present. Afterwards, we would all get to enter a secret guess as to who we thought our Santa was. We even had a little gift for one of our fellow hostel dwellers, Jim from the UK. We laughed and had a grand ole time until the last gift had been opened. It seems the best Christmases are the ones that involve simplicity, improvisation, loved ones, and laughter. So far, this was ranking right up there with some of the very best.

In the end, Chanda was in a new pair of H.A.B. (that acronym is for us to know and you to find out) shoes, two people were wearing new t-shirts, two were in fancy new Latin American dress shirts, three were in Panama hats, and Justin was in a new linen shirt which, as it turns out, was “big enough for a man, but made for a woman.” (It seems I made a mistake at the fancy Italian store in Costa Rica…yeah, the shirt’s trendy style didn’t just have to do with it being European…)

Everybody was ultra-pleased with their gifts, and guessing who gave what to whom proved to be quite fun and challenging. We worked out a little scoring system: For a correct guess, the giver had to buy the guesser a soda for failing to be deceptive enough. For an incorrect guess, the guesser had to buy the giver a soda for being a successfully secret Santa. In the end, Neil got a free cola from Todd and Chanda, Adam got two from Nick, Todd got one from me, Rolf got two from Colin, Justin got one from me, and Chanda got one from Justin. Confused? No worries. Just know that I guessed wrong (my gift was from Todd) AND failed to fool Justin.

While the turkey cooked, we were each on our own to watch bootleg DVDs a few of us had purchased from street vendors for a dollar, nap, read, or goof around. Adam and I found an open Internet café, and I finally got to send the Christmas e-mail I’d been trying to send for two days (my webmail was down). Finally, at 6:00 p.m. (turkeys take longer to cook when you’re at altitude, and Quito is at around 10,000 ft), we sat down to an absolutely amazing Christmas spread.

With the hostel owner (Peter) joining us, along with his employee (Jan), and with UK guest Jim, and two med students from the UK (Charlie and Jo, both gals) whom we had befriended our first night in town, and two of their fellow med students from the U.S., plus our team of nine, we had quite a large “family” with whom to enjoy the wonderful dinner we’d all helped to cook. We gorged ourselves silly on mashed potatoes, gravy, super-moist-and-delicious turkey, fruit salad, chutney (because we couldn’t find cranberry sauce), cake (because Mom wasn’t there to make her famous apple pie), rolls (because I didn’t have Mom’s monkey bread recipe), and, of course, my own rendition of Mom’s delicious stuffing. Each team member had contributed to the preparation of a portion of our dinner, and, it was absolutely amazing. We truly enjoyed the fruits of our toils. (And at the end of the night, we all hit the town and partied like the rock stars that we are.)

I have to confess, this year, with the camaraderie of my teammates and our new friends, I experienced one of the most delicious, most joyful, most fulfilling Christmases I have ever spent away from home. What a Christmas!

Happy New Year to you all. Be safe.

Nancy
nancy@drivearoundtheworld.com

Logbook for December 25th, Day 55
Start: Quito, Ecuador
N: 00* 13.019'
W: 78* 30.004''
Finish: Quito, Ecuador
N: 00* 13.019'
W: 78* 30.004''
Mileage: 000
Notes: Day Seven without our vehicles. Merry Christmas! The team celebrated Christmas Day American style, with a Secret Santa gift exchange and a full Christmas dinner with turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and lots of friends. We were joined by our hostel owner from Switzerland, his assistants, and several British and American friends we met in the streets of Quito. This is an amazing Christmas away from home.(N.O.)

Help support our cause: The LONGITUDE Expedition is the longest journey ever attempted with a focus on Parkinson's Disease. The Drive Around the World team aims to raise money for Parkinson’s Disease research by driving four certified pre-owned Land Rover Discoverys around the globe following lines of longitude. Readers are encouraged to pledge small amounts of money per expedition-kilometer via a pledge form that can be found on our Parkinson’s page by clicking here. 100% of donations received go directly to Parkinson's research and all who donate $10 or more will be entered into a raffle to win an expedition-equipped Land Rover Discovery.