If you’re ever traveled through Guatemala, chances are that you visited Lake Atitlan and Panajachel. It’s one of the most beautiful places in the world, but often what’s so heartbreaking is seeing the children selling bracelets on the street, the adorable little kids who should be in school but instead are pressing you for a few coins.

What do you do?

If you’re new to traveling you might give them money. If you’ve been traveling a while you know better because hand-outs often make the situation much, much worse. Even volunteer programs and charities who have been in the area long term struggle to make a meaningful impact. Sometimes volunteering itself is more of an exercise in educating foreigners than actually providing aid.

Why is that?

The real development work that needs to happen in places like Panajachel has to come from three things:

A) Understanding their true needs

B) Giving them to tools to improve their life themselves, sustainably

C) A long term commitment to the area

I rarely get involved in charity work (I am trying to change that) in part because I’m not in the area long enough to understand what is needed, and while donating food or clothes can help, it’s often a band-aid solution. Sites like KIVA.ORG which do microloans are great but the administrative overhead and the repayment structure gives me pause — also what if they can’t even begin to fathom what kind of project to start if they have never seen another way and they are so consumed with just trying to run their farm? So when I saw this project, trying to raise $30,000 for an education center in Guatemala, I was BLOWN AWAY. It’s really rare and beautiful the way they have structured this and I felt strongly that I needed to share it.

The main staple in Guatemala: corn.

Here’s what’s amazing:

1. There’s a desperate unseen need for nutritional changes in Guatemala. There is poverty but people aren’t going hungry. The problem is they are only eating corn, and it’s making it so the children, even when NGOs come in and provide schools, can’t concentrate in class. Without education the cycle of poverty continues.

2. Raising corn crops is non-sustainable and very time consuming. So everyone has to work very hard just to make their farm work, and then as we can see, it’s barely enough to keep them alive. It diverts them from doing other life-improving tasks.

3. The two families involved in this project live in Panajachel. They have done this on a smaller scale with a local family and it worked. It changed their lives.

4. It’s sustainable so the project keeps on giving. They are teaching them how to farm with fish ponds, raising small animals like rabbits and pigs, putting nutrients back into the soil by composting and so on. But even more importantly, as one family is taught how to do this, those animals have new babies, which go to another family. The surplus food can be sold to raise funds for more education. The project doesn’t need endless money poured into it, it just needs the seed money to get it started.

I recently got to interview Rachel Denning about this project. You can go to the fundraising page here. (Go watch the video it’s really well done but also quickly outlines the project). They are already off to a great start, but it takes hundreds of individual contributions to pull off something so big. I hope you’ll feel inspired to give what you can.

The founders of The Homestead: Greg and Lucy Jensen & Rachel and Greg Denning

Here is my interview with one of the co-founders Rachel Denning:

This project was really launched because you worked with this one local, who you call the Presidente (I love it), and helped him shift from his failed crop to a more sustainable form of farming. How did that come about? Did you have any experience with this before you came to Guatemala?

We’ve had experience working with other humanitarian projects in other countries (DR, India), but not with farming/permaculture. What started it was that we began studying these topics on our own because we were considering purchasing land. We were learning about raising animals, vermicomposting, solar and alternative energy, composting toilets and permaculture and started to see how all these techniques could really help the local people. We were friends with the Presidente, and when he told us about failed tomato crop, we wanted to help. We approached him with the idea of setting up a mini farm, and he said it was something he’d been dreaming of for years but never saw how it would be possible.

Before then, we’d already installed a composting toilet at his house, and solar hot water, as well as a smoke reducing stove, to help improve their living conditions.

What I really love about this project is that you’re taking that concept — what do these people need right now to have better life — and going a step further, in making it self-sustaining and educational. When I was in Guatemala I was really struck by the poverty and at a loss at how to help. Maybe you can talk a little about why this kind of work is so much better than say, simply giving them temporary aid, like a supply of food.

Exactly! With is project, we helped him set it up, but now he’s totally on his own, running it and making plans for expansion and growth. There are a lot of NGOs and other organizations here (and around the world) that want to help… but in our experience, we’ve seen that the wrong kind of help can actually be detrimental. You can start to hurt the people when you give handouts or ‘bandaid’ solutions, because they start to become dependent on you, other agencies, the government… then when things get hard, instead of looking for solutions on their own, instead of trying to solve their own problems, they look around for someone to bail them out.

We want to create solutions to real problems, but in a way that will help the people help themselves. There is a time and place for handouts. There are people (especially children and elderly) who need to be taken care of. But those who can care for themselves need to be introduced to new ideas. In most of those situations — people who are capable of caring for themselves but remain in poverty or look for handouts — what they really lack is ideas, and maybe capital. Given those in the right combination, they can change their own world… for generations.

As travelers, we’re often confronted with that in the form of street kids and the fact that giving them money often does more harm than good. One thing I hadn’t thought of with your project is that even when you do get these kids into school they are so malnourished they can’t concentrate. So when you teach their parents how to farm properly, you’re actually giving their children a chance at a proper education — right? It’s actually the most direct route to helping the children.

Right. Many of the schools here mention that a lack of focus is their biggest problem (have you ever tried to concentrate on something when you’re hungry or underfed), so they’ve implemented feeding programs… which is still not solving the problem (since they’re feeding them only tortillas and tamales). Adding to the problem is that many parents keep their children home from school to work in the cornfields, or to help with chores. More good healthy food can be produced with a small family garden than with a field of corn.

Guatemalan people are notorious for being small/short. This isn’t genetic, it’s due to poor nutrition. I have video of a five year old girl playing and chasing my two year old son around. They are the same size (except that he’s chubbier.) The lack of proper nutrition is having a negative effect in nearly all areas of life.

Wow that’s heartbreaking. I’m so glad that you guys are doing this. Will you have room for volunteers?

We’re very passionate about it! Yes, we are planning to invite volunteers to come work on The Homestead and at the people’s homes. We’ll also be setting up satellite programs where we can teach classes and reach more people. We just need to build some volunteer housing first! (In dry season we’ll put up tents, but during the rainy season we’ll need a bunk house)

That’s fantastic! I think that what you’re doing should really become a model for how to do sustainable development work. I’ve learned so much just from reading your website on the project — I’m really impressed with the creativity and thoughtfulness. I think volunteers could learn a lot from working hands on with you guys.

So for those of us who want to do something, but aren’t in a position to do either volunteer or move to a developing country long term, what’s the best way to help you guys make this happen?

Thanks Christine! It’s certainly been a work in progress, as far as the model of helping goes — something we’ve been thinking about for years, ever since first becoming dissatisfied with the ‘handout’ system.

Right now, you can help by supporting our fundraising campaign. Right now, the learning center is just a dream. We’ve purchased land, and we have a few of our own animals, but we need a lot more to make this the educational hub we want it to be.

We plan on having garden boxes (to demonstrate small space gardening), rabbits, laying hens, meat chickens, fish ponds — all great sources of nutrition and income. We’ll also teach about vermicomposting (to improve soil quality), composting toilets (to prevent pollution of the land and the lake), and solar hot water (a nice little luxury — can you imagine never having taken a hot water shower or bath??)

We need the funds to implement all these programs here on The Homestead, and from there, the people can earn there own materials from the supply we build up here. It’s perpetual. Our hens will reproduce, and the locals who complete the ‘laying hen class’ can then take them home. It’s awesome!

I love it! Thank you so much for taking the time to talk to me about this amazing project! (By the way, the Two Gregs in the video are hilarious!) I have a feeling that you’ll definitely meet your goal, but I’m going to encourage everyone I know to give and share this project as widely as possible! I’m looking forward to following along as this develops!

Thanks Christine! My pleasure. Thanks for sharing this project with others. (I think the Gregs are funny too, especially the red-headed one.)

###

Here are some of the cool items you can get if you contribute, and at every level you can see what you’re helping to buy, whether that’s a fish for their tilapia pond or a queen bee for the bee hives:

Woven bracelet ($15 Donation)

Beaded Bracelet ($25 Donation)

Scarf ($50 Donation)

Shoulder Bag (Small) ($75 Donation)

Burlap Coffee Bag ($100 Donation)

Woven iPad Bag ($150 Donation)

Painting (Small) ($250 Donation)

Huipil (Blouse) Pillow Case ($500 Donation)

Painting (Large) ($1,000 Donation)

Leather Laptop Bag ($2000 Donation)

All photos copyright Rachel Denning except the main slider, courtesy of David Cifuentes.

If you’re just catching up, here’s the short story: I live overseas, I travel a lot and I just had my second baby. I struggled with post-partum depression this time around (although it has vastly improved with exercise and sunshine) but I still have this on-going issue with fitting in exercise while on the road (and with kids and everything else) plus my travel diet is usually pretty much out-of-control. I’m trying to figure out how to fix that, so as I’m trying out new things I’m writing about my results here, in case anyone else is going through the same thing. However this is not advice! Ask your nutritionist or doctor and don’t sue me, okay?

So the question is this: how do you eat healthy on the road when…

1. You don’t always have a kitchen.

2. You eat out a lot.

3. You want to try local dishes and eat like a local.

4. You don’t always know the calorie count of what you’re eating — or maybe even the name of it or what’s in it (Every tourist in Asia ever: “Excuse me, is this chicken? Please tell that’s chicken… oh god, it’s not is it?”).

So here was my plan: Eat SUPER healthy when I’m able to and that will more than compensate for the days when I don’t. So instead of worrying about calories when I’m out and about in a new city, or enjoying street food in wherever I happen to be, I just make up for it by eating very healthy when I’m able to control my diet more.

Call it The Better Than Nothing diet.

The closest thing I found to the “This is Super Healthy” for a diet is the DASH diet (which is similar to the Mayo Clinic Diet and the Mediterranean diet) and it’s good for your heart and if you’re worried about cancer, heart disease, strokes, diabetes or any of the major killers out there, then eating enough fruits and vegetables and maintaining a health weight are two things you can do to signifigantly reduce your risk (I read that you can lower cancer risk by 60% — when you think about it, that’s a pretty good incentive).

I won’t try to summarize the whole diet, but the great thing is that there are two full pdf guides for the diet (for free!) that you can download. The short guide (6 pages) or the long guide (64 pages). Or just read the US News Review.

Right now, we’re in Mexico but we’re renting a little house that has a full kitchen. So I decided to do the DASH diet for a full week. Here’s what it entails:

• Intake less than 2300 mg of sodium a day
• Eat lots of whole foods
• Lots of veggies and fruits
• Healthy fats

If you try to lower your sodium to their recommendation it’s impossible to eat badly. I was making all of my food, eating about 2000 calories a day (I’m breastfeeding so I can’t restrict my calories) and basically filling up on fruits and veggies all day, and I still came close to my sodium limits every single day.

How to track it: I put everything into a calorie tracking program, in this case, fitday.com (there are tons of calorie counting apps out there) and set a special goal to watch my sodium intake.

What you eat: Anything you want, just realize that whole unprocessed foods are the lowest in sodium. A typical day for me:

Breakfast: Zuccini omelet with home made salsa (no salt added) and a few ounces of fresh cheese like panela (or mozzarella) and corn tortillas

Lunch: A giant green smoothie (1 cup blueberries, 1 cup pineapple, 1 cup spinach, 1/2 cup yogurt, 1 orange)

Snack: A handful of almonds, an apple and some cheese

Dinner: Grilled chicken (1 cup), pinto beans (1 cup), home made salsa — pico de gallo (1 cup),  and corn tortillas

Snack: A smaller smoothie (1 cup blueberries, 1 cup spinach, 1 cup hibiscus tea, 1 tablespoon honey) and air popped popcorn (no salt)

Needless to say, it’s a ton of food and from tracking my nutrients I was getting 200% of my daily allowance on almost everything (the except was Vitamin A, Calcium, Vitamin E and Iron — although I started adding hibiscus tea which has a ton of iron — but even for those nutrients I was usually at 95% or more of my daily requirements). Note: Vitamin D I get from daily sunshine and I didn’t track water but it was about 10 glasses a day.

This is a snapshot from one day’s nutrients (click image for larger view). Despite not adding ANY salt and eating tons of fruits and veggies, I still went over my sodium intake by 200 mg — that’s because there’s a small amount of sodium in almost everything. It adds up quick. I have no idea how someone can do the hypertensive version of this, which is just 1500 mg a day without a significant calorie cut (but then again I am not a nutritionist either, maybe they have some magic recipes).

How did I feel: In general, pretty good. I was never hungry, but I did jump at my next meal and devour it. I am breastfeeding so I think the lack of fat was making me feel a little empty after eating. A smoothie just doesn’t fill you up in that totally satisfied way unless you have some almonds, avocado or a little cheese with it, something with fat to make you feel sated  I started to add in more fat towards the end of the week and then it was better.

Here’s the crazy thing: I felt like I was detoxing a little. Like the lower amount of wheat (almost none, really because I was eating corn tortillas, which is not a rule of the diet, just how it worked out) might have meant I was getting a little gluten detox, which basically feels like a cold. My nose was running like crazy. Also I just had a c-section so my body is still healing but this diet made my back pain flare up, like right along where the c-section scare runs but on my back. That might not have been related, but it was towards day 5, so I stopped after day 7 and went back to my normal diet and the side effects stopped.

In other words, for me, it was almost a little too much. I am sure I would adjust.

The big win was the smoothie, it gave me super energy! I think I slept better too.

My weight: I lost 9 lbs during the week, a large portion is likely due to the sharp salt restriction. (I am also 3 months post-baby so I have all kinds of crazy water retention and hormones going on, so this is probably not a typical result).

Equipment needed: I really used my blender a lot and I had to cook all my own meals.

Is it travel-friendly? I would say doing it to the letter probably wouldn’t be realistic unless you’re going to always cook for yourself and even then it’s really restrictive. I used a lot of spicy peppers to add flavor where salt would normally be, so for Mexican cuisine, this works great! You can modify most Mexican dishes to fit this diet. The main Mexican meal, La Comida, which is usually grilled meat plus beans, some kind of salsa, a vegetable and corn tortillas, is a perfect fit as long as you don’t add salt (and it’s cheap especially if you soak and cook your own beans). Having affordable produce makes a big difference too, I think we spend something like $40 for a week’s worth of fruits and veggies but if we were in the States I could see this costing $100+ a week just in produce.

What I took from it: I am a huge green smoothie fan now. I think it might be worthwhile, if you’re like me and trying to eat healthier, to pack your blender when you travel (I KNOW, that’s crazy) but I’m thinking about doing it. Or maybe just buying one in each new city if I’ll be there for more than a few weeks. It’s the only thing you really need, even if you don’t have a kitchen because every place in the world has fruits and veggies you can blend up. They are delicious to boot and really healthy. And so much better than eating a sad little salad with some low-fat dressing. I can’t even taste the spinach and as I got more used to it, I could use less fruit and more spinach. It’s also as powerful energy-wise as a cup of coffee (to me anyway and without the jittery caffeine feeling).

Conclusion: DASH is definitely healthy but labor intensive. The salt restriction will make eating out completely prohibited because salt tastes good — every restaurant puts salt in their food, even vegan places. I can’t see myself doing it everyday, but it’s a nice quarterly way to reset your taste buds. Even the smallest amount of sodium tasted like heaven after a week, and I didn’t feel the need to salt my food at all, the natural salt was more noticible to me.

Science is awesome. The full study is here.

Of course, one small caveat that the paper of record forgot to mention: you have to do it at like 100% V˙O_2max which means you’re basically at the highest level of exertion — imagine sprinting through floor exercises for 7 minutes straight — most people can’t do it. But the study authors suggest an alternative. Just do the routine 2-3 times for a total of 21 minutes and you’ll get the same benefit. Do it 3-4 times a week and that’s enough to keep you healthy. So that’s just 60-80 minutes total, every week, without any equipment, gym fees, fancy moves, DVDs or a personal trainer yelling at you and can get stay in shape. Sold.

And if you are already super fit and can do this whole routine at your max heart rate level, then you’re even luckier — just do it once, about 7 minutes total and you’re done.

I asked my husband Drew to illustrate the steps for this post and he even made a handy desktop wallpaper you can download. (I have it on my laptop desktop now, my goal is to do this 3 times a week this month).

For each step you just do 15-20 reps. Aim for less than 30 seconds of rest between exercises.

For the 21 minute workout: do all the exercises (for 15-20 reps each) in order 2-3 times until you hit your time.

For the 7 minute workout: you do each exercise one time (for 15-20 reps each) at 100% V˙O_2max (basically highest intensity) then you’re done.

JUMPING JACKS

WALL SIT

PUSH UPS

ABDOMINAL CRUNCHES

STEP UP ONTO A CHAIR

SQUAT

TRICEPS DIP ON A CHAIR

PLANK

HIGH KNEES RUNNING IN PLACE

LUNGE

PUSH UP & ROTATION

SIDE PLANK

Pinterest version: VERTICAL
Desktop wallpaper: 1440 x 900 DESKTOP

Oh no the baby’s awake!

To get wifi in our home, we had to install a landline. I’m not exactly sure how that works, but right now for the first time in five years we have a local phone number that’s not a cell phone or skype. We’re like official.

No one calls us on the landline. I use it to call people for interviews occasionally or to talk to people in the States, like my editor (not for this blog, obviously), but it pretty rarely has incoming calls. I think like 5 people in the whole world know our number.

Yet, every day, that phone rings. And rings. And freaking rings. We started getting one or two calls a day, now it’s up to like six. And there’s no voice mail, they just keep ringing until the person gets sick of torturing us.

Inevitably the phone rings just as Stella is getting settled down. Normally if I’m up, I’ll just answer it and hang up quickly. But often I have to wave frantically at Drew, while holding Stella, who is usually either nursing to sleep or recently fell asleep and I mime-scream the words: “ANSWER THE PHONE! QUICK QUICK” while waving my one free hand wildly in the air.

Then Stella opens her eyes and I sit very still and watch her with baited breath as she slowly drifts back to sleep and meanwhile Drew is on the phone with someone, who knows who, squirming uncomfortably through the conversation.

“Uh… puedes hablar ingles?”

“No, okay… uh, Hernandez? no hay una persona aqui se llama Hernandez…”

“Uh…”

And I’m in the background whisper-shouting at him: “DREW HANG UP THE PHONE, YOU CAN JUST HANG UP THE PHONE, IT’S OKAY…”

And Drew’s now deep into it, “Si somos de los estadios unidos, pero estamos viviendo aqui, en Mexico, uh como? uh….”

“No entiendo.”

“No se. Uh, Tenemos dos hijos.”

HANG UP THE PHONE DREW!

“Um, no one here is named Hernadez! Uh… We work online?”

(Still whisper-shouting) DREW OH MY GOD YOU ARE KILLING ME!

“Espera, que quieres…? I don’t know, my wife is a writer.”

JUST SAY GOOD BYE AND HANG UP THE PHONE WHY ARE YOU TELLING THEM WHO WE ARE?

“Ok. I have to … go.. ok.. bye.”

Drew hangs up. I’m shaking my head laughing. “What was that about?”

“I have NO idea.”

And we do this at least once a day.

It’s really hard to stay fit. At least for women. Or at least for women like me. Let’s dive into to some gross generalities here. Drew travels around India for three weeks and loses 15 pounds. I travel around India and gain 15 lbs mostly from the heavy curry dishes that I become addicted to, then I lose 15 lbs from dissentary, which I regain in Greece from the heavy foods I become addicted to.

Drew has basically stayed the same weight, maybe about twenty pounds lighter than when we started. I’ve slowly been gaining weight — at a clip of about 1 lb a month. I also had two kids, yes, but something about this lifestyle doesn’t agree with me.

Maybe it’s recipes like this.

In Thailand, the food is so delicious and so fresh, but there’s no such thing as a salad street vendor. They use oil and fat and fry everything, because most of them are much more active than me, a writer who’s either tied to her laptop writing, or editing photos, or tied to the bed with a nursing baby. In Beirut, they eat lots of veggies, of course, but also pate and cheese and breads and oh god the fresh baked goods. The number one ad I saw online when I was in Beirut was for weight loss. China? Forget it, I don’t really know when I’ve eaten more oil than our winter in Beijing last year.

Ooh street food!

I am hardly complaining. It was all delicious which is part of the problem really. How to you manage your weight on the road if you’re not blessed with a teenager’s metabolism and you’re traveling and this literally might be the only time in your life that you get to eat this thing, this horrifyingly decadent thing, whatever it happens to be?

This is the year I figure this out. How do you eat healthy and reasonably (read: let’s aim for JUST 2000 cal a day, shall we?) and maintain some kind of fitness program? How do you go jogging everyday when there’s no where safe to run? How do you eat healthy when you don’t have a kitchen? How do you count calories when you can’t even read the labels?

Last week, I was talking a bit about having the baby blues, with my now almost three month old, and I have been changing my diet and trying to get some activity in (I’m still healing from my c-section, so there’s some rebuilding there) but one thing I’ve noticed is that maybe I’m not even eating enough. I felt sleepy and sluggish then I drank a big mango / strawberry / oatmeal smoothie and I felt great. Renewed! Fortified!

Could half the problem just be the bad habits of travel? Not eating regular meals, skipping breakfast, not getting enough fruits and veggies and when I do eat, too many heavy dishes?

OMG tacos!

I know I can’t be the only one. My facebook, twitter and instagram feeds are filled with pictures of what other travelers are eating. Yeah it looks really good, but real human beings can’t eat like that every day, can they? And who is doing cardio in their hotel room or running through the rice paddies in Bali? I want to know.

Stay tuned, I want to talk about this more. But first, I want to hear from you… how do you stay fit on the road? Or do you? Have I just lost all cool points for even admitting this? I am seriously not 21 anymore, on so many levels.

It’s extremely rare that I recommend a book on this blog, but today I feel compelled to share with you Torre DeRoche’s Love with a Chance of Drowning, which I think is one of those timeless travel narratives that if you don’t end up reading it now, you’ll end up reading it eventually. It’s basically required reading for anyone who has ever taken a leap of faith.

It just came out today.

Several other books also came out today, thanks to my habit of pre-ordering books months and months in advance, Dan Brown’s Inferno (in Spanish! um, yay) and The Prophets of Smoked Meat: A Journey Through Texas Barbecue (which I have zero memory of ordering but apparently I ordered while eight months pregnant and dreaming of BBQ — for a second though I thought my Kindle account had been hacked).

Anyway, the point is, those books are probably really good. Torre’s book, I can almost guarantee is much better. Unless you really love BBQ and you’re growing a tiny person in your belly.

The premise is simple: Torre is an Australian graphic designer living abroad in San Francisco for a year. She’s promised her family two things: no men and she’d return after a year. Of course she proceeds to meet a guy in a bar, fall in love and when he announces, “oh by the way I’m about to sail around the world, do you want to come with me?” She doesn’t let something like a fear of water and some of the worse sea sickness I’ve ever heard of, get in her way.

Her book trailer gives me the chills:

I asked Torre for an interview, and then I made it all about me and basically picked her brain on how to best approach my book. Wee! Oh and then I asked her the most burning question: is my sailboat with kids idea crazy?

Torre! Thank you for talking with me tonight, where are you right now?

I’m in Melbourne, Australia in a very glamorous location: my parents’ house.

It must be nice to be with family right now, with everything that’s happening, your book just launched last month in Australia and it’s launching today in the US.

Your dad is a screenwriter, what does he think about all of this?

Yes, it’s nice. I’ve been away from home for a while, living in Thailand, so having some family time (as well as my mother’s cooking) is precisely what I need right now.

My dad’s hilarious. He’s very quiet and low-key in person—indifferent, almost—but he shares every small success of mine on his Facebook page. Thanks to social media, I know he’s absolutely thrilled.

He is a writer, so it makes sense that he portrays his joy in writing.

So you have writing in your family but you weren’t always a writer.

Do you think this experience of sailing around the world made you want to tell this story so badly that you had to write it, or was writing something you did before this?

I suppose I was always a writer, but I didn’t really know it. When I was little, I would write obscure stories on the blank sides of dad’s script drafts. My side would be covered in children’s chicken scrawl and crayon illustrations, and his side would be dialogue involving gory horror scenes.

The passion has always been there, and I considered pursuing writing when I was selecting my university courses, but I chose design and visual arts instead.

Flash forward several years: Sailing was a lonely experience, and I longed to feel connected to people. Writing became my tool for communicating, and I kept a small blog to connect with family and friends. Through that, I discovered how much I adore writing. It’s a lot like painting or designing, but with words instead of shapes. You can say a lot more.

Well one thing I can say about you based on reading your book and other things that you’ve written is that you have this highly focused eye for story. How do you do that?

Thank you. You know, I’ve never really made a conscious effort to focus on storytelling. I don’t really think about it, I feel it. I can only guess that this comes from watching 48-hour movie-fests every weekend throughout my childhood. While other children studied maths and science, I watched A Nightmare on Elm Street for the 155th time.

When I start writing something—a book, a blog post, whatever—I have no idea where it’s going. The story kind of unfolds as I go. If I get to the end and find that there’s no cohesion or no purpose to the piece, I go back through it and weave in story or an objective. I ask myself, “What are you trying to say here?” It has to be about a bigger purpose, a universal dilemma—something that everyone else can relate to. Sometimes a story gets unravelled back to front.

But that’s a lot of words to explain something that’s really quite simple: The end needs to somehow satisfy whatever dilemma is created in the beginning. The middle is all the stuff that leads up to the catharsis in the end.

I feel like I write that way on my blog, feeling my way through, but I think it’s really difficult to keep that flow through an entire book.

Speaking of which, you have a blog… having gone through the book publishing process and writing online, do you have a preference for one format?

Do you think certain stories can only be told in a novel? Will we be someday tweeting our memoirs out? (Okay that was a joke.) But seriously do you think it’s more books for you or more blogging or a bit of both?

Book-length is a lot more fun for me. It’s a slow, deliberate process, and nobody gets to see it until it’s done. That means there’s a lot of time to develop rich themes and flowing story.

It is extremely hard to keep the story’s momentum throughout a whole book, but it’s not done in a linear format—it’s woven in over time. Halfway through, you may discover a new thread or theme to exploit, and you can go back to the start and weave it through to the end. You have to read it again and again and pay close attention to the flow.

On the other hand, blogs are quick and dirty. They’re designed to be consumed in a beat, and there’s not a lot of point in obsessing over rich themes or craft. Blogging is a much more neurotic, self-absorbed process too (“Will anyone ‘Like’ this post? Why isn’t anyone commenting?! OH MY GOD I MUST SUCK!”). I find that a little bit soul-destroying.

And yes, certain stories can only be told in 300+ pages. Even at that length, you have to cut every superfluous word to make it all fit in.

Yes, exactly, it puts the writer in constant jeopardy, at least with a book you get some reprieve between deadlines. Which reminds me, I have a writing deadline coming up, then I’m free to do an entirely new and different thing. Do you think I should get a sailboat?

I think a sailboat will be ideal for your family. (Christine’s note: Ha! Yes! Telling this to my in-laws) It’s such a beautiful, symbiotic existence. You’re free to go anywhere at all, and you don’t have to pack bags anymore. Your home is always with you. As long as nobody gets horribly seasick (like I did!) it will be perfect.

Do you still get seasick?

Very! It’s so frustrating. I even get sick on huge catamaran ferries traveling across flat seas. Often I’m the only one on the boat who is ashen. It’s a curse! If anyone has any magical solutions, please tell me (and no, ginger is not the answer).

And yet you still keep getting on boats!

I’ve only been on a sailboat one time since the Pacific adventure. With friends, we sailed to Catalina off Los Angeles, and I was struggling to keep my lunch down the entire time. Everyone else was drinking beer and champagne. Bastards.

So what’s next for you? I read about your adventures motorbiking around Thailand, do you plan to keep traveling?

Absolutely! But with Ivan, it’s always challenging negotiating adventure plans because we have wildly different comfort zones. He wants to fly planes in Alaska during winter. I want to… um… live.

Oh! Drew and Ivan need to get together, because Drew’s dying to do something terribly stupid in freezing cold temperatures (last idea: traverse Siberia in winter). Is this a guy thing?

Must be. And yes, let’s send the men off together, and I’ll meet you in Mexico. We can play with the kids in the sun and create things, and the men can go off and grow giant, rugged beards, kill things, and do all of those other activities that only make sense if you’re flooded with testosterone.

Well, Torre, thank you so much for taking the time to talk to me during what must be a whirlwind week for you. I hope it’s okay but I’ve totally been bragging that I read your book in 2011 and KNEW it was awesome, before your agent or editor found you! I guess what I’m saying is if you get Oprah rich, you’re buying me a sailboat, right?

Oh yeah. Sailboats for everybody, baby! Thanks so much for the interview, Christine. It’s always fun talking with you.

Love with a Chance of Drowning, $14.99 released: May 14, 2013, Hyperion

Images, book cover and book trailer all copyright Torre DeRoche. Amazon links are affiliate links.

Okay to break the ice, here’s Stella. I figured out today that I can post iPhone videos directly to Youtube, which is, as you can guess, not necessarily a good thing. “Look my daughter is ah-mazing! She’s, um, sitting there, but very cutely!”

This video however is my husband making Stella laugh at his very terrible (and probably incredibly offensive) British accent (and for that we’re sorry):

For what it’s worth I do feel a little better, although I know I have to keep at it. I ate so well yesterday, it was awesome. I drank 10 glasses of water. I played in the sun with my son and let him drench me with the hose (and I surprised him by jumping in the kiddie pool fully-clothed, which delighted him to no end). So life is good, even though I’ve been sort of overwhelmed with two babies.

Since this is not a real post, here’s some links for your weekend reading pleasure (these are all really good):

What a week’s worth of groceries looks like around the world

10 TED talks from inspiring teachers

22 Unbelievable Places that are Hard to Believe Really Exist

The Most Beautiful Cherry Blossoms Around the World

31 Days of Creativity with Food by Hong Yi

Have American Parents Got It All Backwards?

Okay let’s just say it: I’m a little depressed.

I realized it this week because I had a call with my editor and agent and thought, “oh god, I suck”. That’s called negative self-talk and it’s insane. Here are two people who are heavily invested in me, and yet I’m self-shaming and worrying about everything that comes out of my mouth. Why? Because depression is sneaky. It seems like it should be about laying around in bed and not taking showers, but sometimes it’s about just hating on yourself for no reason.

Another clue? I have been fantasizing about staying at a hotel. Alone. Big bed, crisp white sheets, and perfect silence. Okay I admit this may just be a new-to-being-a-mom-of-two-kids thing. I’m also really tired. And sad. And unhappy. But just a little. It’s weird. I used to live like this — I spent a decade under the mildly-depressed cloud (I called it overworked at the time) but now I can’t get away with that. I have two kids. I was sitting on the bed with them and Drew and I was just DONE. I said to Drew, “Everyone wants my attention and they want me to be happy all the time!”

Drew, wisely, just nodded. But that’s the thing. When you’re a mom, you’re the center of the family. If you’re unhappy, even a little, it unbalances everything. Your kids look to you for guidance on how to feel — and it’s not okay to self-medicate with alcohol or food like I would in my twenties — I have to own it, and fix it.

A lot of stuff is going on with my body that could be contributing. I had a baby two months ago! I also lost 20 pounds in the first weeks after Stella was born. I also gained 20 pounds the month after that, wee, look at me, amazing, I know, tip your waitress, I’m here all week. I’m breastfeeding. I am recovering from major surgery (aka c-section). Yet, still, the creeping little feeling around the edges, like I’m over-touched, like I want to hide, like I’m not happy with myself — it’s telling me something.

So I have to get back on the program. It’s been a long time, but it works. Here’s what it includes:

1. Admitting that no, not everyone hates you, and yes, the reason you have to admit that is because you’re suffering from mild depression.

2. Be out. Depression is sneaky but talking about it blows away the demons faster than anything.

3. Drink water. 8 glasses a day, plus more if you’re breastfeeding like me.

4. Eat well. I’m not going on a diet, but I did go to the store any fill up my cart with tons of fruits and veggies. I tried to pick a variety and stuff I thought I’d really eat.

I got: watermelon, pineapple, strawberries, blueberries, red and orange bell peppers, green habaneros, zucchinis, apples, bananas, romain lettuce, white onions, sweet red onions, limes, plums, mangos, cantaloupe, green onions, tomatoes, jicama and so on…

Then Cole jumped up on the counter and dug out the strawberries.

Because, yum, strawberries!

5. Do a fun exercise routine. I’m going to start doing P90X with Cole because when Drew did it, Cole loved doing the workout with him. I figure it’s good for both of us.

6. Get sunshine. You know I haven’t been leaving the house as much lately (another sign) so I’m redoubling my efforts to get out everyday and go to the beach, since it’s RIGHT THERE.

7. Dance. You can not be sad while dancing.

8. Listen to upbeat music. Please send me recommendations, my iTunes looks like a Goa Beach Party at this point, I need some variety to my upbeat music!

9. Cut down on sugar, fat and carbs. I don’t have proof but I think those things give you a short term lift with a long term crash.

10. Do something for myself everyday. Right now that means a little teeny tiny break from the kids and work and everything else. Maybe I’ll just watch Rick Bayless on PBS talking about Mexico & Food. (Two of my favorite things).

11. Ask for help. For me that meant asking Drew to speak in Spanish with me everyday, because it was weighing on me that we hadn’t made as much progress in Spanish since moving here — understandable with everything that’s going on, but it would be amazing to take that guilt away. So starting this week we’re switching to a 100% Spanish-speaking family, something that really lifts a weight off my shoulders.

12. Spend uncluttered time with your kids. Because they make me smile. And it’s only the distractions that get in the way.

13. Write. I bought myself a new notebook and three new pens.

14. Read Vogue: Mexico. Okay this isn’t an official thing, but I did wonder if the cute wedge sandals I was seeing everyone wearing were on-trend.

Turns out they are.

15. Working on this, but: get husband to buy you new strappy wedge sandals by writing about it in a blog post.

Stella is at this stage where she’s making lots of faces. And we coo at her. And dance around with her. And sometimes she looks into my eyes and smiles. And it PHYSICALLY HURTS. I love her that much. But also life looks like this too (click to view):

Which may be why our recent house guest said he was pretty sure he wasn’t going to have kids. Now. Because he’s seen too much. (To which we laugh, this mirthless, knowing laugh, that only parents get to make).

I don’t write a lot about our day-to-day parenting experience so I’m really thrilled to announce that my husband Drew is picking up the slack in that regard. He’s finally brushing off the cobwebs on his much neglected blog drewgilbert.com and re-emerging from the ashes (I think I mixed metaphors there) as a daddy blog. Well sort of. He’s also an illustrator so his art, photography and videos can be found there too. And he has a penchant for moustaches. And extreme sports. But other than that… babies! Babies and Hulk Smash!

Today he drew this:

Obviously there’s a context to this, but I’ll just let you go to his latest post to find out what. Great work Drew, welcome to blogging!

It’s a fact that bribery happens all over the world. In Mexico, it’s no different, and for tourists it’s most often seen in the form of an officer from the Transito pulling you over for some minor offense. Then making you a fantastic offer: they will not give you a ticket if you just pay right now.

We’re terrible at all things haggling, bribing, black market and law-breaking. We suck at rushing the queue and cutting people, even if that means standing there, like an idiot, while everyone around you muscles their way past. In the heat. With a crying toddler. Yet, we still do our patriotic duty, as Americans and stand in the stupid line — common sense be damned.

Of course, that’s one of the biggest complaints I hear about Mexico is the corruption of the police. So I share this story with a little hesitation because I don’t want to feed into that, because this kind of thing is pretty common around the world. It’s pretty harmless. Like that one time we crossed into Cambodia via Thailand, and the Thais had set up a fake Cambodian border office and convinced all the tuk-tuk drivers to take all the tourists to them, instead of the real border, where they did process your visa, but at a huge mark-up.

That was awesome.

If you can’t laugh at that and love Thailand anyway, then I don’t know what to say.

They wrote a sign on cardboard that said, The Cambodian Border.

You can’t make this stuff up.

Anyway here’s the thing: we normally suck at this stuff. Drew and I both have this rage problem when it comes to being ripped off. While we laugh about it later, in the moment, if that “oh this is some bullsh*t” switch gets hit, then we’re out. It’s really bad.

Drew has been pulled over four times in Mexico so far. The main highway between Bucerias and Puerto Vallarta is full of traffic cops and they love pulling people over. The first two times were because Drew took a left from the main highway, instead of going on the “lateral” that runs along the highway. For both of those the cops just gave Drew a warning.

See, Mexico isn’t so corrupt!

Okay so the third time was for his brake light being out. Which Drew didn’t believe but offered the guy 120 pesos (about $10) and he let him go.

Look at us, bribing our way out of traffic tickets!

Then a few nights ago, we go pulled over again. Brake lights!

Drew’s pretty much pissed now. He’s not going to give them money for fake brake light issues. Damn corrupt Mexican cops!

So he gets out of the car to talk to them. They say, “Oh well, we could give you 1/2 off the ticket if you pay now.”

“How much is that?”

“It’s normally 600 pesos but we’ll give it to you for 300 pesos [about $25]”

By now Drew is over it. He’s at that stage we refer to as “F*CK IT”.

“Yeah, I’m not going to pay that.”

“Well we will have to write you a ticket.”

“Okay, write me a ticket.”

They stall. You see, there’s absolutely no money in writing tickets. The pay is crap. They may have misjudged Drew.

Drew talks to them some more then hops back into the car.

“So what happened?”

He’s got a ticket. They’ve got his license. They KEPT his driver’s license!

Drew says, “I was like, no I’m not going to pay 300 and you know what, not only are you going to get zero money from me, now I’m going to make you do paperwork. So go ahead, fill out that ticket for me, I want to watch. you. write.”

“You did not say that.”

“No, but that would have been awesome.”

The next day we went to pay the ticket and retrieve the driver’s license.

It took less than 3 minutes. It cost 103 pesos.

“HAHAHA! Vindicated!” Drew says when he comes back into the car.

Later he realized his brake light was in fact out and he got a new fuse. We’re idiots. Sorry mildly corrupt Mexican transit cops. We’re kind of jerks. Also 300 was way too much, you should have gone lower.