黃石公園遊記 (2)

Summer Job and internship

Our rafting guide in the scenic tour is a woman, who currently studies for her PHD degree in Water right mediation. I was very intrigued and surprised. I talked to her during lunch and mentioned that I worked in a Water District in California and talked about the issues and problems with the State legislations on water issues. I mentioned to my older son afterwards that there would be some opportunities for him to consider when he is in college: he can work, make money, and travel to different beautiful places at the same time.  And we have seen many foreign exchange students working in the grocery stores, restaurants, and ice cream parlors. However, I got my biggest surprise when we stayed at the Jackson Lake Lodge in the Grand Teton Park.

There was a petite Asian girl, with a Japanese last name on her name tag which also indicates she was from Wisconsin, serving as a bus girl for our sets of tables when we had our dinner there. I assumed that she was one of the college students till my neighbor dinners asked her. No, she is entering high school as a freshman in the coming fall! My jaw dropped and I let out a surprised exclaim. My son stared at me and made me quiet down. I asked her eventually some specifics about her job and she told me that she could only work 8 hours a day and forty hours a week and had to stay with an adult since she is still a minor. I told her what she did was remarkable and I really admired her parents allowing her to travel so far to work. And she was going to go camping over the weekend with friends.

Camping

The first night we came to the Jackson Lake Lodge, my younger son met one of his friends from his school in San Jose. They are a Chinese family of four like us. The mother told me they drove 11 hours from San Jose to Salt Lake City and camped around. She told me that she was the main driver since she would be car sick if she did not drive. She also talked about how exciting and fun to camp which gave me the impression that camping was the only choice to enjoy the nature. She brought cooking pots and utensils and cooked during the trip so that they would not get bored with American food. They enjoyed two raining nights during the trip, sleeping with wet sleeping bags.  Another secret she shared with me was that she also had a son in college, which means she is the mother of three boys.  And she had already made the camping reserving in Yosemite for the next Spring. I was very impressed and admired her greatly for her high energy.

I related the information later to my hubby afterwards. He blurted out series of questions immediately:”where are you going to take showers?” “What do you do when you need to go pee at night?” “How can you sleep in a sleeping bag on the ground?””Are there lots of mosquitoes?”All of his questions seemed legitimate and we finally settled that camping is just not our cup of tea.

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