On Saturday, while everyone else was BBQing and preparing to light off fireworks, I was de-zombiefying and re-human-being-ifying in order to meet up with Marie, whom I hadn’t seen in eight years. She moved to Vancouver, BC about three years ago, we found each other on Facebook about two years ago, and though we planned on meeting a few times, something always came up–the last time she was in Seattle, I was busy escorting ph34rtimmybunny around PAX. The last time I planned to drive to Vancouver, my car broke down. This time, she said she was visiting Seattle for one day, and that she was moving to Switzerland in three weeks, so this was really our last opportunity to get together stateside, and I sure as hell was not going to miss it. Not for all the fireworks and barbeques in the world. The fact that I wasn’t invited to any is really beside the point.

We met at Twist in Belltown (you know, the place with the giant mirrored disco pig dangling from the ceiling!), and she introduced me to her wonderful husband Paul, and another friend of hers who was visiting from France. We talked about our lives, our jobs, travel, old friends, and some escapades we had in Taiwan, and how our time there has affected our lives going forward. Neither of us spoke a word of Chinese when we arrived, but I didn’t know that Marie *also* didn’t know a word of English (I suppose it was arrogant of me to assume that she would have!). I am incredibly impressed that she managed to make such great strides with two languages over the course of a year; now, she talks like a native speaker. Marie also got into trouble at school–the only classes she attended were art class, gym class, and ‘how to be a good housewife’ class, where they taught her how to apply makeup, clean the house, cook, oh yes, and how to fire a gun in case mainland China attacks. She got banned from the school swimming pool because she jumped in and her classmates didn’t know how to swim, so the school decided she was dangerous. She also figured out how to get to the roof of the library to do some topless suntanning and smoking.

We only got to spend a couple of hours together before they had to get back on the road, but I’m so very happy that we did. We hope to try to organize a 10 year reunion for all of the Debbie Kids in 2011, and between the two of us, we’re thinking a meeting in Europe would be best as it’s the closest for the majority, travel-wise. I hope we get it together; it was just chance that brought us all together the first time, but the connection we all made was something truly special.