I'm so tired of the standard conference affair. The requisite drinks, dinner, gossip about the field, followed by a roll in the sack, and he, whoever he is, either spends the night and sneaks out in the morning, or sneaks out sometime in the night. Sometimes it's guys I've slept with before, sometimes they're new. But it's all so earnest and boring, not at all thrilling like it was when it all began years ago.

At this year's annual geography conference, I decided to challenge myself to do something different to spice things up. I would try to have sex, of some kind, by hook or crook, hand, mouth, pussy, or maybe even anal, with someone from each continent on the planet. With the exception of Antarctica, I allowed myself, unless I got really lucky and found someone who came from there, too.

-Australia-

Is Australia a continent? Or an island? Or a continental island? Ah, debates in geography.

Luckily, I found a way to check that one off quickly, so I didn't have to worry about justifying to myself that it is an island and not a continent if I couldn't score with an Aussie. It turned out the guy I sat next to on the bus from the airport to the conference hotel came from Sydney.

"Well, g'day!" I said. "Today's your lucky day."

"What do you mean?" he asked.

He was cute, in that Aussie outback kind of way, so I told him straight away about my conference challenge. His eyes got big and then bigger as I put my hand on his thigh. It was late on a rainy night and the bus was dark. We were sitting toward the back. The couple across from us were slumped on each other's shoulders sound asleep.

I moved my hand up his thigh. He was already getting a woody. I could feel it hardening in his khakis. I rubbed the length of it. Not bad. Then squeezed the tip. I leaned over and gave him a kiss, and slipped my tongue between his lips. I unbuckled his belt and zipped down his pants. His tighty whities shone in the passing street lights. No surprise there. I reached in and pulled out his hard-on.

It was a nice one, especially when it quickly reached full length at about six-and-a-half inches, I'm guessing, circumcised, and standing straight up from a thick thatch of pubic hair covering a tight sack of warm balls. He moaned softly into my mouth when I squeezed them.

I got my hand good and slick with saliva and started stroking him nice and slow and deliberately, paying particular attention on each stroke to circling and squeezing the helmet at the tip. It really felt like a helmet, too, smooth, slippery slick with precum and saliva, with definite hard edges, just a wee bit wider than the shaft of his cock, standing at attention like a soldier on a wet night.

I swirled my hand around the tip and rubbed the underside with my thumb. And then quickly ran my fist up and down his shaft fast and hard while sticking my tongue deep into his mouth. He groaned and got suddenly harder and bigger. He wasn't going to last long. I went faster back and forth right at the tip, and then down the shaft, then back up around the tip.

The edges of the helmet got even harder and he arched his hips up from the seat. I could feel it coming up from his nut sack, up the shaft, so I leaned over and took his cock in my mouth and suctioned the head, as I stroked the shaft, and squeezed his balls, and he blew a sweet and salty load. Three big shots, one after another, filled my mouth. I swallowed all but the last, which I swirled around my tongue, savoring the taste as I vacuumed his dick clean.

I sat up and shared a sloppy kiss with him. I wondered if he had ever tasted himself before. He leaned back with his head tilted to the roof of the bus.

"G'day, indeed," he laughed.

He put away his cock and zipped his pants just as the bus arrived at the hotel and the driver turned the lights on and the couple across from us shook themselves from sleep.

-Europe-

My next conquest was Europe. It was easy, at first.

After checking in to my room, I went down to the bar for a nightcap. A Frenchman was sitting alone at the bar. I sat next to him and ordered a bourbon on the rocks.

"Good evening," he said with a French accent. "Are you a geographer? Here for the conference?"

"Bon soir," I said. "Yes, and you?"

"No, I am here on business," he said. "But everyone else seems to be a geographer."

"A lovely profession," he said. "I am cartographic curator myself. I'm here to complete the acquisition of a major collection of historic maps for a Paris museum. Would you like to see some of them?"

This is going to be too easy, I thought to myself.

"I'd love to," I said. "I'm a historical geographer myself."

"I have the high resolution images on my computer in my room. Shall I go get it? Or would you like to come up to see them?"

"I'm happy to come up to your room to see them if that's easy," I said.

"Wonderful," he said, finishing his glass of red wine. I drained my bourbon.

"Let me get that," he said, leaving a $20 bill on the bar.

In the elevator up to his room, Pierre introduced himself formally, kissing my hand, and then informally undressed me with his eyes, while we traded impressions of some of our favorite museums in Paris.

Inside his room, he opened a folder on his laptop filled with images of historic maps of California, drawn as an island off the coast of North America.

"What do you think?" he asked.

"Beautiful," I said. "I love these maps. They tell such a story."

He picked up the phone and ordered a bottle of red wine and a bottle of bourbon and some ice from room service.

As I was leaning over the laptop on the desk, flipping through the maps, and examining them in high resolution detail, he came up behind me and put his hand on my lower back.

"You're beautiful, too," he said.

I turned around and put my arms around his neck and kissed him as he pulled my waist to him. We turned together, as if slow dancing, and he laid me down on my back on the edge of the bed. He ran his hands up my stockings and under my skirt, pushing the skirt to my hips. He pushed his face into my crotch, took a deep sniff, and hummed, "Mmmmmm," as he planted a kiss on my panties, right on my clitoris.

Ahhh, the French.

He pulled my panties down over my legs and dove in. He was good, too. And after giving the Aussie a handjob, I needed this. He kissed precisely all along my labia, so it felt like every part of my pussy was getting attention. Then he flicked his tongue across my clit, circled it, sucked, and nibbled on it. Then lapped all up and down my pussy. I felt an orgasm coming from down under as he stuck his tongue out and inserted it into my pussy several times.

"Ah, oui!" I cried, as I came close to the edge.

He pushed my thighs up and apart. And his tongue slid quickly back and forth across my perineum between my pussy and butthole. He really knew how to drive me crazy. I love that almost as much as anything else. He could do that all night, as far as I was concerned. Then he stuck his tongue in my butthole. I nearly exploded with the surprise.

There was a knock on the door.

"Pardonnez, moi," he said. "I'll be right back."

I laid back with my pussy a l'aire libre.

"Oui, ici c'est bien," I heard Pierre say.

"Sur la table?" I heard another man say.

I opened my eyes to see a tall black man staring between my legs as he lowered a tray with two bottles and glasses to the table beside the bed.

"De ou est vouz?" Pierre asked.

"Senegal," the waiter answered.

"Tres bien!" Pierre exclaimed, rubbing his hands together and winking at me. "It seems you have won —how do you say — the daily double, my dear."

I raised myself on my elbows as they both stared at my pussy. I saw hard-ons in both of their pants. One was definitely more impressive than the other. I reached out to touch it.

-Africa-

The waiter didn't flinch. He took a step toward me. I traced the shape down his thigh. I could feel the veins through the thin fabric of his black pants. It bulged at the end, but I couldn't feel a distinct ridge. He was uncircumcised. I licked my lips and unbuckled his pants. They fell to his ankles. The end of his penis hung out of the bottom of his boxer shorts. I watched it slowly grow for a moment. I pulled his shorts down and took it in my hands.

"Ummm," I groaned. It was impressive, even just turgid. It felt way more substantial than any cock I'd ever held before. And it wasn't even fully hard yet. I couldn't get one hand all the way around it. I felt slightly guilty for indulging in a stereotype, but I didn't let it stop me.

I pushed back the foreskin, and put the torpedo tip between my lips. It wasn't any bigger around than the shaft, which didn't grow much longer as it hardened actually. Still it filled my mouth as he kneeled on the bed beside me and I took his cock as far into my mouth as I could.

Meanwhile, Pierre was back on his knees between my legs.

Two more continents down, I thought. This might be easier than I expected.

The waiter was now fucking my mouth as his cock seemed to have achieved maximum hardness. I had to hold on to his balls with one hand so that he didn't choke me. With the other I held his foreskin as the shaft of his cock slid back and forth inside it, and his head slipped in and out between my lips and banged on the back of my throat. A massive amount of precum flowed from his cock and dribbled out of the sides of my mouth and down my cheeks.

Pierre had his fingers in my pussy, curled around to rub my g-spot while he tongued my clitoris. Then he switched his attention to my butthole again. I felt a finger go in. I was wet everywhere it seemed. My mouth, my pussy, my ass. A cock sliding in and out of one, fingers sliding in and out of the others. I was delirious. I had always wondered what it would feel like to be fucked from both ends at the same time.

Pierre must have read my mind. He pushed my thighs up as he stood up and slid his cock into my cunt. It's hard to describe the feeling of being filled up like that. Pierre wasn't huge, but he knew what to do with the instrument at hand and with his hands. While his cock filled me up, he played with my clitoris. And as the tip of the waiter's cock grew suddenly harder and bigger, I came with a shudder, and then came again, and again. I felt like I was coming in my mouth and my cunt at the same time.

I held on tight to the waiter's cock as he pushed it into the back of my throat and Pierre slammed into me again. The cock in my mouth suddenly went still and then throbbed three times as three huge gushes of thick viscous warm cum filled my throat and mouth and spilled out all around the waiter's cock. I nearly drowned until he pulled his cock out and I gasped for air.

Pierre pulled his cock out of my pussy then and held it tight as he aimed it at me and sprayed my dress, my blouse, and my face with a thinner gruel that just kept coming as he rubbed the head of his hard-on and groaned.

The waiter pulled himself together quickly, wiping himself with the cloth napkin from his serving tray and putting it in his pocket. Stuffing his cock back into his pants, he bowed, and said, "Merci, madame."

Then he turned and left.

Pierre knelt down and kissed my pussy all over saying, "Merci, indeed. Tres jolie."

-Asia-

The next morning, I woke up thinking that Asia was not going to be easy. Not as easy as North America and South America. And Antarctica was going to depend on luck. So maybe I should concentration on Asia, I decided.

I was busy with panels the whole day. But I made a point of sidling up to Chinese, Japanese, Indonesian, Singaporean, Korean, and any other Asian conferees I could spot all day long, male and female, between panels. I knew seducing a woman was a longshot. But seducing an Asian guy was turning out to be harder than I thought. They all seemed to be intimidated by a tall, mature woman, who was a full professor at an American university. It was clear they were all more interested in how they could get invitations to my university, than into my pants.

By evening, I was a little discouraged, until the Indian guy in line in front of me for the buffet turned and started chatting me up. He was shorter than me. His head would fit nicely between my tits, I thought, as I leaned over to give him a good view down into my cleavage and introduced myself.

"Raj," he said. "From Rajasthan."

He laughed. I loved his lilting voice and laughter.

I followed him to a table and we sat and chatted as we picked at the food from the international buffet. Both of us, it seems, favored spicy.

He was a physical geographer, he told me. He studied orogeny, mountain building.

"It sounds sexy," I said.

"Yes," he laughed. "I like to think there is a Kama Sutra of geography, some basic forces that play out in different forms. Do you know the Kama Sutra?"

"Not well enough," I said. "Can you teach me?"

He looked at me with a shy smile.

"I just happen to have a copy in my room," he said. "I carry it everywhere, like a good boy scout, no? Always be prepared. Would you like to see it?"

"I would," I said, nodding seductively.

As we rode the elevator up to his room, he kept chattering nervously about the mountains of Indian, Nepal, and Tibet, the Kama Sutra, and other sacred texts and songs. I didn't really absorb a word he was saying. I just listened to him sing like a bird in a cage.

"Here it is," he said, as he fished the book out from his suitcase on the luggage rack beside his bed.

I sat down and opened the book up to a random page, showing a man in robes draped over a kneeling woman, with his big cock penetrating her slit. They were covered in beautiful robes, except for their exposed genitals.

"Can you teach me this one?" I asked.

I started unbuttoning my blouse.

"Ahh, the 'The Elephant,'" he said. "It's based on the child's pose. That's easy enough to start with. And maybe we can try some others, too. I'll be right back."

He went into the bathroom and in a few minutes emerged in a white bathrobe. He handed me another. "So we don't get cold," he said. "And in all of the old Kama Sutra art, they are wearing robes. It enhances the eroticism, to see, and not see."

His robe was not tied, and I could see his smooth, lean brown torso through the opening, along with a glimpse of a spare thatch of black hair and his uncut penis. I climbed on to the bed, laid the open Kama Sutra down, and assumed the child's position, kneeling, my torso bent over resting on my thighs, head on the bed, ass raised, hands and arms free by my sides. He lifted the back of the robe over my ass, and began lightly rubbing his cock against my distended labia. It felt like light kisses. Or like pussylips on pussylips, as he used the soft foreskin at the tip of his cock to tickle my cunt.

I felt his soft cock slowly growing harder as he played it up and down my lips, taking his sweet time, as if this were a meditation. I breathed deeply in and out and let myself surrender to his tempo. My whole backside felt like it was opening to him with each breath.

I was getting wetter now and could feel the hard tip of his cock poking through his foreskin as he rubbed it between my lips. Please put it in now, I thought. But he rubbed it back and forth along my slit from back to front, pausing to circle my clitoris with the head of his cock, which was now fully exposed as I felt the ridge rub back across my lips and my clit.

Then he pressed the head of his cock against the opening of my cunt, and it slipped in easily. He put just the head in and took it out, and then put it back in, slowly each time, going a little deeper. It was agonizing. He was not big. He didn't fill me up, like some men, but he seemed to know precisely what he was doing. As he went in deeper, he angled his pelvis so that the head of his hard cock slid slowly across my g-spot and I groaned. He stopped there for a moment, and then slowly went back and forth across that spot. I fell into a reverie as a fire was slowly, steadily stoked in my core.

I put my hand back and felt his cock sliding back and forth into my cunt. I caressed his balls and fingered my clitoris.

"We should try another position now," he said quietly, as he withdrew his cock ever so slowly. I shook myself from the dream I was in and looked back. His cock was quite beautiful, wet and shiny, curving elegantly from between the sides of his robe. It wasn't thick, but it was long after all. I wanted to take it my mouth.

He sat back on his haunches and his cock stood up proudly. He looked like a statue. A Hindu god. I turned and crawled toward it. I wanted that cock.

He leaned over to pick up the Kama Sutra.

"This position is good for the woman," he said. "And not bad for the man, either."

As I looked at it, he put his legs straight out in front of him in "The Lotus" position. I crawled up on to his lap and guided his cock into me as I settled down on him with my legs straight out in front of me, too. He raised my legs up around his neck. We rocked back and forth gently as he fondled my tits softly and took one and then the other into his mouth. I reached behind my ass to cup his balls.

I can't remember ever experiencing any lovemaking like that before. It was an oceanic feeling. The gentle waves went on and on.

How many positions are there? I wondered. And how many would we try? As much as I could do this forever, I was getting a little impatient. I brought my hand down to my clitoris and starting fingering it as we rocked back and forth.

Raj sensed my meditative state had been broken. He laid me back on the bed and pulled my ass to the edge of the bed. He held my legs straight up in the air and crossed my ankles. He held my ankles there with one hand. And then he plunged his cock into my tightened slit all of a sudden.

Whoa! That woke me up.

He hadn't even bothered to tell me the name of this position.

My pussy felt tighter than ever. And his cock, which had felt pleasant but not big before, suddenly felt big and hot and hard. The head seemed to grow bigger with each plunge he took into me. With this free hand he found my clitoris and began rubbing it vigorously.

I closed my eyes. My whole being was concentrated around this rod going deep into me over and over again. I was becoming a cylinder of pure light and energy. And then suddenly the cylinder filled up and burst in a dazzling display of lights and colors. I hadn't felt it coming. I couldn't even tell if Raj had come. I dissolved completely. Then I slowly recomposed myself around his hard cock as he held it inside me and held my legs in that position while we both found our breath, again.

Then he gently lowered my legs. He lowered his body toward mine and kissed my breasts, my collarbone, my neck, my lips. Then he withdrew his cock and crawled on to the bed and spooned me.

Later, I emerged from a deep sleep and felt him breathing softly at my back. I gently moved his arms and slipped out from his embrace. I checked my watch. It was just after 11 p.m. I was hungry. I gathered my clothes from the armchair, dressed quickly, and slipped out.

-South America-

The bar was the only place open in the hotel, so I found myself there again, ordering a bourbon on the rocks, a Coke on the side, and a burger and fries. I was famished. While I scarfed down the food, I surveyed the room.

It was the usual assortment of late night conference goers. A few tables of emeritus scholars leaning toward each other in earnest conversation, turning their hearing aides up. A couple of tables of nervous erstwhile couples, probably trying to decide if they were going to go forward with the affairs they imagined themselves indulging in but didn't know if they were actually ready for. And one big rowdy circle of graduate students and postdocs, conversing loudly in several languages. I picked out Spanish, Portuguese, and English at a minimum. I recognized a couple of them, a grad student and postdoc from my university.
I ordered another bourbon on the rocks and went over to talk to them. They pulled an empty chair into their circle and welcomed me to take it. They introduced me to the rest of their group. I chatted with the two of them for a while. A cute guy from Brazil sitting next to them joined our conversation. He looked me up and down with a wry smile.

I looked down and realized that my skirt was riding up my thighs. And I hadn't put on any underwear when I dressed hurriedly in Raj's room. I didn't think the Brazilian, Jorge, could see up my skirt, but I'm sure he had a lively imagination. And then I realized my blouse was buttoned wrong, too. With my hair in a bit of a disarray, as well, I must have looked all together more than a little cattywampus, maybe a little loose, like an easy lay. Which, come to think of it, I was.

His girlfriend must have sensed that. When she got back from a trip to the ladies' room, she quickly reined him in. And they were soon saying their "boa noites" and blowing air kisses to their comrades. The grad student and postdoc from my university excused themselves, too. It looked like they were headed to bed together for sure.

It was a fun small group that was left, smart, boisterous, flirtatious. After midnight, our numbers dwindled. I ended up talking with an American couple. Young faculty from a small Midwestern college. I let my dress ride up. I was getting horny as hell, again. Maybe I could get one of my outstanding continental slots punched with a threesome with them, I thought. I could feel my swollen pussylips and I was pretty sure they could see them. I don't shave but I keep it well groomed down there to visually emphasize the right parts. And the woman had a hand on her partner's hard-on as we laughed and chatted.

That was when the Brazilian showed up again without his girlfriend. The bartender announced last call. So we ordered another round, and I ordered a bottle to take to my room. "In case anyone wants to continue partying," I said.

On the way up to my room in the elevator, Jorge didn't waste any time slipping a finger into my wet pussy as he pushed me against the wall and kissed me. The Americans started making out watching us, as she rubbed his cock through his pants and he squeezed her generous tits.

They say that Brazilians really love bunda, and that was the first thing that Jorge went for when we got to my room. As soon as I put the bottle of bourbon down, he embraced me from behind, turned me around, and bent me over the back of the couch in my suite, raised my skirt over my back, and buried his face in my ass.

The Frenchman had taught me something new about myself when he stuck his tongue in my asshole the night before. But he had nothing on Jorge. This guy was clearly devoted to ass. He worshipped it. He gently circled my asshole with his tongue, getting it nice and slippery wet, flicking the tip of his tongue across the opening, rubbing the flat of his tongue along my perineum and back to my hole. Only then did he push his tongue way inside. I felt like he had opened up a new pussy for me. I let myself wallow in his tonguing.

Meanwhile, the American, Stacy was her name, if I remember correctly, had taken Steve's cock—I think that was his name—out of his pants and was blowing him, as he leaned back against the back of the couch beside us. She was watching Jorge rim me with great interest while giving her all to Steve's cock. Steve had his hands on her head, and his eyes rolled back to the ceiling.

Then I felt the tip of Jorge's cock pressing against my ass. I hadn't even realized he had it out. I looked back. His pants were down around his ankles. His cock was in his hand. And he looked single-mindedly determined to bury it in my backside immediately. "Not so fast," I thought to myself.

I turned around and took Jorge by the hips and spun him around so he was next to Steve leaning back against the couch. And then I took Jorge's skinny cock all the way into my mouth, down to the balls. I'd never really been able to do that comfortably with a guy before and it felt great. So I did it again and again. The tip of his cock felt terrific rubbing against the back of my mouth and into my throat, but not so far that it made me gag. I pulled on his balls at the same time and he moaned. This was fun.

-North America-

So, technically, I thought South America is down, what about North America? Did it count to just be in the same room having sex? No, I decided.

I reached out to caress Stacy's hair as her head went up and down on Steve's cock. And then I touched the base of his cock and cupped his balls. Now we're talking, I thought.

I then found Stacy's hand and brought it to Jorge's cock as I let it slip out of my mouth. Steve looked down with wide eyes as Stacy looked up at him. He nodded his approval.

I turned and joined Stacy in lavishing attention on Steve's cock. It was stocky and firm, kind of like Steve himself. And it had a big head. Stacy and I went up and down together along the sides of his shaft. When we got to the top, I kissed her.

She liked it. As we made out, with our hands still on the guy's cocks, they stood up on either side of us, and started pushing their cocks between our mouths. We had two cocks, going back and forth between our lips, and rubbing against each other.

The guys were both wide-eyed and groaning. I didn't know how long they would last.

I squeezed Stacy's luscious tits, and she reached up under my skirt to finger my pussy. I pushed her down to the floor then and lifted up her skirt. Her panties were soaking wet. I pulled them aside and dove into her soft folds with my tongue. She was delicious. So sweet and wholesome. I moaned.

I reached up to grab her tits and saw Steve dangle his hard-on into her mouth. She took it into her mouth then licked the underside and took his balls between her lips.

While I had my head up, watching her lovingly sucking Steve's balls and rubbing his cok, Jorge, who was still behind me, and had resumed tonguing my ass, came up for air. This is what I imagine he saw at that point: my asshole, which he had just been devouring, two wet pussies, and another nicely puckered asshole, one above the other in a row.

Rebuffed earlier by me, Jorge went straight for Stacy's asshole. But she grabbed ahold of his cock as he pressed against her and directed it into her pussy.

I crawled up her body, unbuttoning her blouse as I went, unhitching her bra, and sucking hard on her nipples, while she took a cock in each end of her. I came up further and helped her with Steve's cock again. She let me take it. And as he straightened and I raised up to my knees, I put my pussy in Stacy's face and she eagerly ate me as Jorge fucked her.

Steve's cock was not long, but it was thick. I couldn't take it all the way without gagging. I sucked on the big bulbous head and fisted the shaft. But I wanted it inside me. I wanted to be filled up with that thick shaft. So I pushed him down on the couch and climbed on his lap, guiding his cock into me as I lowered myself on him and started fucking him hard.

I figured this was it. I had done it. All but Antarctica. And that was enough. Success. And I wanted to come right then.

But Brazilians love bunda. And when Jorge saw my puckered asshole riding up and down on Steve's cock, right in front of him, he withdrew from Stacy and came up behind me. I felt the tip of his cock against my asshole. And this time I let him push it in, through the ring of my sphincter. I gasped, but after that it was easy. Anal sex had always been a little painful the few times I had done it before, but Jorge was the perfect size, and he clearly knew what he was doing.

I felt the two continents rubbing together inside me. I knew there was a border or a wall between them somewhere. The Darién Gap, yes, that's it, in Panama, I found myself thinking. But it didn't feel like there was any real distance between these continents. And I could feel orogeny, a mountain building in me, as they rubbed against each other.

Poor Stacy was left all alone, wide-eyed at the sight. But she was a resourceful woman. She climbed up between me and Steve and held her pussy open to me. While I licked her clitoris, and grabbed on to her generous boobs, Steve tongued her ass, and Jorge and Steve picked up their pace inside me.

I suddenly felt Jorge grow decidedly more stiff and hot. Now his cock felt big and getting bigger. With Steve on the other side, I was being filled to bursting. Jorge pushed into me hard once, twice, three times, then stopped suddenly deep inside my ass. I came then with a shudder as I felt the head of his cock throb. Then he abruptly pulled out and came all over my back moaning, "Puxa, vida."

Steve hadn't come, yet, but I lifted off of him, and held his cock while Stacy lowered herself on to it. She rode him reverse cowgirl while I went back to work licking her clit. She came quickly and hard, grabbing me by the hair and holding my head tightly between her thighs as she shook.

Steve's cock slipped out as Stacy fell sideways off of him. He still hadn't come, so I took him in my mouth and tickled his asshole with my fingers. Pushing one in, I found his prostate and pressed against it gently. He came instantly then with a loud grunt and two big blasts of cum. I took the first one in my mouth, but let the second spray on to my breasts. Then I turned to Stacy and gave her a wet kiss, sharing her partner's cum with her.

Later, as we all laid entangled like a pile of cats in my bed, right before falling asleep, I asked, "Have any of you ever been to Antarctica?"

-Antarctica-

The next morning, I left them there with a note to order room service on me. I had an early business meeting and then meetings all day and a flight to catch.

The meetings were so boring. I searched the conference program again in vain for any references to Antarctica. Ah, well, I knew it would be an unlikely lagniappe when I started this challenge. And my dance card had filled out quite nicely. This had been a conference affair like no other. One to remember, for sure, as I wasn't sure I could ever do quite that again.

The sun was setting as I boarded the bus to the airport. It was full of exhausted conference goers on their way home.

I looked down the aisle and saw one seat left, next to a bearded young man.

I sat down next to him and introduced myself.

"Pedro," he said. "Nice to meet you."

"Where are you from?" I asked.

"I'm from Los Angeles," he said. "But I just got back from a two-year research project at McMurdo Station in Antarctica."