January 7, 2009

Phew, I’m starting this a little late this evening, but it seems like everything was pushed back an hour today. We were gifted an extra hour of sleep last night (we got to start at 9 which means getting up at 6:45), but somehow that hour seems to have evaporated a little. I didn’t end up falling asleep til 11 and I woke up 15 minutes before the alarm. People here in Merida are particularly fond of their car horns even though they don’t seem to be very tense drivers (I’m always surprised that I don’t hear the equivalent of “hey buddy, stay on your side” with the way people tend to drive around here).

In any case, we took the bus to school this morning, Chelsea, me, and my host mom. At the plaza de fiesta, which is where we catch the second bus, we waited over half an hour for the bus which finally came to take us the rest of the way to UADY anthropologia campus. UADY is referred to here so that it sounds like ‘wadi’ or “oo-ahd-ee.”

I believe this morning that we talked about academic classes. We did get a chance to tour the library and get log ons for the computers. It costs 50 centavos to print a regular page in black and white which is fairly inexpensive. SU spoiled me a little though with the free printing.

For lunch today I had three little burritos, a salad which was composed of lettuce and carrots, and some pineapple and papaya. The salad I actually ate a little with this guacamole. It wasn’t thick guacamole like guacamole seems to look at chipotle, it was a little more liquidy, but I was actually surprised to find I liked it. (Of course, we had waited an awful long time to eat so at that point I was pretty sure I wouldn’t’ve bothered to pick out tomatoes from too many things either had they been present).

After lunch we had the best part of orientation: Spanish Class. Now, at first I wasn’t particularly excited for this part as I’m not exactly exuberant to start with the whole “getting back to working” phase that school tends to involve for one reason or another. But this was actually really good. Our professor is easy on the eyes and seems to be really nice and fairly enthusiastic. He’s also willing to give corrections and that sort of thing so the class is actually going to be useful instead of worthless.

After class was over, it was 6 o’clock. Chelsea and I went to the bus stop right outside of the school to wait for the camion. It was actually getting dark by this time. But the two of us were fairly content to chat (in English). I feel like I should have a lot more to add to my Male Theory after that conversation, but I’m not sure how you put “how ‘bout you take the initiative’ and ‘how about you just tell me what on earth is going on’ out of the female perspective and into the male perspective. Maybe you can’t, and that’s why such rifts exist. In any case, I’ll try and work on that for you all.

Moving right along, we kept talking. And then we were wondering if the bus was ever going to get here, and wondering if maybe we should call someone, though it would have either cost my host family money (if my cell phone even worked which I wasn’t sure of) or cost Chelsea a ridiculous amount since her phone is her one from home. But we kept talking. And eventually my cell phone rang. The conversation went something like this:

“Hello?”

“Hello, Kate? This is Laticia.”

“Hey.”

“Where are you?”

“We’re waiting for the bus, but it hasn’t come yet.”

“Are the other students there?”

“No…it’s just us two girls…well, wait, there looks like there are two other people over there, but it’s kind of dark so I’m not sure if they’re students or not.”

“Okay, I don’t have the car, but I’m going to get it. You two stay right there. Do not move. I’m going to come get you.”

And she did a little while later, after say an hour or so of chilling at the bus stop. Maybe a little more or less, I’m not entirely sure. But we did go to wal*mart and got there around 8:20. Apparently, if you try to shop lift from wal*mart here and you get caught then you have to pay three times the amount of money the item is worth and wal*mart can still sue you. Now, before you start wondering “how do you know that?” I’m going to say this had absolutely nothing to do with me. There was a muchacha trying to take money out of the ATM when we finished surrounded by four or five police-women carrying guns. Security seems pretty beefed up around here like they all drink powerthirst or something who knows (insert witty powerthirst flavor here).

When we got home, I had chicken in a sort of cream sauce with noodles and after eating it for awhile, I realized what it tasted like: beef stroganoff. I don’t know how you get beef stroganoff out of chicken in cream sauce, but that’s exactly what it tasted like. And I got to round off the meal with a piece of twix that I bought at wal*mart.

Bueno, I think that’s about the entirety of my day. A side note from yesterday is that here they sell Tacos and Tortas in the same locations. If you’re like me, in Spanish class you were taught that tacos are tacos and tortas are cakes/pies. Well, in Mexico you’d be mistaken because here tacos are tacos and tortas are nothing like cakes, they’re made of tortilla and the same meat or something of that nature but they should definitely not be confused with pies or cakes. I think you would be sorely disappointed if this is what you wanted and you ended up with something akin to a taco. Which is why it does in fact make sense that they are sold together.

To those that sent e-mails or left comments, thank you :) I love getting them. Ah, I should also remember to mention that the magic jack is a pretty fantastic invention. Do call and leave a message because those are cool too as I get them in my e-mail! It's nice to hear a voice, too. =) <3 Kate