Day. . . um. . . Monday

Man, I have been so MIA!  Being here all alone with nothing to do sure does eat up some time!
So let's see - where have I been?
I spent most of Saturday at Starbuck's (I know, right?) avoiding the rain and reading through the local paper, Atencion.  It lists all of the activities going on in town and Alan said it'd be a great way for me to find some things to do.  It's definitely jam packed, and my calender is all filled with options - from other expensive cooking classes, to conversation practice at the library, to dance lessons and Zumba in the park, to tours and wine tasting.  I had lunch at a Spanish placed called Cafe Iberico.  The food was really good (goat cheese!) and they have a fantastic roof top garden that opens in the evenings.
That night, I was all excited to see the Spike Jonze flick, I'm Here, in El Jardin, but it started raining which chased me away.  I tried the next night as well, but that damn rain was determined not to let me see this movie.  To escape the rain I ran off to a nearby bar at a restaurant called Mama Mia, had some horrible "sangria" and attempted to speak Spanglish with a guy that struck up a conversation with me.  His name was Saul and he has his own shoe company.  He was very nice, and his English was about as good as my Spanish, so we talked about lofty things like the weather, and what band was playing, and where we were from.  I then headed out to try to meet up with the other Americans at a drag show (!!), but when I got down to the bar, it looked like there was NO ONE in it.  There was a cover, so I opted out and just headed home.

Yesterday I went for a walk to find the best route to my school, and had lunch at a cafe there, Mi Casa es su Casa.  Then I had a $2 Illy espresso (!!) at a cafe on the main square and spent a good chunk of the afternoon and evening hanging out at the film festival.  I caught the tail end of a documentary on the art of coloring b&w photographs with oil paint, then HavanYork, a look at the roots of Hip Hop via American and Cuban cultures, and finally, The Most Dangerous Man in America - a documentary on Daniel Ellsburg; the Pentagon Papers whistle blower.  He and his wife were there afterward for a Q&A session.  The entire afternoon was pretty amazing, even though I was basically sitting on a carpet covered wooden box for several hours, smooshed up near the ceiling of what became a very hot room.

Today was my first day of school and boy was I nervous.  I had been worried that I would be stuck in the "Hola, come estas" class of 7 folks who didn't speak a word of Spanish.  What I got was two other American women, who actually ended up being more advanced than me so I get my own "special" class.  I spent two hours with one teacher, Elvira, and then the next two hours with the other teacher, Felipa.  They are both incredibly nice Mexican women, and it is totally not their fault that I wanted to cry the entire time.  It was so frustrating, and embarrassing and I was annoyed at myself for not remembering more, and UGH.  I totally don't want to go back tomorrow.  But of course I will, and it'll get easier, and blah blah blah.  I mean, this is why I'm here.  So, my Spanish speaking friends - no more speaking English to me.  My teachers seemed a bit horrified that I have friends that speak Spanish but I don't practice with them.  And after this experience is over, I certainly don't want to end up in the same place of not remembering everything I worked so hard to learn!  Because of my desires, you are now all on the hook - lo siento.

I'm sure I had many more witty anecdotes and things to share, but my first P90X workout kicked my arse and I want to go study for school a little bit, so it looks like I know SOMETHING when I get there tomorrow.  Check out the Flickr page for more photos and videos!

Hasta luego.

Day two. . . part two. . . .

I've started uploading my photos for your viewing pleasure, and because I always have your best interests in mind, I'm not embedding them all into the blog since it would take ages for the pages to load.  Instead, check out my flickr photostream down there on the left.  The photo above is a house in my neighborhood to give you an idea of what it looks like.  I should've taken a photo of MY house, but didn't think of it until later, then I forgot, and now it's dark.  Manana, te lo prometo.

My stroll around town was fairly uneventful.  I hardly got rained on at all, which was nice since I didn't see any umbrellas actually. . . I walked and walked and walked looking for this one particular pharmacy that we drove past yesterday, only to realize it's only a few blocks from the house and had cut across to that street a block too late and missed it.  Oh well; I got some good exercise!  I'll give them cobblestone sidewalks (which are super narrow by the way, maybe 2 feet wide - I completely bashed myself on a window sill earlier), but the streets are insane.  Walking on them in flats with very little padding is not recommended.

The markets here are so odd to me, but that's one of my favorite parts of visiting other countries.  I loved in Europe how different shops specialized in different things - one for bread, another for meat, another for produce.  It's kind of like that here, except one is a shoe store/hair salon; another might only sell one or two things and just lots of them (diapers, baby formula, hand lotion and hair dye); another looks like someone's living room with people sitting around on couches watching tv, but then there is a big rotisserie full of chickens in the middle of the room; and tons and tons of huge home decor shops, crammed to overflowing with all sorts of awesome things I want to take home with me.  I kind of can't figure out how you would ever know where to go for anything.  It also seems like some of the shops might close mid-day, all siesta like.  I walked past several that I wanted to go into, but they were locked up, even though their hours said they'd be open.

The town square, El Jardin, is actually quite small; only a block with La Parroquia at one end.  I'm meeting Allan there tomorrow to drop off my rent check.  There were all sorts of people just hanging out; I can't tell if they're local, or tourists, or what, but isn't it a work day?  There was a little table for their version of the SPCA with a couple of dogs and a cage full of snuggling kittens, and a few other folks with leaflets and fliers, and of course vendors - men trying to sell woven bags, women in more traditional Indian style dresses selling little dolls, the carts with their churros and bags of fruit with wasps happily munching away on your purchase before you get around to it, which ew.  I also think ew about the women that are making chalupas or something on the street with their little hot frying pan bowl things, and their bag of meat just sitting out, waiting to go in your belly.  Of course I'm totally going to try one at some point.  I mean, I had ice in my Coca Cola Light today - so why not, right?  Speaking of which; I ate at Cafe San Francisco (oh, the irony) and had their enchiladas especiales - chicken with potatoes, carrots, queso and crema. 

There are plenty of young people in town, all Mexican though, so that makes me feel better.  Hopefully I can make some friends that want to practice their English as much as I'd like to practice my Spanish and I won't be kicking it with my elders the whole time I'm here.  It seems like there a lot of sort of almost hipstery, cool kids that ride around town on ATVs (which you can also rent by the way).  I think I'll have to follow Alan's suggestion of getting out into some nightlife instead of hiding here in the house, which I have opted to do again tonight so I can cook.  I figure Friday night is a better night to check out the bars and stuff anyway.  I hear there are a few "discotheques" as (Alan called them - discotecas, I'm sure) in town, that some of the wealthier kids from neighboring towns come to.  Why this is important I'm not sure, but he seemed to think I should go.  I saw lots of cool looking restaurants too, with nice bars, so I'm thinking I'll start there.  I just don't know if it's socially acceptable to be a girl/woman out alone, sitting at a bar, trying to start up conversations.

The weather hasn't been quite what I expected.  I thought it would be warmer during the day, but it's really only warm warm for a few hours.  The mornings are cool, things heat up a bit, the rain starts to spit at you around 3, it gets a bit muggy, it rains for sure closer to 4 or 5, and then it's cooler.  It's lovely out, don't get me wrong; in the low-mid 70s; I just expected a bit more heat and a bit less cloud cover.  Warmer than San Francisco, but don't come down with a closet full of sundresses, like someone else may have, is what I'm saying.

I'm pretty excited about the cooking school I found today; there is a class tomorrow and it's 600 pesos (about $47).  It's 11-1 and includes the food, obvi.  I'm guessing Concepcion would teach me for free - maybe next Thursday I can ask her; we did talk a bit about cooking today and I think she'd be game.  She is really super super nice, and I feel lucky to have such good people here to help me get settled.  This cooking school looks like the Mexican Sur La Table - created for the benefit of the American tourists that are staying in the neighboring hotels (I have three spas within spitting distance from my pad, and I actually saw valets or something hovering in the doorway of another hotel), and well, that sounds like me, so I guess I'll fit right in.  It's called Sazon, el arte de la mesa (the art of the table), and I bet that can pretty much paint a picture in your mind about what it looks like.  There are dishes there that you know I'm dying over; good thing I saw a FedEx store so I can shop away and ship things home; Patrick can attest to the fact that my luggage is already quite full.

I'm only swooning over a few other items; the star lights, which I always always always covet, every time I come to Mexico, and what do you know, they have them here in mercury glass (which I also have a thing for), and I think they're less than $20, so yay!  I am also drooling over (get ready for it) a Dia de los Muertos type statue of Frida Kahlo with parrots and monkeys, and yes, fine, roll your eyes.  I just always love those macabre little guys, and the one of Frida (or of the flamenco dancers -they'll also do) just caught my attention.  I'm not sure how much they are, but they all say "No tocas por favor" which makes me think they're caro.  I'll get bold and ask about the Frida one tomorrow; I was just all shopped out today by the time I saw her in the window.

 

this is not a photo of the ones I'm drooling over, just something I found online for reference in case you don't know what I'm talking about