Me and Che

Look who it is! I've been having a hell of a time with posting things. the computers here all seem to be going a bit crazy. Ah, it's Mexico.

Moronic devices

So, i just looked at the blog for the first time since i attempted to put up pictures and the enormous post. i have no idea why some pictures decided to come up 10 times on the screen. no idea. one day i'll figure it out.
I started Spanish school today. I'm only taking it for a week, but for 7 hours a day. I'm on lunch break right now, and soon I will be going to las gorditas, the best little restaurant ever. I eat lunch there at least 3 times a week. soooo good.
My spanish is improving by leaps and bounds. In fact last night after i hung out with my friend Ana drinking big beers and we spent the whole night speaking in Spanish i came home adnwas speaking Spanish in my head and went to sleep really soon after i got home. And I had a dream about a sqaure submarine and floating lawn chairs all in Spanish! this was thrilling, and i almost didn't make it to class at 8:30 in the morning because of my wonderment. I have a meeting this afternoon to see about my volunteering with kids in a little little town outside of San Miguel. We will see what happens....

The pictures i failed to include in the

and still not the savviest in the blogging vocation.





The little dog that could and
shanti
These are the pictures I meant to include to accompany the enormous monologue above. So. so sorry.


The bus-station-lovers. 1 am.

the great city they call me'xico

So, the rumours that you have heard about what a crime-ridden, scary, violently dangerous city Mexico city is, which most Mexicans simply call Mexico or D.F., districto federal, are not true. Yes, it's a big city and like any big city it has its fair share of problems, but it is NOT AS BAD AS PEOPLE SAY IT IS. So, with that said, i think you all should visit it, take in a few of the hundreds of museums they must have, do a little shopping in La Merced market, go to the blue house that Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera lived in and see some of their artwork, including the body casts that Frida was in after her accident on the tram, and the weird little things they collected; the Anthropology museum, which is indescribaly huge and and there are just no words to describe it because it is just too too amazing, see the Diego Rivera murals in El Palacio Nacional, which were so powerful and moving I cried on the steps in front of them. Or while waiting in traffic(this is a bad problem in the city, as well as pollution, yuck! That, coupled with the elevation pressure make your eyes red) why not take in a man standing on a four-foot tall ladder juggling torches while his amigo washes your windows. While waiting in traffic you can switch on the radio and hear any number of stations playing all those 80's songs you don't want to admit you know all the words to. They really seem to love the music from the 80's there, I couldn't figure it out.
At one point on my first day after Shanti and I had gotten back from Teotihuacan I was wandering around, looking for the Frida Kahlo museum and just seeing what I could see, when I soon found myself utterly lost. I thought I knew what I was doing, assuring myself that I didn't need to go back the way I came, I could go down an alternate route and still get back, nodding to myself self-assuredly. oops. Soon, I was just thinking, oh, SHIT, where the hell am I? I asked all sorts of people how to get back to the street I thought I started on. I think their directions made me more lost than before. And then the rains came. Almost every afternoon in the city as well as San Miguel it pours rain for about 30 minutes or so to clear the air and then it usually stops. I was, unfortunately caught in one such rainstorm, while utterly and desperately lost. Finally I stopped a woman coming out of her house and asked her how to get to La calle de Universidad. She didn't know. El parque cerca de Universidad? You want to go to the park? Why? Where are you trying to get? She asked me. And I told her my hostel on Quemada street. Ok, I will drive you there. And she did, all the way telling me about the best places to visit in Mexico and what I absoutely must do while I am here, and soon I was in front of my hostel, dropped off with a big smile, a kiss on the cheek and her phone number in case I had a problem. How's that for some nice people in this city that I have heard referred to as 'the land of the locusts.'
I luckily met an awesomely fun transvestite named Sofia in the shoestore. Before I knew it she had gotten me to try on these 5 inch tall pink high-heeled boots. I couldn't walk in them and she thought that was the funniest thing in the world. She tried to give me lessons, as she was a pro, but it led to nothing but more laughter. We laughed some more after we left the show store over the strange occurrence of 4 Leon shoe stores all in a row and all with the same shoes. I guess this is common in Mexico, dating back to Aztec times when if you wanted beads or something, all the people who were selling beads were lined up. Here, you will find blocks only full of gold jewelry, bridal gowns, printing presses, fancy bibles, posters, and more. It's kinda nice, but a little odd as well. After that she took me to this little hole in the wall restaurant for lunch, which was fabulous. Ah, the joys of Mexican food, everything is spicy and delicious. After that we went to La Merced market which was just so damn big I was entirely overwhelmed and we went to the Zocalo, which is the center of town and sat down and ate some ice cream in the middle of the square. A girl came up to us and wanted to interview us for the newspaper about how we felt sitting here in the Zocalo, a very powerful place, the sight of an Aztec temple long ago and now a place for massive demonstrations, or protests.
In all i LOVED this city. I loved the people, I loved the fact that you were a mere 20 minutes from the once largest civilization in MesoAmerica, and their temples, see the pictures, were just unbelievable. We took the second bus of the day (there are 48) out there and shared the entire place with 2 guys from Toronto and a few hawkers. i bought a mask from one of them for a great price and it has become my prize possession. It belongs in a museum. Really. Sorry about all my run-on sentences, but it's just the way it goes. I can't type as fast as I think.
This city is very odd no doubt. It seems that something strange lurks just beneath the surface of everyday life, popping up in the most peculiar of palces. I ran into an Australian guy on the Metro that I knew from Santa Cruz, and I met a woman who lives in Carmel Valley, right across from Garland Park, 2 minutes down the road from me! Quite the coincidence.
Before we went to the City we stopped in Morelia, where Shanti and I unfortuntaley chose a hotel that despite our guide book reccomending what we thought was highly, was in actuality a hotel for some of the cheapest hookers in town. Oh, that's why we were woken up at 3am by the screams of someone in the throes of passion. And just when we thought it was over and we could go back to sleep, it began again, and again, and then onto the shower. Jesus H. Christ. In the morning when Shanti's relatives (see the picture) picked us up we all laughed at our poor choice and they drove us off in a big white chevy SUV to sweet Patsquaro, an idyllic, charming little town. There, Shanti's aunt owns a beautiful old hotel and they got us oh-so-drunk on delicious tequila and hordes of fabulous food on the top floor with a gorgeous view of the lake there, so big it has little islands that people live on. It's here where the country convenes to celebrate Dia de los Muertos in early November. Then they set us loose to wander around. It was still early and we went to the market. I bought a huge mask for Peter the mask collector and then realized too late that I would now be carrying this around thru Patsquaro and into Mexico city. Greeeeaaatt. But, he's worth it. And today is his birthday!! Everyone wish Peter happy birthday!
Anyways, I'm back in San Miguel today. And i can't sit in front of this computer any longer so i must be off.

getting ahold of Jessica

Someone has requested my phone number, my auntie in fact, and I thought that I might as well give it to all of you if you feel so inclined to speak to me. It is, from the US: 011-52-415-154-5570. And when you call you should let it ring twice, hang up and then call back in a minute or so. This is Zuzu´s, our landlord who lives upstairs from us, special code. I think that sometimes she forgets and picks up the phone anyways, but she´s a funny lady and she´ll probably start telling you about her little poodle Shena who is the love of her life, or how she´s SO glad she´s an old lady(she´s 83) and doesn´t have to worry about the troubles of being in her twenties anymore, or maybe even about the exercise show that she watched on TV last night without getting up from her couch. So, that´s the information. Happy trails.

lawyer?

Today, i had a very odd experience with the lawyer from the disappearing office. he exists! but, he isn{t at all what i thought, he doesn´t know how to type, where the paper for the printer is in his office, has 100 year old men visit him on a regular basis, thinks that i want to spell-check spanish for him all day, and does not speak one word of English. Hmmm. Maybe this isn´t what i was looking for after all. Plan B must be put into effect.

El Mosquito

Last night Shanti and I found ourselves turning on the light at pronounced intervals, standing on the bed, swinging books and newspapers around, mistaking holes in our Styrofoam ceiling for our despised, hated enemy; searching desperately for that chingada of a college-educated mosquito. Finally, after 20 minutes of examining the walls and cracks, I found it, hovering nervously above the dirty toilet, quivering with fear, and awaiting what I hoped would be its certain death. I whacked it with Hayduke Lives!, (sorry Kate) the sequel to The Monkey Wrench Gang, and an excellent read, full of Mormon inanities, clever Abbeyian analogies, and Salt Lake City humourisms. And blood, OUR hard-working, Spanish-learning, sleep and oxygen deprived blood splattered all over the praise for Edward Abbey´s 13th novel. Success!

Reset

Well, i think i have finally recovered from the poopy illness. that[s a relief. oh, back to no apostrophes. why are all these keyboards different! no question marks either that i can find yet, so the exclamation will have to stand in. Today I went to a great little spanish class at the biligual institute and we talked about what is more important, your heriditary characteristics or your environment. And then we learned about possessieve pronouns that are meant to be more emphatic that I have already forgotten. I'm going to sign up and begin on Monday.
I started my internship with the organization Fundacion de Apoyo Infantil. I sat in front of the computer yesterday for 6 hours while they mopped the floor behind me with undiluted Lysol, and researched federal and state environmental laws in Mexico. There are some real contradictions between the two. Surprise, surprise! The law office that I was going to work for has diasappeared, even tho 2 weeks ago they were supposedly in business. Hmmm. And the reforestation project does not have enough funding to begin for at least 2 weeks. Some major disappointments.
On the other hand I snuk into the Conference for Women and Globalization for 2 days last week. I was going to intern for the Organization who put it on, the Center for Global Justice, but when Shanti and I went to their office/house, it was just way too weird. No one was speaking Spanish, I was introduced as the new intern, even tho I had yet to promise anyone anything, the man running it had eyebrows that stuck out a foot if a millimeter, and they were mad that i wasn't going to be living at the center. There were just some odd, fringing on negative, vibes happening and i didn't want to be a part of it, especiually since i found out later that very few of the people who work there actually speak Spanish! And they live in San Miguel! The conference, however, if any indicator of the happenings at the Center were all-telling. The first lecture, on water crises was great. The conclusion of it was when you think of a crisis in water, you must instead think of a crisis in water management. I'll have to do some research on that, but I wouldn't be surprised if it were true. The next two were alright, but the fourth one was entertaining to say the least, altho not in the way the speaker intended it to be i'm sure. He was speaking about how we should not use the word socialism in Latin America because it's become a dirty word. He went on to say, and I wasn't sure how these were related, but that Mexican women were not aware that it was illegal for their husbands to beat them and that much of their oppression was in their own head. Sorry? People were standing on chairs, pointing their fingers, shouting, you're a liar! What's your problem?! I'm leaving, and it's all because of you! People were gong way over their allotted 2 minutes, yelling at the poor interpreter who would have to interpret someone speaking for 2 minutes straight without stopping, that she was wrong! wrong! wrong! They were ignoring the mediator who was trying to calm people down and coax the chair standee down from the chair. It was madness. I was completely appalled at these people acting like kindergartners.
On Wednesday I taught English all by myself to the sweetest little children who called me teacher and held up their homework for me to see. I took a picture, but again, I am at the library using the internet for free and I don't have my hook-ups. You will have to wait. This is getting a bit too lengthy anyways. Basta!

More market pics

This lady was pushing a whole wheelbarrow of peppers. We took a taxi up to this enormous market that had everything you ever could have wanted. The colors around here are just so, well, colorful. It makes you feel more alive and happy, even tho you may not feel so well. It got too chaotic after awhile tho, and we had to go. I was moving very slowly at this point thanks to that demon in my stomach and whatever little shit is swimming around in there turning cartwheels and somersaults of joy on account of my misery.

My fruit man and his mango

One of the best things about being here is the incredible abundance of even more incredible fruit. There is even a little organic store(we haven´t figured out how to tell if they are in fact 100% organic, but we shop there anyways) down the street. The markets are great. full of stray dogs picking up bits of fried meat and screaming kids, loud bargaining, the smell of corn tortillas strong in the air.

La casita

well, here´s the picture of our room that i meant to include in the last post. Man, this is a hassle. Good thing the internet cafe is cheap.

The Doors

Here is a very nice door. And here is me. I have seen the coolest doors and doorknockers. You wouldn´t believe it! Ok, I still can´t figure out how to turn the picture. But, who cares. I certainly don´t at this point. At least I have figured out where the apostrophe is.

Montezuma´s Revenge

Sorry. I know I should be updating this more frequently, however I have been a bit indisposed lately. The toilet has become my latest and greatest best friend. I guess i drank some Mexican tap water? It´s hard to remember to brush your teeth with the water from the bottle. I have had to put up a big sign on the mirror--Pour the water from the pitcher! All in all, it´s been very uncomfortable. I´m showing you a picture of where I have sadly spent the last few days. In the back, the pink room is our own sweet little baño. joy!