Midweek Post

Hello Blog-Readers,

Here I am on a Wednesday afternoon writing to you all from the comforts of my very own apartment. Well, comfort might be pushing it as I can't yet figure out how to get my computer to recognize the stupid modem and am thus forced to sit on the tile floor next to the shelf (which is only as far as the ethernet cord allows me to stray). Nonetheless, my apartment is now connected to the world wide web.

I have spent the last couple of minutes looking up articles on the UN for my classes (Oct 24th is UN day and we make a big deal out of it at Montessori). Yesterday night, on Pako's computer (because mine was being stupid and unconnectable), I spent a glorious half an hour on foodnetwork.com looking up stove top recipes. Eventually I plan to go to cnn.com and huffingtonpost.org to once again reclaim my status as informed citizen of the world. Hooray.

A number of people have now asked me about the drug violence (if Bush thought he had a drug war on his hands, he should have spent some time in Mexico) in Zihua, so I thought I'd address that theme briefly here. Zihua has, unfortunately, been affected by the drug violence that so often makes the news in the States. There are drug killings here often (not in Zihua proper, in the surrounding pueblos) with graphic pictures in the newspaper to prove it. However, I would like to state that I do not feel unsafe in my daily life. Those killed are involved in the drug trade in some way, they are not every day civilians. Pako and I choose to be safer than sorry and avoid certain events and don't go meandering around Zihua or Ixtapa late at night. My students (10th and 11th grade) continue to populate the bars and clubs (yes, 10th and 11th graders regularly go to the club and it's not surprising to anyone, but their English teacher) of Zihua and Ixtapa and none of them have reported feeling unsafe or had any unsavory experiences. Yes, the drug violence is something to be aware of and to always keep in mind, but beyond that, it does not affect me on a daily basis. I look at it this way: there were places in Minneapolis that I avoided late at night (or all the time) and events that made me wary. The city is nick-named 'Murderapolis' for goodness' sake. This is not a uniquely Mexican problem as the news would have you believe (not that any of you were suggesting that, I just like to reiterate), it is all around us.

Ok, now that I've said my piece, I'll climb down from the soap box. Hopefully you're all still reading and haven't written off this blog as a liberal slanted forum (even though it is). Happy hump day to you all, tomorrow begins the end of the week! Sunday or Monday will have another update for you, hopefully with pictures and better lottery results!

Take care and book your flights to Zihua!

Leyah