BRIGHT ... and early?

Good Morning Friends!

Here I am, 9:11 am, voluntarily out of bed and writing this blog. That means either a.) I got enough sleep or b.) Pako is snoring too loud! In reality, it's a combination of both, but mostly A. Normally, if Pako is snoring and I still want to sleep, a carefully (and gently) placed hand on his face will do the trick. :) The picture is of the boys at 9:42 am, as I am concluding this blog. Neither one of them has made signs of moving, except Tekila raised his head when I took the picture. Yesterday, I slept in until 9:15 and then rolled out of bed and made pancakes. It was weird not getting up and going to the Tech, but good weird! I met my friend Chandra and we walked downtown for a licuado and a visit. It's always nice to chat with her because I don't have to worry about grammar or syntax. She is going through the immigration process that I will have to go through next year and so far, it doesn't look fun. Pako picked me up after a bit and we went to order our invitations. I experienced a rather strong sense of deja vu because as we were discussing the details with the lady at the story, Pako wrote down abbreviations that were evident to both him and me, but probably not to anyone else - which is something that I dreamed about over a month ago. Exactly that, in fact. Pako wrote down abbreviations for my name, the date, the beach where the ceremony will be held! It was so strange. In my dream, I wasn't there to correct anything, so our invitations came out all wonky, in real life, I got lucky and was able to write out all the abbreviations. I'm sure I'll be anxiety ridden the night before we pick them up, but hopefully nothing will come of the dream!

This week went by quickly, thank goodness! All of my students can smell the summer vacation at the end of the tunnel (mixed metaphors, sorry) and they are chomping at the bit (ok, couldn't help myself)! So can I and so am I! There are 2 more weeks of classes (mas o menos) and then a week of review and exams!!! What's making it all the more difficult for me is that my high school classes have finished their books, which means that I am creating all of my materials, a very time consuming process, which should NOT be left until the end of the year! I think next year I will plan better and have a mid season book break so that we are finishing the book at the end. That way both my and student energy will still be high (supposedly) and focused (again, SUPPOSEDLY). Anywho, we're getting towards the end and nobody is complaining. Next Friday I'll be taking the high schoolers to el Refugio de Potosi, which I think will be awesome! (That is, we'll be going if Ricardo hasn't totally neglected the numerous reminders I have been leaving on his desk for the last month...). **El Refugio is a must see for all visitors to Zihua, expect mass trips if you make it for the wedding!

This past Wednesday, Pako and I opened a joint bank account at Scotiabank here in Zihua. We had a number of reasons for wanting to do this (not keeping all of our savings in an envelope in the apartment being a large factor), but mostly we did it now for immigration purposes. Later on, when we're asked to prove our love, they won't ask for pictures, cards or engagement rings, they want bank notes, titles and deeds in both of our names. Anyway, we went and opened an account, which turned out to be much easier than I had anticipated (all I needed was my passport and FM3 visa), and it was uber-romantic. We might have even held hands in the bank manager's office. I can't remember. The bank manager has two students at Montessori, one of which will be in my 6th grade class next year. Our next step of proving our love 'immigration style' will be to change the title of Pako's car so that both our names appear. Now, that might not seem romantic to most of you, but if you knew how Pako was about his car, you'd understand that he'd truly have to love someone to legally share ownership! By the by, should any of you ever get the urge to deposit money into our account, feel free, Bank of America is our US affiliate! ;)

Pako had a heck of a sports week. He played with his Sol team (scored the game-winning goal in his new cleats - from me, thus clearly giving me all credit for the game) on Monday and then sometime Wednesday his ankle swelled up and started to ache. Also, he snapped his new surfboard in two. He loves doing that. I tried to take a picture, but he wouldn't let me - it was too sad to document. We went to a man, who lives on a farm/roof tile factory out in a little pueblo named Coacuyul. He not only makes tiles (and trains packs of dogs from the looks of the place), but he rubs joints. Not joints as in marijuana, that would be illegal and who rubs a joint, anyway? No, joints as it where your bones meet. Anywho, he's pretty famous and had rubbed Pako's ankle before, so Pako knew what to expect. Apparently it's extremely painful as the man rubs your sore joints and flexes your limbs, but worth it. Pako went on Friday evening and Friday night his ankle had returned to normal size and he was running after Tekila like a kid again. Go figure.

I think that's it for today, unless anyone would like to enter into a political debate? No? No one?
Ok, that's it then. I took a picture of the morning because the burning of the hills to ready the fields for planting has ceased and my eyes no longer burn and not everything in my apartment smells of smoke, it's finally clear and I can see the ocean again! Hope things wherever you are are going well! Talk to you soon! OHMIGOSH! I can't believe I forgot the most important part of my week: Comercial Mexicana stocked Tollhouse Ready-Made cookie dough and I bought it! Chocolate chip yummy to be had at my apartment! YAY! :)

Adios and hasta la pasta!

Leyah

Disjointed, but soap-boxy

Well kids, another week done and gone. They are positively flying by, which I don’t mind telling you, is fine with me! While I’ve had fun and definitely learned a lot, I won’t be sad to see this year of Montessori come to a close. Right now we’re dealing with the splitting of groups (who will teach what grade/class) for next year and let me tell you, it is one more big pain in the arse, shaped scarily like that big lump I sometimes refer to as Ricardo. As it stands now, there are 3 English teachers: Artemisa (Kindergarten 1, 2 and 3, and primary 1), Coco (Primary 2-5, Secondary 2) and myself (Primary 6, Secondary 1, High school 1 and 2). Ricardo thinks that it’ a good idea to incorporate all of us in ALL levels of the school, kinder – high school, thus giving all of us classes in Kinder, primary, secondary (impossible, there are only two levels) and high school (NO!!! those are my classes!). Now, this irks all three of us teachers because we like our levels (except I do NOT like Secondary 1, but next year they’ll be my babies from Primary 6, so I’m hoping for a better class) and we’re comfortable in our roles. I don’t know how the heck I’d teach kindergarten. I have no clue how to teach 3 year olds and I have interest in finding out. They don’t use a book, so curriculum would be up to me. No thank you. I’m also not buying one of the ridiculous aprons they make the kinder teachers wear. I love my high school classes. They are conversation classes and I like the freedom of that. I can follow the book and bring in my own articles and it’s interesting listen to the discussions that develop. Anywho, this is the current Montessori drama in my life and it is nowhere close to being finished. I am NOT going down without a fight. What is going to happen is that I’m going to drop off my resume in other schools and do some networking with the other teachers that I’ve met in Zihua. If I have to drop some hours at Montessori and pick some up elsewhere, I’m not opposed to that idea. Ricardo has no idea who his sad, confused, inept self has messed with.

Continuing with the school theme, yesterday was my last day at the Instituto Tecnologico de la Costa Grande as a college professor. Bummer. Though not so much bummer when I think about the Saturday mornings that won’t be brought in with a too early alarm. May 15^th is Dia de los Maestros (Teacher’s Day) here in Mexico, so a lot of my students shook my hand or gave me hugs. It was an odd experience. I didn’t know why they were hugging me at first and then one of the more advanced student’s said in English “happy teachers’ day, teacher.” Well, not only did my heart swell as I realized that she used the possessive -s (teachers’) correctly, but I then understood why all of a sudden people were shaking my hand. Now I knew that teachers’ day was this week because of the two parties I had missed during the week due to an awesome cold that decided to take up residence on Wednesday morning, but I had forgot that the actual day was on Saturday. Montessori threw a pretty nice party for the teachers at a restaurant in Ixtapa and gave out presents and then the local government through an even bigger party at a hotel in Ixtapa and gave out presents (but only for government teachers, which means I wouldn’t have qualified anyway – they raffled off laptops!) Alas, I was laid up in bed, sweating from a slight fever compounded by unpleasant humidity. Oh well, there is always next year!

I’m happy to say that I’m feeling better today. Still have crud in my throat that forces me to make obnoxious noises from time to time, but I’m definitely on the mend. On Wednesday, after Pako picked me up from school early, we headed out to La Ropa to pick something up from Eliseo and he offered me a home remedy for congestion – mescal. I took a shot, all the while being a doubting Debbie, and immediately my sinuses were cleared and I felt slightly drunk. Now, mescal is not tasty (not even a little bit – ugh) so it’s not a medicine that I will be turning to often in the future, but I had to try it at least once, if just to be able to write about it here. In Minnesota, they give you tea and honey. In Mexico, your father in law gives you mescal. Sounds about right. Thursday I stayed home from school and only went for half a day on Friday and on those days definitely stayed away from any home remedies. Saturday I manned up and went to give my last class at the college, which was shortened as it was only a quick review and then an exam. Then came home and took two naps. Apparently, sleeping helps when one is sick. I had to remind my body of this as it is so averse to sleeping well at any time, in sickness or in health.

Speaking of sickness and health, Pako and I finally found little glass thingys to complete the centerpieces for the tables at our wedding reception. Woohoo! No you all may think that is boring news, but its one less thing on my list. Planning a wedding is a lot of details and all this heat makes me lazy! People asked why I planned such a long engagement – well, this is why: I knew myself and my tendency towards laziness when planning fiestas. So here we are, 10 months away from the big day and I’m already feeling the time crunch. Can you imagine how I’m going to feel in 6 months? 8 months? 9 months? Poor Pako.

May 14^th was my dad’s birthday. If you forgot, well shame on you! If you didn’t know, now you do. I wish that I could have been there to celebrate; especially when I found out they were eating beer-brats, potato salad and baked beans. I neglected to send his present through the mail as I’ve been to the post office here and it’s sketchy at the best. At least bringing it home with me means that it will arrive, late but sure, in June. Speaking of June – woooohooooo! I’m already dreaming about the food I’m going to eat! I know that’s probably not what I should be dreaming about, but it is. Friday fish fry, Turkey Tuesday, Krohl’s, deep-fried cheese curds… the list goes on.. but I won’t. Happy birthday again Dad, I love you!

Pako’s soccer team (with Sol, of all ironic places to be playing soccer) has made it to the semi finals and he broke his cleats open doing some fantastical defensive move that he has described to me in it’s entirety a number of times (but which I still can not visualize… or bring myself to care about … shh) and thus we had to go searching for some new ones. How could he be there for his team 100% with broken cleats? Anyway, we got ULTRA lucky and found some really nice ones here for the exact same price they are selling for in the states. That NEVER happens. Anyway, he’s like a proud papa and brings them out to show anyone who knows anything about soccer. Whilst playing, he’s been hearing rumors about being called back to Sol, but we’re not holding our breath or counting any chickens. He’s going to stop by Lala (Dairy products) and drop off his resume sometime this week. He really needs a job because it’s only a month and a half until the cold current and sharks leave the area and he needs to buy a new surfboard! Also, there’s the added benefit of insurance for him, Petra and me! And money for food and all that good stuff, too. But primarily it’s the surfboard, who are we kidding?

Alright, I apologize for the jumpiness of this blog, I’ve been on cold medicine for about 4 days now (and mescal). I’m going to do some quick lesson planning and then hop in a taxi to make tacos with Lorena and spend the day playing with puppies and painting my nails. It’s a rough life, but someone’s gotta live it! (Language note: gotta and gonna really irritate ESL teachers because while we want students to use them when pronouncing words because of their true value in conversational English, it’s rather annoying to see it pop up in a formal book report – and they say academic English can be learned in 2 years? Don’t even get me started).

Oh, one soapbox moment before I go. Recently the newest anti-constitutional bullshit (pardon me, but that’s what it is) that Arizona is calling a “law” has brought immigrants and immigration to the forefront of everybody’s mind, including mine. Now, I realize that everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion (let them write about it on their own blog, this one is MINE), but I would remind everyone that immigration is NEVER an easy process. Pako and I are not even married yet and we’re already checking requirements and getting ourselves ready for what is sure to be a year long (minimum 6-8 months, if we’re uber-lucky), expensive process. The United States grants 50,000 alien resident visas a year, total. When considering that more than 50,000 people around the world apply for that particular kind of visa every day, the number seems absurdly small. I am not advocating that the US open it’s borders completely, I’m just stating facts. The process is difficult and expensive and if my child was starving or the drug violence was too much to take, I’d do what I needed to do, including crossing a border illegally. Let’s not be too quick in judging people because of their choices.

ALSO, and even if you didn’t agree with me in the last paragraph, please take a moment to read this one carefully. Arizona is no proposing a law (SB 1097) that would require teachers to report any children they believed to be in the country illegally. This not only targets innocent children, who probably had little to no choice in immigrating to the US, but it puts teachers in an impossible position. If students can’t trust their teachers, they cannot learn. This is a simple fact. Ask Maslow, he’s got this hierarchy of needs that explains what students need in order to be able to learn in school (safety - see pyramid). If you feel that your rabid sense of “patriotism” (cough * racism * cough) compels you to target any adult on the street because the “look illegal” that is one thing, but let’s not target the children. They have enough on their plate. I will never report a student, regardless of the laws that govern the state where I am teaching. Never. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.

Happy May 16 – 23^rd to you. Check back next week where I’ll attack some more ridiculous political mistakes… or I’ll just tell you about my week.

Besos and Abrazos and death to SB 1070 and SB 1097!

Leyah!

PS. Some links for those interested:

So You Want to be an American: 5 Circles of Immigration Hell

Arizona's Attack on Kids

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

I stand corrected

Sorry I’ve been delinquent with this blog. It appears that I have temporarily lost the ability to sleep at night, which leaves me unable to do anything worthwhile during the day. I’m working on it though, not to worry. Luckily, my sleep problems waited until the end of the school year to resurface and May is an unusually holiday-ed month (Day of the child, student’s day, mother’s day, day of the worker, teacher’s day) and that means I have more days than usual that allow for mid-afternoon naps.

Last week was excellent! It included both Day of the worker and Cinco de Mayo, which led to a 5 day weekend and a work week of only Thursday and Friday. Taking advantage of the fact that Pako was, again, laid off from Sol, we decided to spend a couple of days in Acapulco with Pako’s Grandmother, Doña Tomasa. So Saturday, right after I finished at the Tech, Pako, Petra, Lorena, Tito, Tekila and I piled into the car and drove 4.5 hours. To get to Las Lomas de Chapultepec, which is wear Doña Tomasa actually resides, we had to drive through Acapulco proper and I was introduced to some seriously scary traffic. I would like to state for the record that I stand corrected: Zihua drivers are not crazy lunatics, but rather slightly sketchy drivers who have a low level of patience. Acapulco drivers are, without a doubt, totally obnoxious, dangerous, crazy lunatics! There was no respect for driving lanes, traffic lights, pedestrians; no use of blinkers, hand signals, brakes; altogether too much use of horns and hand signals; and finally, just a general disregard for the value of human life. I would take Zihua over Acapulco driving in a nano-second and state now, in writing, published to a possible infinity of readers, that I will NEVER drive in Acapulco. Never. I’d rather take a cab or a bus (not exactly a tranquil ride either, mind you), walk, bike, jump, skip, crawl… anything but drive!

On the drive in we stopped at a mall called “La Gran Plaza.” Nothing special, but man did it feel good to be back in a mall! I like malls. I am a fan. I didn’t even know I missed them until I set foot in one. Turns out, I do. Petra stayed outside with Teki, while the 4 ‘kids’ walked through the mall. We didn’t really see anything great, but it was nice just to enjoy the air conditioning and stretch our legs. Also, it helped my heart rate to return to normal after having survived my first dose of Acapulco traffic. After a short while, we left and ventured into traffic again. One the one, main road that goes through the tourist zone, La Costera, I saw no less than 5 McDonald’s, 3 Starbucks, 3 Burger Kings (which delivers… gross), 2 KFC’s, a Pizza Hut, a Dominos, an Office Max and an Office Depot. It was slightly like driving down a main road in Fond Du Lac, Wisconsin.

We arrived and went directly to Doña Tomi’s house and gave her a big hug and she immediately served us dinner. Then we dropped the car off at Pako’s brother, Juan Pablo’s, house (better driveway area) and chatted with him and his wife, Roselia, a bit. Then it was back to Doña Tomi’s where we bedded down for the evening. Pako and I were given the guest room, Lorena and Tito were given Doña Tomi’s bed and Petra and her mom, against my strident but ignored protests, slept on a mat on the floor. Well, I’m not sure if they slept, but I sure the heck didn’t. See, the thing is, Doña Tomi has chickens. And roosters. Roosters that like to crow at midnight, 4 am and 6am. There’s also the small matter of the house not having any real windows, just open areas in the cement. These open areas, as you can imagine, do very little to soften a rooster’s crow at 4 am. Needless to say, I found out on the first night that this vacation, what with the death treks through the traffic from hell and the roosters, was not meant to be a restful one. Side note, in Spanish, a rooster says ‘ki kiri ki’ rather than ‘cock a doodle do.’ Silly, mixed up, Spanish speaking roosters!

About an hour after we showed up, a tiny woman walked in looking very much like she owned the place. She turned out to be Doña Tomi’s sister, Perfecta. She had come to visit from Carrizo, Oaxaca, a tiny pueblo with no access to a bus station. She and her granddaughter walked 5 hours just to get to a bus… 5 HOURS!!! That is crazy talk! But she did it and she didn’t seem too nonplussed about the whole situation, so who am I to get bent out of shape? She decided it was time for a visit and her granddaughter had a week long break from school and could accompany her so she packed her bag, walked 5 hours, took 3 buses, a van and a taxi and there she was! She looked just like Doña Tomi and had many of the same mannerisms, though it had been more than 50 years since they’d lived together. She was super affectionate and gave me about 15 hugs over the course of the 3 days that we were there. It was great to see Petra, Doña Tomi and Tia Perfecta interact because it seemed as though they’d lived together their whole lives, they were just in sync with each other. Pako and Lorena had never met Perfecta, so it was quite serendipitous that we all decided to visit during the same week.

Sunday and Monday were super shopping days. On Sunday Lore, Tito, Petra, Ximena (Pako’s niece), Pako and I set off for the markets of Acapulco, home to every pirated thing you could think of. I bought a pair of sandals for $50 pesos, which is roughly $4 USD. Lorena bought about 10 pairs. She is even more shoe-obsessed than me. The markets were pretty normal, a larger, cheaper version of what we have here in Zihua. We walked around for a bit and visited the church, which was pretty. Then Lore and Tito caught the bus home because Tito had to work the next day and the rest of us went on a site-seeing tour. Pako showed me where he lived and studied last year. Then we drove to a couple of places with panoramic views of the ocean and coastline. It was really interesting to see where Pako had spent most of last year. Finally we all went home and ate dinner at Pako’s brother’s house with Roselia, his sister-in-law and Pakito (nephew).

Monday, Pako and I rolled out of bed after a night of non-sleep due to the lovely crowing of the house roosters and pumped ourselves up for a marathon. We went to 4 malls. I do believe, even for me, that is a record. Luckily we started out the day with a trip to Starbucks! Now, it’s interesting because in the States, I’m not a huge Starbucks fan. I’m a Caribou girl through and through (a MN-WI coffee chain), but man that overpriced ‘grande’ frappuccino sure did hit the spot! Even Pako enjoyed his overpriced cappuccino. So, properly caffeinated, we headed out into the awful Acapulco traffic and hit 4 malls in just under 6 hours. My favorite was Plaza Diana because it had a Bershka and a Zara, two stores that captured my heart in Spain and haven’t yet made their way to the Mall of America (YET being the operative word). We were so tired and hungry and I was so drunk on shopping that we decided to eat at Applebees (very authentic, I know). Pako ordered Tortilla Soup and said that it was the best soup had ever tasted. Then he ordered a New York Cheesecake and was a very happy camper. We ended the day by walking around the newest Acapulco mall, La Isla, which is a huge outdoor mall with many upscale boutiques and name brand stores. I went into the Coach store, just to salivate, and the prices were DOUBLE what they are in the States! As this mall was clearly geared towards a higher economic class, we did a quick tour and then took our tired, out-shopped bums home for the day. Petra wasn’t terribly pleased with us when we returned because we’d been gone all day, but when she saw that we had bought Tekila a new sweater, all was forgiven.

We came back to Zihua on Tuesday and fell asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillow (which is a big deal when you’re me!). The next day was the 5th of May, Cinco de Mayo, so most schools had it off, but for some reason Montessori decided to hold classes. I decided to observe the holiday and abstained from going in to work. I spent the day lying around and unpacking and decompressing from a fun, but less than restful vacation. Thursday and Friday at school were normal days. Nothing special to report except that my students are comparing the book Blackbeard’s Treasure with the movie ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ so I got to spend a couple of enjoyable hours watching Johnny Depp as the world’s sexiest pirate. Saturday was my 2nd to last class at the Tech and next Saturday will be an hour long review and then a final quiz and that will be that. I’ll be sad to see the class end because I like the students and I like the curriculum, but I won’t be sad to stop waking up quite so early on Saturdays!

I would like to take a moment to mention that on April 28th a member of our Las Urracas family passed away. Fred was a long-time Las Urracas guest and a good friend to Pako and his family and many of the other Las Urracas-ers. He always made me smile, either with a sarcastic remark or a joke meant for Pako or at the expense of Canada. Without a doubt, his presence will be missed greatly and winters at Las Urracas will not be the same. His passing was sudden and reminds us all to tell everyone in our lives how much we appreciate them, so if you’re reading this it’s because your path has crossed mine and I want to let everyone know that I’m grateful for their presence in my life.

Today is Mother’s Day in the US and tomorrow is Mother’s Day here in Mexico. Happy day to all the Mothers and especially mine because she is a beautiful, smart, intelligent, caring woman and I love and appreciate her. Everyday should be her day!

Extra hugs and kisses to all the mothers out there! Until next week!

Leyah