Changing sceanery (again and again)

Changing scenery again and again

Well... I started this post about 6 days ago and never finished it... So I'll give you that and then get to the rest :)

¡Feliz dia de los tres reyes!

Today (1/6/10)in Mexico it is el Dia de los Tres Reyes or the Day of the Three Kings. Today they celebrate that day that the three kings (or however many wisemen) brought gifts to baby Jesus. Today is the day that they give gifts (mostly only to children) instead of giving gifts on Christmas. Everyone celebrates by eating this big round sweet bread called rostro and drinking hot chocolate. Each person has to cut their own piece of bread because inside the bread are little plastic baby Jesus toys. Who ever cuts the baby Jesus or gets a piece with it inside has to through a party and buy tamales for everyone in February... we celebrated it at the school and then again back at the house because a travel seminar group arrived that night. They're studying migration.

Which leads to my first change... After spending two nights in the house by myself (the interns and the professor from Augsburg are in the other house... la casa verde). I got kind of used to being alone... then this new group (Aindrea, Brittany, Becky, and Alicia) came and they are staying in the house I stay in... la casa CEMAL(change). Since I hadn't started my practicum yet i was able to join them for some things... We went to the market, learned about the economy of migration, and listened to the stories of people who either went to the US to work or had family that did so. These people also happened to be there host families. After two days of living in the casa CEMAL with me, they stayed with host families for the weekend (change). So I had the house to myself for the weekend. They came back on Sunday (change) and I moved last night (huge and permanent change!).

The language school keeps changing too. When I first started there were only a couple people there... Taylor and Ben from Rhode Island (they had been there a week before I got there), Mike (the social work prof), another woman in his class, and a woman from Canada... and that was about it for students. Then a huge group about 20-ish people from Rhode Island School of Design (RISD aka RIZ-DE) came and started taking classes, then the next day the four girls in the travel seminar started taking classes, and this weekend a group of 14-ish from Pennsylvania came... We also change classes every week. So yesterday I started a new class with Taylor, Ben, a girl from Pennsylvania named Rachel (she's going to be here for a while!), and a girl from RISD named Laurel.

Icm sure you're all wondering what I did this weekend all alone in the casa CEMAl. right? but I told you I have friends... remember? haha. On Friday after the other girls left... I watched a little OTH and went to bed. Haha. I was exhausted... and no one was doing anything. on Saturday I went to church with Christina... ate lunch, went to visit the house with stephanie,

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I don't think I told you all what I am going to be doing for my practicum/fieldwork/internship (whichever word you prefer). I'm going to be working for a place called Ministerios de Amor (http://www.ministeriosdeamor.org.mx/ in spanish). They have several homes for street kids and orphans... what I was told is most of the kids have some sort of family but for some reason or another they can't live with the... whether they're in jail or something else... I am going to be working in the house for the little kids and babies. It is also the place where I a going to be living!

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went downtown to eat Pizza with Mike, and met Taylor and Ben on the walk back... I literally turned around and walked right back where I came from. We ended up at a bar with a couple of RISD girls... with out of even meaning to... but 3 soon turned into 10... and then even more... we stayed there for a while just hangin out... and then we went to a club and stayed there way to late because we left at 8am for an excursion with the language school the next day... this left me with about 3hrs of sleep before climbing the pyramids. We went to a place called teotihuacan, I have pictures but not time to post them... here's the google images version...http://www.teotihuacanhoy.com/teo/upload/imagenesnotas/teotihuacan0eu.jpg . It was a really fun, beautiful, impressive place... with lots of really interesting history... ask me about it later...We also stopped a really interesting tourist trap... and learned about all of the things you can make out of this one cactus (soap, paper, needle, fibers for weaving, and a drink) but... If I don't move on now I wont have time to talk about anything else... and I rambled a lot already! The other girls came back on Sunday we went out to eat.... New class on Monday... and then... repacking and moving in!!!

Stephanie took me out there around 4... we talked to the Tia (which means aunt... but is what the women who work there are called), I think I met about 500 people and remember about 5 names... then I helped two girls with there home work... who were much more interested in this strange new person than their homework... I hope I didn't get them in too much trouble... after homework time I helped bathe (well, dress after they were bathed) and feed the littlest ones and then went over to be introduced to all the other children and helped with supper... then I the girl (16-ish) that I am rooming with showed me the room and made room for my things... then we went back to eat a little something, watched part of a novela and part of some movie on TNT, returned to our room, I did some homework and passed out because I was exhausted and had to be in the Kitchen by 6 to help with breakfast... Then I went to class this morning... it is sure to be an eye-opening and interesting experience... I'm sure I will have many stories to tell... so far I feel pretty lost there... I don't know what I am supposed to be doing most of the time... I was pretty confident in at least my spanish comprehension skills before I went there... and last night and this morning, I felt like they could have been speaking french... I know that will come though...

Well... I think it is about time for lunch... I'll update again when I have time... You can pray for the transition to living out there and that comprehension would come quickly.