Well, I have settled in to a really sweet routine for my last two weeks: 5:30 Celso, of course :) 9 AM Breakfast with the guys 9:50 Taxi 10-12 Teach the mainly girl group 12-2 Teach the mainly boy group Return to the Hacienda and go in the pool 3 PM (Mexican Time) Volleyball game at the church (forgot, again, to take a picture. Today the ball was overinflated and my forearms and two fingers are black and blue...
The schedule is basically the same every day of the week, but I think this Saturday, I am going to go in to Merida. Sunday, I see the girls at church, so I don't really need to do a lesson, but they are just so cute, so who knows what will happen.
Wednesday night, I went in to Xcalacoop with Max to talk to his wife about the wedding, but she didn't want to talk to me. Max's mom did want to talk to me, and she said that the wife is shy. Julio said "she speaks Spanish -- doesn't she?!" and then decided that she was jealous. Well, I hung-out anyway, because I didn't really have anything else to do while I waited for the bus to cruise through town. I went down to wait for the bus; and of course everybody stared at me -- I'm the resident gringa... Well, I thought I saw Julio crossing the street, and I thought that would be great luck, because I was not enjoying being by myself and getting stared at. Then a random old guy (who is the same guy who owns the restaurant that Troy and I ate at on vacation) came too close to talk to me and tried to get me to come home with him. I just kept repeating "no hablo espanol" and he finally deduced that I was German. He staggered backward and I was hoping he was going home, when I saw one of our maintenance guys on a bike, headed home from work. So I waved and he waved and the drunk old guy walked away. Julio and his neighbor were across the street laughing the whole time. Apparently all the guys from work had arranged to meet and I crashed their party. I guess it wasn't a big surprise that we would all end-up in the same place -- the volleyball game was in Piste at 8, and there is one main location in the village of Xcalacoop to catch a ride. Then another guy we know came by and tried to give me a lesson on driving a moto. I tried to be really nice about not learning to drive a moto in the dark on a highway with a drunk guy... and Julio told all the guys about that this morning so they could laugh at me again... Finally, everybody arrived for the taxi, and then another party crasher (aka Hacienda employee) showed up, and 5 of us piled into one tiny little taxi to drive in to Piste for the game :) Of course the Hacienda Chichen players won. Conejo ("Rabbit") kept sort-of squatting the ball up rather than tapping it with his fingers. The referree kept blowing his whistle and shouting "malo golpe". Finally, Abraham arrived after work, swapped his shirts, played in his workboots, and helped them win the game. Tonight when we played, the guys started to actually call things (in preparation for Monday's big city championship), and random players would yell "Mal Golpe" when someone fouled. It was SO FUNNY! We all laughed everytime. At one point, Abraham stopped the game to explain to everyone that their hands have to be fists the whole time unless they're using the tips of their fingers, and I explained that you aren't to use your fist when you spike the ball -- that should be your palm, facing downward, and I demonstrated. Conejo said "Look at that, the Gringa knew all along -- who would have thought?!" and of course they all laughed again. The kids are awesome. I think the pictures say more than my words could. Obviously I have been letting kids take pictures. The boys are making a powerpoint of random things. They are really learning a-lot and I am very happy about that. I mostly play with the little ones, and when we're doing something that the older ones don't know, they all come over and leave one behind at the computer. Of course we have a schedule, so the person whose official time it is never leaves the computer. Oh, that's my Xcalacoop bff, Max, with a paloma that fell through the roof while I was hanging out on the hammaka. I didn't think to get-up to take the picture, which is why it is at such a goofy angle. I am making a gazillion paper flowers for Max's brother, Matteo's wedding. I just went in to Piste tonight and bought all of the paper, but I couldn't find any string. They are going to have the same sort of paper flowers that the girls have, but all white for the wedding on August 21.
Monday 8-2-10
The guys were busy this morning; so they invited me to eat breakfast with them. I ordered my beans and eggs from the kitchen and took it out to their little table under the tree. Marciano flung a clean, green tablecloth over it and everybody proceeded to open up their plastic bags with warm breakfasts in Rubbermaid containers. Julio put down a cut-off, empty 2-L Coke bottle, and Silvestrio, arriving late, plunked down a 3 L of Coke in the middle of the table. Julio filled the sawed-off 2-L bottle with fresh Coke and said (to me) "Oh, necesita su propia cupa?" (Oh, do you need your own cup?) Of course I said no. Then, they all started eating each other's food and it was like a proper Thanksgiving feast. So, I ate freshly made tortillas, tamale, and a fluffy, fried tortilla with meat and pickled onions and something else -- it was all heavenly. I told them I didn't realize we were sharing, or I would have ordered something different from the kitchen. They laughed and told me to send it back. I don't know what they'll like for tomorrow. Nobody used forks, and the tablecloth doubled as a napkin. Max called his friend for a taxi, and I was off to visit Luis's family. The little ones were up and about, so I did have lessons, but not with Luis's children who are a little older. Tomorrow I'm going to their house at 12 instead of 10. When Luis's wife came over (I sort-of set-up shop on their porch under a shrine to the Virgin de Guadalupe) and said hola, her son greeted her with "Good morning" in my sing-songy voice aka Debbie Reynolds in Singing in the Rain :) An entire village of Mayans is learning functional vocabulary from Hollywood musicals... Oh well, it helps the words stick. Then I took a walking tour of Xcalacoop looking for the "Temple" (church) that I was at last night, so I could find Max's family's house. To be fair, it was pouring down rain when I arrived yesterday, but, obviously, I couldn't find it again. Everyone in town came out of their houses to guide me along, so I did find it eventually. The guys asked where I walked when I came back and I tried to explain that I covered most of the town but I didn't know where I walked because I didn't know where I was in the first place... I told them not to worry, the entire town knew my whereabouts and they could just ask when they got home. I passed Matteo's house that is brand spanking new, waiting for windows and a door, and turned right on to the road/driveway of the rest of the family. Tons of girls ran out to greet me and the next thing I knew, I was sitting in the front room of a house. One of the guys here said "You were in my house" and another said "They only speak Mayan"... Very funny. Talk about a girl-fest. They remembered a little bit of Jesus Loves me, because the one little girl proudly showed me her "I love you" t-shirt. 5 little girls piled into the hammock and stared at me when I first arrived, but by the end, around ten kids were climbing all over me. I used-up all of my coloring book pages in three "classes". I bought a little foam 1-9 puzzle like we have in the dollar stores in the states. I never would have imagined it would engage so many children for so long. Of course we all took it apart and put it back together as a unit. So, the first kid to properly enunciate the color or number that I was requesting received the piece until we finished. They all had their little pieces in a deathgrip while they focused on the next question. It was great!!! At Luis's house, they are mostly boys, so I think of them as "the boys", even though there are some little girls. Anyway, the boys took 78 photos yesterday. I promised that I would bring the computer tomorrow if they are very careful, and one at a time, they may work on things using the computer. A-lot of kids around here go in to Valladolid (about 40 minutes on a bus) on Saturdays to have computer classes since they don't have access anywhere else. Tomorrow the girls are going to make tissue paper flowers to keep them quiet while we're singing & talking. They sure do love singing and learning, but with 10+ kids, they just need to be occupied as well. Also, Max's brother, Matteo, is getting married on August 21; and they are in need of tissue paper flowers to add to the garland to decorate the doorway in front of their house where the wedding ceremony will be. So, if we can help-out, that would be awesome! When Troy and I were in Xcalacoop, there was one house that was amazingly fabulous. I said "that's where the king of Xcalacoop lives" -- well, he's not a king, but a government employee who guards Chichen. We shared a taxi today :) When I got back, I had to go in to town for more supplies, so I walked in with Max, who was catching the collectivo. He helped me pick-out paper that would match the wedding colors for the flowers. I also finally felt hungry while in town purchased a pollo asado from a tiny little old lady who cooks them on the grill everyday. 20 pesos -- $1.60 for 1/2 a chicken, rice, cabbage and salsa. While she was bagging it up, and even tinier little old man got up to leave and said: goodbye, my daughter! I came back and walked all over the hacienda grounds and settled down to watch the fish in the reflecting pool. Abraham came over to hang-out and asked me questions about English for a little over 1/2 hour. Then I swam for a bit. I am obviously typing now; and will eat momentarily -- around 8 PM. As I haven't sat down since Celso woke me up this morning at 5, I think it was a pretty wonderful day. I'm too tired and hungry to read over the post; so please forgive me :)
Luis ;)
Friday night -- walked in to Piste after the thunderstorms in search of a hamburger. I did find one and it wasn't bad (El Carousel Restaurante -- I was the only person eating. Everyone else had humongous bottles of Sol, only). The reason I wanted one in the first place was because I saw and smelled beautiful hamburgers on a food cart near the square the other day when I was not at all hungry. Apparently, the carts don't come out until after 8:30; and as I had to walk back through Chichen in the dark again, I figured it would be too late to wait around for the carts. Of course Luis saw me. The other Luis saw me earlier in the day when I walked in with Jim and noticed that I changed my clothes. This morning, a third Luis mentioned to Jim that his son would LOVE to learn English. Jim told him that he could bring his son by anytime for lessons with me -- but I mentioned that he might get in trouble for bringing his child to work. I offered to ride in to Xcalcoop to teach him (not everyday, but a few days a week). Luis brightened-up and said that would be wonderful! He has a black-board. He said that anything he can buy to help his son learn, he will. He then mentioned that his nephews want to learn too -- so there will be 5 kids, all around the age of 12. I'm taking the taxi in tomorrow at 10.
Full Moon over El Castillo
Friday, July 30
Had an awesome experience sneaking around Chichen in the full moon. The picture here is El Castillo in the daylight so you would know what to look for in the other photo. The park closes at 4:30, so I didn't want to draw any attention to myself by taking tons of photos. It was magical. Yesterday I wrote that I walked in to Piste and drank a beer and ate ceviche. Well, today Santos woke me up from my hammock sieta to ask if I really did drink a beer out of a bottle yesterday. I was completely dumbfounded. He repeated: you drank beer? and you didn't put it in a glass? You know, a glass, like this (he tapped the flower-vase)... Well, yes, I did. If I had realized it was going to make news, I would have asked for a glass! Sounds like we are going to have one of those beautiful, late afternoon thunderstorms :)