Whirlwind Week

This was another jam-packed week in Mexico filled with lots of laughter, adventure and work.  On Monday I gave my “Readiness to Serve” presentation which essentially outlined my early work plan for my future site with an analysis of all that important Peace Corps stuff I’ve been learning over the past 2 months.  That’s it for formal presentations during training, although I do have more conversations and tests to finish before our swearing in ceremony on May 27th (i.e. when we become official volunteers).  

 View from my training site for the past 9 weeks. 

 A few of mis amigos. 

Tuesday was the Día de los Madres, which meant I got to take the day off and celebrate with my host mom, Lilia, and her daughter and family.  Two teenage grandsons dressed to the nines picked us up and serenaded us to songs like “Buried in Detroit” and “Downtown” which was just awesome.  We spent the full day at their house and Lilia’s daughter served an elegant meal with delicious paella, cheesecake, jello cake, wine, teenage grandsons dancing with their grandma, and lots of laughter.  It was so nice to get to be a part of their celebration as my host mom told me “in this house, you’re a daughter, and I’m a mother, so you’re coming with us.” In the evening her son and his family also came over with another jello fruit cake and visited for quite a while.  This family is so nice and talented – in fact, their granddaughter’s squad just won a national dance/cheer competition this week!

  Happy Mother's Day! With my host mom and her daughter.  

 My host mom's prized bougainvillea. 

The rest of the week was spent studying Spanish and prepping for Friday’s “Readiness to Serve Café” which was essentially four hours of interactive work to demonstrate understanding and knowledge related to various Peace Corps concepts and approaches to development. I’ve got a lot of language and culture classes in the next 12 days, and the homework assignments are getting creative.  This week I had to go to the local mercado and ask for the price per kilo for frijoles and platanos and I had to write a short dramatic story about a student in outer space.  I’ll save you the suspense – it involves a student studying soil who is abducted by a giant space cat who forces him to eat tuna and listen to Beyonce for 5 years, and he escapes by promising a cat bride for his captor back on earth.  It’s golden.

 Beans at the market. 

  Pinatas and fruit. 

 And then there's the meat...

Saturday was a pure vacation day, although technically I did practice Spanish buying my bus tickets, asking for directions and talking to people on the trail.  My friends Kati, Becky and I headed out to Peña de Bernal to hike one of the world’s largest monoliths and it did not disappoint! We left bright and early to beat the heat and the crowds and spent a full 6 plus hours there on the mountain, eating gorditas and ice cream, walking through town and shopping. On the trail we met a guy wearing a shirt from Chicago (Becky’s hometown) and on the bus back I met three students on an exchange program from Seattle U, which just proves how small the universe is.

  View from the centro. 

  Me and Kati on the trail. 

 Mis amigas - Kati and Becky. 

 View from the top. 

  Local art. 

 View of the pueblo. 

I put sun block on every hour and ended up with only one small strip of burn which I consider a great success. I also bought the cutest head band that expands to cover the top of my delicate head for additional sun protection, along with sweets to take home to my family.  When we arrived back at the terminal in Querétaro we heard that a group was meeting up for a drink, so we hopped another bus to meet them before returning home for highly anticipated showers.  It was the best of days here in Mexico.

Today I’m going to the mall for a very US-centric activity: I need to buy a few more clothes before I head out to my new site in less than 2 weeks.  I talked some other folks from my group into joining me so after the hot cakes my host mom promised me this morning, the weekend adventure continues.