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Published: August 30th 2007
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Well, a lot has happened in the last few weeks, so much so that I don´t really know where to start. Last weekend (which is about as far back as i can remember) was my host niece, Sophie´s first communion, which i was invited to attend both the service on the saurday and the party on the sunday. Now as Mexico is a predominantly Roman Catholic country, the first communion is pretty important and a lot of effort goes into preparing for the big day and the party. My part in the preparations involved removing the skins off about a thousand blanched almonds (nice) then sitting in the kitchen until ridiculous-o-clock helping to prepare about 300 Tamales (A traditional dish of bashed maize filled with meat, almonds, fruit and an amazing sauce called Mole, which consists of everything you can find in the kitchen, including, but not limited to the following.....banana, bread, chocolate. chilli, onion to name but a few. suprisingly this is delicious, although ridiculously rich). They are then wrapped in banana leaves and my job was to trim the ends of the little parcels to make them look pretty, easy enough, but as i said, we were making hundreds,
Sophie
Looking pretty in her First Communion dress so it was pretty monotonous.
At this point i´d like to add that on friday night i went out to a party. It was a bit of a high society thing and we had special invitations(although so seemingly did the rest of the chiapan youth). It was for the launch of a new beer...Now i like launch parties because generally that means free stuff. The beer was certainly free-flowing, but it was some horrendous light version of an already fairly nasty beer. Plus there was nothing (and I mean nothing) else to drink, so we were forced to drink the stuff, maybe in the hope that excessive consumption may condition us to like it. I´m fairly confident i wont be buying it anytime soon, but anyhow it was a free party. I was a little bit angry however, because Mexican doorpeople have a tendency to search girls bags, and for some reason the door woman took offence to my camera. i thought for a while that it was going to be confiscated completely, but a bit of pleading resulted in my rechargables being chucked into a bush never to be seen again. The thing that made me really mad
Loki....
...looks so innocent (still waiting for him to eat the birds :) was the fact that virtually everyone has camera phones, so to get rid of the english girls batteries seemed a little bit pointless, and even though the beer was bad and the music worse, i certainly wasn´t going to be throwing them at anyone, so i´m baffled as to the point of the exercise.
Anyway that little aside resulted in no photos of the night, and me hitting my bed at just before 5 in the morning, only to have to get up at 7 for the church service. needless to say it was a difficult morning, but i managed to stay upright during the 3 hour church service, for which i´m fairly proud. The party on the sunday was a lot more fun, because i actually had a sensible amount of sleep, and it was at a slightly more reasonable hour. We got to eat a ridiculous amount of food, then go swimming, which was hilarious, especially when Alba and the other Aunts got in (fully clothed) and were more noisy than the 20 or so kids already in the pool (who thought it highly amusing to try and drown the english girl).
My little host neice
Bertie
we have aquired a new cat (the family claim Loki is the father, i´m not so sure) Sophie is adorable and we spend quite a lot of time together. She is trying to teach me Hawaian dancing, plus we do a lot of colouring in. She tries very hard to talk to me, and the spanish is getting a little easier, but like many 10 year olds it easy to forget to speak slowly and clearly, so there are frequently a lot of blank looks on my face.
I spent the week at my project getting to know the kids and what sorts of needs they have. The kids are adorable, but have an astonishing amount of needs. As i said in my last blog the staff were pretty excited that i was coming to work at the centre, and its starting to dawn on me exactly why. These kids have had so little therapy input its scary. I reckon i have 27 kids who need therapy so i´m certainly going to have my work cut out. I asked the other day if there is another therapist who comes to work at the centre. I recieved a mumbled of response which followed the lines of there might be someone coming in 3 weeks, which my Mexican
terms will proabably mean next year. hmmm, well its all good experience, so i´m just trying my best to get on with it.
The following weekend (the one just passed) i went to yet another party (but have been ridiculously lame at taking photographs...i´m going to try much harder from now on i promise). Can´t really remember that much about it, but it involved slighty better beer and dancing to some bad music. Unfortunately for me it was another 5am stint, only this time i slept through my alarm and through the first hour of my (5hour) spanish lesson. hmmm sorry Rafa. That was a little embarrassing to say the least, but as it turned out i only missed out on the general greetings and formalities and if, after 3 weeks in Mexico i can´t say Hello, how are you? then i´m in pretty serious trouble dont you think?!
Tuxtla is a pretty nice place to live, even if it is not the most inspiring place for architecture, culture and the like. There is a lovely park that plays live Marimba music on friday nights, and if ever i get tired of looking at the brightly coloured houses
(and avoid the heckles of the men on the street who wear too much hair gel) all i have to do is look into the distance and all i can see is mountains. Its certainly my kind of place (minus the sleazy men, obviously). Even better is the view from my therapy room at work (which i have now cleared to the best of my abilities and is ready to be worked in (almost) safely.
And on that, i will leave you with a few final thoughts....
* I love Mexican signs...yesterday i saw a sign pointing in the direction of Mexico (maybe Chiapas really is striving for independence?!)
*There is an alcoholics annonymous on every corner(the beer/tequila drinking will slow down soon i can assure you). There is even a neurotics anonymous, which i am intrigued and mildy amused by.
*Everyday is a culinary adventure. Don´t get my wrong i LOVE mexican food, but when you bite into what, by all accounts and purposes, is a piece of cake and it tastes like cheese, its a little suprising to say the least
*and finally....there is always room for one more in the combi van (minibus public transport), oh
and i can guarantee that it will be a big mexican mama with an arse the size of a small country, who reckons she can fit in a space that a small cat would struggle to make itself comfortable (more directly to the point...lets sit on the foreign person and make them sweat just a tiny bit more)...
and really...on that note i leave you with un beso and a big hug.
nic x
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