Celine Dìon

She is blaring over the speakers in the internet càfe I am currently in. It is so inspiring. I also heard Brian Adams singing the braveheart song en español a few days ago. I am so proud to be Canadian.

I just managed to cross a very busy street while eating an apple and no buses even came close to hitting me! I will gladly accept congradulations in the comments section.

Finally I met my other roomate. His name is Marcus. He is a police officer and has been for 7 or 8 years. Before joining the police force he was in the miliary for 6 years. He has lots of friends in Mazatlàn. He has lived all over Mexico, but likes living in Mazatlàn the best. His family lives in a city called Vicoria which is near the US border. Why are you writing about these very boring details you may ask. While I am proud to say I had the entire coversation in spanish! He dosen´t speak any english. I also managed to tell him some details about my life (ie. I am here visiting my friends with a baby, I live in the centre of Canada while my family lives near Toronto, etc.). I guess the $60 I paid for spanish lessons so far have paid off. Whoo hoo Alfredo! He (Marcus) also told me I had beautiful eyes, although that was communicated with sign language. My amphibious roomate seems to be a little shyer. I have only seen him twice, but I hear him every night.

Wow, it is an encore for Celine in the computer room. This time in french. I am really enjoying the Mexican music experience.

Only in Mexico

This morning I was taking a cold shower (despite paying extra money for access to hot water) and the water spontanously stopped while I was litterally covered in soap. I then knocked on my land-ladies door and said ¨no agua caliente¨. She thought I was asking if there was anyone in the bathroom (duh, I was covered in soap and wrapped in a towel). After she turned the water back on (or switched sources, I am not sure) the water came out of the tap a lovely brown colour. Fortunately the water cleared after running the shower for a few minutes. I am trying to decide what aspect of being here is more difficult, communicating with my somewhat crazy land-lady or trying to cross the street without being hit by a bus!

On a happier note, it is a beautiful day here and my spanish lessons are progressing well. People are actually understanding me when I attempt to communicate en español (except for my land-lady). I have become a regular at a few cafés and patio bars around the city, mostly in the 'Plaza Marcado' in Old Mazatlán. It is a really pretty place with a arts centre at one end where the sound of students playing instruments usually drifts out across the square. My other favourite spot is a little bar about a 10 minute walk from home. It is across the street from the Malicon (a very wide side walk basically) which runs along the ocean for 13 km. I can get a Corona there for a whole dollar.

I am now off to find a nice cool place to read my book (I am now on #6). I noticed the weather in Ontario is similar to here, so I hope everyone there is keeping cool. For those on the praries, I hope summer returns there quickly!

Not a big surprise

I took this quiz on my theological worldview (complements of Jenn), and these are the results:

You scored as Emergent/Postmodern. You are Emergent/Postmodern in your theology. You feel alienated from older forms of church, you don't think they connect to modern culture very well. No one knows the whole truth about God, and we have much to learn from each other, and so learning takes place in dialogue. Evangelism should take place in relationships rather than through crusades and altar-calls. People are interested in spirituality and want to ask questions, so the church should help them to do this.

Emergent/Postmodern		79%
Classical Liberal		71%
Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan		61%
Modern Liberal		57%
Neo orthodox		36%
Reformed Evangelical		36%
Roman Catholic		29%
Charismatic/Pentecostal		21%
Fundamentalist		7%

What's your theological worldview?
created with QuizFarm.com
I am curious to see what other people´s results are!

Dancin´ 2 Banda

I had a once in a lifetime experience last night. Ives´ cousin recently graduated from Nautical school and there was a huge formal party to celebrate with his whole class and all of their extended families. The venue was in a parking lot with a huge stage and speaker system. The size of the stage and number of speakers were similar to that at a U2 concert I was at a few years ago. Music for the evening was live `banda´. Jamie did a good job of explaining banda music in that everyone (all different brass instruments) starts together (really loud) and ends together, but during the song it sounds like every instumental section is playing a different tune with a different rythum. It is also really loud. I am talking ear drum blowing, had a headache 5 minutes after the music started loud. Since there are half a dozen different rythms occuring at the same time, the music isn´t the easiest to dance to. But it is Mexico, so everyone dances. I will do my best to try to describe how couples dance to banda music. The girl hangs on (for dear life) around her partners neck and the couple stands really close together so that their legs are basically intertwined. Then while stepping around (rather quickly and aggressively), the guy kinda swings the girl all over the place in ways that I have only ever seen on `Dirty Dancing´. The funniest part is that when slow music comes on, all the couples all of a sudden turn into zombie-type, stiff dancers and hardly move. My night was complete when my life-long dream of having my picture taken with 2 Mexican sailors came true. I can´t wait to get my film developed! One of the `sexy sailors´was Ives cousin Arturo who later showed me how to banda dance. It was a good night.

On another note, I am trying to decide which piece of `art´in my house I like best. It is a toss-up between `the last supper´painting where the wine in the glasses and Jesus´robe are sparkly or the clock with a dead scorpian at each hour.

some random stories from mexico

I have a personal spanish tutor. His name is Alfredo Herrera. He is old and very cute.

Jamie and I spent the afternoon driving around Mazatlan in a Safari which is a VW bug with the top cut off and and golf-cart cover put on. We got some really funny looks seeing as only locals drive these types of vehicles. Jamie is a really good Mexican driver.

I had my first encounter with a cockroach last night. It was in the shower. I caught him in a cup and flushed him down the toliet. I am now having dreams about cockroaches coming out of the toilet while I am sitting on it.

I think some new bugs have recently been introduced to my digestive system. We will see if they are happy there or not in a few days.

I live with a crazy lady, a single young woman named Olga who works at a bread factory calle Bimbo (pronounced Beembo), a customs officer named Miguel Angel who does not speak very good english but likes to hang out with me all the same and another guy who I have never seen, but I know he is home occasionaly b/c the toilet seat is often left up.

I accidentally spent $8 on lemonade in a cafe yesterday.

Graffiti and Geckos

So it is another lazy Sunday at Estrella del Mar. I am on book #3 and still loving every minute of my peaceful slumber. Jamie and Ives headed back into town last night and left me here to soak up a little more sun by the pool. Since my last post there have been a few developments on my life here in Mexico as I am getting a little more settled. I am debating taking private Spanish lessons instead of taking some classes as I had previously considered. I think I will be able to teach myself more and hopefully take in a lot more rather than being bombarded with Spanish vocabulary and grammer.

After doing some more apartment searching last Tuesday, Jamie and I found a room in house right around the corner from her and Ives. The place dosen’t have nearly as much character as the other (unless you consider gaudy religious art, ‘70s Mexican furniture and a mirror plated bar character-like) but is much more functional for my purposes here. My new land-lady seems a little crazy. She chatters away to me in Spanish not realizing I don’t understand a word she is saying and then says “entiendo?” (the only word I do understand) to which I shake my head no. The first night in my new room I was convinced there was an invisible bird living in my room that kept ‘clucking’. I even had dreams about it while I was sleeping. Since then I have been informed the ‘clucking’ I heard was actually caused by geckos. Those little creatures make a huge sound!

I had my first ‘babysitting’ experience with Matteo on Wednesday when Jamie and Ives were called into work. He was so good! Such a great little guy he is! He dosen’t seem to like McDonalds via Jamie’s chi-chi’s though. I also had a chance to meet Ives’ family and see the house he grew up in this week. His mom is really sweet and his brothers and sister are so nice and cute, I just wish I could talk to them rather than just smiling a lot. Whenever I do attempt to say something in Spanish, they don’t understand me. It is very discouraging.

Being submersed into a different culture, it is really funny the things you notice. The other day I passed a grocery store that had a sign about 40-50 feet in the air which had something spray-painted under the store name. It really made me wonder why someone would want to climb that far up to do such a stupid thing! In Toronto, the spray painted images are often artistic, but not here. Most of the graffiti consist of black squiggles that don’t even say anything most of the time. Very weird. I guess it is just another one of those ‘Mexican’ things that just don’t make sense. Kind of like the phone system here.

This week I am hoping to find a Spanish tutor and figure out the bus system in Mazatlan so I can see a little more of the city. I am starting to feel a little more comfortable in the city and a little more independent from the translation services of Jamie or Ives. It was so good to hear back from so many of you, so please keep me posted as to what is happening back home. Until then I will be having fun with my new hobbies – poping beached jellyfish (more fun than bubble wrap), playing with baby turtles while chasing iguanas and crabs.

Hmm, Interesting

I took the most accurate villain personality test
created by: The Arch Villainess Gracie

Sol es Pacifico

What a life. I am sitting on a deck overlooking the pacific ocean which is providing a nice breeze to cool off the 30+ temperature with my new favourite drink (Kahlula and milk) in my hand with computer on my lap listening to some good surfer music (Jack Johnson of course). Too bad I am actually afraid of the ocean right now (I will explain later). For those of you who I didn’t get a chance to tell, I am currently in Mazatlan, Mexico and will be for the next 5 weeks or so. In order to fulfill my numerous promises to my friend Jamie to come see her, I decided to make it a nice long visit.

In order to make a 6hour overnight layover in Vancouver (self imposed to save money), I parked myself at the hotel bar and worked on my computer for 3 hours. After two beers, my pathogenicity paper was starting to sound a little hmmm, is there a word for what you write when you are half looped. Anyways, I managed to sleep a few hours amongst other travelers who appeared to have the same travel budget. My great plans of sleeping on the plane were destroyed as I ended up sitting beside a BC left-over hippie version of my mom who felt I really had all the solutions to her parenting woes. I told her numerous times that I am only an expert on plants. Luckily I have had all the time in the world to get caught up on sleep since arriving in Mazatlan.

Since arriving Wednesday afternoon, I have been staying at Estrella del Mar where Jamie’s parent own a condo right on the beach. It is so great although, as I mentioned, the ocean scares the crap out of me. The waves are bigger than any I have ever seen and I have never seen so many beached jelly fish in my life! I have walked along the beach a few times, but whenever a wave gets past my ankles I end up running away from it. Oh yes, I also managed to burn my buttock a bright shade of fushia. I was being so careful with crazy amounts of sunscreen, but for some reason I burnt to crisp a few days ago. I swear I was only out in the sun for about ½ an hour! It has been a little soar to sit, or lay down or even to walk the past couple of days, so I have been avoiding the sun. I expect my butt to start peeling in a few days. It should look absolutely marvellous. Too bad I couldn’t drop a couple pounds off my ass with the skin.

So I will probably only be at the condo for a few more days before heading into Mazatlan. The resort is about a 40 minute drive from town and it is pretty secluded out here. Jamie and Ives found me a really cute apartment about a ½ hour walk from their apartment. It is very ‘Mexican’ with an amazing garden courtyard. I am hoping to take a week or two of Spanish school once I get a little more established.

Over the weekend, Jamie and Ives toured me through a few of the towns near by. Actually I think they just wanted to go for a drive because Matteo sleeps really well in the car. I have never seen so many mango trees and chicken barns in my life! I have also identified some other crops somewhat exclusive to Mexico (such as agave and nopal) along the drive, thanks to my International Field Trip in Agriculture class in 3rd year. Yesterday we were heading to a town about 30 minutes from the resort where Jamie’s ancestors apparently settled in before moving to MB. Does that make Matteo even more of a 'Mexican Mennonite'? Anyways, we stopped along the road on the way there as there were a bunch of fruit stands. Ives wanted to introduce us to some kind of fruit that is similar to a plum. Matteo started crying while we were looking around and soon we realized it was because he had pooped all over himself and his car seat (I never realized baby poop was so loose, I am to use to calves who start eating solids a lot quicker). So Jamie changed him in a family’s thatched roof hut where they were processing their fruit. The baby was still a little upset, so then Jamie had to nurse him there. It was so funny, we (2 Canadians, a Mexican and a baby) just landed on this family while they were spending a quiet Sunday (family day) together on the side of the road. Luckily Ives is pretty social and ended up having a cervesa with one of the men. While taking some pictures of fruit trees I managed to snap a couple pictures of Jamie nursing under the thatched roof.

I am trying to help Jamie and Ives with the new addition to their family, but unfortunately I end up talking about what happens when the cows are nursing their calves. Jamie hasn’t seemed to overly offended yet (being compared to a cow that is). The baby and I are starting to bond. He was also a little scary at first the way his head flopped around. I have never been around babies that small before. I thought he was smiling at me the other day, but apparently he was just farting. Jamie and Ives are such great parents. Jamie seems to be a natural mom and does not at all look like she had a baby only a month ago! Matteo just loves to dancing around with Ives with the music cranked.

Sorry for the rather long post, I will try to post a little more often so this dosen’t happen again. I hope everything is well with everyone back home (whatever part of the country that happens to be). I will be thinking of you while I go cool off in the pool … or not. Take care everyone!