This has been here since before time began.
Then some Spainards went and plopped this on top of it
There is one factor that transcends time, space, culture, religion, and colonization however:
LUCHA LIBRE!!!!!
Monday, March 30, 2009
Sunday, March 29, 2009
How to go to ancient Cholula and learn nothing...
Saturday the weather was perfect. Perfect for me, that is. It is cold here for many natives Pueblans, but I think 70 is just right. I wanted to check out the tiny town to the west of Puebla that has some serious history.
I needed a day trip. Puebla was feeling really suburban and lame that day. As I had spent from 8-11 at a Starbucks online, I wanted to get out of my computer and head and kick up some dust.
I went to my local travel agency, my housemate Paulo and got the scoop on the three busses necessary to get there. This was complicated. It involved looking for the correct color of bus, asking the driver before getting on, looking for the correct mini-mart to get off near, and to catch the right bus that goes to Cholula.
Of course, I screwed up my first shot. I wound up hoofing around a part of Puebla I'd never seen, though. Ran across some pretty weird shit, and it was relatively easy to get back exactly where I started, a block from my house.
This was all fine, but I wanted to get to the archeology, you know?
Perhaps I'll get those pictures up tomorrow.
Talk the Talk
I had one of those ridiculous days on Friday where you have the same, "detail of foreigner life" conversation twenty times.
Well, it wasn't really twenty times, but you'll recognize the feeling when I tell you what it was.
All college students, travelers, etc. have it more times than they can count, you guessed it,
the accent conversation.
It started in the morning, at 7:00 when my spanish was particularly poor and I went back to english to ask my housemate about a "tutor."
He had no clue what I was talking about, until I said tutor in a Spanish accent. He thought I was talking about an architectural style or family of English monarchs. This led me to share with him what the Chicago accent sounds like, which he found absolutely hilarious.
Later that day, while commiserating with some other gringos, it came up again. As they were from either the West coast or the East coast, I was able to entertain everyone with my spot on requests for a "haat dog, or a poleish saasage. Yu know, aftir da gaame."
More hilarity.
Anyway, my housemate's girlfriend, Paola, says to me, "Everyone tells me I speak spanish with a Chicago accent because I lived there when I was a little girl! You're from Chicago, what do you think?"
Third time today, and it wasn't even brought up by me. Chingada madre.
Well I had no choice but to explain that she did not have a Chicago accent, and that a Chicago accent could be achieved by either holding your nose or joining the Chicago Police Department. I was forced by circumstance to produce another round of impersonations.
Hilarity ensues.
The weirdness was yet to come though. Housemate Paulo was putting on music later in the evening, and Paola was saying something about Oldies. Then I hear "Oldies 104.3..." I stopped her, "What was that?"
"Oh I don't know, I just said it."
"You know that's the Chicago radio station that plays the oldies, right? You just pulled it up out of the attic of your brain."
"WHAAT!?"
Then the true test, Chicagolanders, you know what I'm going to do:
I put Paola to this one,
Complete the jingle everybody:
Five eight eight, two three hundred ____________
She totally got it. And had no idea how. First she got the tune, then without me telling her, she came up with "Empire."
That old man has international scope.
Depressing.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
little hurt
that I did not get similar treatment...
just kidding, happy to be in the same country as Wild Hill for a moment.
So wacky, reading the coverage now...
A lesson for today, a lesson for tomorrow
"Who would like to share their answer with the whole class? Ferdinand? Yes, of course, stand up and read for us! No? Are you sure? Okay, I'll read it..."
(internal monologue: holy shit, this is illegible and makes no sense wtf wtf wtf, everyone is staring and waiting...wtf wtf wtf...okay Prof. Brendan, time to lie like the wind!)
Today was my first experience up in front of my two sections of 5 grade English. It was great, but it did not come without a few surprises.
Surprisingly, everyone listened to me! However, the new teacher phase will wear off soon enough. The rest of the surprises were all in the moment...like the scene above. I just ignored what was on Ferdinand's paper and summarized his answers. I made the best of what was there, putting together the pieces.
This is what everyone does with my spanish, i'm sure. I have a little piece here and a little piece there.
When I walked out of my house today, I saw this:
The similarities to my brain right now are shocking.
But its also every young person in my class, what I know of them is so small...a flash of color here, a fragment there. Am I looking at the polished side of this one, or the unpolished side? Will i see a beautiful fragile pattern emerge tomorrow, or a simple, strong lines and clean edges?
Like this bucket of broken tiles could become a mosaic, I hope I help to shape something memorable. Today was a beginning.
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