Last days

A few kids admitted to me that no one brings them lunch at school. Most kids have moms that bring them their lunch and then sit with them through the gate and eat with them. But not all of them. When I pressed them further they admitted that they dont eat breakfast either, or dinner. They resort to eating whatever scraps they can find. One of my favorite little (trouble making) 8 year olds is left alone all week long. His parents abandoned him and his grandparents visit him on the weekends. So he sleeps in a little shack by himself and makes his own food. He says he only knows how to make eggs with hot dog..so thats what he eats every day. 

One teacher has a soft spot for the stray dogs that roam freely through the school so she puts out some dry dog food. I've caught a few of the kids eating the dog food. These arent curious unknowing toddlers but full grown eight, nine, ten, eleven and twelve year olds. They are literally starving. There is a little food stand in the school where they sell little sandwiches and juice. So far I havent really offered or given much money to the beggers or homeless people here. I know I dont have much and even a million dollars wouldnt be enough to help everyone who asks. People ask for money all the time. We kind of had to learn to just ignore it. But one boy asked me for money for a piece of bread on monday and I knew he really needed it. So I bought one sandwhich and told him to share it with his friend who also looked starving. I didnt think he would actually share it so I spied on them and saw them walk around the corner where they sat on a bench and split the sandwhich. The next day I couldnt help it anymore..I bought ten kids lunches. They were running around screaming and dancing. Kids shouldnt get that excited over being able to eat lunch. It was really special but really heartbreaking. There are only 8 days left of school so I will buy them lunch for the rest of my time here. Its too hard to say no. 

So many of the kids I work with our Caleb's age. They tell me how their parents beat them, abandon them and leave them home alone for days at a time. So many cant read and have zero self esteem. Their clothes are in shreds and dirty and they are starving. I cant blame them for any acting out they do in class. 

Not all of them come from homes like that but way too many do. But I love them all so much. I would adopt all of them if I could. I do have to say that these kids rally around each other and care for each other unlike anything I have ever seen. A few kids have pretty major handicaps and disabilities. But the kids will hold their hands to help them walk and always include them in everything. I never see any teasing or  anyone being left out. They have a level of caring and unity that we cannot match. Today a whole third grade class tried to teach me how to play soccer during their recess. I am getting way to attached to all these kids. I think I am too attached to everything here. The whole way of life is so simple and laid back. I like walking around the corner to buy enchiladas from someones porch at night and feeding the pigs with the babies. I like washing my clothes in buckets and knowing that everyday around 6 there will be a huge thunderstorm that will kill all the bugs (hopefully). 

There are parts of life I wont miss though. Right now its midnight and I am in bed trying to sleep. Its going to be impossible though...there is music blasting to an exteme I have never experienced. Its like there is a huge rock concert 5 feet away. My ears hurt. Its been going on for 7 hours already and shows no sign of stopping. Gotta love it though! The people here are hard core partiers! There are huge parties every weekend!

Last week we went to an interesting party. For lack of a better name it was basically a loss of virginity party. Here whenever a guy a girl are ready to get married or whatever they just sneak off for the night. The next day the parents cry and then plan the wedding (even if the girl is 13). That night they invite the whole town over to eat endless amounts of ice cream and celebrate/mourn the coming marriage. Its pretty funny. I liked the ice cream though! 

Our professor was in town a few weeks ago and took us all to guanajuato again. I ate the best ice cream of my life and also found some decent enchiladas (shamefully I like american enchiladas better than the real ones). The next day we went to a rancho wedding. The mass and wedding itself were in this adorable tiny church. We all three rice at them afterwards and then went to a nearby house to celebrate. The party after the wedding went from 2 to 1 am. The bride and groom were in charge of cleaning and serving all the food. It was weird to see the bride walking around the whole time cleaning and getting all dirty. At one point it starting downpouring (we were all outside in the dirt) and she was in her huge white wedding dress and it got all soaked in mud and red mole. They also had pictures of random people on their wedding day everyday (i think it was supposed to represent the bride and groom but they just dont have their own pictures?). The traditional wedding and party meal is rice, mole and shredded pork. I used to really love it but then it gave me food poisoning and I've had a hard time eating it since then. Anyways the party was so long and so loud that me and Abbey decided to leave after only 6 hours of it. We tried to find the bus but were in this tiny town and got lost. We ended up walking a good hour or two along these strawberry fields in the wrong direction. Luckily we ended up finding someone who gave us a ride back to the rancho. 

I went to the high school graduation here and it was really cute. There werent very many graduating (most kids drop out after middle school). But the ones who were had their parents walk with them. There was one man who walked to get the diploma with his daughter and you could just tell that he was really proud. He was wearing pretty destroyed jeans and was a rough looking man. I watched him as he went back to a little ice cream cart where he sells ice cream all day in the street. He probably never even went to kindergarten (most adults here didnt) and I can't imagine what a huge deal it is that he got his daughter all the way through high school. It was special. 

La Calera (my rancho) had its big rancho party a few weekends ago. It was basically a small fair in the plaza but everyone took it very seriously. Rosa wanted us to get all dressed up so we could find a husband there. It was pretty funny. Sadly we didnt find any future husbands there and she was upset. 

I finished up all my therapy sessions this week. I am going to miss all my kids so much. They are all so special and all just want to be better and have better lifes. I have learned tons from each of them. Some of the teachers and the principal told me that they have seen a lot of improvement in the kids I worked with. ( I ended up focusing on 60). That made me feel better about this whole thing..I think a lot of them just lacked some positive attention. 

On Tuesday me and Abbey decided to go on one more adventure. We went to see a huge Christ statue on a mountain (like a mini one of the one in Brazil). We thought it would be a short little few hour trip. We had to take a bus to Silao and then from there we took an old, green rickety bus up the mountain. It ended up being a two hour bus ride up the edge of a mountain. We went through multiple mountains actually. Everything was green and there were beautiful plants and trees everywhere. I felt like I had left Mexico. It was really just out in the middle of no where. The street we drove up on was cobble stone and a huge thunderstorm came. It was raining so hard we couldnt see out of the window and I was really worried about driving or slipping off the side of the cliff. Once we made it to the top it was really raining too hard to stand around and enjoy the Cristus statue. It was actually too foggy to even see it and it was getting dark but we enjoyed it none the less. We were the only ones on the bus ride the way down so our bus driver just stopped randomly outside of a house and invited us inside to eat. We ate deep fried chilies stuffed with cheese. I was relieved when we got off the mountain but we still had to take the bus back to our rancho. The bus driver didn't want to drop us off outside of our rancho so we had to walk along side the freeway for awhile.  It was an adventure. 

We went to Leon last weekend since it was our last weekend here in Mexico. I got really into the food while I was there and just ate my heart out. I think it was because I know that good (mexican) food is shortly coming to an end. Leon also had some beautiful cathedrals....but the food was the main highlight (as it normally and rightfully is). 

We started teaching a little family literacy at night. I kind of drag my feet to go because I am so exhausted after being in the school all day but its turned out to be a good experience. The other day we were talking to the grandma about teaching her to read too. She said no because she has no weave all these baskets for her job. We offered to teach her while she worked or to even help her. She said it was too hard for us to do and that she wouldn't be able to focus on weaving the baskets and learning at the same time. I thought she was just rattling off a bunch of excuses. But then we went back to teach the son and she was on the floor making the baskets. She had long sticks of bamboo around all around her and was using this huge knife to skin the bamboo. Then she used the knife to kind of peel the bamboo into long shreds. I was worried about her stabbing herself with the huge knife. But her hands were hard and had cuts all over them. She had to kneel to make all the cuts and got out of breath doing it all. I'm not doing a very good job at describing this but trust me when I say a 25 year old man would have a hard time doing it. It looked extremely labor intensive and dangerous. It also was something that I would not be able to do (she was right).

 Being here has really taught me to value my education and to value the opportunity that America offers. She probably spends at least one very labor intense hour making a basket that only sells for 75 cents. That is her job. That's how she supports her family. She is happy and has a beautiful family but I am still grateful that I have the opportunity  to get an education and to not have to peel and cut up bamboo until an old age. We should all be grateful. Our education really is precious and in so many parts of the world people are denied that opportunity. I don't think I will ever complain over homework again (at least I shouldn't). 

Rosa must have decided that we aren't prepared for marriage until we know how to make tortillas. So Monday she taught us how to make both corn and flour tortillas. It was a lot harder than it looks but the flour tortillas were heavenly! She also bought each of us a mini tortilla maker as a goodbye gift. It was very sweet. Rosa feels like a second mom to me. I respect and admire her so much. She is such an incredible woman and I am going to really miss her. On our last day in the rancho we went to the school graduation that was filled with dancing. We said goodbye to the students and the teachers. It is so sad leaving. This place feels so much like home. 

The governor of the state of Guanajuato came to the rancho to give a speech or something. He talked to us white girls for awhile and even invited us to eat lunch with him. It was fun. 

Me and Abbey got about 17 book of Mormons from the missionaries in the city and spent the last day handing them out to pretty much everyone we know. Most of the people have never heard of the church before (there aren't any church buildings, members or missionaries there) so they were all super grateful for the books. It was a cool experience. Hopefully something good happens there someday. 

Rosa and Lencho drove me to the bus station at 5 am this morning. They stayed until my bus left and they both cried a lot. It was so hard saying good bye. I do feel like I am leaving my family here in Mexico. I know I  failed Rosa by not finding a mexican man to marry and wont be staying there forever. But I do think part of my heart will always be here with this family that so fully and generously accepted me into their family. And with all the kids..who have so many problems I desperately wanted to just take away from them. Hopefully I can return with a bit more knowledge, wisdom and money to make the changes that those kids deserve. 

June

Night time is kind of tough here. I try and go to bed but the sound of bugs scratching everywhere and falling on my face makes it hard. Cockroaches are probably the worst (besides spiders of course). They are so big and so thick and hard to kill. I feel like I need a hammer to do it. 

This weekend we went to San Miguel de Allende. It was a four hour bus ride from our rancho but I feel like I entered another world. We passed through super green mountains to get to this little city on the edge of the mountain. Most of mexico that I have seen hasnt been too green so it was refreshing to be in almost a rainforest atmosphere. San Miguel de Allende is a very rich city and half the residents are ex americans and europeans. So the city has a very different feel...its very clean for one thing. But its gorgeous. We spent lots of time in bars watching the american cup soccer games. That was interesting. They had mariachi bands playing in the street all night. It was fun to dance along to. 

Saturday we went to national park thing where we hiked around and looked at different ruins they had. There was also a lake and a bamboo forest..it was really pretty! We meet the most interesting people here. I met one lady about 50 years old from England who is taking the year to travel the whole world..by herself! She is just backpacking the world and is going everywhere. We stayed at a fun hostel this weekend where we met lots of different people. 

We were greeted at home today by 4 new pigs! They are about the size or horses and scream like a dying chimpanzee. We are killing all of them tomorrow in preperation for a wedding this weekend. Its going to be a bloodbath!

Sunday night we went to the town carnival which was adorable! It was fun to see all my students in another setting. I also had some awesome chocolate milk and got to dance around with some babies. I avoided the carnival rides though as I couldnt think of anything more sketchy than mexican carnival rides.

I love my family here. They are so wonderful. At the hospitals here they dont serve any food and most people dont have any money either if they miss work for a day. So the people who have family members in the hospital basically starve. So my dear family came up with the idea of feeding all of them. They made a giant pot of arroz con leche and about 100 mini loaves of bread. Then we drove into the city and parked outside of the hospital and started feeding people. We probably fed about 150 people. It was kind of heartbreaking as there were so many children and elderly and they looked so hungry. Me and Abbey talked about how many people we could feed with $100. A loaf of bread is about 10 cents so thats about 1000 loafs of bread for only $100..,1000 people fed! We plan to do that soon.

People are extremely family centered here. And even though I hear so many horrible stories of abuse all day long here I know that most of the parents are really good. One evidence of that is lunch time at school. All the moms or grandmas or aunts (or all of them) spend the morning making their childs lunch. Then about 30 min before the lunch break they will line the fence of the school (they arent allowed to go inside). When their child has their lunch break they find their family through the fence and they all sit and eat their lunch together (prison style through the fence). Its really cute. 

I finally got bug spray and it is working miracles. I was averaging 15 new mosquito bites a day but I've got that down to nothing! These are exciting times! 

Also it has been raining almost everyday for a few hours which is blessed relief! For a few hours a day I'm not wet with sweat. 

Me and Abbey have been on a world war 2 kick this week (a little random for mexico). We watched Pearl Harbor and Schindler's List. I read some holocaust book here and tonight we are watching The Pianist. Just a random tidbit. 

People are so friendly in our little rancho. Yesterday we went to visit a lady and her daughter who had stopped us on the street asking us to visit them. They were so excited when we came over..literally almost jumping. It was a little overwhelming. Everyone wants to take us on weekend trips with them. I cant count how many random strangers invited us to live with them. They let me know that as long as I am alive I am part of their family and have a bed in their house.

Everyone is so surprised we arent married. Most girls get married around age 15 teen (and get pregnant even earlier). Mama Rosa is constantly dropping heavy hints about what an old maid I am and its time to have children! She has given me lots of grandchildren as options. 

Halfway in!

Its hard to believe but I've been in Mexico for almost 6 weeks already! I feel like there was never a time when I didnt know the people here..they all feel so much like family.

I have gotten into a nice little routine here. I wake up around 8 and drink my banana chocolate milk that Rosa makes us. Then I go to the school across the street where I have my list of students. I talk with each of them for about 20 mins each. Then around 11:00 I go home for lunch. We always eat tortillas and something. Like tortillas beans and salsa. Or tortillas and eggs. Or tortillas with chicken and mole. Or basically tortillas with anything. After lunch we normally fill up some buckets to wash the dishes (all by hand and outside of course). Fun fact: we use the same water to wash the dishes as we do to wash our clothes. We also do a lot of mopping, washing clothes and that sort of thing. When thats done I will spend time holding the babies or sleeping. At 2:00 I go back to the school for more therapy. I take the kids out one by one and then talk to their parents or the teacher or the principal about them. I really enjoy it and think that I am slowly getting better. I have had sessions with 80 kids now and am going to pick a focus group of about 30 of them to focus on for the next 7 weeks. 

After school we have another meal of something with tortillas. Then I play with more babies (my favorite is Katita..she is basically my sister now and I'm taking her home with me). We help make salsa or cut up foods. We sometimes watch mexican novelas with Katy or go on walks with Rosa. Around 7 we almost always walk to the garden where we buy fruit ice cream or sweet bread and sit in the sqaure watching kids run around. The people here are so friendly and I think almost the entire town knows my name (not my real name but my mexican name, Noelia). Shop owners offer their house and anything they have. Its such a cute place and I feel so at home. At night we eat either sweet bread with milk or we go out on the street and Rosa buys us enchiladas or tacos from a lady making them in her front yard. As you can see I am being very well fed. 

People here know me as "the psychologist" not that I have been spreading that. I do tell them I am just in college but they dont seem to care. They stop me in the street and ask me to talk to someone they know. So sometimes at night I have adults come over and I do some therapy with them. I kind of like working with the adults more. It feels more productive. I know the problems of this town pretty well. 

Speaking of problems, the towns water supply has dried up. We had a town meeting last night to decide what to do about that. All the grandpas came in their cowboy hats and everyone was all dressed up for it. It was cute. I felt like I was in stars hollow! Me and Abbey took advantage of out time in the town center and bought some ice cream and corn on a stick.

Sunday my little Katita turned one year old and was thrown the biggest birthday party I have ever seen. The place was decked out in decorations and they dressed her up as a popular tv character. They even put hair extensions in her hair so she could have pig tails. They killed 25 chickens and cut them up. One interesting thing here is that meat is never refrigerated. It will sit out for days-cooked or raw-and then we will eat it. But we havent gotten sick yet so who knows? We spent the weekend cooking and the day of the party about 200 people came. We served them all food and these creepy clowns came.

There were some intense pinatas and the biggest cake I have ever seen. It was fun.

The other day I was putting something in the fridge when I noticed (it was impossible not to notice) the head of a giant pig. This was a pig I had been feeding just a few days before. Now its huge bloody head is in the fridge. Supposedly we are making a soup out of it soon..but its really gross to look at. 

Two weekends ago we went to this city called Celaya. I got some quesadillas there that were truly life changing. This last weekend we went back to Guanajuato. I love that city! We stayed in this adorable old hostel that was built into the mountain and made of old brick and wood. We watched another wedding in the cathedral and went down into some mines. I didnt really enjoy being so deep underground with all my clausterphobia. But I lived! We also went to this mummy museum that guanajuato is famous for. Apparently the dirt in guanajuato is special as in it preserves bodies. So when someone dies they bury them and then uncover them like 5 years later. So they have all these corpses basically on display. It was a little creepy. They had a lot of baby corpses too..it was interesting. 

We also went to a ward talent show that they had in the city. We got up and sang a song from backstreet boys. It was kind of funny. 

I love the busses here. They remind me of Chile. But you have to be careful how you sit or you could break your back. Its so bumpy!

We have been having quite the thunderstorms here! They normally come at night and last hours. The thunder is unreal it is so loud. And the lightning is unending. Its like the light is on basically. I have feared for my life a few times. 

Speaking of storms..I have about 50 mosquito bites on my body right now (not exaggerating). Every morning I wake up with more and more. I dont know what to do. So much for staying zika free haha. 

I have been working pretty close with one kid in the school...little 8 year old marcus. He is a handful. The principal gave him to me as the hardest kid at school. He is always beating others and stealing things. When I first went to observe him he was rolling around on the floor and climbing everywhere. He has a pretty huge group of followers too. The whole class was out of control actually. They are all just beating each other up and climbing and jumping everywhere. But when I talked to Marcus he was such a sweet kid by himself and comes from such a horrible family background. He just needs some love. He is a lot better behaved now and its fun to watch the changes. He is super hilarious. 

Welp its about time to go out searching for popsicles. But I'm well and happy here. I love being here and wish I could stay the whole year. 

Storms and chicken feet

Wednesday I started working at the school. I didnt really know what to do it how to do it but I started with just meeting all the teachers. I just went and knocked on their classroom door and explained I wanted a list of all their students who have social, behavioral, family, emotional and academic problems. Then each teacher would give me a detailed account of each student. Each class has about 40 students. The school has 1st through 7 grade and two classes of each grade. So its a pretty big school! Each teacher gave me around 10 students. We are working with both the morning and afternoon schools so I have about 150 students that I am supposed to counsel and come up with plans for. Now that I know all the students I am going to start meeting with each of them. Once I meet with all of them I will try and meet with their parents. I dont really know where to go from there. I actually have no idea what I am doing but hooefully it all works out. 

It is kind of shocking to see the difference between the schools here and in the US. For one the classes are huge. The teachers leave for hours at a time (who knows where) and most of the kids just come and go as they please. There is chaos everywhere. The teachers are allowed to do about anything they want to the students. Some times I would walk into the class hoping for a private discussion with the teacher about their troubled students..but they would just talk about each student loudly in front of the whole class. Its easy to see why so many students have issues..they are humiliated daily by their teacher. Its sad. We so oftan become what others say we are..and some of these kids have no chance to become anything good. 

Not all the teachers were like that though. Some were really wonderful. There are so many children here who cant write or read even in 6th grade. There are a lot of children who never come to school because they work all day with their parents. There are too many children who come to school starving. They steal from other children or out of trash cans. They misbehave and cant concentrate..because they are hungry. And who can focus on anything when you havent eaten in days. Almost all the children have problems with their teeth from lack of nutrition. There are too many children who come to school in clothes too small or big or dirty or with patches all over them. 

Lice is a big problem too. And even though one wonderful teacher personally washes her students hair they come back to school with lice after sleeping in their bed that is crawling with bugs.

There is so much abuse of every kind. So many (small) children are left home alone all day while their parents work. Or they are taken to work all day. A shockingly high number of children are physically abused on a daily basis by their parents. Some are more horrific than others. Some abused children come to school to fight. Others come and are so traumatized that they cant even speak and sit in a daze all day. 

One huge problem is a lack of education all around. The average age for marriage and pregnancy here is 14 years old. So these little girls get pregnant and hardly know how to read and write themselves. They marry and have multiple children. They are too young and poor to care for their children. They cant help them learn how to read. They dont know how to stand up to their abusive husbands and at 30 years old they are already grandmas. Their hands are cut and worn from years of making baskets all day. Sometimes I feel like they are just too exhausted to have the capacity to care at all for their children. And the cycle continues. The number of mothers who have commit suicide in the last year is shocking. But not too shocking when you look at their life. The poor children who normally find their dead moms after the suicide cannot be expected to have the ability to sit still and behave in school. 

Its all terribly heartbreaking. There is so much suffering everywhere. 

But I am happy to be here. And I hope that I can help someone..even just a little bit. 

Our days teaching and helping at the school are pretty long. Once we get home I normally hold all the babies or help make salsa. I feel incredibly safe in this small town. Me and Abbey have started a great tradition of going to the plaza to eat fruit popsicles after school. The popsicles here are amazing. 

I'm reallt grateful to have Abbey here with me. I think it would all be a bit too stressful without her.

Every weekend we leave the rancho and travel to a different city. This weekend we took two busses to guanajuato. Our family was very worried about us leaving. They watched us get on the bus and made sure we arrived safely to guanajuato. 

Guanajuato is a beautiful city. I feel like I've left Mexico though. Its clean and pretty rich feeling. Its very historic and the buidings are beautiful. All the buildings are brightly colored and from far away it looks like hills of different flowers. All the streets are cobble stone and its full of steep hills and alleys. Its adorable and I totally love it. The city also has historic underground tunnels that go through the whole city. All the busses are cars drive in the tunnels instead of above ground. Its like a huge cave with streets in every direction. I cant really describe it but it was really cool. 

Saturday we explored the shops and the city. At night we watched a wedding in this beautiful cathedral. They had a choir and it all echoed off the marble. It was beautiful. One lady also sang ave maria after the vows. Everyone was super dressed up and the cathedral was pretty dreamy. I loved it. After that we danced along to some mariachi bands in the street. They have a wonderful night life here..and I felt totally safe being out late. They also have some ice cream that is pretty life changing. Oh! I also got a picture with Don Quixote! Apparently in October they have a huge Don Quixote festival here... I wish I was going to be here for it. 

Today we went to church in the city. It was a pretty tiny branch but we had sunday school outside overlooking the whole city. Then we took a bus home. I am happy to be in my little rancho again. I had missed my family here. We got home and Rosa talked about how sad she was that we were gone the whole weekend. We helped make dinner...which was amazing! I have tried mole a number if times here and have never really liked it. But Rosa made a mole tonight that was honestly incredible. I was basically drinking it. We ate it with some wonderful tortillas, tomato rice and some fresh chicken (that they had killed earlier this morning). We also ate some chicken feet. That was hard to eat as it looked just like chopped off chicken feet (which it was). 

After dinner there was some big soccer game so we all crowded into a bedroom to watch it. I got to hold a newborn baby through it so I was happy. Also Ivanna, a very mischevious 4 year old girl did my hair... its basically in knots now.

There is a huge storm going on right now. Our bedroom is wet and it is thundering like I have never heard before. Its also flooded and on the edge of completely flooding the house. Its kind of fun. The family is outside just laughing at it..totally unstressed and having a grand old time. 

The family here is so great. All the kids and grandkids stay over every weekend and are here almost every night. All the aunts are like moms to all the kids. Its really sweet to watch. It makes me think that I dont ever want to live far from mom and dad. I want my kids to grow up next to them. If family is the most important thing than why do we all live so far apart? These people would give up anything to be with their family. 

La Calera

A rancho is a small village. My small village is called "La Calera" and its about an hour or so to the closest city. 

On monday we went to the school to see what we could help with. The school is actually pretty large and has 6 grades..each grade has 2 classes of 40 students each. We talked to the principal of the school about what we could help out with. I expected him to just let us observe classes or maybe tutor some kids. When he learned I was studying psychology he said "great! we need a school psychologist! that can be you!". He told me to talk to the teachers about their troubled students and then to give therapy to them and their parents. When I am done with that he wants me to teach parenting and discipline classes to the teachers and parents. Its incredibly intimidating and obviously I'm super underqualified. I wanted to say no and do something safer but the principal acted like it was a great need and if I do my best I shouldnt do any harm. At the very least I can at least be a friend to the troubled students. The principal was pretty funny though and called us "angels from heaven". Abbey will be teaching english class here. 

Monday evening we went to some political event with our mama Rosa. She knows some top political people here in the state of guanajuato. They wanted to take pictures with us and I was worried we were going to have to give a speech. One of the governor people invited us to their house to ride their horses or something. Sometimes I feel like a celebrity here. And people are a lot nicer when I am here just doing service and not as a missionary. 

We also went to a store in the city with Rosa. She is very protective of us and will not let us go anywhere by ourselves. Not even the bathroom (when we are in the city). She also buys us treats all the time. She bought me an ice cream yesterday and when I had finished she asked if I wanted another. I said no but that made her mad and she got me another one anyways. She spoils us a lot and calls us her "white daughters". We feel like little girls just following her around and eating ice cream. But its fun. She is the sweetest! 

She thinks that we are abandoned children and cannot believe that we live so far from home. All her daughters still live with her and will never leave. She just thinks its the cruelest thing that we were "sent" so far away to study and then all the way here to Mexico. She takes her role of our "mom" very seriously. She feeds us like 6 meals a day and is always checking on us making sure that we are safe. She sends her grandchildren to spy on us when we are in the street. 

Yesterday was mothers day here and its a huge celebration! They celebrated the entire weekend! We went to a festival at the school and watched all the children dress up and do these traditional dances. It was adorable. After all the 13 grandchildren and 5 daughters and us went to go get ice cream. We rode in the back of the truck to get there..all of us. Its a miracle people dont die here more oftan. 

The food is amazing as always. I love just playing with the babies all day and feeding all the goats and pigs. I've gotten used to the roosters in the morning and to only drinking coke (clean water is hard to find). I have almost memorized everyones names and can walk the rancho without getting too lost. I'm also getting used to the heat and becoming okay with always being sweaty and just covered in dirt and sand. Its hard work living here but I enjoy it. The babies are seriously so adorable!!

In the rancho

Mexicans are such funny people...they really crack me up. 

Friday our professor took us to watch the Jungle Book and then we went back to our hostel to pack. We got a taxi to drive us to our little ranchos. Mine is about 40 mins outside of Irapuato..its called "la calera". Our professor came and dropped me and Abby (who will be in the rancho with me) off. The rancho is kind of hard to describe. Its very small and very much something I would picture when I think of Mexico. Its hot. There are hardly any trees and just little sandy dirt roads leading from one house to the next. There are no stores or anything like that. I feel like I have stepped back in time quite a bit. 

My host's mom is named Donia Rosa and she has 5 kids and like 13 grandkids who also most live here too. There is a main part of the house that has a kitchen, bedroom and living room and then there are add on's to the house everywhere. They built in a bedroom in the barn, on the side and in the roof. They make all the roofs flat here so they can just build up when they run out of space. The house is green and surrounded by animals. Most of them are in pens but there are always a few chickens, pigs and dogs running around free. They do most of their cooking outside and there are bathrooms outside of the house. Inside the house there are lots of statues of Mary and Jesus. They kind of scare me a bit. Me and Abby have a room on the roof. We have to climb a kind of sketchy outside staircase to get to it. But we have a great view! There is a giant poster of a baby in our room and lots of little religious statues. There is a door but we always use a lace curtain instead to help with air circulation (did I mention its crazy hot here?). 

When we got here they immediately sat us down to eat. There are so many people here its hard to remember anyone's names or who is related to who. There are a ton of kids here and adorable babies. Friday night we colored with the kids and held the babies. They have us this awesome bread and milk to eat before bed. We went to bed at 11:30 but the rest of the house stayed up until about 3 am blasting music. Then they all woke up at 7..and blasted music again. Its kind of hard to sleep here. We are also surrounded by farm animals and roosters that crow (not once but around 50 times) at 5 am. I cant decide if I think the constant animal noises are soothing or annoying.

Saturday morning we woke up and started doing our laundry. Its kind of a long process. We hook up differnt pipes to get water and then fill up 3 large buckets with water. Afterwards there is some more transporting of water that happens.  The whole washing process happens on the back patio. Then we place some clothes is soapy water and mix that with our hands. After a few mins of that we take the clothes from the soapy water and put it on a curved rock that is shaped like a giant bowl. We kind of knead the clothes on there (it feels a bit like kneading bread. Then we take fresh water and pour it over the clothes and try and knead out the soap. From there we put the clothes in another water bucket with perfume or something in it. Then we knead out the water from it and go hang them up to dry. The whole process took about 4 hours of constant work and my arms and hands just ached after. I gained a new perspective on how hard woman in the past (and in the present in many places) worked just to clean clothes. I felt like a pioneer though and enjoyed doing it. It was very soothing. Its good I liked it since I will probably be doing it every other day. I'm going to get very strong arms. 

I should add that I have changed my name. Everytime I said "Ariah" people would just vacantly stare at me. I decided I needed something more hispanic so I thought I would go by my middle name, Noel. But people were still having lots of trouble with it so now I am Noelia. It feels a little strange introducing myself as that and I still get confused when people say Noelia to me but I'll get used to it. 

I have cooked a lot since I got here. All the woman here mostly spend all day cooking and cleaning. I have made a lot of salsas, tortillas, enchiladas, chiles relleños, pastels and chopoed up a lot of meat and spices. When we are not cooking we play with the little kids and hold the babies. 

Yesterday we went to a little party with our family where we basically just ate. Some other people in our group were there too so it was fun to see them again. Then we came here and started preparing for a party they are having here today. The main portion of that preperation was slautering a lamb. They have a bunch of cute lambs roamimg around the house. My host dad picked (the cutest one) and sliced its throat. Then he hung it from a tree and blew up its stomach a bit. Then they skinned and totally dissected it. It was disgusting. During this all the kids are playing around the puddles of blood and chasing each other with the unattached lambs head! Then they took the parts of the lamb and dissected the guts in the tub right where we had washed our clothes earlier that day. I dont think I'll be able to ever wash my clothes there again. So basically my clothes arent getting washed ever.

After that we ate some awesome tacos and a vegetable soup. Around 10 I was ready to go to bed but they announced that we were going to a circus nearby. We walked into a circus tent. They had like football benches that were about 15 feet high and were made out of plywood that was about 6 inches wide. I cant really explain it but it was really sketchy and I was pretty scared the whole time. The circus had some funny dances but the best part was this gorilla. They turned off all the lights so you could hardly see anything and this guy dressed as a gorilla came out. He started running around and chasing people. When he got them he would grab their hair and YANK on it. He banged peoples heads together and it was absolutly terrifying. People were running up in the bleachers and they were all creaking and I felt like they were all going to break. It was really scary but pretty funny. Not something you would see in a circus in the US. Also they had some kids dress up as rockstars and give lapdances to old grandmas in the audience before the grandpas could slap them away. It was all very different. It ended around midnight and then our host mom announced it was time for dinner so we went to a little taco shack. I was pretty exhausted by then. 

Today our wonderful host mom, Rosa (who is the sweetest lady ever) brought us banana smoothies in bed. We spent the day preparing for dinner and then went with our family to mass. We ate a huge dinner (including the lamb) that was all just amazing! Then we had a tres leches cake for dessert. I'll probably wont fit on the airplane coming home. I am eating very well here. 

I held the cutest babies today. They are all so adorable. I had some good discussions with my new family too. I already feel so at home here. I love everything about this place. I cant even begin to describe the feeling here..but it is a wonderful place. Its not very pretty but the people are amazing. I dont think I'll ever want to leave. 

Holy water and Zika

I thought parots only exsisted in the zoo or in the jungle. But there are about 20 in the trees above me right now making lots of loud noises. I guess I am closer to the jungle than I thought. 

Monday we took a long mountainy bus ride to Cuernavava. Its really pretty here. All the houses are colorful and the streets are really steep and go up and down everywhere. It kind of reminds me of san francisco. There are a lot of trees here and they are all full of these huge colorful flowers. Its all very green and lush. Its kind of a magical place. 

The people here are a lot nicer too and everything is just calmer. Sadly we only stay here until Friday and then we are heading out to the ranchos to start working. 

I think I got a tad bit of food poisoning so I have been much more careful about what I eat. 

I have seen a few billboards about Trump (obviously not in support of him). One nice old man was talking to me about dancing on the street and asked me what I thought about Trump. I told him I didnt like him and he told me that Trump was really mean disrespectful to mexicans. And then I kind of realized how much we would seperate ourselves from Mexico if Trump wins. And that would be a huge loss for us. Our country has always been about accepting immigrants and accepting others. Mexicans and other latinos are extremely hard workers and very kind. It would be damaging to our country if we lost them. 

We are all missing vegetables. I feel like they dont exsist here. If I do see a vegetable I get nervous about eating it because of all the water problems.

Anyways, I am excited about getting to the ranchos! The touring has been fun but its time to do something with a little more purpose.

 I really love my group. I feel like I have known them all forever. 

Yesterday was a terribly long day. We awoke very early to go see some anciant cathedral. There were some mummies in it and lots of fun looking confession booths. There was also a giant tub full of holy water. People come in all day long to fill a cup with the holy water and then have it bless their home for the week. I rubbed some holy water all over my face hoping that it would help my stomach. We also saw a giant marble box thing where they put everyone's ashes. Of course we also went to see some more art that I tried really hard to appreciate. 

Then we drove an hour away from Cuernavava to a mountain with a city of ruins on it. I liked it a lot more than the other ruined city we looked at. There were some trees but it was extremely hot. We walked along the ruins through these hills until we came across this cave. We stepped in and walked through these dark tunnels for longer than I would have liked. I was pretty proud of myself for staying calm in this place of my three greatest fears (spiders, the dark and small enclosed places). It was a really narrow tunnel until we came to this opening. There was a pinhole of a opening in the ceiling that the sun shone through. We were there to watch the sun's cycle or something. We sat in a circle around this tiny drop of light and watched as it grew bigger and bigger and then started shaking a bit. And then (an hour later) the cycle was done and it disappeared.  We just sat in the cave in silence watching the circle of light. It was pretty cool. 

Then we walked around the pyramids and ruins. We saw all the different places they did human sacrifices.  We were up in this mountain for 5 hours without any water. It was around 110 degrees and humid walking up and done these stone stairs. A couple times I thought I was going to die but we made it back down the mountain and someone was selling cold coke and the end. It was a wonderful moment to have liquid again. 

After we went to a nice restaurant for dinner and then we all jumped in the hotel's pool. Our professor is really funny and played marco polo in the pool with us for a long time. It was our last day all together so that was sad.

This morning we woke up to travel 2 hours back to mexico city and then took another bus 5 hours to Irapuato. We are staying in a hostel type place here. Lets just say its not the cleanest place. We will be here tomorrow getting trained and then saturday we are splitting up into our little ranchos! 

Landes, our wonderful security guy, left us this morning. He is headed back to the states. I was really sad to see him leave. I also feel a lot less safe with him gone. Our professor is leaving on saturday and then its just going to be the 6 of us..seperated from each other..in this place that seems like it truly is in the middle if no where.

Today is cinco de mayo and Mexico has made it quite clear that they do not celebrate it. Most people here don't even know what it is and there is no sign of any celebration going on anywhere. I thought that was funny. 

Anyways, I think the next week will be pretty tough but it should be good! 

PS. I'm testing out the whole zika virus thing. So far I have about 10 mosquito bites but I'm still feeling good! I will keep you updated ;)

People places and things

We went to the panaderia for breakfast this morning again. I got this raspberry stuffed bread thing that was covered in raspberry sauce and powdered sugar. It was actually good and not dry! So the day started off good! We were also able to sleep in. 

We went to a diego riveras museum and then some other musuem. I'm getting kind of sick of art. Then we went to this place called chupetic park. Its this huge park..kind of like golden gate park. There were vendors everywhere selling all these wonderful things. I thought about getting you all some gifts but then I remembered what you all did with the gifts from Chile. 

Anyways, we walked around this big palace thing and then went to the museum of anthropology which was huge and super cool! I'll send lots of pictures of that. Oh, we ate lunch at this outdoors patio that was super good! I got some awesome flautas (basically taquitos but softer). 

We got back to the hotel around 9 but I was still hungry so we roamed the streets looking for tacos. We found this heavenly taco place. I only got 3 tacos but I should have gotten 20. They were these tacos made with lamb amd pineapple and were just out of this world! You know when you eat something and its just so amazing that you cry a little? Well I took a bite of that glorious taco and almost had a meltdown. It was like a little piece of heaven. I'm really hoping that they are open for breakfast tomorrow. The place was very interesting as well..you almost couldnt breath it was so crammed. They also were frying the tacos like 8 inches behind me and it was all pretty hot and steamy. You dont care about those things though when you are eating dewdrops of perfect love. 

I'm doing well (obviously..all I do is eat tacos). I look similar to a lobster but I'm going to buy a hat tomorrow to help with that. 

When we were walking down this super busy street I saw a vendor lady. Backstory: lots of vendors dont have permits to sell so they just lay their merchendise out on blankets on the side of the street and if they see a police man they just roll it up in their blankets really quick. So they are some of the poorer people. Anyways, I looked down and saw this lady changing her babies diaper on the blanket where she sells her merchandise. It made me feel bad that neither this lady nor her baby get any privacy. 

They are out in that street all day trying to make some money and who knows if they have any sort of home to go back to after. Its a really hard life. I was thinking about the desperation that must come from having to change your baby's diaper on the place you work with hundreds of people almost stepping on you. Then I noticed that this lady didnt have any hands. It was one of those kind of startling images that really stays with you. We are all really blessed for everything we have. The people here work sunup to sundown (literally) 7 days a week without any breaks or vacations.

I hope you all have a great day!

So yesterday was another musuem day. We went to Frida Kaulo and Diego Rivera's house and toured around there. That wasnt super impressive but someone was selling bowls of fresh mangoes outside that were amazing!! The mangoes were creamy and just melted in your mouth. It was incredible. 

After the mangoes we went to this little historic church in this cute town and to a hippie market. 

We passed a bunch of teenagers in the back of a truck and they were kind of laughing at us at yelled out "where are you from?". My professor yelled back "del infierno!" (from hell). It was really funny. He's a funny guy. 

Today we got up really early to take 3 different metros to get to church. I really dislike the metros but I'm getting more used to them. It was so fun to be back in a latino ward. I felt so at home. Its interesting to see how much more they focus on the basics of the gospel here (and in chile) and they dont get caught up in far off doctrine things. It feels much more like a "everyone is learning together" experience and not a show off show that happens so much in the US. Its just a different feeling that I like a lot more. I wish our US wards could be more like these latino wards. They are so sincere. 

After church we went to the famous basilica where the virgin guadalupe has her cape or something. We attended this huge mass with incense flying everywhere. It was interesting to see people crawling about. A lot of people put a towel under their knees and crawl all the way to the cathedral from outside the gate (thats like a 1/4 mile!). It was fun to see everyone with roses to lay at the alter and kissing everything. I think the whole city was at mass. Its nice to see a whole country so religious. 

I got to eat more of those amazing tacos today. People in my group have become amazed at the amount that I can eat. I dont know why they are surprised..this is what I have been training my whole life for. 

I am continually amazed at how hard everyone works here. Most of it is hard physical labor in the sun for 15+ hours a day. And yet they are still mostly happy and kind. We walked by this huge fountain in front of a musuem and saw about 20 kids playing and swimming inside it. Some of the adults were in it too and everyone was splashing everything. They have their priorities straight here. They work hard for their family and any extra time they spend devoted to them. Social appearances and any sort of competition hardly exsists. I think that is a great example to follow. 

I love Mexico City. I love more than just the food (although that is a huge thing for me). I love all the cathedrals and the street dancing and how at any moment you can count at least 15 police in sight. We are leaving tomorrow..and I am sad. I love these streets. 

First week in TacoLand

So today has been pretty great. I forgot how much I love it here..it is going to be hard going back. I had myself convinced that America was great and that I liked it but now I can see that was just a lie.

I got on my flight to phoenix easily but then we had an extra long delay and I was late to my next flight. They held the flight for me and I ran on just as they were closing the doors. I sat next to this boy who is in my internship. 

There is this guy who is a security person from byu who will be with us for our first two weeks here. He has lived in mexico for a couple years. Once we got to the hotel he took us to this taco shack. You just walk in a say how many you want and they slam them on your plate. Then there are just these long tables in the back and like lettuce and gaucamole dispersed randomly throughout the place. I got 6 tacos and a coke for $1.50!!

I sat in this dirty little corner with my plate that is covered in plastic (they cover plates with plastic bags and put the food on top so when you are done you just throw away the bag and give the clean plate back). I started eating these tacos and oh my goodness I wanted to cry! They were amazing!! out of this world!! I ate all six quickly and couldnt believe what I have been missing out on my whole life!! Seriously so good! It was worth this whole thing just to eat those tacos!!

The wimpy boys i am with were only able to eat like 4. By the way there are four girls and 3 boys in this. They will put two of us in each town. 

After the amazing tacos we walked around the historic part of the city for a bit. It is so pretty here and the weather is perfect!  We went to mass for a bit in this huge gorgeous cathedral. There is so much energy here and so much diversity. I love the atmosphere and had forgotten how much I miss it. We watched some dancers in the street. Now I am back in my room and we are watching princess diaries in spanish. I'm really exhausted. 

Tomorrow morning we are waking up early to get fruit platter for breakfast and then we are going to take busses to some anciant ruins and pyramids. We will be there most the day and then we are going to some ballet folklorico at night.

Anyways, I'm super excited to be here! All the food looks amazing and I'm excited to eat all of it. I will probably gain a lot of weight but its for a worthy cause. Those tacos were so amazing!! I think this is going to be a lot more fun than I thought. This city is amazing! and i love being surrounded by latinos again! I feel so at home here!

Also my roommate already got pickpocketed so I will just have to be extra diligent!

Hello all, 

So Landes is the guy in charge of all BYU international security and he is here with us in mexico city for these 2 weeks. He reminds me a lot of that dad in Taken so I am in good hands. While he is here there is no need to worry! He doesnt normally come with students to their study abroads and internships but he said he was looking for an excuse to come eat tacos in mexico. He has some pretty fun crazy stories about BYU students in trouble so its been a good time! 

Yesterday we woke up bright and early to bus to some pyramids outside of the city. It was this whole aztec city that they uncovered. There were like 30 pyramids in circles and rows and then 2 huge ones! They were as tall as skyscrapers! We walked up and down some of them but it was kind of scary because there was no railing and they were super steep and high up. I had the sensation of falling the whole time. The sun was also pretty strong out there. But it was cool seeing the ruins of this whole city and then the pyramids too! Apparently they have found some treasures in the walls of the pyramid. There is another wall they know there is treasure in but they are not allowed to "discover it" until the president is there to "discover it" and form a nice distraction for some political mishap. I thought that was pretty funny. 

After we went to this plaza where they had a massacre in 1968 I think. It was right before the olympics were held in mexico and a lot of the people were upset. They didnt want to hold the olympics because it was expensive and it was the people who would be in debt and working to pay it off the rest of their life. Anyways, they were protesting and causing a scene. So the mexican president was told that if he didnt get a handle on the situation they would hold the olympics somewhere else. It was a week before the olympics were supposed to start and the president devised this plan. He took a bunch of soldiers and police and had them dress as civilians. He then gave them all a white glove. Then they went out into this plaza where the protesters were and they joined them. Then when a airplane flew past (the sign) all of the police or soldiers put on their one white glove so they could identify one another. Then they just started shooting. They estimate that about 400 people died that day. And the next day the plaza was cleaned of blood and no newspaper or radio said anything about it. It was like it never happened. It wasnt until recently that they have been allowed to talk about it.  I thought that was an interesting story.

After we saw all these ruins we got home in the evening and I had some enchiladas for dinner. They were kind of weird and I wasnt totally in love. At night we went to this dance show thing. It was at this really awesome opera house that was super pretty. I was a little suspicious of it though since in reminded me of the opera houses in phantom of the opera, mission impossible 5 and Abe Lincolns opera house. Good things did not happen there so I was a little worried. But it was fine. The dancing was cool but I was pretty sleepy and having trouble concentrating. After I had to walk the streets for a bit looking for a pharmacy that was still open (i got a pretty bad sunburn and wanted aloe vera..didnt find any though). 

This morning we woke up early to watch the soldiers put up this huge mexican flag in front of the national palace. They had a huge marching band and like 100 soldiers participating to put it up. That was nice. I felt very patriotic. 

I went to a little panaderia for breakfast in search of bread. I was kind of dissapointed. I was spoiled with the bread in chile (which was straight from heaven) and the bread here is pretty dry and flaky. So I will probably stay away from that. 

After we went to a musuem about sur juana. Then we went to this big market place. One part of it they call "prostitute street" because there is a prostitute like every 5 feet. It was kind of strange because its not a bad part of the city at all. There were also families everywhere and it just seemed very out of place. A lot of the girls looked like they were only 13! Its sad.

I love all the colors everywhere. The hills are just covered in cololful houses. We were talking about how first world and third world countries grow. First world countries grow when someone arrives with a new skill. Sqauter communities here in third world countries start in different ways. Mexicos rural areas are shrinking and people are forced to move into the city. But they have no money and no where to go once they get here. So they meet with a member of a sqauter community and get on a list to build a house. They wait a couple years and pay some money and then are told to meet in a certain spot. So like 500 families all meet in an open place at night and are told to build a house before dawn. They all scramble and build something and in the morning a whole new community is there. No one owns the land but there are so many houses and people that the police dont get involved. So thats how mexico is growing. 

The politics and goverment here are really interesting. 

We went on the metro today. That was an experience I didnt enjoy. I thought the busses in chile were bad. We basically fell onto the metro and it was so packed! Our security hero, Landes, was yelling at us to keep our hands in our pockets to protect our possessions. The moment I got in there I could feel hands going down all my pockets. Luckily my phone was in my purse that I had covered with my hands. It was impossible to see who was doing what as it was so crowded. Everything was sweaty and gross and I felt faint. But even if I did faint i wouldnt have fell down because i was so slammed against other people that i would have stayed up straight. It was unpleasent. 

We also went to different art museums today. Art is great and all but I get my fill in a few minutes. We probably spent like 6 hours in art museums. People were ohhing and aweing over different pieces but i thought some of them looked like they had been painted by a pack of preschoolers. 

We were supposed to go around 6 to watch them take down the flag but they were late in doing it. I can hear them doing it now (its 11:00 haha). 

Anyways, I'm pretty exhausted. Tomorrow we are going to some more musuems and famous parks or something. My goal is to find a good tamale tomorrow. That sounds nice. I will try and send like 50 pictures tonight so that I can make more space on my phone. Good night!