The food here is awesome but I eat so so so much. My mamá is an amazing cook but I seriously never want to eat again. Ever. I feel sick after every meal because of how much she gives us. And she’s always offering us more, which I almost always turn down. But here’s an example to demonstrate the situation: today at lunch, she gave us large plates each with an entire fish and lots of vegetables including potatoes. An entire fish with the head and everything. It watched me as I ate it…creepy. Anyway, the way the food is cooked makes it very heavy and filling. They use a lot of fat and savory flavors in cooking pretty much everything. So when I saw the plate, it seemed challenging but not the most food she’s ever given us. I would be stuffed but okay. Then she brought each of us a bowl full of beans. And a BUNCH of hot tortillas. As always, the food tasted great but I felt despair as I began to feast. When I was almost done, I felt SUPER full. But I was almost there. Then, she asked me if I wanted salad. I said no, thanks. So she asked me if I was sure because there was salad if I wanted it. So I said no, thanks. And she asked me again if I was sure. So I said, yes I’m sure but thank you. About two minutes later, she asked me again if I wanted salad. The end of the meal was in sight and I did NOT want salad. So I said AGAIN, no thank you. And she asked me again if I was sure so I said, yes I’m full. About two minutes later she AGAIN asked me if I wanted salad. So I said no. And she asked me if I wanted just a little bit. I said no. She asked, “not even a little bit?” So I gave in. I agreed to eat a little bit of salad, thinking it would be some iceberg lettuce and carrots (that’s what their leafy salads are here). It wasn’t iceberg. It was a heavy, savory salad with lots of potatoes and mayonnaise. I thought I was going to lose everything currently occupying my extremely stretched stomach. But I did it. I ate it. As I forced down the last bite, she brought out a dessert. Distraught, I watched her come towards me with the desert. It was a little bit like flan except richer, heavier, and with a honey flavor. Emphasis on the heavier part. Eating that entire piece was so hard! With each bite, I had to concentrate to get it down. The last bite was the worst. My stomach screamed “NOOOOO!” as I forced it into my esophagus. After I finished, I hurried to put my plate in the sink and escape before she gave me anything else. So here I am, writing this with no desire to ever eat again.
Anyway, here’s an update:
After class on Thursday, my mamá invited Mari and I to go somewhere with her and I didn’t really understand what it was, but I went along and when we arrived, I realized it was a tiny daycare-like place for extremely poor children. It’s free and they go there after school to do their homework and eat a meal. For some of them, it’s the only real meal they eat that day. The point of it is to keep them somewhat supervised during the day and attempt to help them succeed in school. It was a dirty, tiny place that was way understaffed. I saw three workers for 40 children. And it’s all volunteer. The lady that runs it lives there. The “facilities” included two tiny, old buildings without air conditioning. Put together, the buildings were smaller than my crappy little apartment at the Elms in Provo. For 40 children. And they were very young children, about 5-9 years old. It was so sad. Mérida is nicer than most cities in Mexico and still that level of extreme poverty exists. I’ve never seen anything quite like it. It’s super sad. :( My mamá is part of a service committee in her church and she donates food and time several times each month.
Later that day, I went the El Centro with some people in the program to visit some museums. There are a LOT of them in Mérida! In one of the museums, I found this sign:
I think it does an excellent job of describing the buses here haha. They drive so fast and at times are SO full of people! I'm usually standing, squished between people on the way to school each morning. Anyway, after the museum, I went with Laurel to the institute building for a class. And it turns out there was no class haha. So we went with a couple of friends (Beto, Thomás, and Edwin) to “El Parque de los Americas,” a really big, nice park. We played “busca busca” (hide and go seek) and sardines. It was so fun!
The next picture is of an amphitheater in the park. It's so cool! It's really big and it was constructed so someone on one end can whisper against the wall and someone on the other end can hear them perfectly.
On Friday, I went to the beach and ate a REAL churro from a street vendor there. It was sooooo good! And way cheap. It costs 20 pesos ($1.70) for seven large churros. Later that evening, Laurel, Beto, and I went to a crepe street vendor. That lady KNOWS how to make crepes! I had the “sensación” which included two different types of chocolate, kiwi, and strawberries. Mmmmm….
After the crepe place, we went to………LA CARRERA!!! La carrera is a drag race. They happen every Friday night beginning at 10:30 p.m. It was awesome! It’s legal here…they had police watching from afar and an ambulance waiting just in case. Some of the cars were REALLY nice and others were souped-up crappy cars.
Beto is way into cars so the carrera was his kind of thing. He has a friend who has a nice, carrera-worthy car and he told us he raced it once. He said that he could get his friend to let us try it if we wanted to. I really really wanted to. I mean, it's not like I have any idea how to race. And it's not because I enjoy doing that kind of thing but because it's something awesome that I will never get another chance to do. But the program has strict rules against driving cars so there is NO WAY ON EARTH I would be allowed to participate in a drag race haha. Also, it's super dangerous and I value my life. But still...if the rules weren't in place, I think I would have taken him up on his offer. Maybe.
On Saturday, I went to Chichén Ítza, one of the seven wonders of the world! It was bigger and more spread out than the other ruins we visited.
There were TONS of people selling stuff, and a large portion of them were Mayan. There were lots of TINY Mayan girls selling items and I felt sooooo bad for them. It was obvious that walking around in the heat, begging people to buy their stuff was not easy. After going to the tiny place for the poor children on Thursday, I just felt so bad for the little children, forced to spend their days begging people to buy their stuff in order to eat. I couldn’t keep saying no to them. Their disappointed, frustrated faces were so pitiful. It just kept reminding me of the place with all of the poor kids. I talked to one of the little girls. Her name is Lili and she is five years old. A little five year-old spending her days basically begging for money. I took a picture with a couple of the kids and then decided to buy something from them. They were selling little embroidered handkerchiefs. I definitely didn’t need any but they cost less than a dollar each so I said I’d buy one. Instantly, about ten little children surrounded me, begging me to buy their handkerchief. I couldn’t decide. How do you choose between those poor little kids? So after several moments of feeling terrible, I picked a random one. The other kids walked away, dejected. Lili came up to me and reminded me in her adorable little voice that she was my first friend. How could I say no to that? So I bought another one from her.
The smallest girl on the left by the Mayan woman is Lili.
On the way back from Chichén Ítza, our tour bus was stopped by the police. A cop entered the bus and asked us for our passports. I had a bit of an “oh crap!” moment because I definitely do not carry a copy of my passport with me. I know I should…we’ve been told several times that we need to, but I never got around to making a copy of it. Luckily, most of the people didn’t have their passports so after making us wait for a while, he let us go. So that was my encounter with the police here. Hopefully it’s the only encounter haha. The police here are super scary and sketchy.
