Classes ended well and I’m definitely going to miss my teachers! They were so great! I’ve had some awesome Spanish teachers at BYU but it’s definitely different when it’s a native speaker teaching you. Here is my Spanish 205 teacher (Mariana) with all two of my classmates and I:
Mariana is on the far right
And my conversation class teacher (Addy) and I:
Addy is super fun and definitely taught us the truly useful things when it comes to getting by in a Spanish-speaking country. Some of the things she taught us were……uncomfortable haha but it was good to learn them anyway.
So in my previous post, I talked about La Michocana and our dear old friend Jesús. Well, I got a picture! Here we are:
He’s a crack addict and I’m pretty sure he thought we were really annoying as we asked him what each of the different things were. But we’re gringas. We had never heard of “chaya” or “paletas de tamarindo.”
Also, I previously wrote a little about my hammock. Well I got a picture in it:
Now that I’m back, I SERIOUSLY miss sleeping in it. I’ve been trying to figure out how to set it up in my little apartment but I don’t think it’s going to end up happening. :( I can’t install hooks in my weak, thin walls and hammock stands are EXPENSIVE! I thought about somehow hooking it outside of my window and then maybe on my dresser or something but every time I think about having that kind of set-up in my tiny room, I laugh out loud. Haha.
So now I’ll talk about my last few days in Mérida. First of all, I didn’t sleep much the last two weeks I was there. I got tons of sleep my first few weeks…but then I made friends haha. The last week in particular, I didn’t make curfew once. By a lot. I feel kinda bad about blatantly admitting that. But it’s true. Program rules said we had to be home by 12pm each night (except Friday, which was 1:30am). My mamá was super easy-going and cool so she told me I just needed to send her a text if I was going to get home late. So that’s what I did every night for the last week. In fact, here is a picture of James and I giggling as we point to the clock in el Centro that proves we were out late:
The next day (still during the program), he posted it on facebook. I told him that was a baaaaaad idea and he took it off until about a week ago. He’s not as experienced with sneaking around and breaking the rules as I am. Rule #1: don’t blatantly advertise what you’re doing! I could make a book or something. That is definitely NOT a good thing… While I'm making confessions....I went on a date. Dating is strictly prohibited so I didn't tell ANYONE about it during the program. It wasn't a REAL date in the fact that Beto and I have no romantic interest whatsoever with each other. But it was a date in the fulfillment of the 3 P's. It was paired off (just the two of us), paid for (he bought me a bottle of water and entrance into the Carrera's), and planned...sort of. We invited other people but it ended up just being the two of us to go. So we made it a date. We went to the carreras again (the drag racing). It was fun! Except Beto spent the entire "date" going on and on about how he's hopelessly in love with a girl in my program hahaha...here we are:
Another confession...actually, let's just keep that one quiet. ;)
Anyway on Monday (of my last week), I went to the Canul home for FHE. It was fun! I really really like that family. They’re so welcoming and really good people. I stayed there….for a LONG time and got home super late. Then went to class the next morning. On Tuesday night, David, Yorch, Markz, James, Laurel, and I went to the beach. At midnight haha. It was really cool. The weather was awesome and watching the ocean as it stretched into darkness was sweet!
Another confession...actually, let's just keep that one quiet. ;)
Anyway on Monday (of my last week), I went to the Canul home for FHE. It was fun! I really really like that family. They’re so welcoming and really good people. I stayed there….for a LONG time and got home super late. Then went to class the next morning. On Tuesday night, David, Yorch, Markz, James, Laurel, and I went to the beach. At midnight haha. It was really cool. The weather was awesome and watching the ocean as it stretched into darkness was sweet!
So by the time we got back, it was LAAAATE! I got about 3 hours of sleep that night. The next day, I went to a mall with James and Jonatan. It was super fun! I LOVE these guys!!
The mall totally had an ice skating rink INSIDE of it!
For lunch, James bought us pizza from Los Trompos. He had some left over pesos haha. I definitely did not. We got pizza al pastor, which means it had meat al pastor on it. It was phenomenal! We ate the WHOLE thing! Meaning, we jokingly got Jonatan to eat the last few pieces even though he was already stuffed. We told him, he’d have to eat a lot of food he doesn’t like on the mission! James also packed in a few extra pieces. :)
That night, we went to the chapel for a final institute activity. They planned it specially for us. It was super fun but SO flippin sad! It was where we said goodbye to our friends. I was so sad to say goodbye. Even now, four weeks later, I’m feeling super emotional just by looking at pictures and reminiscing for this post.
That night, I went with Jonatan and Beto to buy a rose and deliver it to the front porch of a girl Beto likes. It was really fun haha. When Beto tried to deliver the rose undetected, Jonatan kept making noises and throwing stuff. It was FUNNY! Beto is such a payaso (clown) that he laughed as he kept trying to get close enough to the house to drop off the flower. Then, we went back to the church and spent some more time with friends there. Finally, people started to leave and I went to hang out with David and the Canuls again. They wanted to see us off at the airport the next morning, so they offered to take my roommate and I, which I though was awesome. My mamá was super grateful for that too because we had to be at the airport at 5am and it’s hard for her to get up and going so early since she’s elderly. After a few hours of hanging out, it was getting kind of late so we decided to stay up all night. At that point, we only had a few hours left anyway. So we went to a bus station to say goodbye to a few people from my program (they were going to another part of Mexico before heading back to the US). Then, we drove around the city blaring music. Then, we picked up James (he had been hanging out with a GIRL!) and went to buy a GIANT hamburger to share from a street vendor. James liked this girl and our Mexican friends egged him on like you would not believe. They convinced him to tell her the four magic words: "Solo vine por ti." (It means "I only came for you.") and four more magic words: "por ti, dejaría todo." (for you, I would leave everything.) Well...it turns out they're not so magical after all. Or maybe you have to be Mexican for the magic to truly work. Or maybe they're just super creepy. Either way, poor James got rejected. Pobrecito. Anyway, here's that giant hamburger I was talking about:
After a significant amount of chatting, eating, and enjoying one last night together, we realized it was 4:00am. Time to head back to my place to pick up my baggage and my roommate! I was super sad to say goodbye to my Mexican home and mamá. After we loaded our stuff and started to drive away, I realized I didn’t have a picture of my host mom! Que triste!! At the airport, Yorch told me that he left me a surprise in my back pack. I later found a book and letter. (I asked him once about books in Spanish because I'd like to find some good ones!) He’s so nice! He, David, and Markz were super amazing and I didn’t have to carry a bag until we got to the point where we said goodbye. That was so difficult! I’ve always hated goodbyes.
Being the funny, amazing, wonderful person he is, Markz tried to lift the mood a bit by pretending to try to run after us, past the point where you are required to have a ticket in order to pass. You can see Yorch and David had to hold him back. ;)
Now for the final part of my trip…the original travel plan was to go from Mérida to Houston to Salt Lake City. I got to Houston okay but while I was waiting for my connection there, the airline official said they were overbooked and needed some volunteers to take a detour. She said the volunteer would receive a $300 credit to Continental Airlines. So I ran. And being the first person in line, I beat EVERYONE. So I received my voucher and my new flight plan was Houston to Phoenix to Salt Lake City. Not too bad, right? It only meant I’d be traveling for a few hours more. BUT, the plane to Phoenix arrived late and I missed my connecting Delta flight. Delta didn’t want to help me because they said it was Continental’s fault since their plane arrived late. So I ended up running back and forth between the two terminals (Delta at one terminal and Continental at the other) to figure out what I was going to do. But the terminals were far from each other so I had to catch a bus to travel in between them. Luckily another girl from my program, Brianne, was with me. We were told we could fly stand-by on the next Delta flight to SLC and we were given a $12 meal voucher. But there was no guarantee we’d get onto that flight. Well, Brianne made it on. And I didn’t. And the next flight was at 5:00 the next morning! Que horror, no? Keep in mind, I didn’t sleep the night before. And the night before that, I got 3 hours of sleep. And for many nights before that, I got home way past curfew and then got up early for class the next morning. So I was super tired and starting to stress a little. That's what I deserve for breaking the rules. Expecting to stay the night in the airport, I went back to the terminal with Continental to talk with the customer service guy who had helped us before. He was super nice and got me a free hotel room. And there was a free shuttle to and from the hotel. I was so grateful for his help! I didn’t have a toothbrush, clothing, or anything like that because my bags had been sent along to SLC. But it was super nice to have a warm, comfortable bed. You’d think I’d immediately crash, right? Well, I’m not that smart haha. I ended up skyping with a close friend from Mérida for several hours before going to bed. So I got 3 hours of sleep that night. I needed to be at the front desk at 3:30am for my shuttle to the airport. I arrived at 3:32 and missed the shuttle. :( So the hotel worker called a cab for me. I thought it would be a cheaper cab, right? Nope. It was a luxury sedan and cost $18 to go less than a mile to the airport. Insane, huh??? So I got to the airport and on the plane and finally arrived in Salt Lake City! Then my friend, the saintly Jackie Eborn gave me a ride to Provo. I got back a little after 11am and was at work at 12:15! I worked til 4pm and then went back to work 8pm to midnight. I was SO EXHAUSTED by the end of that shift haha. But anyway, that’s getting into my life back here in Provo so I will end this post before I go into the less interesting, less fun, less exciting life to which I have returned!
Me sleeping in the Houston airport haha
It’s now been just over four weeks since I got back and I still miss it SO MUCH! I spent all of my free time of my first few days back skyping with friends from Mérida. I’m so grateful for my time there and the friendships I made but it’s been hard being back. I spent the first week back constantly sad and nostalgic. I cannot believe how long I’ve been back already! I’m trying to come up with money to return to Mexico and hopefully will return before TOO long! I miss my mamá, the food, my hammock, my room, my teachers, the climate (crazy huh!?!), the beach, the buses, deal ole’ Jesús, and most of all my friends! That list could have been infinitely longer but I will end this post and my grand adventure with one sentence.
I love Mexico.
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