Viva Mexico!

Life here in mexico…well, it’s been two and a half weeks. This is what I have so far!
I arrived the 29th, late at night and stayed the night in a hostel with some other people in the group. We went out the first night to check out the town. We had our first legit Mexican meal and beer that night. I had carne asada tacos with some burn-your-mouth-off salsa. It was pretty hot, but my domestic beer helped it go down. Everything tasted great! The tortillas were fresh, the meal was good. It was a great beginning to the trip.
The next day was the first official day in Queretaro, Mexico. It was the day we all met our host families for the first time. The day started off super shaky for me; I was having some problems back home and my mind was completely not in the game. It was hard to go through my first day like that. I couldn’t understand where we were walking, and I wasn’t doing much to pay attention. I just kind of was a blob of a person that first day before heading to my host family. Everything got cleared up in the end, so I guess in a way it’s good all the bad things happened on the first day. I got, knock on wood, all my bad luck done with.
I say all the bad things happened because of a few things. So we had to take taxies together in groups of 2 to our neighborhoods and houses. I went with a girl, and she was dropped off first. We were told that the taxi ride would cost about 40 pesos so she paid me 25 and we said our goodbyes. When I got to my house the cabbie let me out and gave me the bill. 100 pesos. Wow holy crap not what I was expecting! Luckily I had the money on me, but jeez! (I found out later that the cabbie may or may not have cheated me because I couldn’t speak Spanish.) so I went and rang the bell to my house…rang again…rang again…dog was barking. But nobody was answering. O.my.gosh. you’re joking right?! No, there was no one home. I thought maybe I had the wrong house, so I walked up and down the street for several minutes. I asked a bunch of people if they knew the house I needed to go to and sure enough, I was at the right house. So I just parked it under a tree and waited for about half hour. They did show up, everything turned out fine. Didn’t understand much of what they were saying to me, and to this day I don’t know why they were late getting home. But o well. I just went to bed basically when I got there. It was great. After an intense skype session home, I slept about 15 hours. I definitely needed that after all of the travelling and lack of sleep.
Let me tell you about my family. I am living with an older couple. They are both in their 60s or 70s. both are very nice. They have 2 kids that are married that live in the city. Our house is a white stone house. There is a huge brass gate in front of it. (every house, and most buildings have gates in front and bars on all of the windows. No joke. It’s very secure.) there are 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, a kitchen, a living room, a room with a tv, but no, there is NO wifi. =( sad day. It’s a great house, but it’s hard to stay connected. It gets super frustrating sometimes because there is like nowhere for me to get a wifi connection in the city. Mostly all are locked. Ugh. Haha first world problems, right?? Everything else in the house is great. I do my own laundry and hang it up to dry outside. I’ve finally convinced my host mom that just cereal in the morning is more than enough breakfast for me. I mostly get the upstairs bathroom to myself except for showers…the bathroom. My worst enemy. And I’ll tell you why. The toilet doesn’t flush. Legit. I have to poor a bucket of water down in the bowl to make the water go down. Yea…trying dealing with that your first day in the country. The host mom didn’t actually show me that trick until the next day I was there, so imagine my horror of thinking that my toilet is never going to flush. Yea. I miss toilets back home. STOP LAUGHING AT ME. It’s true. And apparently you’re not supposed to throw the tp in the toilet itself. You’re supposed to put it in the trash next to it…I literally just learned that one too. Haha well, nice to know that I haven’t broken the toilet yet by flushing the paper. But shhhh, that’s just between us.
I’m going to school mon-fri here, just like back in the states. My classes start at 8:45 and last until 12:30. There are just 2 classes, grammar and communication. It can get pretty dull sometimes. All I know is that I’m super tired after my classes, but I have to walk about 30-40 minutes to my house. That’s by choice, not by force. I’ll go into that in a minute…classes are going ok. Tons and tons of Spanish. Hoping for good grades. But grades are really not the point of this exchange. Learning about the culture and learning the language is what’s important. I’m trying my best. The culture here is super rich, and there are tons of differences.
The first: the busses. The busses run on their own schedule. You basically just wait at the stop around the time that it might come by and flag it down when it passes. The busses feel like their held together with duct tape sometimes. They are very tight and close quarters inside. It costs a whopping 6.5 pesos ($.50) to ride the bus. To stop the bus…I’m honestly not sure still. There are no buttons to stop. I think you just yell at the driver.
The taxies, and all the other drivers, are crazy as hell. They drive so scary! When I took a taxi the first couple times, I almost had a heart attack. Fearless drivers that think they own the road. There are no seat belts in the backseat, and I’m not sure how serious the seatbelt laws here are anyways.
There are tons, TONS, of police. Everywhere. The first night on the way from Mexico City to Queretaro, I saw no less than 20 stopped on the side of the road and lights flashing. In the street while I walk I always seen at least one every couple of minutes just driving by. At night I sleep with the window open and I always hear sirens.
(throwing this in there. Just because there are lots of police doesn’t mean it’s dangerous or scary here. This is a super safe town, and the police are there in a preventative way. I haven’t felt threatened or in danger at all since being here.)
The men here…wow. What can I say? We were warned before coming about the men, machismos, and about how they are. But wow I didn’t believe til I experienced it. I get cat-called, wolf-called, honked at, yelled at, HOWEVER YOU WANT TO PHRASE IT, at least a couple times a day by passersby. It’s crazy. At times it’s a little offensive, but I’ve mostly just blocked it out. The guys are all talk really, I’ve never been approached or felt in danger. But maybe I should look into getting some pepper spray here… =p
I live in a super conservative city. There are at least a hundred churches for the 2 million people here. Thus: the women usually all wear pants. I’ve only seen shorts or dresses a handful of times. So naturally when I wear my dresses and skirts and shorts, the only clothes that I brought because it’s a hundred freaking degrees here, I stick out just a bit. There is a lot of irony here though, because I’ve seen no less than 2 dozen couples just going at it and making out in front of God and everybody here too. It’s kinda funny.
There are lots of fair skinned people here. Like, LOTS. A long time ago a bunch of germans settled here I guess. But the people are not very dark. Sometimes lighter than me. That’s really different and something that I noticed. A lot have to use sunscreen because their skin is super sensitive to the sun. my thoughts: sucks that you live in mexico where it’s sunny all year long.
There is so much more to tell. But I feel like I’m droning on and on. I’ll leave it with some stories. Everybody loves stories!
Wednesday of the first week. We all, 12 people, went out to a bar where girls got free drinks. That was a fun night. But everyone was sluggish the next day at school =p staying up too late and school the next day apparently doesn’t mix.
I’ve gone out with a couple people just walking around the town. It’s been fun seeing a lot that there is here. It’s such a big place!
There is another Rebekkah here on the trip. Kinda funny. We go out.
I’ve eaten some super amazing Italian food here. Like to die for Italian. (kind of ironic considering I’m in mexico)
I’ve almost died by getting hit by a car a few times. Still alive!
I climbed a monolith in a town about an hour away and almost died of exhaustion. It was super hard.
I went to a movie theater. That was pretty awesome. Also went to chilies ;)
I danced with a couple Mexican guys at the school; they taught me to salsa! Well…kind of. I’m not much of a dancer to begin with. But it was fun =)


I think that’s it for me. Sorry it’s so long! I’ll be more regular soon! It’s the internet thing that’s screwing me up. love you all. Keep me in your thoughts <3