Semana Santa

Days in Mexico: 77

This week has mainly been dedicated to relaxing. I've caught up with friends and have spent a lot of time at the beach and the pool. The weather has been hot with most days reaching above 30 degrees but it hasn't been too humid.

Just after I posted my blog update last week I went out to a Japanese Restaurant with some friends to have dinner. I was having a really great time until I went to the bathroom and realized that I didn't know which door to pick; the one with an 'h' or the one with a 'm'. In Australia we either have 'm' for male and 'f' for female or 'l' for ladies and 'm' for men. There was no one else around and there weren't any pictures on the doors. I thought about what to do and as I was walking up to the 'h' door a man came out so I quickly turned and walked through the 'm' door. That day I learnt an important lesson that 'h' stands for 'hombres' (men) and 'm' stands for 'mujeres' (women). 

Semana Santa translates in English as Easter week. This year Easter was very different to what I am use to. It wasn't commercialized with loads of chocolate, in fact I didn't eat any chocolate last Sunday! My family went out for breakfast and then we went shopping. At the shops there weren't any decorations up or Easter eggs being sold. In Mexico, Easter is a time to relax and spend time with your family.

An Aunty and Grandma (from my dad's side) came to spend a couple of days with us from Mexico City. I had met them before when we visited Mexico City in early March so it was nice to see them again.

On Monday I showed my family how to make sushi. It isn't a typical Australian food but I like making and eating it, especially on hot days. I learnt how to make sushi about 10 years ago in a cooking course I did through my primary school. They turned out well and we were able to use local produce in the sushi rolls like avocado and mango.

The ingredients

Demonstrating how to make sushi 

Sushi rolls

I have also spent some time at the plaza and watching movies. When I was at the plaza we had a look through the pet store. There were cats, dogs, birds, fish, rabbits, guinea pigs, mice and... turtles!

In Australia you need to have a licence to keep turtles but in Mexico you can just buy them from the pet shop. They were so cute and they were tiny!!!

Baby turtles

Last Wednesday I found out that the Ruta Maya trip that I wrote about in my blog last week has been cancelled. Unfortunately there weren't enough people wanting to go but hopefully a shorter trip of a similar route will be scheduled for later. I still have over 9 months of my exchange left so I am sure I will get another opportunity to see other parts of Mexico. 

My taco count has now reached 53! Yesterday for lunch (Saturday) I went out to a taco buffet with my family and managed to eat 7 tacos which is my new record. The all time record for anyone in my family is 12 tacos which I don't think I will be able to match. The tortias were smaller than normal which made it easier to eat more and were really good. 

At the taco buffet

School starts again tomorrow and the weather is expected to get up to 38 degrees with thunderstorms later in the week. It is going to be hot and humid!

Vacaciones

Days in Mexico: 68

Week 1 of holidays has been relaxing and really nice.

On Monday I caught up with some of the other exchange students who are in the same city as me. We went to the beach and then had a water balloon fight. Some other friends joined in as well so there were more people to fight against. It was a 35 degree day with high humidity so I was glad I could spend it keeping cool. It was lots fun and a great way to start holidays!

Keeping cool

Tuesday came with a weather change. I was so cold and windy that one of the trees outside the house fell down! The strong wind here is called 'norte' and it comes with a light cloud cover normally during the afternoon. Sometimes it's only a light wind which brings a nice cool change to a hot day but other times (like on Tuesday) it was strong and dangerous. It wasn't a good day to go out so instead I had a lazy day. My sister and I had movie marathon and caught up on sleep.

Wednesday I went to the plaza and the movies with friends. We saw Divergent which was shown in English with Spanish subtitles. It was a really good film and it was nice to watch something in English. The only problem was when we stepped out of the cinema, I forgot that I was in Mexico so I started speaking in English because that was what I had heard for the previous two hours. It took a couple of minutes to adjust back to Spanish but it was a weird sensation.

During Thursday I spent some time with Diego (my host brother.) We had a brother-sister bonding session over racing cars on the Xbox. I lost the first race by a lot but after I changed controllers I came back and won the next two. He then won the next one and then we had to go so we will have a final game to break the tie some time next week.

Game on!

Easter is a bigger celebration in Australia than it is here in Mexico. Last year we went to church on Friday morning and to a dawn service on Sunday which was followed by a big lunch with my family at my house.
Today (Good Friday) we started the day with an earthquake! At 9.27 the magnitude 7 earthquake hit the west coast and tremors were felt all over the country (I live on the east coast.) It was my first ever earthquake and it was a really weird experience and we have been told to expect more in the coming days. We spent the day relaxing and swimming in the pool for most of the day with our neighbours.

Diego, Dany and I

During this week I sent in confirmation that I will be going on a tour with Rotary at the beginning of May! I will be going to see some of the remains of the Aztec ancient civilization and other parts of Mexico with the other exchange students. It is only in a couple of weeks time and I can't wait!

On a final note, as of next week I will be publishing my blog on Sunday instead of Friday. This means I will have more time during the weekend to write it.

It only gets better

Days in Mexico: 61

This week got off to a bad start. I got sent home from school on Monday because I almost fainted at assembly. I then went to the doctor and found out that I have hypertension (low blood pressure.) It is treated over time with medicine and hopefully once it's gone it won't come back. I started feeling a bit better by Tuesday but I still wasn't great so I didn't go to school.
By Wednesday I felt about 75% better so I went to school and I am so glad I did. On Wednesdays' I have my favourite combination of subjects and it is normally a really relaxed day. When I got home from school I was surprised by a parcel that had arrived for me from Australia! Inside was birthday cards and presents. It took a month to get from Perth to Veracruz!

My Birthday Package

One of the presents- a Pandora bead

On the way to the doctors on Monday, we drove past an electronic sign that had a count down on it. The count down is for the Central American and Caribbean Games which is held every 4 years. In Australia we have the Commonwealth Games and this is the equivalent event for Mexico. The games will be held this year in Veracruz from the 15th of November to the 30th of November. It involves the following countries:

Participating Nations
Antigua and Barbuda	Aruba
Bahamas	Barbados	Belize
Bermuda	Colombia	Costa Rica
Cuba	Dominica	El Salvador
Grenada	Guatemala	Guyana
Haiti	Honduras	Cayman Islands
British Virgin Islands	United States Virgin Islands	Jamaica
Mexico	Nicaragua	Panama
Puerto Rico	Dominican Republic	Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Lucia	Saint Vincent and the Grenadines	Suriname

 Table from:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Central_American_and_Caribbean_Games

The count down is on!

Spring break has officially started and I am so glad I can now sleep in! So far I don't have much planned for the two weeks of break but I'm sure I will enjoy the Easter celebrations.

3 languages

Days in Mexico: 54

This week has been less eventful than the previous couple. I have almost been in Mexico for 2 months now and I am really settling in.

Spring break is coming up and I am really starting to feel comfortable at school, even though I still don't understand what is going on most of the time. I made the decision after much deliberation to move from the English class to the French class. I know that it sounds crazy learning two new languages at once but I think it's better to have the opportunity to learn something new rather than revise what I have been learning for the past 12 years at school in Australia. At times it is a bit hard to figure out if the teacher is speaking Spanish or French but once I know more Spanish, it will get easier. Unlike Spanish, I learnt a year and a half of French during high school 4 years ago and have been to France before so I am familiar with some words.

Today there was a display of physics projects at recess break. Each group had to create a water wheel and there were some really impressive designs. My group's project had a Willy Wonka theme and we used weak coffee instead of water to look like chocolate. Some of the other groups had original designs as well. One group used the energy to power a marble circuit and another group even used fish in their project!

Willy Wonka themed water wheel

A mechanical water wheel with a marble circuit

A physics project with fish

It's already April and the weather is heating up. Summer is set to be hot and humid. This week the temperature got up to 36 degrees and even Pancho was trying to keep cool...

As I am getting more comfortable being in Mexico, my family in Australia are getting use to life without me in the house. My sister said that my bedroom is cleared out I and I didn't believe her until I got a Snapchat from her. It doesn't even look familiar to me anymore because it is so empty without all my stuff.

My room looks empty