Bienvenidos a Cuernavaca

I’m still in a bit of a travel daze, but I think I’m going to like it here in Mexico. Be forewarned – this is a lengthy entry.

Saturday was a long travel day that started at 6:30 a.m. with a flight out of Madison, followed by a tight connection in Dallas. By the time I got through the long line at customs in Mexico City’s airport and dragged my bags to where a representative from the school was waiting for me, it was already close to 2 p.m. We had to wait longer for another girl who was apparently on the same flight – Meghan Dove, a 21-year-old student from New Mexico who’s here for a month to earn two college Spanish credits.

There was a mix up about our host family arrangements. Meghan and I had both been told we would be at the same house – La. Sra. Martha Mendoza, a homemaker who lived with her mother, two kids about our age, two birds and a dog. I had even called her on Thursday to introduce myself. But our driver, Carlos, had me listed at a different house. After several calls and discussion with Sra. Mendoza, we figured out what had happened. Apparently, I was originally supposed to be with her but she couldn’t take a student for six months because she was leaving town in August. So the school assigned Meghan to her instead and moved me to Sra. Abigail Ayala. They just forgot to tell me that.

It worked out in the end. Meghan told me later that the Mendoza family also had a cat, which would have been a problem for my allergies. (They also had two dogs, not one, and no sign of any birds. Weird.)

It’s too bad that I didn’t get to have dogs around, but I got lucky in other ways. For one thing, it looks like I may have my own room the whole time. My host family, the Ayalas, live very close to Meghan’s family. It seems like most of the schools’ host families live in two wealthy neighborhoods just across the street from the school. All the houses in the neighborhood look gorgeous, though some of them are hidden behind locked garages that front the street. The Ayala’s have a split level house with their bedroom and a sitting room on the bottom; then a dining room, kitchen and living room; another level with a library and TV room; and the top floor with four bedrooms and three bathrooms.

La Sra. Abigail and her husband Facundo, a retired civil engineer, seem very sweet. They have five or six grown children and their 20-year-old granddaughter, Itzayana, also lives with them. One daughter, also Abigail, was there taking care of her 1-month old son and a 16-month old niece when I arrived. She’s also the mother of Itzayana. Confused yet?

Wait, there are more people. In addition to the three family residents, there are five teenagers from Evanston, Ill., attending the school for a one-month summer program. So although I have my own bedroom, I share a bathroom with two of the girls.

The house has beautiful wood staircases, high ceilings, a pool and a large yard. It’s not as grandiose as a U.S. house this size would probably be, but it’s certainly a not something a poor or middle class (if that exists here) family could afford.

On Sunday, I met up with Meghan to go shopping downtown. The travel books are right about the convenient bus system here. We barely had to wait, it only cost 5 pesos per person (about 50 cents) and it took five minutes to get downtown. Our first stop was the Mega store, which is basically like a Wal-Mart. Then, we spent the rest of the afternoon walking around the downtown. There were at least three beautiful cathedrals all in the same square near el Parque Revolucion. You can tell this is a city geared toward students. There are schools everywhere – language schools, photography schools, art schools.

That night, I had my luckiest break so far – I found out that my host family has wireless internet! Woohoo! I had noticed earlier that the family computer was next to something that looked like a router, but Sra. Abigail told me she knew nothing about it, to ask her granddaughter. Itzayana gave me the password and just like that, wireless! This will make my life so much easier. If any of you have skype accounts, please let me know. My account name is deborah.hirsch.

Between my excitement about the Internet and starting school, and the ridiculously loud thunder that cracked in the middle of the night, it wasn’t easy to sleep last night. But I made it to school on time for my first day.

The campus is about a 10 minute walk from my host family. It’s very nice, with lots of tiny classrooms surrounding a central building with a landscaped lawn and pool. I met the office staff and Spanish program staff, who interviewed me in Spanish and gave me a LONG placement test.

Classes normally run from 8 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Grammar goes until 10:50 a.m., then there’s a break until 11:30 a.m. when the students can hang out by the cafeteria or check email, etc. Then, conversation class until 12:50 p.m. followed by either “lectura” or “situational Spanish” until 2:20 p.m. I guess the lecturas are meant for more advanced students because S.S. focuses on vocabulary. But apparently there were no lecturas this week. The lectura/S.S. is only M, W, F. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, there are language workshops. The staff posts several topics grouped by level (beginning, intermediate and advanced) on Tuesday mornings, and you sign up for whatever interests you.

The reason all the classrooms are so small is because none of the classes are supposed to have more than four students, except for the afternoon workshops. The schedules also change weekly because the enrollment is constantly changing. So one week, I would be with one teacher, and the next week with another.

I wasn’t able to jump into class until 11:30 a.m. My conversation class was just me and one other student, Karin, an ESL teacher and speech therapist from Door County, WI. Lots of Midwesterners here, I’ve noticed, including one of the office staff members, Amanda, who is from Milwaukee. Our teacher, Estela, was very nice. For “Situational Spanish,” it was just me and Prof. Olvera.

I was surprised at how much I was able to understand right away. Still, by the end of class, my head was feeling the strain of doing everything in a second language. Before I could go home, though, the office staff gave me an orientation to explain the school’s rules and info about the city.

The school also has activities in the afternoon and on weekends that sound like fun. The weekend excursions cost extra, but my scholarship includes a package of seven of them. I’m most excited about the Mexico National Ballet. The others include: Teotihuacan pyramids, Taxco, Tepoztlan, Las Estacas, El Rollo and one more that’s yet to be determined. Most of these places are within two hours of Cuernavaca but other than that I don’t know much about them yet. The activities after school are usually free. You go home first and have your big meal of the day, then come back at 4:30 p.m. On Mondays, you can volunteer at an orphanage or watch a Spanish movie and discuss it with one of the professors. Tuesdays and Thursdays, you can make traditional crafts, take a dance lesson, or do an “intercultural exchange,” which is basically a conversation hour with the students in the English department. You speak for half an hour in Spanish and half an hour in English.

I was hoping to go to the orphanage today, but after the orientation it was already almost 4 when I got back to the house. On the flip side, that gave me time to write this. More to come soon. Hasta luego!