Dang sorry this is gonna be super long, but here goes anyways... also, im not adding pics bc this thing is already gonna be like miles and miles long, so check my fb for those :). Also, thanks alison for keeping up your blog, bc I may or may not be using it to remember what the heck happened a month ago :) and it’s a good thing I take way too many pics. K here goes:
Jueves 5-5 cinco de mayo!
Ok, so we went to school super early again. Still way hard to stay awake. Some people from the school newspaper took a pic of us and we ended up in the paper a few days later. When we got home from school there was something cooking on the stove. I looked in the pot and saw chicken feet cooking!! Ha, I was super freaked out/excited to try it. Turns out it was just for the broth and we didn’t actually eat the chicken feet. I felt a lil relieved about that one, but I think it would be cool to try it. Instead, we had this awesome chicken stuff, and all I remember about it is that it was DELICIOUS! We took a siesta and headed off to the temple. This I def remember. It was amazing! The Lord is so full of tender mercies. I was reading a particular chapter and everything I read was just exactly perfect. everything I read brought deeper significance to a lot of things and everything really just made me feel comfort and I learned a lot. After the temple we went to the centro for the serenatas and it was awesome! It was super fun. We also bought marquesitas, which are amazing! They are like these rolled up crepe things and we had nutella and queso in ours. Mmmm. Delicious.
Viernes 5-6
Friday we went to Dzibilchaltún and the playa! It was awesome! The ruins were incredible! Ha, there was this outdoor chapel that was built bc the Spaniards would never bathe and the mayans bathed like 3 times a day in los cenotes (I don’t blame them, I would too. cenotes are amaaazing). so anyways, the mayans refused to go in the capilla with the stinky Spaniards, so they built an outdoor chapel, with just an altar thing. Pretty funny if you ask me. which brings me to the cenote. Its like a little lake pond thing in the ground with natural spring water. We were super hot and sweaty from the sun beating down on us during the excursion and once my body hit the cool fresh water, I was in heaven! Swimming in a cenote is probably the second best feeling ive ever felt in my entire life. and by probably I mean definitely. right next to super good church related feelings ive experienced (that’s #1). Ya it felt like I was swimming in a glass of ice water. It was perfect. it was way hard to get out too. and there were tiny baby fishies swimming in there with us. I was kind of tempted to drink the water. It was so fresh. But I didn’t. anyways, so then we hopped on the bus and headed for the beach. Awesooooome. I think I was super spoiled from the fresh cenote water bc the beach wasn’t as amazing as last time, but it was still amazing and super fun! We met up with all the mamas from our families and had a huge lunch w delicious food. Then we went swimming in the mar and it was way fun. Ha, we saw some dead fish skeleton nasty thing that reeked and someone found a dead baby shark thing. It was fun.
Saturday 5-7:
we went to uxmal. And I gave Bryce a wet willie on the bus, haha. 2 actually. That kid cracks me up. We also ate nasty arco iris which are these lil cookie things that have those fluffy pink and white balls on top.. ya kinda gross. Ya uxmal. Lemme tell ya, that place was sweeeeet! I took way too many pics. I always do, but I take like 400 a day here. Or more. This place just brings out my inner artsy self. But ya at uxmal we even got to climb up this sweet pyramid, which was amazing. I love the arquitecture and detailing and the precision of these ancient pyramids. Seriously, it blows my mind that they built them. After spending all day at the pyramids, we went to this super nice resort for dinner. We had delicious sopa de limon and I had some amazing pollo. It was awesome. Dinner was fun, then we had some pina sorbet. It was either that or flan. And im not gonna lie, flan kinda makes me gag, so I chose the sorbet. After dinner we swam in this pool adjacent to the restaurant, while the sun was setting, overlooking the pyramids of uxmal. Yeah, it was awesome. This place is paradise. Someone was like, dude we are swimming on top of ancient mayan pyramids. So cool. So after we went swimming, there was this cool light and sound show at the pyramids. It was pretty sweet, but kinda creepy. Haha CHAAAAk CHAAAAK! When we got home, there were some delicious panuchos waiting for us. I am so in LOVE w this stuff. They are like tacos but better. Waaaaay better.
Sunday 5-8:
church was way good. I love love love my Sunday school teacher. It was mothers day too, so the babies sang in church, which, ya made me cry. Go figure. I cry like all the time in church over here. Anyways, I was sitting by michelle laraway and her kids weren’t singing bc they don’t know the songs in Spanish. I felt way bad for them bc I realized this is probably a super hard transition for them. Like, its hard enough, but they are young and they don’t know the language and they don’t have friends here and its a lot different for them than it is for us. So we decided that we wanted to do something awesome for them. We decided that we wanted to ring and run at their house. We thought they would enjoy it, and it would be nice to have some comfort food. Plus we wanted cookies too ;) so after church we got home and ariana (our lil sis) wanted to show us her tent. It was bright pink and had Disney princesses on it. I LOVED it. Ha, she is so adorable and so much fun! And she helps us w our Spanish. She was way shy at first, but not at all anymore. :) also, on Sunday I got to skype w my mom which was way good. And I got to skype w my dad too. so much fun! I love them. So afterwards we made no bake cookies for our familia. They loved them. So did i. they were super tasty.
Mon 5-9:
so everyday is an adventure. After school I had the best siesta of my life. I slept for like 3 hours, which was awesome and desperately needed. For fhe we were sneaky and made cookies for the laraways kids. We wrote them lil love notes and snuck over to their house and did a lil ring and run. Shhh, don’t tell tho. It’s a secret still :) haha on the way to their house, we saw a creep dog on top of some roof fence thing. And I think that’s the day that I saw a dead dog in the street by our school. The dogs here give me the creeps. They are skinny and nasty lookin. Oh yeah, and this is the day that I cut my toe open on the streets of merida. Well, more like the sidewalk. Anyways, also, this is the day my life changed forever bc I asked carmita if I could sleep in a hammock. Best decision ever. I LOVE it! Its awesome. I sleep in that thing all the time now! its super fun and I feel like a lil baby rockin to sleep every night :).
Tues 5-10.
Tuesday we went to class, hung out, had an amazing lunch, then we met up w some friends in the centro. We were going to go to an art museum, but it was closed for el dia de las madres (its always the 10th here) so we ended up going to the governors palace and taking some pics. Oh, and also before that we saw freddy in el centro looking for his next victim. He sat right next to us at the cathedral while we were waiting to meet up w some friends. Ha we pretended to take a pic of me and we had him in the background. He looks super creepy and that makes me laugh. Anyways, after that we headed over to institute, which was super amazing. It was awesome too bc the teacher was like the Mexican version of russ vaclaw. Hes a way good teacher and I learned so much. After institute we went to this mayan chocolate place called ki'Xocolatl. It was fun and tastyyyy.
Weds 5-11.
Dang, this feels like FOREVER ago! Weds Alison and I went to the centro to buy a purse and some other cool things. We started out in this lil shoe store, which had some cool looking shoes, but they felt way cheap and lets just say my feet are a few sizes bigger than mayan feet. we went to this one part of el Mercado and there were a lot of cool things. I love how the vendors fuss over me. I love all the attention! ja, they are like, senorita, senorita! And trying to sell me stuff. Ha, it kind of reminds me of the very beginning of Aladdin.. ha anyways, so I saw a lot of cool purses, but I wasn’t really feeling any of them. We finally found a lil tiendita that had some cooler purses. Lo and behold I found it. My purse totally did that thing where it like calls out to you and you just HAVE to buy it! Ya. It was awesome. So then we kept shopping and we went to this store to find a gift for alisons husband. I found a shirt that I fell in love w, but the lady was asking $350MX for it, which was outrageous. It was handmade and I loved it, but she wouldn’t lower the price. I got it down to 250, but I only wanted to pay 200 for it. She wouldn’t budge, so we started leaving and she yelled out, ok 200! Wohooo! So I bought my super awesome shirt! I felt like I was on top of the world. The store just happened to be right by el colon, so we figured, what the heck, lets get some ice cream/sorbet stuff. so we did, and it was awesome. It was like the best day ever. Again. Ha, but its not over yet. The YSA kids invited us to an activity at the capilla. We played a super fun game that involved water ballons, soccer (which I actually played and had a blast), bball, and we danced too. I LOVE LOVE LOVE this place. it was so perfect! So. Much. Fun. This is when I caught that latin fever! So then we were super parched, so we went to a lil store on the corner to get a Gatorade, and you will never guess what they had. (well you might if you already saw the pic on fb..) MANZANA GATORADE!! That’s apple folks! Jaja! Ya, so when we were in the store, we saw other kids f the activity and they were buying pinguinos. They asked me how to say it in English, and I told them and they were crackin up! Anyways, so then we went back to the church and everyone was waiting for the bus. They were waiting for like FOREVER, so tony (our new amigo) took some of us girls home. It was super fun.
Thurs 5-12.
I honestly do not remember what happened this day. I was a lil sick, like I had a cold, so I think I just chilled after class. And ate. And napped. Oh yeah, I remember now! we went to institute too. which was amazing again. After institute we were playing foosball with our new Mexican friends. We didn’t want to leave, but it was getting late so laurel and I were leaving. Thomas told us that he was catching the bus too, so we all left. We met jonatan outside the temple (its connected to the stake center here) and hes way cool. Hes heading on his mission at the end of june! Anyways, so then we were almost to the middle of the centro when a car drives up and whistles and says laurels name. we were kinda super freaked out, but then we saw luke and brianne in the car w some Mexicans from institute. Ja! So we all jumped in the car. there were 7 of us squished in there Mexican style. We had 5 in the backseat, which was super hilarious and way fun. We had the music blastin, cruisin down the street, Mexican style. I absolutely LOVED it! So then we went and got betos car and we went to some other chocolate restaurant and I got some quesadilla type things. Tasty. That was a fun night.
Friday 5-13
Friday we had an optional unofficial excursion to a hacienda, but I was super tired and we had an 8-10 pg paper due the next week, so I decided to sleep in and work on my paper. I went to the school to work on it bc there are less distractions there. Ha, I didn’t bring my cord for my laptop and it ran out of battery, so I had to use a computer in the library, and that was an adventure. The keyboard is different and I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how to use the @ sign. I was too embarrassed to ask for help. Verguenzaaaa. Anywyas, so that night we met up w beto and tony and we were chillin tryin to figure out what to do. We went to go get crepes and we met up w maria jose and ivan and ate some AMAZING crepes! They were so sooo good! Afterwards we went to tonys house and chilled and watched tv. Beto was crackin me up, like he usually does. I totally fell asleep but we had lots of fun!
Saturday 5-14
Saturday we went to celestun. So awesome. Its like a beach resort place. We drove there and took lanchas (lil boats) out into Campeche. It was pretty dang cool. It was awesome. And we got to see wild flamingos!! In REAL LIFE!! this place is like straight out of nat geo. We got to see them fly too, and I got a super sweet pic of it. Also, we went into this jungle thing and we got to swim in it. They told us that jaguars and crocodiles live there, but no big. Ha! I totally went swimming in the jungle! It was awesome! But super nasty. And yeah bad idea to bring a white swimsuit to mexico… who does that anyway? the worst part is that it was sucio from the playa and I totally cleaned it and got it all pretty and white again, and then basically the next day we went swimming in the grossest water ever, but it was super fun and totally worth it. And refreshing =). So anyways, we got back on the lanchas and got back to the beach at celestun. They had showers there, so we were all super happy! After we rinsed, we sat down to eat. They gave everyone this amazing tuna as an appetizer. Im not really into tuna, like its super nasty and I cant stand the smell of it, but this stuff was amazing and super fresh. Like I really really liked it! Dad, you would have LOVED it! So I kind of got my fill of seafood from that so I ordered some chicken and It was amazing! Then for dessert I had peaches and cream and it was way good. After that we still had some time, so we chilled on the beach for a lil while and I found some super sweet shells. The beaches here are COVERED in shells! I LOVE it! I love everything about the beaches here! They are perfect :). So anyways, after we got back from the beach, I went w tony, maria jose, ivan, and liz to go see a movie. It’s the new elephant one w Edward Cullen. It was interesting bc first of all it was super cheap. Like half the price, and it was in English w Spanish subtitles. This is where I learned that there are some things that are funny in English and not in Spanish. Like there were a few parts where I was laughin and no one else was. I was like, oh.. yeah that was funny in English… awkward…ja! Also, things don’t translate the same so I got a good chuckle out of some of the translations. I really enjoyed it actually. So then we went to some random restaurant on the side of the road and got some tacos. I can’t remember what kinds they were, but they were so delicious! Except for the last one. The flavor was way good, but the meat was like half fat. No joke. Its like some famous dish here that everyone loves, and for every chunk of meat, there is an equally big chunk of fat attached to it. Ja, my first bite was super hard to swallow, then after the second I was like, do you guys seriously eat this stuff? ha, I was like, it tastes way good, but how do you swallow it? I couldn’t eat it. Just like one morning I woke up and for breakfast there was a hotdog waiting for me. it had ketchup and mustard on it. (remember that I eat bfast at like 5:30 am) yeah, couldn’t do it. I couldn’t even look at it. So yeah, I didn’t finish the tacos de fat, and then it was time to go home bc we have a curfew. Lame.
Sunday 5-15
Sunday we went to church and it was good. Again. I love church here. Except its getting harder to stay awake. Ha! After church we had amazing food, don’t remember what we had, its just always super delicioso. So this Sunday was different bc Carmita invited us to go to mass with her. her daughter and son in law (which are here all the time and we love hanging out with them. Sergio and carmita hija) were playing in the mass, so we went to go hear them. The chapel was beautiful and was surrounded by palm trees. We went in and sat kinda close to the front. It was interesting and way good. I realized that these people are worshipping just like I do every Sunday. I gained a deep respect for them just then. And Carmita and Sergio played really well. Afterwards we went outside and I saw the coolest thing ever. The sun and the moon were both out at the same height in the sky. Like I looked to my left and the sun was going down and exactly opposite from it in the sky, was this beautiful moon. It was all dusky looking too. and let me just tell you that the sky here is absolutely gorgeous every single day. The clouds are big and beautiful and fluffy and the sky is always a gorgeous blue color. Unless the sun is coming up or going down, then its just breathtaking and all tropically. Everyday on the way to school I watch the big beautiful orange sun rise and I just love it. I always ask tony how the heck does he live here w/out dying bc this place is so awesome. He just smiles and says “contento”. Agreed. I love love love this place. and I love the heat too. like its super hot, but I like it :). The weather here is to die for. unless you hate the heat. Ok so anyways later that night tony came over and surprised me w his old phone. He is letting me borrow it bc I don’t have a phone here. I said something about it the night before how I always try to check my phone, and it drives me crazy that I don’t have it. So that was a super nice surprise and it felt like Christmas. so then I went to my room to work on my paper some more. 8 pages is way too many. Especially for a paper that’s due randomly during the term. Anyways, so everyone else had a paper due Monday too, so we were all on facebook and we had this super long chain of comments (like more than 350) on one post in our study abroad group. Ha, it was AWESOME. Needless to say, I did not get much sleep that night…
Monday 5-16
After school I went w nate and alison to get modelo shirts (that’s our school). We got some sweet shirts then headed to walmart. From walmart, I went w tony to make breakfast. We had eggs with ham and hot sauce and ketchup, oranges, (ok which they peel them w a knife then slice them down the middle) and bananas w honey. The bananas w honey were super nasty, so I just ate the ones w out. But the best part was when yoyo (tonys bro) made this delicious nesquick shake thing. Mmmmmmm. It was amaaaazing!! Ok bc I love love love milk, but I just can’t drink it here. Its super different and I cant stomach it, and when he made that nesquik stuff it was absolutely delicious. It was like heaven sent. That breakfast was perfect. I felt like I was in a movie or something. Oh, Monday was awesome bc we went to komchen for the bullfight!! It was awesome! We walked around the city bc we got there early, and they were having a little festival celebration thing b4 the bullfight. I was standing there in my flip flops and I started to feel my feet burning. I looked down and saw there were ants all over my feet. I started freaking out trying to get the ants off my feet and people thought I was just dancing. Jaja its kinda of funny in retrospect, but those things burned. My feet burned/itched like the dickens after that. It went away after a few mins and I was super glad about that. So then we headed over to the cemetery to check it out. I had a super powerful experience there. I felt something super deep and I cant explain it. I remember it super well and I just ached deep inside. It was a very somber experience. I loved that graveyard. There was something different about this one. I felt things there. Anyways, so then we went back for the bullfight and it was awesome! Ha it was so much fun. Except for one thing: so I was trying to say something super simple during the bullfight, and I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how to say what I wanted to in Spanish. I started to get super frustrated bc it was an easy phrase (like something you’d learn in Spanish 2). Someone was like, well what are you trying to say in english? And my mind went completely blank. I couldn’t even speak in English. I have never felt so inadequate in my entire life. seriously. It was horrible. I felt like absolute crap. A lot of times its super hard not to get frustrated w myself bc I make lots of stupid mistakes while trying to speak Spanish, and im like, dude these are like easy things that I should know, but mexico is teaching me patience.
Tuesday 5-17
Today nate, Alison, y yo fuimos al centro to do interviews for our project. We interviewed some people and then went and got some delicious drinks. This is the day that I saw the vending machine that vends shirts and I tried guaya. Which tastes like a sour/sweetish tiny furry animal in your mouth. Awesome. And that’s all I remember from that day. Except for the fact that I started speaking english to Sergio that day… which is super weird bc ive never done that before. Ive started doing that with other people too. including carmita. Which is super weird bc she doesn’t even speak English. Anyways maybe its bc I feel comfortable around them and I know them know them, so I think English just came out. Anyways…
Wednesday 5-18
We presented our awesome video in class and it was awesome. Everyone loved it. Our teacher talked about it for like at least 15 mins after we were done. Awesome. I hope he liked my paper too… anyways, carmita forgot to wake up and make breakfast for us, so she made a huge delicious lunch and we were like, dang you can skip cooking breakfast any day you want. That meal was dang good. Also, I went running that day and it was awesome. I don’t remember which other days I went running, (I remember only bc alison’s blog reminded me) but every time I go running I feel so free. Its like my sanctuary. Seriously its so liberating and I love it! We had another YSA activity that night and it was a photo scavenger hunt. It was funny trying to explain to carmita what a photo scavenger hunt was. Ah, now I remember running that day bc I was standing in the kitchen dripping w sweat trying to explain what it was, and carmita asked me if I was showering bc sweat was just oozing out of me. Haha it was pretty nasty how much I was sweating. That was a good run. So the activity was super fun! We got there and we were playing volleyball waiting for everyone to get there, then we split into groups. Our group had me, tony, jen, michelle, and markz. Haha we had a BLAST! It was so much fun! Then we got back to the church and Thomas attacked us with water ballons. By the end of the night I was soaked. So much fun!
Thursday 5-19
I have absolutely no recollection of what happened this day except for the fact that I have a picture of a gecko that we saw in our room. Oh, wait I remember! this is the day we (Adrienne, cat, jen, michelle, Alison, tony, roox) went to see Jorge (yoyo) a la olimpiada. It was super fun! And that’s about all I remember…
Friday 5-20
We had class this Friday bc we didn’t have an excursion, blehhhh. Super lame, but whatever. We went to the beach afterwards, so it made going to class not so bad. When we were in the water, something bit me or something on my stomach and it burned like no other, so I had to find a bathroom and look and see what the heck happened. I had these little mosquito bite looking things on my stomach but we learned that there are just these little animal things that live en el agua y se pican. No big, and it went away like the next day, but it was kinda weird and burned. We were chillin in the sand and some way triste looking guy came up to us trying to sell us paper airplanes. He was schizophrenic and I felt way bad for him. So I gave him a cookie. I actually had a pleasant conversation w him. People always want to speak English w us, and he was asking me where I was from. I told him Oklahoma, and he was like, oh so you’re a cowboy then? Haha I was like, I suppose I got a lil cowboy in me. he complimented me on my smile and he was like, you are so happy! And im like duh! Im at the BEACH! Ha, but anyways he was super excited to make a new friend as was i. then he left. Haha so we were chillin and eventually about to leave, but then michelle saw 4 super muscly guys, she and cat went to go take a picture w them. Haha they looked like models, (except for in the face. Which sounds super mean, but I just mean that they had sculpted bodies. They must work out a lot….) anyways, so they took some pics w the model boys and we were crackin up bc the boys were taking a million modely pics of themselves and I think they were gay. It was super funny. And I may or may not have taken a pic w them too… ha so we got back home and we (tony, Alison, y yo) went to Costco for some delicious pizza. tony wanted chicken bake, but they were out :(. but the pizza was super good and it totally hit the spot. Then we decided to go dancing, so we went to the club. I felt like I was in a movie. Seriously, this place was awesome. And I was thinking, im in a club in mexico. This is awesome. The dance floor was raised up and it was in the middle surrounded by tables. I have never felt so white in my life. I felt super white. Ha at first we were the only ones dancing and it took me a while to warm up bc I felt super awkward. When we first started dancing EVERYONE was staring at us and it was super awkard, but then I guess ppl loosened up and I quit caring bc I kind of went crazy and it was super fun!
Saturday 5-21
WE WENT TO CHICHEN ITZAAAA!! Dude this place was awesooooome!! Seriously, it was so much fun! It was incredible. Also, we built a pyramid with our bodies in front of chichen itza w our bodies, which was way sweet! Super fun! Then we went to eat at a restaurant buffett thing and they had the absolute best pina ive ever tasted in my entire life. I swear I ate like 3 plate fulls of that stuff. it was so sooo fresca! And sooo juicy sweeeet! (haha Emily…) anyways on the way back we got stopped by the merida border patrol. A cop got on the bus and asked to see everyones passports. No one had theirs so everyone started freakin out! I was thinking, what are they gonna do, throw us all in jail? And its kind of funny bc this is the only excursion that profe laraway didn’t go w us… so we are like, crap what do we do? Anyways, our tour guide and nate both talked to the cop explaining that we are students intercambios a la modelo (that’s my school) and we just went to chichen for a field trip. We had copies of all of our student ID’s for la modelo, but only like 2 people had a copy of their passport. Professor laraway has all of the copies of our passports. Of course. The cop said he had to talk to his supervisor and we had to wait for like 15 mins. Eventually he came back on the bus and told us we should always have our passports and let us into merida. Also, this bus ride was hilarious bc Adrienne told me all about her love life and I was crackin up. I really like her. in a me calle bien kind of way… so then when we got back we got ready super fast and went to the fireside w Quentin L Cook. It was pretty cool bc there hasn’t been an apostle there for 11 years. it was cool too bc there was a translator and elder cook is funny. It was about marriage. Go figure. I finally get away from BYU and the first fireside I go to is about marriage. It was way sweet tho. I need to be better. Anyways, after the fireside we were gonna go to colon w all the white kids, but my friend told us about noche Mexicana, which happens every Saturday night. So we went there instead. We got some tamales and looked around at the lil tienditas. There were cultural dances and there was some lady who was singing horribly. Like, I don’t wanna be mean, but it was awful. Haha. anyways, that was a fun night :)
Sunday 5-22
Sunday carmita went w us to sacrament meeting bc Alison was playing a special musical number and she invited carmita. I was sitting in between Alison y carmita, so anytime carmita had a question she asked me. I got to explain stuff to her and it was cool. Anyways after church we we hanging out w some of or Mexican friends and they took us home. We got home and you’ll never guess what we had for lunch. CHINESE FOOD. In mexico. I feel so international. It was way good too. like I was super nervous for obvious reasons, but ya it was good. Then we had our lil panchanguita. Pachanga= huge fiesta, so we just wanted to have a lil party. It was way fun! We just played games over here and it was a blast. We had settlers of catan, jenga, uno (WE PLAYED UNO IN MEXICO!), and the biggest game of nertz ive ever seen. After that, I went w tony and markz to take michelle home. Ja markz wanted to meet michelles parents and he wanted to convince them that they were engaged. Jaja it was super funny. He asked me how to say suegro en ingles, which is father in law. Haha. the Mexican boys are so funny. Oh this was also the day that emma and cassyie told us about the copo bus. HALLELUJAH! The copo bus! Its everyones favorite discovery and heres why: in the morning we always had to leave at 6:00 to catch 2 busses to get to school by 7. And sometimes the busses didn’t come and or were late so we would miss the second bus and have to wait forever for the next one. So the copo bus is awesome bc it picks us up closer to our house at 6:30 and goes straight thru copo and we get to school at like 5 or 10 till 7. I love it. We only have to take one bus (which means I don’t have to pay for 2) and it gets us there in half the time! And its more fun than the plaza fiesta bus anyway. Except for I miss my adventures w Alison there. So so much fun! So ya we love the copo bus.
Lunes 5-23
After school Alison y yo went to go find some food. Carmitas suegro passed away that weekend, so she was busy and we told her we would just go out to eat. Haha, we were walking around trying to find a place to eat, but everything was still closed. We really wanted to try the fogoncita, but they told us they were closed and we should try charlies across the street. Charlies=carls jr. ok, im not a big carls jr fan, in fact ive only had it one other time in my life. so we were like, what the heck, im ddying of hunger, so we went in and it was a dream. Seriously, I had a burger and fries and the lettuce was super fresh. Like it actually had FLAVOR!! Lettuce has flavor here!! That’s what I love about the vegetables here. They are super fresh and I love LOVE them! Especially tomatoes bc usually sometimes they make me gag, but they taste good here. Oh yeah also Alison bought French toast sticks and she gave me one and I can honestly say those were the best French toast sticks I have ever had. In my entire life. they were so sooo good! Also, it was super nice and not ghetto like most carls jrs are, which was actually kind of hilarious. Like they had plasma flat screens there. Haha they had some ridiculous show on. Of course. And it was air conditioned. I was like, this should be our embassy. I didn’t want to leave that place. it was awesome. I went swimming that day too. I go swimming like everyday. I love it. That night we had fhe at the laraways. It was way good. Michelle (laraway) gave a super good lesson about sympathy and empathy and i thought about stuff. it was way good. Then we had pizza (another amazing blessing. I crave pizza like 24/7 so this was perfect) and we went swimming. It was super fun!
Martes 5-24
School…. PLAYA (BEACH!!)!! We went to the playa again! I cant get enough of this place! I absolutely LOVE it! Jaja we walked into this one mayan store and we here (in a super fuerte hick accent) “where yall from?” jaja it was some white dude from Pensacola fl! He said hes lived here for like 23 years or so helping the mayan people. He had some cool stuff. Alison bought a way cute purse and I bought a sweet headband. I love it. haha we were walking down the beach and this man that was kinda far away yelled out to us with his arms in the air “I have twenty dollars!” and I was like “...bueno?….” And we kept walking, then he was like “to make-a-love!!” and Alison and I looked at each other and we were like “....uhhhh.. no gracias!” and we ran off. Haha this place cracks me up. Also, we ran into the laraways at the beach, but we were starving bc we didn’t have lunch, so we found a restaurant on the corner called las henequenes. It was delish! Ja I ordered an oj and they brought it in a margarita glass. Super cool. And delish! So fresh and mmm I cant get enough of that stuff. anyways so we ordered and Brittany came up and was telling us about some sweet deals she got. We invited her to eat w us, and she came and chilled w us. She bought some super tight bracelets for 35 cents, so (ha they have stores here that are like TODO $5.90(MEX)) jaja It cracks me up! So we were like we HAVE to go! Also, the vendors came up w their sob stories trying to sell me stuff. like pirated movies. some dude was like im hungry bc I don’t have any money. I was like sorry I cant help you. He asked again, so I was like do you want some food? (I was already full anway) hes like no I need money because im hungry. And I was like here, so we gave him some food and he left. Ha I was telling Brittany that reminded me of the schizophrenic guy we saw on the beach the other day and right as I was telling her about it, he came up. Like, no joke right as the words came out of my mouth, he appeared out of nowhere! He was like, do you remember me? and I was like of course! He tried to sell me some paper airplanes for money bc he was hungry. I told him I couldn’t help him and he just looked at me w those clear brown eyes and my heart ached for him. I felt super bad for this guy. So anyways I was like I cant help you but, do you want some food? And he was like, no I ate at my house. Then I didn’t feel so bad since he has a house and food. But I still feel bad for the poor old man. Anyways, he finally left and we bought those bracelets and some movies then we chilled at the beach. I found lotsa cool shells there. It was super fun. I also took like 300 more pics. Oops. Judge me if you want. So then we left the beach at 6:30 to make it to back bc Thomas was opening his mission call at 8. We got home at like 7:20 and I was naaaast, so I rinsed SUPER fast and we made it to the chapel just in time. Except for that we had to wait at least 30 mins for everyone to show up. Then when it started (its sooo diff here.) we sang a hymn and there was a prayer and some testimonies. A lot of them. Then FINALLY he opened it! GUADALAJARA!! That’s where lars served. Pretty cool. Then we had a slice of delish cake and a big group of us went for argentine ice cream!! So sooo good! Then tony, markz, Alison, y yo went to go get some pizza, and they have little cesars here!! Ha but its actually super nice. Like youd think it be super ghetto here, but its like 30 times nicer than the one in provo. we actually decided that we didn’t want a pizza tho, so we were leaving and the guy at the counter gave me 2 ballons and i was super excited. then he was like, wait! And he gave us stickers that said “save a taco, eat a pizza”. I DIED laughing! Jaja ohh mexico! So we were driving around and I felt like I was 5 years old w my balloons. Seriously, I felt like I was a lil kid the whole night. And I loved every minuet of it. At one point one of the balloons actually flew out the window, so we turned around and chased it. haha! it happened another time too, then when I got back into the car it popped right in front of my face and scared the crap outta me. no lie. It was the funniest thing EVER! We also went to an oxxo to get some Gatorade bc we were super thirsty (or at least I was). Ya. This was like one of the funnest nights ever!
Weds 5-25
This was a fun day too. after school we had to find our own food again bc carmita was still dealing w funeral stuff, so we found a delish Mexican grill. Mmmm it was awesome! The guacamole was so stinkin good. Normally im not way into that stuff, but I couldn’t get enough of this guac. I could have drank it it was so fresh and deliscious! I ordered a steak burrito bc I have been craving something like that for a long time and it was AMAAAAZING! Mmm so good! While we were there (Alison y yo) we were talking about where we would take our families if we had a chance to bring them to merida for a week. We were talking about our favorite excursions and it was super fun. We had plans to go to the zoo afterwards, but my stomach was killing me, so we didn’t go. And we were gonna go to the YSA activity that night, but we were super tired/still not feeling super good, so we decided to go to wal mart bc we needed a few things. Super random, we started walking and tony pulled up in his car. He totally gave us a lift to walmart and that was an adventure, lemme tell ya. So I needed deodorant, and they def don’t have the same/as many choices as they do in the states. It was basically lady speed stick or secret. Which was kinda weird bc I haven’t even seen lady speed stick since I was like 13… anyways, I had to get some face stuff, but they didn’t have the stuff I needed. I was looking and looking for something kind of like it, but first of all everything was in Spanish (go figure. we’re in mexico) and second of all they didn’t even have any products that were even similar to what I needed. Tony was asking some lady for help and it was way sweet how he was helping us. We finally found some neutrogena stuff, so I figured what the heck and got it. so then we went back to tonys house for some alka seltzer bc our stomachs were hurting a lot. But we had no idea what he was doing at first then we realized he was getting it for us. Not gonna lie it was the nastiest. Alka seltzer is hard enough to swallow, and on top of that the water was caliente, so it was wakala, but it helped our stomachs, so it was good! thanks tony. Then we hung out for a while and that’s when we learned the word calzon chino. JAJAJA!!
Thurs 5-26
This is the day that we went to the beach w beto!! I love beto!! Hes so much fun! We got out of class at like 9 and we went to the beach at like 11, and it was PERFECT! hardly anyone was there bc it was way early and the water was absolutely gorgeous that day. It was more blueish than normal, and it was just the perfect day to go to the beach. Plus we were there for 5 hours. Which was awesome too.! Alison basically slept the whole time and me and beto went swimming then laid out then went swimming then laid out like 30 times. I got super sandy so I went to rinse off and I was just soaking it all in. its like the ocean calls to me. I want to be there right now. instead of sitting in my hammock, haha. anyways I was on the shore and a man called out to me and I recognized him from the bus . the last time we went to the playa, he was on our bus and we made friends w him. We had a nice conversation. except for I was a lil creeped out at first. I was like, ahhh whose that dude coming towards me?.. then I recognized him and chuckled to myself. Things I like: the beach and friends. Well other things too, but I like those 2 things a lot. So we got back from the beach and that night we went to the boys bball game. it was super fun and they won! I was like their good luck charm. They needed it, ha jk! But ill just say its way diff from watchin jimmer. So then we went to get some food w the boys. Awesome.
Friday 5-27 – all I remember from this day is that when I took my siesta I had a horrible pesadilla (nightmare). To make a long story short my everyone in my fam was super mad at me and no one would talk to me. I tried and tried to get someone to not be mad at me and forgive me and talk to me, but no one would. I woke up and felt horrible. Like, ya I know it was just a dream, but it was one of those that just puts you in a weird mood and it bothers you during the day. Anyways, that night we went to go watch the boys play again. We played w them to help get them warmed up and I sucked. Ha, really badly. But it was still super fun. and they killed the other team. So then afterwards we went back to tonys house for pizza and chocolate milk. Those boys crack me up. They are just like the boys I grew up w …kinda.
Sat 5-28
Saturday we (me, tony, michelle, jen, Jorge, dano) were gonna go to the girls bball game but got crepas instead. Mmmmm SO SOOO GOOOOOD! I love loooooove crepas! We met up w ivan y maria jose there, and they were like hey come to the movies! But the girls didn’t want to see that movie so we went back to their house and met up w Adrienne and cat and watched the blindside. We thought it was in Spanish but it was in English, and we didn’t have a clicker (remote, for those of you not related to me) so we were stuck. I fell asleep like 20 mins into it and ended up going home like halfway thru the movie. It was fun tho. Also, I realized I end everyday by saying something like “it was fun”… whatevs.
Sun 5-29
Went to church. Then we had another game night at Adrienne, jen, michelle, and cats house. That was super fun. Jaja so Brittany and I went outside to get some air and we were chillin around the corner. After like 2 mins, we heard a noise kinda far away, but we ignored it. Then we heard it again and saw an arm swinging outside a door. We heard someone say “HEY” and we looked at each other and we were like, baaaa, lets go inside, so we get up and some dude (we cant see him) was like (in a SUPER creepy voice) hey chicas! HEY CHICAS!! So we ran around the corner and I spilled my drink. We tried to get inside super fast, but someone thought we were just messin around so they were holding the door and wouldn’t let us in. we were like freakin out, and they finally let us in. wakala. HA! I have never heard a creepier voice in my life. gives me the creeps just thinkin about it! Anyways, the rest of the night was fun, but the party ended early bc the old ladies that live there had to go to bed. And I mean no disrespect by calling them old. They just are.
thats all i have for now. sorry its not all the way caught up… I gotta run. Buuuuut MEXICO IS AWESOME! I love it! Everyday is the best day of my life. especially today, bc its my BDAY! Ha today has been the absolute best bday ever! :) LOVE IT! thanks for reading. if you're still reading this by now, its either really intriguing or you super bored and are putting off homework. awesome. besos!
