Getting Comfy!

Today was just another day of getting adjusted! Rosa and I had to get up early and was out of the house around 7:30… a little late to walk, so we caught the bus. The first day of class was interesting, a lot of speaking Spanish! Which is the idea, I guess! I think I spoke more Spanish in my two classes today than all the classes I’ve had back in the States combined. I’m sure my Mom is really excited to hear that, haha. I can already tell that I’m learning, or at least getting more comfortable trying. I especially like my first teacher, she’s really sweet. Doesn’t speak any English, but for some reason I can understand her really well.

We had our first bus disaster today. We missed our stop, because we thought it was going to stop again, closer to our house, but it didn’t stop for another 10 minutes or so over and around a couple of bridges and tunnels. We ended up in a whole different part of town that we’d never been before, so we just started walking. We found another bus stop going the other way and hopped on and eventually found our way again. I guess it could have been much worse, but we were still completely lost!

So guess what? There is a Walmart here. Ha! About a 15 minute walk from our house. We met some of our Missouri friends there to pick up some school stuff and snacks. It was exactly like the ones back home except everything in Spanish. And they don’t have any bagels. (I had a craving!) Oh! And we ran into this Asian guy from California as we were walking into the store and he asked if we were American. When we said we were, he said “yeah, i can tell. your clothes are baggy.” Ha! And it’s true, all the women here wear SUPER tight clothes… no matter the body type. Rosa and I don’t know how to explain it, except it’s like they all buy their clothes about 3 sizes to small, by American standards. Don’t worry Daddy, I won’t get any ideas, but I do have to admire their confidence. The guy was kind of weird, he told us the same stories about 5 times, but I guess he was just happy to have some Americans to chat with. Anyway, the Walmart was part of a strip mall type area called La Plaza de Mexico, where I also bought a Mexican cell phone. I got 300 minutes and a Samsung phone for about 40 bucks, and it will be so much easier to meet everyone and keep in contact. I found the welcome message for the company on the phone interesting though, it said “Vive libre con Telcel” which means “Live free with Telcel”. Don’t cell phones keep us tied together? A little Mexican irony

We’ve spent a lot of time with Marianna today. Our housekeeper, Carmen, is sick today so we had to take care of the food. She had a vegetable soup heating on the stove when we got back from school, which was made of artichoke, tomato, celery, carrots, etc. and was really good. Then she had some salmon there, but Marianna can’t cook because of her condition. So, Rosa and I took over! We found some lemon pepper (yes, Rudy, I stole that from you!) and it turned out pretty good. For dinner, we made Marianna her first grilled cheese, which she decided was “muy rica” which means “very delicious!” in context. It was a fun little cultural mix.

Now we’re just getting ready for bed and showing Marianna pictures of all of you on our laptops. So if your ears are itching it’s because I’m bragging about you! It’s just making me miss all of you even more… Hope everything is well back in the States.

Also, a big thank you to my Uncle Lowell for helping me with this blog!! It’s my first one, and he’s been helping me set it up today… you’re the best!! And I loved the test post

I think we’re going to go on a little cantina adventure tomorrow, so stay tuned!