Christmas Vacation

We are now on Christmas vacations and definately enjoying the free time. Teaching is hard work! On the last day of school (Wednesday) we were invited to the 4th grade fiesta. We played in a basketball tournament, danced and ate with the kids. The basketball games were more reminisce of football with the amount they charged down the court holding the ball or practically wrestled it out of their opponents hands. We were very impressed by their dancing skills though. I´m pretty sure 4th grade boys from Sitka wouldn´t be asking girls to dance. Santa came and gave the kids gifts, which caused a lot of excitement and Perla and Saul (the 4th grade teachers) were even thoughtful enought to get us little santa boxes filled with sweets. It was a very nice celebration that they put on for the children.
The weekend before we caught the end of another surf competition at Playa Linda and went to a local rock concert. The three bands we saw played mostly American music with pieces from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Ramones, Three Doors Down and Metallica. A good show. We were both suprised at Zihua´s large American punk rock following.
Thursday we decided to try the next beach down from Playa Linda (our favorite). Playa Quieta was pretty much empty when we arrived in the late morning, but there were hundreds of empty beach chairs. I convinced Sarah that no one would care if we lounged in a couple for a few hours, but when I walked down the beach she was ousted by Club Med´s security guards. Oh well, it is a pretty beach anyway.
The next day we rented kayaks from a friend on La Ropa beach and kayaked out the bay to a point past the lighthouse. Kayaking is much more comfortable here because when you get splashed, it´s actually a relief. We saw a turtle, lots of birds and fish and a floating coconut that actually wasn´t a seal head.
Also this weekend Christine took us to Barra de Potosit again. It is such a laid back place; all the restuarants have hamacks for each table. We had fresh coconuts, fish quesedillas and amazing fried bannanas. (see pic)
Tomorrow we take the bus to Manzanillo to visit some friends who are vacationing there. The actually time of the trip seems to be widely disputed between our contacts; somewhere between six and ten hours. I guess we´ll see for ourselves. We are going to stay there until after New Years and return before the start of school, which is the 7th of January.
Feliz Navidad,
Ben and Sarah

The Pre-school Surf

We started our day today paddling out to the Playa Linda Point reef break before dawn. It was our first time in ¨real¨ waves, instead of surfing mostly whitewater. Even if we still aren´t very good at surfing yet (this was our third lesson), it was great to watch the sun creep over the palm-lined beach from the vantage point of the warm blue water.
Out of the water at around 9:30 after more than two hours of surfing, we rinsed and changed in the parking lot and drove to school.
This week in our English conversation class we´re reviewing our introduction conversation with a game. Games in the classroom are a very rare occurance for the children, so the 3rd and 4th graders were all quite ecstatic. Even after we took the time to explain that we couldn´t play games if the class got rowdy, we still had the whole group jump to their feet to present the answer instead of the person writing raise their hand like we had asked. We´ll see how the 5th graders take to it tommorow.
Some domestic news: we put up wall hangings yesterday (square swatches of different patterened cloth that matches our apartment). They make the apartment seem less empty than white-washed cement walls on most sides. I bought a classical guitar from a man named Pepe. it should be nice to have some chords floating around in the warm nights after dinner. Also, we have further delved into Mexican cooking by making our own refried beans (with onions and garlic) instead of buying them in a can and by trying our hand at Agua de Jamaica (an iced tea made from dried hibiscus flowers), a very common refreshment at restaurants here. We may have to try our hand at Mexican dishes other than tea and tacos later.
This last weekend we had the oppurtunity to attend the 2007 Catcha La Ola Surfer Reunion Competition. That is, we sat on the beach (the same place we surfed this morning) and watched the 40 and older category compete. I must admit, for old men (some of who looked more like 60), there were quite a few who could really rip up the waves.
El Dia de la Virgen de Guadalupe (the day of our Lady Guadalupe) started last night at 12 and ends tonight at the same time. What we have noticed so far are parades, (increasing in frequency, but seemingly at random times with small or non-existant audiences) and fireworks. We haven´t actually seen fireworks, but we are often shaken at the table frequently by explosions that seem more like larger seal bombs than domestic fireworks. I´ve read that the main festival takes place in the north of Mexico City, but I´ve also heard there is a big parade here as well, but I don´t know how long we will stay up tonight because we have to walk the hill to school tommorow morning.
If you haven´t been able to comment because of a lack of a Google account, you should be able to now. I found the setting (which I thought I had already changed), to allow all comments.
Thanks for tuning in,
Ben and Sarah

December 4th

Today was the first day of our independant teaching. (Until now we have been assisting Christine in her classes, which was a great way to start off, but we wanted to do more.) We all felt that the kids would benefit from having an additional hour of English each week, so Ben and I are designing a conversation class to supplement Christine´s general English class. Our first conversation is ¨Introductions¨. Today we worked with the third graders and it went well considering it was our first day. We gave our first class of third graders a writing task that was way too hard, so the second class received the benefits our mistake in a toned-down lesson. It´s kind of an experiment for us (maybe guess and check is more descriptive, experiment sounds a little refined), not having taught much in a classroom before, nevermind in a different language, but we´re learning. Luckily for us, Christine is very generous with her teaching knowledge.

This evening we experienced our first storm; thunder, lightening and rain. Very exciting, but over in a little more than an hour. Ben took a picture of the street from our balcony, the discoloration in the sky is from the lightening. With this rain hopefully the flowers and green will stay a little longer!