and then the trip to the ruins was ruined

well, yours truly was officially bitten by the travelers' bug, and shoot, it was a stinger. it hit me square in the gut on thursday evening and i was out of order for the majority of the weekend. it's karma, karma i tell you! karma comes back in travelers' bug form and bites you big time for laughing in its face when the sweet little health center ladies were dutifully presenting their pre-departure orientation slideshow on shots, foreign feminine products, and the occasional unavoidable explosion of the intestinal organs due to foreign waters. snicker, snicker! she just said diarrhea! and we all were thinking "pish posh, that would never happen to me. i am the most cautious of them all! with a stomach of steel, might i add!" and then eaves-dropping travelie bug makes a mental note of your most cockiest of moments, and a few weeks in, after a full day's worth of snacks + tuna salad + spaghetti + salsa-covered quesadillas for dinner {at 10 pm.. you're gagging, right? it sounded like a good idea at the time...} he strikes! and boom, man down.

i slept for approximately 35 hours straight {and therefore my sleep schedule is now completely out of whack}, and had to miss our first field trip to the mayan ruins of mayapan and acanceh. fortunately there are many, many more ruins to be seen in my future {and i'm kind of expecting the ruins to be a once-you've-seen-one-you've-kinda-seen-them-all? sort of ordeal}, but i was still bummed to to have missed our first big mayan culture field trip. i'm just fortunate the travelers' bug got to it and didn't decide to delay the process a mere 7 hours! how's that for a nightmare!?

travelers' bug is no joke, so when you start to deem it unrealistic and laugh at the stupidity of it all, think again. those of us who have gotten it and survived are feeling pretty tough and have convinced ourselves that now that we've gotten it we're "immune" and are free to gobble up every last mouth-watering yet extremely questionable street vendor item.

 i am finally feeling back to normal and was able to get out and explore yesterday afternoon. a few of us went downtown to the centro after lunch {or i guess before lunch! i don't know! depends on whose mealular clocks we're running on here!} and went to a few art museums and browsed around at the different vendors. i tried a tamale for lunch {never again} and am still craving that churro i didn't buy for dessert.

next weekend: a churro it is!

bus stop auto-timer shots are the best shots!

sundays at the centro

my tamale - i've decided if i can survive that, i can survive all!

My Initial Thoughts about Life in Merida

once upon a warm january's night, a young maiden named rachel was doing homework {it's that ugly type called reading where you don't necessarily have to do it right this minute buuuut when you're sitting on the computer facebook stalking your friends it suddenly hangs over your head, taunting you like a dark thundercloud}. why yes, reading. this so-called reading was of the science type - about a man named charles darwin to be exact. for those of you who are familiar with darwin {and even for those of you who aren't}, you know it's some dry stuff. darwin, tired eyes, and a current temperature of 82 degrees are the perfect recipe for a big batch of mind wandering. so my antsy thoughts started a-drifting, and while my eyes skimmed the words of sir darwin, my mind conjured up a plethora of more important topics: food, blogging, things to google, food, my outfit schedule for the rest of the week, words in spanish, my itchy bug bites, sleep, and food {and that uncomfortable encounter i just had with my host brother when i attempted to tell him i hope he felt better in the morning and it turned into a bunch of jibberish and ended in my saying... "yeah." and him walking away chuckling?}{i'm sure my incapability to formulate sentences is endearing!}.

it's at the most inconvenient of times that i come up with these things, i tell you what. and this thing being a {i survived week one! oh my yes!} recap on my initial thoughts about life in merida.

• the food is {surprisingly} not spicy. in a lot of restaurants {okay, the two i've been to so far anyways} and in the central house, the food is fairly bland, but accompanied with a variety of hot sauces for you to add on your own. an enter-at-your-own-risk type of set-up, if you will.
• throwing my toilet paper in the toilet might be one of the hardest habits i've ever had to break. yep, that's right, for the past week {and two days, to be exact} i have been un-potty training and retraining myself to drop my soiled toilet paper {could i have not used a more awkward phrase for that?} in the trash can located next to the toilet. and yep, that's right, a trash can right in yo face full of mounds of used toilet paper. but really it's not as bad as it sounds. and it beats toilet overflowsion.
• it is quickly morphing me into one of the grossest, uncleanliest human beings {i prefer the phrase: embracing my body's natural capabilities}. honestly, i was probably a little too uptight about my appearance/smell/cleanliness before {now having to use bottled water every time i brush my teeth - which is quite a process! - makes the 4-5 times i used to do it daily seem a wee bit excessive}. i'm sticky, my feet are dirty, i now have so many bug bites on my legs that i can no longer find a path to shave around them {and i am an EVERY DAY SHAVER people}, and my sweat 'stache hasn't disappeared since i arrived. and if we're being completely open here {since i didn't totally overstep those boundaries moons ago}, i'm actually sweating less than i ever do during a summer in the united states. three cheers for sweat gland adaptation!
• everything is in spanish. this is one of those little details that didn't cross my mind pre-departure - every sign, label, menu, product, ad is in spanish. i don't want to blame my surprise on ignorance, because looking back it seems so obvious, but i just hadn't given thought to the fact that every piece of writing would be in their official language. duh! it definitely made realize how much i took for granted the ease of getting around in the united states.

it's wednesday! have a good one!

i'm so envious of those of you {safely} stuck in a snowstorm right now. the temperature is expected to drop to a high of 77/low of 66 here tomorrow, which is practically the dramatic equivalence to a snowstorm in iowa. it's as close to freezing as it gets in my neck of the tropics.

adios!

ESTOY EN CASA!

i am in the house!

i made it! and i was right, it feels so nice to have my things unpacked and finally be somewhere that resembles a "home." meeting my host family and getting settled in their casa that they are so graciously opening up to me has put many of worries and anxieties to rest.

but apparently a few nervous cells are still bouncing around inside me and chose to make their debut on the evening of my arrival. after clumsily bumping around with my luggage trying to unpack [desempaquetear -- try casually using that one in a sentence!] and get things situated, my host family ordered pizza and we had a nice first dinner together, chatting and getting acquainted [they chatted, i kept my end up with mostly smiles, nods, the occasional laugh, and a si! when appropriate]. as i was carrying my dishes to the sink after we finished up dinner, i noticed my host mother was by my side and that she was speaking to me in a sincere and heartfelt tone. i quickly caught on to what she telling me and before i knew it she was leaning in for a hug. i hurriedly set my dishes down next to the sink [la lavadora -- today has been full of some serious vocabulary learning!], and as i turned to hug her, my elbow swiftly swiped my big glass of horchata and it went flying. all over the floor. and barely missing doña rosí. 

now talk about a first impression.
and a moment ruiner.

i frantically smeared around my little used napkin in the mess and muttered apologizes in english [i was not anticipating that they would be needed the first night! apologizes were on the back burner of my learning stove] while she got a mop, and then i slunk up to my room and cried a little. [and waited for the call that said i'd been kicked out of my home stay house and out of the program and college forever. but looking back, that's kind of dramatic?]

yesterday was much, much better. while i'm sure they all think i'm a loon [sometimes i can be a paranoid penelope...] i managed to consume all of my food and or keep it in its respective dishware. and carry on a conversation or two! good things are happening!

i will post a full on virtual tour soon so you guys are able to get an idea of my living quarters for the next few months. [i thought going around taking pictures of everything might be a little much for the first day. :) especially after my "episode"...]

buenos días!

BROUGHT TO YOU BY MY PINTEREST BOARD

and now for a completely random yet totally obviously relevant photo:

via

someone asked me about mexico and my emotions and how they're all melting together in a big pot of scared-ness and a bystander snapped this photo of me replying and turned it into a "demotivational" portrait. (did you know those pictures framed in black and captioned in white have names? and that name is a demotivational? me neither!)

but seriously, how punny is this?

do you ever go back through your pinterest pins and think "nice work, pinner of the past. you're such a creative rock star! you have the maddest pinterest scavenging skills of them all!"

also, do you ever ask your peers questions that start with "do you ever...?" and they just stare at you blankly, blinking, blinking, and slowly scrunch up their faces in distaste and grumble "no..?" with a quick shake of the head? because obviously whatever it is that you do so often you're sure others lives' are consumed with it too is apparently the most unique and or repulsive thing? okay yeah good, me neither...........

Onions & Orchids Wednesday

i felt it necessary to bring back my weekly tradition of onions and orchids. it's a fun way to reflect on the silly, awkward, awesome, and memorable little things that occur each week.

and now! i present to you!

onions for: 

• my mom and sisters went back to school today. bruiser and i are bored and lonely. so bored, so lonely. already. sigh. however we are getting our money's worth out of our netflix free month trial. ;)
• i'm in the process of buying textbooks for next semester. shall we just leave it at that? okay no i must pause for some quick real talk: what's your take on "ebooks"? would it be worth it cost-wise to purchase a tablet and renting the book on there [and weight-wise - those 15 minute walks to class in 100 degree heat are gonna be a kicker]? i just have this thing about being able to physically hold the book and flip through the pages. it's half the fun of book reading. and that old book smell! kindles just aren't old book scented. 
• i was hanging out with my mom at work before christmas break. she and i were walking a student back to their classroom. said student and i are buddies, so we were holding hands and skipping very cute-like. a friend of the student ran up to us and yelled, "HEY STUDENT, IS THAT YOUR MOM??!" i smiled sweetly while thinking the friend was referring to my mom and then looked at her, only to realize she was gesturing to me. SHE WAS ASKING STUDENT IF I WAS HER MOTHER. gasp. shudder. end scene.
• mother and i went to red blobster to splurge on our favorite usual: chef's signature lobster and shrimp pasta. it'd been taken off the menu. of course.
• please read bullet two en la seccion de orchids. soak it in. now: i bawled cried in les mis. 8 times. a.k.a. never stopped shedding tears. and i am not a crier. my family can't get over it. the crying i mean. it was unusual. i guess i was feeling a little emotionally unstable?

orchids to: 

• netflix. netflix netflix netflix. and the beauty of its free trial and plethora of tv episodes [note: the movies are lamies].
• les miserables. it was absolutely, beautifully outstanding. it moved me.
• i am a new owner of an espresso machine! our house has practically been transformed into a starbucks! it smells fabulous. and i am forever hyper! a win-win!!
• my best friend applied for her passport today so she can come visit me in mexico over spring break. [!!!] she is the wonderfullest. march 10, i can't wait to see you.

i hope you stayed warm on this chilly wednesday! the weekend is a measly 48 hours away! yes!

to see my first onions & orchids [which contains a bonus explanation of the whole deal] click here