Diary/Diario

  March:

  Week 3 

Monday – 3-14

  BEWARE OF THE IDES OF MARCH!  haha, I still remember learning about that in my latin class.  Thats the day that Caesar was assassinated.  Unfortunately so was I....that is in the mind.  I had a lot of reading to do.  Only 140 pages, but it is of course in spanish!  I only managed to read about 40 today.  Oh well, at least I figured out that my brain just gives up after soo much spanish, and it refuses to try to comprehend anymore that I read or hear.  My aunt told me that i may have to have her read to me, but I dunno about that.  It's hard enough that I have to mentally translate the words, and then have to figure out the figurative meaing of the passage, sentence, or what have you.  I forgot to mention to you that this is for a literature class.  yayyyyy, good ol lit classses.  At least this one is interesting.  The book I'm refering to is called Ariel and its main messages are:

     1.  One should always be active in what they do even if they are not the actor.  Basically this is saying that we should pay attention even though we may not be "on the stage" at the moment. That way we can look for ways to grow.  

     2.  We shouldn't try to be a perfect civilization, for if we do we limit or halt the growth of mankind.  If something is perfect it doesn't need to be changed, therefore limiting growth.  Ancient  Athens did not strive to be perfect and this is why we saw the wonderful birth of the arts, as well as other things.  

     3.  Find a harmony between the masses.  

  The other book I read basically said to govern is to know.  One can not govern the people if it does not know them, what they want/need in life.  Also it talked about how not knowing your neighbors can lead one to hate them.  Therefore it's important to know why they do the things they do.  I guess this applies to me, as I found more and more things that would annoy me here.  When I go shopping, I tell them what I want at the chocolate shop, then they give me an order slip.  I then take this to another counter to pay.  I give them the slip and the money and then they give me a receipt to take to yet another counter where they wrap up or package the chocolate.  Sounds downright backwards huh? Well I guess they do this for when there are big lines.  This way they can get people in and out faster, because by the time they have paid, the chocolate is wrapped and ready to go.  

Tuesday - 3-15

I had no class today so I just worked on moving the site over to its new server.  Sorry I didnt have anything interesting to say!

Wednesday - 3-16

   Today I had my first class of linguistics which was ok.  I didn't totally understand what we were doing so I recorded most of it, but the two teachers I have are easy to understand.  By the time I returned home I was so tired of concentrating so hard I wanted to sleep, but could not, because we were going to eat.  So I endured 1.5 hours of spanish and then finally slept.  When I woke up I felt more fresh and decided to watch Rojo, which is like american idol, except sillier.   haha.  In the beginning all they do is dance to the hit songs of the summer (summer just ended here and the reason why is that the seasons are exact opposites on opposite sides of the equator.  Its fall here while its turning to spring in michigan).  There's this one song called the cocatera which is as annoying as the macarena...almost...and for some reason I almost like it.  Darn it!   I think they are putting subliminal messages in my head when I sleep:like our crappy dance music....love it, worship it!  Well my first impression was what the heck are they doing?  Their just dancing and the announcers keep saying countries names, and names of the dancers from time to time (which I will add gets very annoying).  Then as I continued to watch I found out that they are just warming up for the competition round.  So now it makes sense!  

Thursday - 3 - 17

     Success!  I finally enrolled my 3 classes and am relieved.  Now all I have to do the rest of the week is read....:(  I hate reading sometimes, but I know it will really help me in the long road.  I finally got to know my sister rocio a little better.  We talked about music, the tv shows rojo, and brujas(witches), as well as many other things.  We played a card game with her mom that is very interesting called revoltiro I think.  I will have to teach ppl how to play it when I get back.  It seems like I've been here for 2 months with all the running around I've done, but I'm really starting to settle in.  The thing that I love the most is that everyday is different, no matter what I do.  Its such a change from the usual daily drag in america.  This is only due to the culture difference.  If anyone really wants a cool experience, seriously go abroad for a period of time like 6 months.  You'll really learn a lot.  I'm even learning how to cook, imagine that. I'm thinking hopefully by next week I'll have a lot more videos and pictures.  Some of my family members and others of the botanical garden.  That'll give you all something to look at.  

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