Montevideo City Tour

This was my third tour begining of the semester tour of Montevideo. This is the first one however during which the weather was nice. Its quite brisk out today, but it was sunny. The first two times I've been here, it rained for the city tour, which makes for a not so great tour.

We mostly did quick stops to see some highlights that if people want to come back to and spend more time they can. Wimon did the tour guiding and did a good job.  Here are some of the highlights... or at least some of my favorite pictures.

Taking notes in the van

Our first stop was the Museo Blanes. It was good to see the paintings by Blanes and Figari again. It was also nice to go to the Japonese Gardens behind the Museo.

Japonese Gardens

After the Museo Blanes, we stopped by the Parque Prado. There is a monument there to the Charruas. They were the native people of Uruguay. Most were killed off soon after Uruguay became a country. A few (4, I believe) were sent to France to be in a circus.

The Charruas

After visiting the Charruas, we headed up to El Cerro, the hill that overlooks the city.

Our whole group and Montevideo behind us.

We took lots of pictures on top of El Cerro

 From El Cerro we headed to one of the local cemeteries where some presidents are buried. We weren't allowed to take pictures. The cemeteries here are fascinating with lots of sculpture. From there we went by the Stadium where the first world cup was held. It has been painted since I was last here. It looks much better. We then saw visited a monument to those that settled Uruguay.

This evening, Diana and I went back to the gym, which is fun as always.

First Day of Classes

Today, as the title indicates, was the first day of classes. I taught one and attended two, so that's a pretty good balance I think.

The semester started off with biochem, so what can be better. :) It always takes me a day or two to get into the swing of teaching face to face after a few months off. But it was fine. It is also really different to just have 4 in class.

In the afternoon, I went to Intermediate Spanish at Universidad de Montevideo with a couple of the girls. Its a class for people who are speaking Spanish as a second language. I was a bit nervous, although since I've had more advanced Spanish than intermediate, I knew I should be fine. And I was. I look forward to hopefully getting the grammar down better and expanding my vocabulary. The instructor was really great.

In the evening, two of the girls and I returned to one of my favorite places in Montevideo... the gym. The name has change and the location has moved around the corner. But its still the same awesome people. I guess Ezti told Fabricio that we were coming tonight. He showed up wearing an ACU shirt that I sent to him after my first trip down here, so 5-6 years ago. That was super cool. Dario was finishing up a class while we were waiting outside. While teaching he stopped to give up a big wave. Class (Fight program) was fun as always. 

On the way home, the girls kept saying that they couldn't believe how fun it is. I'm not sure what it is they do there... but the classes are extra fun. Another great quote was when one of the girls said something along the lines that "We really are living here. We are joining a gym."

Back to Montevideo

Well, I have been blessed to get to return for a third semester to Montevideo. We'll see how the blogging goes. I know the first time I did a good job of keeping up, the second time not so much. Here are the highlights from the trip down and first few days:

Trip Down:

Circling up before heading off

Overall the trip went smoothly. We along with the Oxford group met at ACU at 11:15 to load the bus and head to the airport. Candace brought me to school. On the way I realized I hadn't packed any notes for biochem. Now I'm pretty sure I could do biochem without notes... but we decided to stop by the office to pick them up. After the buses were loaded (early) we circled up to pray with our friends and family that came to see us off (Thanks Candace, Josh, Sandy, and Terri). Sandy took our picture, and off we went.

When we got to the airport we had our only hiccup. Uruguay has a 90 day visitor's visa that we use for staying in the country. Well our plane tickets show us entering and leaving Uruguay more than 90 days apart. It is fine because if we leave and reenter Uruguay (which we do multiple times) the visa resets each time we enter. Because of this we have to have proof that we will be leaving the country, which we had. We had another set of plane tickets to Peru. Well one of the ladies decided that wasn't ok. It was only 5 or 10 minutes of worry, until they called someone who actually knew how it worked. But YIKES!

After that we went on through and it was fine. Alyssa's uncle is the manager of Auntie Anne's in the airport, so we got free pretzels and drinks. The first flight was really crowded and there was a bit of worry about whether I was going to get my carry on bag in, but again... it was fine.

Our flight from Miami was not crowded, my poor students all had to sit with someone (mostly each other) but I had two seats all to myself, which made my 9 hour flight much more pleasant.

Welcome to Montevideo:

Our group at the lookout over the city

We got to Montevideo about 20 min early. Passport control and customs were a breeze. Wimon and Rosalinda were there to greet us and take us home. Montevideo greeted us with another beautiful day. We stopped at a look-out on the way into town to see an overview of the city. When we got to Casa we had some time to unpack then we got eat Raquel's amazing empanadas.

In the afternoon, the students went on a scavenger hunt to learn more about the neighborhood. I ran a couple of errands, got cleaned up and visited with the Walkers. In the evening, we went to dinner at Mercado Abundancia, our traditional first night dinner. Most of us walked home and then slept really well.

Friday:

Palacio Salvo used to be the tallest buildings in South America. I now mainly grateful that they took the radio tower off of the top of it.

The morning was taken up by orientation/ house meeting. In the afternoon, we took the students down to Ciudad Vieja (Old City). They got to meet the statue of Artigas, the Cathedral, other landmarks and have a look around some. The students and I then walked the couple of miles back to Casa. It was another gorgeous day with a high somewhere in the 70's. I was in the faster moving group to get back to Casa because one of the students needed to be back for an online class. I somewhat bullied the other group into stopping at a plaza on the way back.

In the evening the Walkers and I went out for the faculty dinner. We went to a new Mercado that was beautiful. There were lots of fun little stores. The restaurant we ate at was mediocre, but the setting was nice. We actually stayed until it closed down.

Saturday:

We took the students to Punta Carretas Shopping, a high end shopping mall that used to be a prison. After a quick look around, we took them to an open market near by. From there we split up from the kids. The Walkers and I looked around the market, then went back to the mall to buy groceries for the Saturday night dinner. We bought a bunch of groceries and planned to take a taxi home. Turns out that there was a taxi strike and that the buses are showing solidarity. Fortunately, we ended up not having to wait too long for the bus, but it was a very crowded ride home.

Once we got back, I ate lunch with the Walkers then spent the afternoon battling OpenClass in an attempt to be ready to start classes on Monday. I finally, with the help of Vic McCracken, won the first skirmish. I am currently losing the second one.

In the evening, we all worked together to make dinner. A few of the young people from church came over. Diego gave instructions in how to drink mate. It was a fun evening and good to catch up with old friends.

Sunday:
This morning we went to church. It was good to see people again. It was even better to be able to understand a bit more. As our usual Sunday habit, the Walkers and I went to lunch and walked through a big street market.  Now I'm supposed to be doing school work.

Sometimes I almost feel like a different species...

 Well, I'm now at my parents' house in Beebe, AR... but here's what happened my last couple of days:

Thursday was pretty normal.  I went to my morning class. At lunch, I went to pay my exit tax at the bank  In the evening I hung out with the family.  On Wednesday night, I had had my first nightmare about the beginning of school, so I spent part of Thursday evening working on school stuff.  

Friday I woke up early for no good reason, so I started packing.  When I got to school, I had a long conversation about politics with one the teachers.  I was pretty proud I pulled that off in Spanish.  Cathy and the boys were overly impressed... I guess they had never heard me speak Spanish really.  Which is sad since we had been in Costa Rica together for 5 weeks.  I also took some more pictures of the school and my teachers.

Forester from the front

The back garden at the school.

We liked sitting at the table on the back porch during breaks.  Cathy, Nigel, and Simone.

With my morning teacher, Halder.  I had him for the last week.

My teacher!  She was awesome, but you put us together and its hard to believe we are the same species... I'm probably not standing totally straight either.

    During our last class, Simone and I kept hijacking the conversation to reminisce, in Spanish of course.  At the end, I got a certificate.  After class, Simone, Violet, Cathy and the boys headed to Rio for one last time.  I went home.  Mathias was there and so was the neighbor girl who is 10.  We had a big time playing.  The little girl can actually speak quite a bit of English.  We spoke in Spanglish.  After dinner, Isabel and I visited for quite awhile.  Jorge even did the dishes so we could keep talking.  We then took pictures.

Mama Tica y Papa Tico.

We visited for awhile longer.  I was getting tired and headed up to finish packing.  I think it took me until about midnight to get it all organized.

Saturday I woke up even earlier than I needed to.  It turned out to be good, because my taxi came even earlier than we asked for.  (We had scheduled 6:30 instead it came at 6:15.)  Anyway... I worked on not crying... we loaded my stuff into the car and off I went.  I talked to the driver all the way to airport in Spanish... so I was pretty proud.

The trip home was super easy.  The flights went smoothly and my luggage made it.  Mom, Dad, and mom's college roommate picked me up.

An Opera or Captain America... same thing right?

This last week is flying by.  Last night (Tuesday) I got home early.  Isabel and Jorge were out and Mauricio was apparently asleep.  Papas Ticos called Mauricio to ask if I was home, he said no.  (I was in my room.)  They came home and were in the house for a little bit before they realized I was in my room.  We were invited to go to Isabel's sister's house for dinner.  So the Papas Ticos and I headed over to my Tios Ticos' house.  It was another night where I felt a bit like a pet.  Autumn, come.  Sit.  Watch TV. Eat. 

Actually its the first time I've felt a bit better about my Spanish.  (I feel like I can't say anything most of the time.)  BUT I could follow most of the conversation at dinner.  Usually I have a hard time with a bunch of people and with Isabel's sister and brother-in-law.  (Especially the first week I was here and we spent a lot of time with them.) Anyway... it was fun.

6 hours of classes a day are still brain melting.  BUT I think I'm learning a lot. 

Simone and I were going to see the opera Carmen tonight at the National Theater, but it was sold out.  So since we had told our families that we would be out for the evening, we decided to see "Captain America."  Another student from school Devon, who happens to be from Arkansas, came with us.  We were going to try to go to the 6 PM 2D version.  It was sold out, so we went to the 6:40 3D version. We were not going to have our plans foiled!  My eyes still aren't quite the same... but I enjoyed the movie.  So there you go... not as many exciting stories without the tours.

My first pilgrimage?

As I have mentioned before in this blog, the patron Saint of Costa Rica is La Virgen de Los Angeles, nicknamed La Negrita.  Legend has it that missionaries were having trouble converting the natives to Catholicism.  A little girl named Juanita found a little dark statue of the Virgin Mary holding baby Jesus.  No matter where she or the priest put it, it returned to the rock where she found it.  The priest took this to mean that they should build a shrine and church there.  The Costa Rican natives then found faith because she was dark like they were (hence the name La Negrita.)

La Negrita on the stone where she was found.

Many healings have been attributed to La Negrita.  Her Saints day is on August 2.  People walk from all over some from as far away as Nicaragua and Panama to Cartago to celebrate her day.  The main road from my house to school is the major road from San Jose to Cartago.  Thousands upon thousands (probably in the 100 thousands) of people walk this road on the days leading up to August 2... August 1 is the big walking day.  From where we live it is about a 4 hour walk. My Papa Tico got up this morning and walked to Cartago.  He said it took him about 3 1/2 hours.  (By the way, this walk includes going over the continental divide... there is a mountain between here and Cartago.)  I saw small groups all weekend walking which I thought was impressive.  Seeing 5 or 10 people walking it together was cool. 

After class today there were so many people walking that it was safe and easy to walk home (there was police stopping traffic and everything.)  So I guess I did a couple miles of the walk. The sidewalk which is generally pretty empty walking long distances was full.  I was even more impressed than this weekend.

Apparently mi familia tica has the tradition of walking up to the ice cream shop on the corner and watch the walkers... I've never seen anything like it.  They had closed down one direction of the road totally and the other direction mostly...  The road was full of people.  What impressed me the most is that while we saw the very old and very young... I'd say most people were between 15 and 40 years old.  I would not expect to see that much devotion from people so young. It was really something to see... There were families pushing babies in strollers or even carrying them in arms.  There was one guy in a wheel chair rolling himself.  There was a very old woman being pushed in a wheel chair.  There were church groups walking together singing.  Some people had on sensible shoes... others did not.  One guy was pulling a rolling suitcase with another bag on top... I'm guessing he came from further away than San Jose.  Oh and a lady carrying her little dog.  Yikes!  Anyway, it was really interesting.  I felt uncomfortable taking my camera, but I did steal this picture off the interwebs... I'd say its about what I saw.  We watched for a half an hour to an hour or so and saw thousands of people.

In other news... it is very weird at school with just a few of us there.  I enjoyed my first day of intensive school with 2 hours of one-on-one in the morning and four hours of now two-on-one (now that everyone else has left) in the afternoon.  But my brains were ready to fall out.  Those of us that were left were a bit sad without the old crowd.... but I'm learning lots.

The Beginning of the End

Friday was the last day of classes for most of my friends.  Those of us in Intermediate 2 have really loved our profe Hazel.  (Simone and I get to continue with her for one more week.)  We decided to get Hazel a present.  The fact that she had never read Harry Potter but wanted to had come up in class.  I had volunteered to be the one two buy the first couple of books Friday morning.  An easy task as I had seen them everywhere earlier in the month, or so I thought.  Well, with the last movie coming out there must have been a resurgence of interest in reading the books, because it took me 4 stores in a rain storm to find them.  In the store where I finally found it, I bought the last of copy of the first book. Its all David's fault... he had jinxed me the night before.  Simone made a loaf of Swiss bread (her dad is Swiss) and brought it to class.  Hazel had bought iced coffee drinks, so we had a little party.  We had the option of watching a movie or doing more exercises with the subjunctive.  We chose the subjunctive... we are a sick group.

Intermedio 2 - Julio 2011 Back: Eric, David, Me, Simone, and John.  Front: Rob and Hazel.

After class, we headed to El Rio for something to drink as per usual.  Stacey had to go pick up a friend who had come to travel with her for a few days.  After a while we headed to a Mexican restaurant down the street for a goodbye dinner.  We eventually had to break up the party and head home.  Saying good-bye was not a lot of fun.  It has been a great group... I feel very fortunate to have made such good friends here.  It was kind of funny.  I said good-bye to Stacey for real.  I knew I was going to see Simone, Eric, and Jenee again.  John, David and I rode the same bus toward home.  I get off a stop or two before they do.  So once the bus hit my stop... it was basically a... "Well.. uh... see you guys."  and I hopped off the bus.  (Well stepped down carefully, I keep waiting to fall down the bus stairs but you know what I mean...)

Saturday, I decided to head into Downtown San Jose.  I had been there a few times on various tours, but never really looked around.  There were lots and lots of people around.  This coming Tuesday, Aug 2, is the day they celebrate (for a lack of better term) the patron saint of Costa Rica, La Negrita (I've mentioned her in previous posts.)  Anyway, I'll probably talk about this more later, but people walk from all over to for Mass on Aug 2 in Cartago.  The main street near my house is a major thoroughfare to Cartago.  There were lots of pilgrims walking, which added to the crazy number of people around.

Anyway, I wandered through a couple of markets again.  I holed up in the smaller one when it started raining really hard.  (It's covered.)  It was funny because most of the people at the various stalls knew who I was at least for awhile.  Several told me that for me they'd give me a good price (In Spanish or English depending on the person.)  I'd laugh and say, "Just for me?"  Most would laugh and say "Of course."  BUT one guy looked at me with a very serious face and gave me a very flat, "No."  (I mean seriously lady, why would I give just you a good price.)  I found it hilarious.  I only ended up buying stuff from people who spoke to me in Spanish.  It went about half and half on what people would use with me first.

After awhile the rain lessened a bit and I caught the bus home.  In the evening, I had the house to myself.  Jorge's aunt died earlier in the week (I think.)  And so Jorge and Isabel went to the wake.  Mauricio went out... although he was in for a bit in the evening.  I actually really enjoyed having some time in the house alone.  Isabel was a bit worried about what I was going to have for dinner... I assured her I was capable of making a sandwich for myself.  :)  I got to sit around and watch movies in Spanish.

Sunday was another quiet day.  In the afternoon I decided to go the the Museum of Costa Rican Art.  It is supposed to be open on Sundays and free.  I took a taxi there, because I wasn't sure which bus to take, and its on the other side of town.  When I got there, it started raining again... of course.  (I've been very grateful for my umbrella the last month.)  And there was a sign that said it was open and free on Sunday and Tuesday... and this was true kind of... parts of it were open and it was free.  Mostly the outside parts and a couple of the inside rooms were open.  I did get to see some cool stuff, but it was weird how it was only kind of open.

I decided to walk back to the city center which was a 2-3 kilometers away.  I stopped in a Quiznos with internet access for lunch.  (The internet had been down all day Saturday and Sunday.)  I then walked on through the downtown and caught a bus back to home. 

Jenee, Eric, and I had made tentative plans to go to a ballet Sunday night, but the ballet had been postponed until September apparently.  So we met at the Mall near my house.  We aren't really mall hanging out people, but we managed to kill a few hours.  Particularly with Jenee and I oohing and aahing over all sorts of stuff in a home decoration store. After the shops closed and we ate dinner, we caught a cab.  They dropped me off by my house.  The head home tomorrow (Monday).  In the group that I hung out with... it is now just down to Simone and I.

When I got home Jorge and Isabel had just returned.  They had spent the afternoon with Jorge's family.  I hung out with them for awhile.  Then I headed to bed.  I was about to go to sleep when I saw the internet had finally come back on... so I took the opportunity to post.

Tomorrow (Monday) starts my private lessons in the morning and just two of us in the afternoon... it should be and interesting experience.  Its hard to believe that I'll be back in the States in less than a week.