isla mujeritas

i have arrived on isla mujeres. pretty much paradise (plus tourists)
it's gorgeous here and so laid back. but the problem is the rain. i woke up this morning to RAIN! ruining my island vacation!

anyway, i digress

after valladolid i made my way to chichen itza early the next morning. i heard that it was best to get there early to miss the crowds. that was not a lie! by the time i left there were HUGE lines everywhere. On the bus there I met a girl, Talia, who i ended up spending the rest of my time at chichen itza and in merida with. She's a junior anthro major at Vassar so we hit it off great.

Merida was wonderful== on sundays they close off the streets and there are musicians everywhere. we had a great time eating good food and listening to music.

then i took a bus to cancun and the ferry to isla. on the ferry over met an aussie girl who hadc been working at penn state for the summer... bizarre... she's one of those SUPER hyper crazy girls, but it's been fun hanging out with her because she has no qualms about going up to anyone. we ended up spending the afternoon at the beach with these twins from holland. At night we met up with some israeli guys as well as another aussie and a canadian. it's the first place that i've really gotten to meet a lot of travelers which has been great!

this place is gorgeous. i could definitely spend a while here... (as long as the rain stopped!)

anyway, i'm off to figureo ut what to do with myself now! the weather site gives no hint as to when this is going to stop!!!

El Rey de Beisbol

after settling into my hostel today i took off to see what was listed in the guidebook as one of the top 40 sites in mexico, the cenotes. the book gave two options for transport, collectivo or bike. i thought to myself, well, i could use a bit of exercise to burn off my campo panza plus it´ll give me a better chance to see the countryside, plus i´m cheap. so, bike it was. the guide also tells you to get your bikes from a shop entitled Rey de Beisbol run by the rey (king) de beisbol himself, who claimes to have been a professional player. so i find my way there and walk in to find a very large shirtless and hawaiin shorts clad old man sitting in a dark shop filled with sports equipment as well as trophies for sale (i can only assume he creates his own rey status with these trophies)
i go to pick out my bike, making pleasant conversation with the rey. i should have had the first hint that he was a miser when he wrote down the time i was starting on my journey as 155 when it was really 145, but alas, he told me i was a beautiful guerra and sent me on my way, reminding me not to lose the key to the lock.

as i make my merry way down the bike path (which incidentely was filled with wholes and ruts and suprisingly high dropoffs onto the highway) i hear a clink. shoot, i think, a coin has fallen out of my pocket. i make mental note of the blue building a bit ahead so that i can look for the coin on my way back. i continue on my way thinking about the lack of cactus in the yucatan and the proliferation of iguanas. apparently cacti and iguanas do not go to gether. when all of a sudden my bike goes nuts. i try to stop but no brakes. What? no brakes? well, the entire brake apparatus had fallen off a few feet back, piece by piece. i drop the bike and go try to find the pieces (but still missing that crucial piece wqhich i now discover must have been the ´coin´a ways back)
as i´m looking i see a man coming down the road. he stops, smelling heavily of the beer that i had watched him drink when i passed him before. he´s also got a few more beers and a bottle of cheap tequia in a plastic bag.
he wants to help, great! i think, just don´t kill me. while he takes a look at my bike he offers me a beer for the heat. no thanks i say. he starts pulling bike parts out o fhis pocket, telling me that this sort of thing happens to his bike often. unfortunatly theres no fix and after 10 awkward minutes of being invited to a fiesta and having to decline because i´m not going o a rancho party solo, i´m on my way, brakeless to the cenotes.
i feel bad for the kid who wants to watch my bike so i let him watch it for a few pesos even though its a piece of junk with no brakes anyway, it is my ride home.
the cenotes were gorgeous... totally beautiful. google search cenotes valladolid if you want to see. it´s like a lagoon in a cave with an air shaft letting in light.
i grumblingly hop back on my bike afterwards and hed bck to the town. as i arrive i check my watch. 350, great, under 2 hours. (or if you go by his timing 2 hours and 5 minutes which he surely cant charge me for)
çwell, i was wrong. he wants to charge me for 3 hours! i talk him down to 2.5... that miser with a bike whose brakes fall off! teaches you to deal with professional baseball players!

wheeeeeee

that last one was super rushed. it seems like i only have time to write entries at the very end of my internet time.
but here i find myself back in the internet cafe mostly because i'm so thoroughly wigged out by cancun. this place is WEIRD. i think cancun is only a place to be enjoyed in the safety of your all-inclusive beachside resort. because downtown is this horrendous mix of crappy stores, internet cafes, bad food, and tour offices. guacala.

luckily this is just a stopover before i head out tomorrow towards the lagoons (for lack of a better name), chichen itza, merida, and isla mujeres. clearly better things to come!!

seeing juan yesterday was interesting. in ways a flashback to the past and in ways a sort of jarring reminder of the fact that we've grown up a lot since we were teenagers hanging out in the canchas of tepic. everybody is either married, graduated, has kids, has a house, or some combo of the sort. it made me a little sad to realize that you can't go back.. but i guess where we are isn't half bad-- juans got himself a really nice place, a good job, car, etc. he's what i fondly call a 'real person'... as a lot of my friends seem to me.

as for me, i guess i'll make the announcement official--
i'm fairly positive i'm coming back to philly for a few months to take a class, have a part-time job, and see my family before they take off in february! (yes, it's definitely official now).. then i'm thinking of going traveling again for a few months and then hopefully san francisco! that's the rough plan

anyway, i'm off again!

Love
Kir

can i do this in 3 minutes?

the question is can i do this update in the 3 minutes left before i have to pay more. i'm up to the challenge.

i just got to cancun.. well, about an hour ago. what a change from the center of mexico. it is sticky and hot and everybody speaks english. that being said, it's really refreshing in a sort of ocean breeze way. finally my vacation!

the story that needs to be told here is of my return back to the campo with rita. I went back with the thought that i would go hang in mexiquito and make a trip to junco for a fiesta (i do love my fiestas) everybody in mexiquito spent all day saying that they had no desire to go to the fiesta, butr when it came down to evening time they all did their hair (and mine in pretty little tie things) and got ready to go... only there was no ride.. we looked everywhere for a ride, sure that one would happen. rita and i are convinced that in mexico where there's a will, there's a way.

alas, an hour later, and 10 different people who told us they were "out of gas" we gave up and went to get hotdogs. as we got our hotdogs the skies POOOOOURED.. we ran back to the house and threw a dance party there. and instead of getting soaked in the rain partied it up in the house.
where there's a will there's a way

GTO closeout

the volunteers are officially gone. They left yesterday at 12:30. Marcus, Kalie and I watched the plane take off from the airport restaurant. One of my volunteers had some problems with her tickets-- basic incompetence of a travel agent-- but she ended up on the plane in first class. lucky her! seeing them go home sort of made me want to be able to fly home for a little while! but maybe that will be able to happen sometime soon.

I'm really proud of all of them--- You forget how difficult it can be to be a teenager in a place that is totally different from what you've ever known. We had a candlelight ceremony on the last night and listening to their stories made me see how much a lot of them have grown in a short time... and i think the thing about amigos is that more of that growing happens after you leave than even while you're there.

well, i wanted to post some photos, but i think blogger doesn't have the same idea... maybe next time?

my route did an amazing skit on the last night.. i was falling out of my seat laughing-- they're really for the most part a great group of kids. They all wore our route tshirts (will put a picture on next time) , cowboy hats, and lifted their shirts up so that it said "panza" (belly) and pointed to their stomachs--- then they did a song and dance.. it was fabulous!

staff is still the same as it's been for awhile.. well at least for a week. we have our good parts and our bad parts.

for the most part this summer has been a really positive experience and i'm definitely glad that I did it.


now for the next part of my life since today is pretty much the end of my 'job'. I'm going to stick around here until monday (the 14th).. then i'm going to go back to two of my towns-- well, maybe three.-- there's a party at one of them on the 15th which should be really fun...

then i'm going to go to queretaro for one day to see Juan--- pieces of my old life--- and then on to D.F> to fly to Cancun. once i get to cancun i think i'm going to make my way to Merida, stopping at this lagoon and at chichen itza and maybe one other ruin. spend a day or two in merida, then go back to cancun area and take a boat over to isla mujeres for a couple of days until meeting up with mom and dad!
so, i do actually have a plan through the beginning of september..
now only if i knew where i was off to afterwards!!

if you're reading thisyou should be sending me an email and telling me what you're up to

Kir

great week on route. great. went to an AMAZINg fiesta.

more about that sometime when i have the energy to do it and am not almost done a book about german/british spies.

the vols are here.. wheeeee. the next two days are going to be very interesting.

and a bunch of my vols cried. which was touching.