June 9th newsletter

Hola!

Dear friends and family,

This weekend Nicolle and I went on another adventure to Xochicalco! Personally, I think the mountain ranges of the last ruins were a little more interesting (because we were in them!), but the hike was far easier than last week and the pyramids were much bigger, much more intricate. The difference between the two cultures and the uses of the summits was strikingly obvious. The first site we visited last week was for monks to offer little sacrifices and live in seclusion. However, here at Xochicalco, the priests not only controlled the calendar and the water, but made sacrifices for the people and spoke with the dead. This I found most interesting. The way they did it was to burn pieces of paper soaked in human blood (some kind of sacrifice) in ornately decorated clay pots and look for faces of deceased relatives in the smoke. If someone they recognized poked their head in, they would ask about the future. Now why hadn’t I thought of that?!?!

In other news, I played soccer with some friends on Saturday. Mexicans are really serious about soccer, and everyone knows how to play. I played with seven other guys, ranging in age from eight to thirty something. It was quite fun and I look forward to playing with them again.

Here’s a funny story for you. The day before yesterday it was about 80 degrees raining like crazy! Now I needed to go outside to the garage to get some ingredients for making cookies from the fridge. Not having an umbrella I just put on my flip flops and ran out and back as fast as I could! I still managed to get considerably wet because of the torrential down pore and when I came back to the steps Nicolle stopped me and said “you are giving our host mother kittens! She thinks you are going to catch pneumonia or something!” She kept asking me if I was cold and if I felt alright. She was wearing jeans and a sweat shirt, I was bear foot and in shorts. HA! Where I come from this is considered warm, but for them it was quite cold and called for hot cocoa and a blanket. Hehehehe!

School is progressing slowly but surely. This next week I am starting past tense verb usage. This has really been a crash course in Spanish! I wish I had more time to study more thoroughly but the requirements of my internship require me to get back to Mexico City and begin working with the kids. I can hardly wait!