Maras Showdown with Government, etc.

This is a quick life update for my non-mathy friends:

El Salvador is crazy. I am mad that the maras decided that they could shut down the entire public bus system as a fist-waving gesture to the government. Some of you might remember that back in June, as part of their extortion schemes, the maras burned down a bus with over a dozen people trapped inside. The outrage continues, when they issued a threat (via pamphlets and other things) earlier this week to do more of the same. So, in response, the entire country's bus system was shut down 2 days ago.

As usual, this doesn't impact the well-to-do, who travel in private vehicles. It only impacts the poor Salvadoreans who now have to get up early in the morning and walk hours across various towns to get to work, or to take camiones if those can be found. It sounds like as of yesterday, parts of the transportation system have resumed operations, but the system continued to be affected today.

What a ridiculous situation! Supposedly the reason for this wave of mara threats is a retaliation / protest against a newly passed bill outlawing Salvadoreans from joining a gang. Well, it looks to me like the mara are playing Quien tiene mas grande huevos with the government, and they're not doing so badly in this contest. I was talking to Geoff about this, and I was saying that in the States, those gang threats would have been SQUASHED by the government. He reminded me that this situation would never have even occurred, because the gangs simply don't have the same power over there. What a different world it is that we live in. :(

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In brighter news, Geoff and I finally got our car back! Yay. We might have to send it away again soon, to fix the shocks. Who knew that there were 4 sets of shocks in a car?? I don't like the sound of that. We need to go back to driving Flintstone cars.

But, having a car allowed us to go back to our salsa class last night. SUPER FUN!!! :) :) We did some closed-eyes dancing, which is always incredible, because you have to rely on the raw connection you have with your partner in order to follow their lead. It made me miss swing dancing like crazy.

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By the way, our first progress reports are due tomorrow. Time in school is flying by!! Time to finish grading those quizzes...

Thoughts about Mothering from a Non-Mother

I want you to know that I've been talking to/reading about mommies and mommies-to-be and I have decided that once you become a mom, you don't have to just give up the things that you love to do!

Case in point: Last night, I went swing-dancing. It was an utterly lovely time, with a wonderful deejay and a crowd that wouldn't sit through any of the songs (the songs were literally awesome one after another), even though we were each dripping with sweat. Amidst all of this, I saw my dance friend walk through the door, who had recently become a mommy (about 6 months ago). I started talking to her, to find out to my surprise that she has been trekking from Jersey to New York once every two weeks since the birth of her baby, to swing dance! YEAH. (Her husband watches the baby on those nights.)

And recently, I've been reading our friend Katy's blog. (See your right-hand side for links.) Katy used to be -- wait for this -- a rugby player. She semi-recently had a baby and a C-section, but she has been getting back to the rugby field. ...DOUBLE YEAH!

One of my NYC friends is getting married soon (with plans to start a family), and she is a marathon runner. :) She has been talking with our mutual friend Annie about planning marathons into her pregnancy schedule! haha. And how once she gives birth, she can go back to running with the stroller, but she just can't be training for a marathon while pregnant.

--I love, LOVE how these mommies and mommies-to-be still try to maintain a life of their own outside of their kids. That makes motherhood seem so much more do-able. Because we, as women, are diverse (read above), strong, and beautifully independent. How can all of that go away with motherhood??

Thank you, women everywhere, for being my inspiration. (And good luck on motherhood.)

Inception and Math

I went and saw Inception yesterday; it was fantastic! There were some inconsistencies in the plot, like what happens when people get shot (Do they die?? do they go back up one level?? Does it depend on their level of sedation??), but the fight scenes were original and the plot kicked some serious ass.

Spoiler Alert -->

And, make no mistake -- I did not miss the math references in the movie. They said that every time you go into another dream-within-a-dream, the time expands by a factor of 20. So, 10 hours in real life is "about a week in a first-level dream, about a month in a second-level dream, and about 10 years in a third-level dream." They then did a similar analysis towards the end of the movie, to figure out how much time they still have left in each dream to get stuff done. --Not to mention there was a good amount of Geometry -- transformations (reflections, rotations), and even a discussion of impossible Geometric constructions (ie. infinite-loop staircases)! Beautiful.

Awesome WCYDWT material, once I can get my hands on a copy of the movie. :)

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If you are an aspiring PreCalc teacher (like me!), you might be looking around for tools or demos that will illustrate / elucidate the sometimes-confusing concepts of radians, degrees, arc lengths, etc.

Fortunately, Mr. H has a slew of good tools you might be able to use. :) He creates things with GeoGebra that I had no idea were possible! AMAZING.

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I am frustrated that Geoff and I don't have cell phones while visiting in the States. I waited for a friend for an hour yesterday at the corner of Columbus and 82nd, but still missed her in the end! argh. I felt really bad because we were waiting at two different places, and I didn't have a phone to call her with. Boooo.

But, on a good note, I did get to hang out and catch up with my friend John for a bit, before he rushed off to the airport. (This seems to be a trend with me/him.) :) It was lovely, and totally worth the two-hour commute from Jersey to grab breakfast with him at 9am in the city! (That meant I was waiting outside for the bus at 7:10am, after catching only about 5 hours of sleep!)

In other news, Geoff and I went swing-dancing on Thursday, and it was lovely! Geoff sweated through 3 t-shirts; that's a pretty good measure of how great the night was. Now my old people knees are hurting, and I'm hoping that they will recover by next Thursday (the next Fram). :)

In the meanwhile, I am going to look at property with Geoff. I anticipate this being loads of fun. (Not.)

When You Go Budget...

I was reminded yesterday of something silly that had happened in Peru, and I thought I'd jot it down for future reference. It goes to illustrate how budget Geoff and I are, and the general ridonculous nature of our travels.

(As is the norm when you are or date a redhead...) G and I decided to buy some wine for the four-hour train ride between Aguas Calientes and Cuzco. Because we didn't have a bottle-opener, boxed wine seemed to be a natural choice. The tienda we went to only had a (dusty?!) box of WHITE wine (named Gato, or Cat), so whatthehell, we decided to get it even though room-temperature white wine in a box seems even more suspicious than red wine in a box.

About 20 minutes into the train ride, we realized that we didn't have cups. So, no worries, we emptied our plastic hiking water bottles and poured the white wine into them. We shared a round of drinks with our hiking mates, and while partaking in this first round, Geoff discovered the expiration date on the box: January 2009.

...Needless to say, hilarity ensued, during which we made several tipsy bad puns such as, "The cat is out of the box!" and "Hey, cats are supposed to have 9 lives," and other things I can't remember now. I'm half-amazed that we didn't die from bad chemical reactions.

That night, Geoff and I went to some local restaurant in Cuzco, where Geoff orderd a dish that looked like someone had literally thrown up all over his plate and brought the puke out as a dish. Hysterical in hindsight, but we were really worried about food-poisoning when it was all happening (especially because there was trash all over the floor of the restaurant and everything -- and I mean everything -- tasted recycled). I know it has been days since, but I am still banned from choosing a restaurant.

(Geoff was most traumatized because Peruvian food is super delicious, and this restaurant was damaging our impression of their national cuisine.)

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In other news, Geoff and I have arrived in Jersey/NYC! I am SUPER excited for Fram tonight (especially because Heather and Ryan will be DJing!). :) Oh, how I've dearly missed swing-dancing in the city!! (Not to mention the awesome ethnic foods galore... YUM.)

...I love how in NY, ya never know whom you're going to bump into, where, and how. When Geoff and I got out of Customs at JFK Airport a couple of nights ago -- at 2:30am -- I saw my old student Pamela V. waiting to pick up her uncle at the airport. How funny!

And, randomly, here are a couple of hysterical photos of Geoff's one day of mustache following our trip to Peru. (He thought that since he already had a full face of beard from 10 days of not shaving, he might as well shave it into a mustache look for a day.) ...As you can tell, I am just thrilled by the idea of his upper-lip decor. (--I will, until the day I die, never figure out why men think mustaches are cool. That night he wore this look to dinner with our Escuela Americana amigos; the gals all winced, and the dudes were all ready to start a new mustache trend! Ri-donc!)

LA and Shanghai

I just arrived back in San Salvador after a two-week whirlwind trip to Los Angeles and Shanghai. Honestly, I had been a bit antsy to get back, because I don't like to be on the road constantly, but I was ridiculously sad to say goodbye to my parents in Shanghai nonetheless. The older they get, the more heavy-hearted I feel when I leave them after each visit. (My mom especially misses me when I'm gone...) Unfortunately, for financial reasons, I see my parents at most once a year. ...Maybe some day things would change and I would live at a closer proximity to my parents, but until that happens, visits home are almost as difficult as not being at home, because my mom counts the days until I would have to leave again. :(


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Anyway, en route to China, I was able to see and quickly catch up with some high school friends (Cat, Helen, Danna, and Jenny) and to visit my sister, my cousins, and my grandma in Los Angeles! My short stay in LA was busy and fabulous. Since I only go back to LA once every couple of years, it was so good to hear how everyone's life is moving and changing ever-so-rapidly. I miss my California girls and my sister already... Seeing them and missing them made me reflect that we each pay a steep price for our wanderlust -- or any other life that we choose to live.

In Shanghai, I went with my parents to briefly check out the Expo 2010 (aka. World's Fair), for which the entire city of Shanghai had been transformed in preparation. But I also spent a good deal of time home with my parents, besides going out with my parents to eat and to go to the hospital. (--Long story, but I am on a two-month herbal medicine regimen until my "moisture diminishes", my "heat lowers", and the root cause of my recurrent infection is cured. It was actually my idea to try herbal medicine this time, because I had been sick for well over a month with a common recurrent infection, and Western antibiotics seemed to be of little help. I figured I've got nothing to lose in trying the alternative. Although, I had to ask my mom to sit and wait outside during my examination/consultation, and that was pretty awkward... But, really, I think it was definitely the lesser evil of the two possible awkward situations; she didn't even expect me to say that I am on birth-control pills, despite knowing that I'm 28 and that Geoff and I obviously live together!) At home, my parents and I watched a lot of TV, talked a lot, and I learned a lot about the history and attitudes of the mainland Chinese people. Consequently, I felt more connected with Shanghai than I had felt during my previous visit...

I also took some time in Shanghai to check out its swing scene! This was my second try at swing-dancing in Shanghai, because Geoff and I had gone two years ago to the only small bar that had hosted a weekly swing dance. This time around, the venues have changed and there were definitely more dancers. In fact, I got to meet various cool international folks who are currently living and working in Shanghai; they helped me to appreciate Shanghai as an increasingly international -- and metropolitan -- community. I had super fun dancing, and (even though I got a little out of breath) I was surprised to feel how quickly I was falling back into the rhythm of the music.

Now I am home! :) Am ready for some serious downtime before we head out again (to Peru, in mid-July). How funny is it that we always want to get away, and then as soon as we do, we start to miss home?

Brain/Life Dump

It has been sweltering here in San Salvador, but this week that heat and humidity have finally turned into rain. First, a trickle, and then today, an all-out ugliness outside. I guess this marks the starting of the rainy season. Yuck!

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Geoff and I went to the beach last weekend to check out "Atami," a private beach club to which the school has membership. We had heard mixed things about it, so we decided it was something to see for ourselves. They had two types of rooms, $20 for a room with a fan or $36 for a room with an AC unit. We sprung for the one with AC, and it turned out to be a blessing, because the beach area was unbearably humid during most of our stay. But, besides that, Atami had a couple of huge pools (warm even at night because they are completely exposed to the sun during the day); a 100-meter water slide (actual curvy, water-park style); and a couple of salt-water pools right next to the ocean! The salt-water pools were awesome during high tide! The waves actually splash over the edge, but the pool is roped off on the sides so that you would not fall into the rocky ocean 10 feet below.

All in all, we had a LOT of fun at the club, and we think that we will try to go back there with a bigger group of people next time. My only gripe from the whole weekend is that the club is a bit remote from the happening spots along the popular beaches, and yet their food has a high price-to-quality ratio. Our weekend ended up costing a little over $100 bucks -- definitely not cheap for El Salvador -- once you included all the food and drinks, and that was only for mediocre food and a few drinks!

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In other news, my dad is out of the hospital! YAY. He was in there for a short stint for something potentially very serious, but in the end, the docs determined that he was OK and let him go after a few days of in-patient care. :) Thank goodness! (Needless to say, this had been very stressful...)

I can't wait to see my parents in June, which seems to be, amazingly, just around the corner.

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On the teaching front, I have been working hard to pull together the last projects of the year for my kids. I showed my Geometry kids a super fun movie about dimensions, called Flatland, and they loved it! On Monday, we will launch into a multi-day project on the computers, using this link in combination with some excellently scaffolded spatial puzzles (which I found while digging through the reference books at my school) to do a 3-d visualization/surface area/volume/base perimeter project. I can't be more excited! The entire project will take 3 or 4 days, but it should be super fun and educational for the kids.

In Algebra 2, we're wrapping up the exponential / logarithmic functions unit, so I dipped into my long-past engineering background and worked with the science teacher to figure out an RC-circuit lab for the kids. I have already tried it out, and I think it is going to be brilliant! (We're also doing a water-cooling lab, which is also exponentially slowing down as it approaches room temperature. But, that one is easy to set up, and I had actually already made the kids do it once last year with my friend Tim when I went away myself on a school trip, so I'm not too concerned about working out the logistics of that lab.) I am relieved to be wrapping up the long and very tedious exponential and logarithmic unit with some hands-on science activities.

Addendum July 2, 2010: In the spirit of sharing, here are the RC circuit lab thumbnails. Let me know if it looks interesting and you want the original file!





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The last bit of update is that I got to swing-dance to live jazz music last night right here in San Salvador!!

April is apparently the jazz-appreciation month around the world, so the American Embassy had sponsored a free jazz concert in the plaza across the street from La Feria (the San Salvador convention center). I went with my sensible swing shoes on, just in case the music and venue were swingable. And, it was amazing!! Geoff wasn't there, but Andrea and I danced, and then I asked some of the Peace Corps volunteers we had met to dance. By the end of the concert, there were 4 or 5 couples up swing-dancing, and it was so lovely! (Even the locals were looking on, admiring the energy we had spontaneously generated.)

Afterwards, Andrea and I went along to grab a drink with the Peace Corps people we had met. They were super cool, and they gave me an interesting perspective on El Salvador. But, that's story for another time. :)

Rejuvenating Weeks

The last two weeks have been pretty amazing. For one, work has been extremely productive. The Measurement Unit I had envisioned for Geometry has been in full swing, and the kids' progress in understanding length, volume, and (2-D and 3-D) conversions is staggering and extremely rewarding. Not to mention it has been a lot of fun to give the 9th-graders a chance to work on all kinds of hands-on math problems! :)

The other beautiful thing about the last two weeks is that I have started going to a yoga class, held in a very intimate setting -- the home of our great yoga instructor! I had never had much of a motivation to do yoga back in the States (it seemed too much like a fad to me), but now with swing dancing being out of the picture for so long, I find that I really need something else to keep me active and energized. Salsa is totally fun, but I don't always work up a sweat, for some reason. My friend Colleen had told me about this yoga class she had started going to regularly, taught by a teacher I had taken a one-off yoga class from once. Last week, I tagged along with her finally, and it felt so amazing physically that I've decided to make a regular effort to attend the class.

So, between yoga, salsa lessons, and Spanish classes, life has been busy outside of school the last two weeks, and beautifully so. :) I'm also slowly reading my way through a pretty good book, The Geographer's Library. (Ever since I've come back from Christmas vacation, I'm finding time to do recreational reading again. Any suggestions? It can't really be current best-sellers, since I check them out from the school's library, which is delayed in its ordering of the best and the latest.)

Anyway, the next big thing: BELIZE!!!

Disco Party and Driving in El Salvador

I like themed parties, because I think that the people who actually participate in them take having fun "seriously", and therefore that attitude always contributes to a good party. :)

The past weekend, our friend Andrea had a Disco / "Crazy Accessories" party. Geoff and I have no disco-wear down here in San Salvador, but we decided to do our best to show up in costume anyway. To that end, we made our own disco shirts! It was pretty silly, but we just printed out a picture of floppy disks arranged in the shape of an "O", and taped that to our shirts. ("Disc-O"... get it?) We also dug up some accessories from around the apartment: Geoff's Avatar-3D glasses, my "2010" New Year's glasses, two pairs of suspenders, and my bright striped tie, and we mish-mashed everything together and showed up in good spirits.

The disco party was good times! Afterwards, some of us went on to dance the night away in Zona Rosa, at a bar next to our favorite Jungle. I got to do a lot of dancing -- to electronic music in the basement, to Spanish pop on the first floor, and Geoff and I even salsa-ed for a brief bit while waiting to be picked up. :) It was a great night out!

Next Friday, there will be an 80s party at the Marines house. I'm not sure whether we've decided to go yet, but if we do, I'll have to start planning our costumes now, since it's only 5 days away!

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This morning, I drove -- for the first time in years! It was very... needlessly exciting. I already get nervous driving in the States, and here they've got steep curbs and ditches and roundabouts, not to mention impatient Central American drivers. I'm going to keep practicing with the hope that I can soon navigate myself to go to yoga lessons, to start in (hopefully) 2 weeks. Wish me luck!

Winter Holidays

Geoff and I had an amazing trip back to the States for the holidays! Not only did we get to see a lot of friends and family, but we also got to spend some time in the city, revisiting our favorite restaurants and checking out the current Broadway shows -- and we even managed to swing-dance for a hot second! It made us miss being back in the States, for sure, but also helped us appreciate things back in San Salvador (ie. the ridiculously warm weather and things being reasonably priced). In any case, it will likely be a good while before we get to take another vacation to the New York area, so we cherished this opportunity to catch up with everyone.

Since it is costly to fly directly from San Salvador to the States, Geoff and I had decided a few months back to try instead to fly through Guatemala. On paper, that saves us about $200 per person round-trip, which is a kickass deal. But, in reality, the bus + extra nights in a hotel + extra food expenses just about balance out the savings we would have had. And actually, the hassle of traveling by bus through Guatemala isn't worth the savings, regardless of how comfortable and luxurious those busses may be.

Still, Geoff and I thought this particular trip through Guatemala was well worth it, because we got a chance to check out Volcano Pacaya, which had been our only regret from our previous visit to Guatemala. There is a reputable tour group that takes people up the volcano at night, camps overnight, and then hikes up to the flowing lava just before sunrise. But unfortunately, 1. they're not too flexible with their dates, since they need to rally 4 people in order to make it worth their effort to lead such a trip, 2. the boss is kind of an asshole to his employees. In the end, we booked another day trip instead. The day trip only costs $10 per person, plus about $5 for entrance fee to the park and tips for the guides. The afternoon hike, which Geoff and I had gone on, left at 2pm and was supposed to catch the sunset as we were descending the volcano. But, since our group had a few old ladies and children, the group hiked extraordinarily slowly, and it actually worked out to be to our benefit. We didn't get to the flowing lava until sunset, so we saw an amazing sunset right over the lava stream, and we got to enjoy the lava in the dark before descending the hill! (Most other day-hike groups only see the lava in daylight, which just isn't the same.)

The experience was truly phenomenal, and I would highly recommend it. Although, you definitely feel when you are up there, that you are tempting fate. Even as we were climbing the volcano, the local guide pointed out chunks of rocks where lava had flown only months -- or weeks! -- ago. He said that the lava flow changes its direction or location sometimes within a day. Then, when we got to the mini-crater about 200m from the main (top) crater, the hot river of lava was breath-taking. At one point, the rocks near where Geoff had been standing collapsed, and everyone was pretty freaked out from the keen awareness that we were standing on only a thin shell of rocks above a huge reservoir of hot lava. Later, as we got further away from the lava, and we looked back, we could see two different places where the volcano was erupting, and see heavy smoke coming from the top crater. One of the guides told us "no es normal", which only hastened our steps down the mountain.

Geoff and I spent the next couple of days just relaxing in Guatemala, getting over our sickness (which we had acquired in the below-freezing weather of New York) and easing our way back home to the tropics. I posted the complete set of vacation pictures on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/averyseriousmimi/sets/72157623154596774/show/ , which you can watch as a slideshow.

Take care! Hope you (whoever and whereever you are) had a lovely holiday season. :)

Mini updates!

This week has been somewhat distressing. Geoff and I had some noticeable water problems -- as in, our water got turned off by the water company! --Not fun. We learned the hard way that the ANDA water bills here are not cumulative; if you miss a payment (which we did in the beginning, since we didn't know whether we were supposed to be paying the bills ourselves, or how), the next bill that comes doesn't contain or refer to the overdue amount. Each bill stands alone, which doesn't make much sense to us, but that's just the way it works here. So, we had paid off the most recent bill online, thinking that would suffice, but that was apparently the wrong assumption. And, after a couple months of an unpaid old bill... tada! off goes the water. FOR THREE DAYS!!! Geoff and I couldn't get down to the office in person to take care of the issue during the work week, so we had our super-ish person look into it for us. She spoke to the company and they said it was coming back on, blah blah. Predictably, nothing happened following that promise. Eventually, because of a fluke, a maintenance guy from a different company turned the water back on for us today. So, in short, we don't know whether the water is here to stay, or if the water company is going to come back and turn it back off, or what. We can only hope for the best.

And, you know, it's amazing how difficult this was. The amazing thing is that we sort of did have water; we still had drinking water in tubs, and we took our empty tubs to the pool out in the back and filled them to flush the toilets. But still, we were frustrated as hell. We can only hope that this is a permanent fix, and that the water company just flakes out altogether and doesn't send anyone else down to toggle with our water supply. But, as the running joke goes, it's El Salvador, and anything is possible.

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I learned while talking to a friend that once you employ a maid here, you are responsible for paying the maid weekly even if you aren't going to be around that week (ie. the maid gets the week off). This is because the $10 to $15 you pay your maid each week is, in fact, their main source of income, so if you go on vacation and decide not to pay them, then they are unemployed for that duration. Good to know, since Christmas break is coming up. I would NOT want to cause our maid to be unemployed and to be in financial difficulty when we are away.

It's one of those small things that showcase the income disparity in this country.

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On a brilliantly good note, Geoff and I went to scope out a salsa dancing class yesterday, and it was fantastic! The dance teacher, Raul, had been dancing for 16 years. It was basically like a private session, because he thinks we're not good enough to be with the rest of the class. So, for the whole hour, Geoff and I practiced on the side, and he showed us several moves. I have taken a number of social dance classes and am usually pretty good with following the rapid-fire instructions, but this instructor was moving fast. I love it! He says that in two months, he thinks we'll be good enough to join the rest of the crew in learning fancier moves. It sounds lovely...

We want to go back there at least once a week. The only problem is that getting a cab ride to and from that place isn't totally easy, so we have to resume looking for a car to buy...

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Geoff won't be around this weekend, because he is heading to Jersey for a wedding! I'm totally envious, because I want to be in NY and I wish I could be at this beautiful wedding of two really good people. But, it's good that the local crowd is organizing a weekend getaway, so I wouldn't just be hanging out at home feeling bored. Congrats, M&M!! Enjoy your big day!!

Anniversary weekend

Geoff and I celebrated our third-year anniversary this weekend. :) It was kind of a big deal, since I think we had hit a few big milestones in this past year (ie. moving in together and moving to another country), and everything had been as smooth and fun as can be. We don't eat at expensive restaurants much (since we cook decently well during the week, and we also enjoy eating at mom-and-pop Salvadorean places that cost only a few bucks for the whole meal), but we decided that for this particular occasion, we would splurge a little...

Colleen and Eric had highly recommended an Italian restaurant in Zona Rosa called "Vittorio's", so G and I decided to start our night there. It was by far the most expensive meal we have yet had in this country! A bottle of wine, a fabulous calamari appetizer, two entrees (fish and pasta) muy ricos, and two cappuccinos all added up to be about $70, but we thought it was well worth the price. The food at the restaurant was fantastic, and the ambiance was also lovely. Even though it had rained on-and-off throughout the night, Geoff and I sat in a covered section of the garden outside, surrounded by decorative wine, wooden wine racks, and lush tropical plants.

After dinner, we went to a couple of different spots, eventually landing in the "Jungle", which is now officially Geoff's and my favorite dancing spot on the Zona Rosa strip! We were already pretty tipsy when we started dancing there, and after a short while, the DJ offered us a free bucket of beers! --WHAT?! We were really surprised and a little confused; we never quite figured out what the free beers were for, but we were told it had something to do with our dancing. Anyway, we had a pretty great time there; a few of the locals were talking to us and being very friendly, and by the time we finally got home, it was already past 2am! For partying by ourselves, we didn't do too badly. :)

The rest of the weekend was also deeply relaxing, complete with naps in our two hammocks and some old-school video game-playing. (Geoff and I have been downloading old Nintendo games and playing them on my laptop, with the $7 game controllers we bought. It feels pretty silly to be playing games from the 80s, but G gets really excited about them. The only caveat is that I have short attention span and can barely sit still through a game, if we last through multiple levels...) I think I am almost ready for a full week of work. Almost.

First Surfing Lesson!!

Geoff and I had a fabulous week! On Tuesday, the new international hires played a hilarious game of Charades at Eric's and Colleen's apartment over drinks and popcorn. Then, on Thursday night, some of the same people went salsa-dancing with us at an awesome salsa spot in the neighborhood. The cover charge was $5, but there was a live band and some serious salsa-dancers there! I had a ton of fun asking the locals to dance, and Geoff and I are definitely planning on returning to that place regularly once we start taking salsa lessons. :) Finally, over the weekend, Geoff and I caught a movie (G.I. Joe, which was surprisingly decent), went to scope out the famous volcanoes and the beautiful Lago Coatepeque, and even took our first surfing lesson down at El Tunco!!!

...Surfing was really fun, but also a lot harder than I had imagined. Admittedly, I'm not the strongest swimmer, and my upper-body strength is definitely non-existent. Paddling my way on the long surfboard all the way out to where the waves break was so discouraging, that I actually almost asked my surfing coach to let me go back to the shore. Literally, he had to drag my board all the way out there each time, in addition to paddling for himself. --So embarrassing! It was only later that Ali and Jose told us that it is pretty common that the surfing instructors have to drag the newbies out there, because you just don't build the same upper-body strength doing anything else than surfing. Anyway, the actual surfing part was a BLAST. It's not easy to stand up on the board, obviously, but the long boards we had actually felt really stable; even I caught a wave that pushed me all the way out to the beach! It was awesome! And a definite do-over at some point (after we do some pushups, perhaps).

There were some other things I had wanted to say, but I'm so exhausted from the week that I'm going to just crash now. Tomorrow's the first official day back at work for all teachers, so I'm going to start being very busy! Our school day here starts early -- I will have to leave home at 6:30am everyday from now on, to arrive at school with a little bit of time to spare. Yikes...

Weekend Excursion

Geoff and I spent the weekend by ourselves, because the rest of the new international teachers were busy settling into their apartments. In El Salvador, we have thus far met a lot of really nice locals, but because of the disparity in income, we think that many of them would not be able to afford the lifestyle that we want to have, ie. going out regularly. To give you an idea of what a "regular Salvadorean" makes in income, Geoff and I could go out and have a FULL meal -- with two pupusas and a drink for each of us -- and the total for BOTH of our meals would be around $2.50. And many "restaurants" and snack stores are holes-in-the-wall that are run literally out of someone's home or front yard. You can get a chocolanana, or frozen chocolate banana, for around 35 cents. Clearly, that's not a very high profit margin; the vendors make those right at home and sell them through a little window that faces the street, in order to keep their costs low.

International school teachers are considered upper-middle class here. In truth, my salary here is far lower than my salary back in NYC, but because the cost of living is so much lower here, our life is much more luxurious than what we once had back in NYC. Geoff and I could afford a 3-bedroom, 3-bathroom apartment here, with a pool and 24-hour security, in a nice neighborhood. In NYC, for the same amount of money, we couldn't even get a single room in a shared apartment in Manhattan!

Anyway, on Friday, we had gone out in Zona Rosa, which is a posh partying district here in the city. After having a delicious steak dinner and drinking in an outdoor bar typical of this area, we checked out another indoors bar, Riconcitos, which had an awesome vibe and a cover band. The band's music was upbeat and diverse -- I think they started out with some electronica and ska, and then wrapped up with some reggaeton and salsa. The crowd was young; here in San Salvador, high-schoolers can go out and drink and party as well, and you definitely can spot their young faces in the hip bars around town. Afterwards, Geoff and I went and danced in another cool little spot across the street, where they were playing some American music, mixed with a lot of merengue. --All in all, a really fun night. :)

We ran some errands on Saturday, and then headed down to the beach. We had our minds set on going to el Tunco, which is a beach named for its giant pig-shaped rock. (Actually, the rock looked awesome, but it also looked more like a whale to us than a pig.) This beach is a famous surf spot, but we didn't get to surf this weekend. Instead, we swam in the ocean and had some delicious pupusas and seafood. We also stayed with a semi-creepy artist at his guesthouse, and that was very interesting. While we were hanging out with him on his porch, the electricity went out for the whole village, and momentarily we were sitting in complete darkness -- with a creepy guy who had already demonstrated his prowess with his machete and had reiterated his love for Asian women! Yikes. ...Fortunately, everything was OK in the end, and we even ran into our friends Alison and José the next day at the beach! :)

On Sunday night, we drove our rental car back to the city and went to a barbeque at the school's complejo, where the rest of the international hires live. That was fun, because teachers are almost always a social bunch. I'm hopeful that once they are settled in, they'll be up for going out and exploring the neighborhoods with us. :)

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A pictoral illustration of a crazy bus that went into the lane of on-coming traffic in order to pass cars in our lane; it eventually gave up and came back into our lane. (Taken on the way back from the beach.)




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As you might have read, the swine flu has been in full-swing in El Salvador for 4 months. Well, the ministry is closing schools for two weeks -- this week and next week. What that means is that we are not allowed to go into the school itself, and all of the paperwork and professional development meetings we were supposed to have this week have been moved to another location. School will be delayed at least one day in opening, which I'm certainly not complaining about. Other teachers are keeping their fingers crossed that the school will be delayed even further, to allow us a last long weekend before school re-opens.
We'll see about that, I guess. I'm not too worried.

Zones, Roads, and Mail

The country of El Salvador is divided into 14 departamentos, or states. Within each state are many cities, or ciudads. Geoff and I reside in the city of San Salvador, which is also located in the state of San Salvador. This city is the capital city of the country, but even within it there appears to be a vast disparity in wealth. The city further subdivides into zonas, or zones. Our apartment is in Colonia de San Benito, which -- depending on whom you ask -- is either itself a tiny zone spanning a few blocks in diameter, or is embedded in a bigger zone (Zona Rosa). In any case, we finally got some sort of address for the apartment when we signed the lease, but even without it, our mattress delivery guys had figured out where to find us based only on the zone information and the building name. Because the city is so small and compact, things are easy to find here and addresses are not too specific.

That said, we still need to test out our address before we set up permanent mail-forwarding from the States. Geoff has been doing a good amount of research, and it looks like we can either get a service that scans in our mail, or one that forwards them periodically without examining the mail. I think we are going with the latter. For now, all of our mail is sent to and held by Geoff's parents in New Jersey.

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Speaking of geography, trying to find a good city map here has been nearly impossible, and I have just about given up on the notion altogether. A free map that we got from a local restaurateur has turned out to be the best thus far. It highlights the roundabouts and major streets, even though it does unfortunately omit certain smaller streets. The roundabouts are important, because here you are very restricted in where you can make left turns. I would say maybe one out of every 6 or 7 streets allows left turns, and -- because the streets themselves curve -- before you know it, you are already going in the wrong direction altogether. The roundabouts are useful in allowing you to make all kinds of turns. Another traffic peculiarity here is that when you come to an intersection of two major streets, where there is no roundabout there is often a road bridge that raises the traffic from one road to be above the other. This avoids unnecessary waiting at the intersection, and is actually very useful, if you're familiar enough with the roads to anticipate the intersection. Their labeling of the roads is different from that of the States. When I get a chance, I'll take a picture. Geoff and I had a wild ride on the first day, trying to figure out what those signs mean and where we were on the map...

But, all is well. :) Still missing internet and phone services, but for now Geoff and I are stealing wireless bandwidth from our neighbor, so things are OK. I also miss dancing, but until we buy a car and are able to get out more regularly, my assignment for myself is to expand my jazz collection and jazz knowledge. It's something I had always wanted to do, but hadn't had time for. If you have killer jazz playlists, please do send them my way. :) Adios!

Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver

There are some trips that you take with friends or lovers -- adventures to be shared and epic stories to be told -- and then, there are some that you take just for yourself. I had planned my solo NW trip with full intention of it being a breather in between all the craziness; I really wanted things to go at an uber-leisurely pace, with some dancing here and there to fill the time. In fact, for the first time ever, I didn't even try to coordinate anything with friends before arriving in Seattle, and -- as poor Micah could attest to -- I was yet making arrangements to crash at people's places after hugging them hello. :)

But, ironically enough, various parts of the trip turned out to be very busy! I had bizarre / hysterical experiences in both Portland and Vancouver, and I ended up playing things by ear the entire time. God bless the charming Oregonians, and God ought to bless the Canadians. ;) (...I might be biased, since I was detained at the border for 2 hours by the Canadian customs officials, who had the infinite wisdom to suspect that I might be dealing drugs. But, really, all kinds of weird stuff was happening in Vancouver! I even walked into a local bank to find out that it didn't have an ATM on site! And random people you grab on the street usually can't tell you which direction is west. ...WHAT?! I am pretty sure Canadians are all very well-intentioned, but... umm... they seemed like they could use a little logistical help, maybe.)

Funny idiosyncrasies aside, my trip to the NW definitely lived up to all of its promise: warm weather, awesome dancing, beautiful music, and a lovely time catching up with old friends. :)

I love summer traveling. This summer will be cut short because of the big move, but I am still hopeful that we will be able to find an apartment quickly, so that we can drive around El Salvador and explore a bit during my week off in August.

A Weekend to Remember

We had our goodbye party in Geoff's parents' garden on Saturday, and it was a blast! The weather was beautiful, even though it had been predicted to rain for part of the evening. A steady stream of guests came and went throughout the night, and I think everybody had a good time mingling. Geoff and I were surprised by the turnout of New Yorkers, actually, since it was definitely a bit of a trek out of their way. Even our friends who came solo seemed to be having a great time. And, as a special treat, I got to see an old college friend (Dan) for the first time in five years, because he had just arrived in NYC for the summer! All in all, we were more than grateful for all the friends and family who came out, and we will be spending the rest of our time here catching up with the rest of them...

Earlier in the day, when I had realized that my friend John wasn't going to be able to make our party (because he and his girlfriend were busy doing last-minute packing for their own summer trip), I made a hasty decision to rush uptown to meet him for coffee. As a result, I had to take a cab and sprint through midtown Manhattan to get to Port Authority on time for the bus -- TOTAL CHAOS! -- but it was totally worth it, because I got to say goodbye to my dear friend before he headed off for the airport today. yay. :)

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Then, this morning I came back into the city to meet up with the dancers for brunch at our troupe director, Laura's, apartment. There was an incredible spread of food, and we played Apples to Apples for a while before heading over to Central Park to enjoy a live jazz band. The afternoon wrapped up with some awesome music and dancing, before I had to say my goodbyes.

I am terrible at saying goodbyes, and I felt very sentimental to be leaving the troupe... But, it was definitely the perfect afternoon to remember. :)

30 days!

It is unfathomable that I will be moving out of my apartment and getting rid of all of my stuff in the next 30 days! I think that time will really fly by, now that we are actually in June. (--A surreal notion, in and of itself.) It is a two-week sprint from now until my high-schoolers are done with instructional days, and then another week until my 8th-graders take their Regents exams. And another week until those middle-schoolers, too, will finish school. Following that will be a busy weekend of: dance performance; our going-away party; and hanging out with the lovely dancers for the last time. Then, finally, I will have a couple of days of packing, throwing crap out, and MOVING!

Meanwhile, I'm teaching the next two Saturday schools (because I am a sucker) and Geoff is trying to organize a weekend trip to Pittsburgh to visit his pal's upcoming new baby. Our lives are caught in a centrifuge, and it's about to get crazy.

Countdown

There are only 7 weeks left between now and the end of school! After June, I will be traveling around the Northwest (squeezing in some last-minute swing dancing) and then heading to El Salvador! Craziness.

Meanwhile, we are enjoying New York in all of its spring loveliness. :) The mirrors at the weekly swing dance are starting to fog up because of the humidity + body heat, but I'm not complaining. I know I will miss it dearly when it's gone.