killing time.

My first class of the day was cancelled. We only found out after I got up, went to class, and waited for the teacher for 30 minutes. But waiting 30 minutes for our teacher is something we´re used to. So now I have two hours until my next class and not much to do, so I´m just killing time.

Last night I went to my salsa lesson. A couple of friends & I signed up for a month´s worth of salsa classes, every Monday, Wednesday, Friday. The first two weeks or so were very fun & exciting. I was catching on quickly & had the basic steps down. I was learning everything as we went along, which was the opposite of what I was expecting since I´m not the most coordinated person. Then our teacher decided to speed the pace of the class up & since then it´s been very discouraging. He introduces crazy spinning moves to us & calls them "sencillo" When my feet have to move in 6 different ways, quickly, all to a particular beat of music, I don´t consider it simple. Most of the other people in our class learn quickly and I have a sneaky suspicion that they aren´t quite at the beginner level as they say. Then last night, our teacher announced that we would be changing the schedule and having class every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and going to salsa clubs on Friday to practice. My friends and I stayed afterwards to make sure we understood everything the teacher had told us in Spanish and while he was reiterating the changes and talking about going to a salsa club on Fridays he looks at us, in our jeans & tshirts and says in Spanish, while also using hand gestures to his face & body, "so make sure you don´t forget to do your hair, and put on your makeup, and wear your nice clothes." We all laughed and he just stared at us. Apparently, he wasn´t kidding, he was really reminding us to look better than we do for class! After we laughed he said confused, "or, you can just come as you want to.." I know he expects us to wear heels, but that won´t be happening with me. In general, I think my heels would be easier to dance in than my tennis shoes that sometimes stick to the floor but I have the little problem of being taller than all my dance partners in the class. It´s hard to practice spinning moves when you´re partner has to stretch his arm to fit over your head. Or when I have to duck slightly to fit under their arm. So needless to say, I won´t be wearing heels. Plus, I do not have the skills that walking in heels in Xalapa requires. I have trouble walking in heels and flat, level surfaces. The roads here are either cobble stone or old & broken. Plus, Xalapa is in the mountains. And when I say in the mountains, I mean, I hike up a mountain on my walk home from school. I have trouble walking in my tennis shoes sometimes, I´m amazed that the women here can walk everywhere in their high high heels. It´s impressive, and a skill I just don´t think I´ll ever have. and I´m ok with that.

I´m trying and learning all kinds of new things here. I tried elote, a corn-type snack they sell in every park and people seem crazy about. They take a corn on the cob, put butter on it, then cover it in mayonaisse, and then put different types of chili and spice on it. My family convinced me I had to try it when we were eating our hotdog dinner in the park one night. I felt rude turning it down and I see elote everywhere so I thought I might as well try it. I got the elote in a cup though, so it was just corn, butter, and mayonaisse all mixed together and then I picked the type of chilli powder I wanted to sprinkle on top. All I can say is, I am not a fan of elote. Mainly I´m sure because I am not a fan of mayonaisse. Which sometimes proves a problem here because people in Mexico are mayonaisse crazy. They put it on everything. There is a mayonaisse aisle in the supermarket. It´s not just mixed in with the other condiments, no, it has it´s own aisle, filled just with mayonaisse.

Mayonaisse & ham, my new main foodgroups.