Ropas baratas y otros cosas buenas

I am really enjoying my second week. My new family is great - although after this trip I may never want to see juevos y frijoles again - and I enjoy just hanging out in the dining room watching Señora Leon and Caso Cerrado (both of which rival Jerry Spring in the drama department); watching the kids play, or simply trying to decipher their conversations. It is interesting to me that I can understand 95% of what my teacher says, but only get about 5% of the dinner table conversation. But I am only in week two and I have a lot of time to go.

Today I went to the gym that I had joined (i.e. handed a man named Carlos 150 Quetzales for a month, who when I asked him if I needed a receipt or a membership card, responded, "No, I will remember you.") and spent 40 minutes on a cross-training machine (that I had never used before and now love) listening to my new reggae tone CD, that I had bought earlier for 10 Quetzales (less than $1). On the way home from the gym, I stopped into a few clothing stores, where I looked for something a little more feminine than the Goodwill pants, t-shirts and hiking boots that have become my uniform (after having gone salsa dancing in the aformentioned outfit and feeling a bit strange) and found a knee-length jean skirt and somewhat dressy top for 30 Quetzales (less than $4!!). For those of you who know how much I love Goodwill, you´ll understand how excited I was when I heard the price. It is a good thing that I did not bring a bigger bag!

Tonight I am going to go home and spend a few hours studying. I am learning a lot, but I am still having trouble getting the words to flow out of my mouth and want to work on common frases that I would say every day. My second week been an enormous improvment over my first and I am very much looking forward to this weekend´s hike (although I get winded climbing the stairs to my room, it should be a great, if painful, experience).

I also recieved my confirmation from the Ixchel Spanish School in Antigua where I will spend a week or two during Semana Santa.