Uneventful, just the way I like it

May 27, 2009

‘m writing under less than ideal conditions due to the fact that a car has hit a tree and taken out half of the city’s power.  The last couple of days have been pretty uneventful but it’s pretty hard to top throwing up in the Andes and getting bit by a spider.  I’m rather enjoying the uneventfulness.

On Saturday, I went to El Centro (downtown) with one of my friends.  Most of the students went up to the mountains to camp for the weekend.  Using my amazing judgment and that of the doctors I thought it would be best to take it easy, besides if I went on the trip I would have missed the Indy 500 (which CLEARLY wasn’t an option).  The other didn’t go because she got a parasite, so we made quiet the duo.  After walking through El Centro we went to the Mercado Principal.  It is a three story indoor market with food, clothes and all those little things you buy on trips thinking they are great until you get home and have no where to put it.  It was almost too overwhelming because there was just so much stuff plus the air smelled of the dried fish with a hint of lemon and salt.  To continue are day of shopping we went to Garcons or the Venezuelan equivalent to a Wal-Mart.  I bought something there that I could have for dinner since our host family only provides two meals for us.

On Sunday (Race Day), I slept in which was amazing because there weren’t cars zooming past my window at six in the morning.  I turned on ESPN Deportes to watch the race and probably understood maybe every tenth word mostly because it would Indianapolis or one of the race car drivers names.  50 laps into the race our power went out for about 30 minutes.  The power went back on around lap 100 just in time to see TK being interviewed. The end of the race was great.  Oh, thanks for who ever drew Ryan Hunter Ray for me…. and Scott congrats at finally winning.  

The last two days of school have been long and exhausting.  All of the Spanish is starting to make my brain hurt, but hopefully that means I am learning something.  I am liking my classes a lot. This weekend I think we are going to the beach.  Hopefully I can get some color, that way when my teachers refer to white people that wont use me as an example anymore (Its happen 3 times already).

I hope to report more uneventful things but lets be honest, its me.

The Whiter You Are , The Sicker You Get

May 23, 2009

My first day of school was only the start to my last two days.  My classes seem like they will be interesting.  The hardest class for sure will be Latin American politics the teacher is crazy.  In Venezuela they have no problem asking your political views before they even know your name.  My teacher seemed troubled when I responded I was an Independent but he seems to give the same face to everyone.  My other two classes should be good too.  All the teachers are really nice especially since they give us 30-minute break during our class. After classes on Thursdays we have this program called “Nuevos Encuentros” were we get paired up with a Venezuelan student learning English.  For half of the time we talk in English and for the second half in Spanish.

Thursday nite we went out to a popular bar to celebrate the first day of class and one of the other student’s birthdays.  As all of you know, I am not a dancer so the bar we went to was an experience for me PLUS the bar didn’t have any juice to mix drinks with… so probably wont be going back there too much. While at the bar I realized my ankle was hurting so I went to the bathroom and realized it was the size of a grapefruit.  Being the responsible person that I am I decided to go home, totally the next day I would probably need to cut off my foot or something.

Yesterday morning I went to VENUSA to show the people in charge my ankle.  The first person I should was told be just to take an anti-histamine and Ill be fine.  But then I showed it the director of the program and he freaked out because he never seen something like my bite before.  The part that I was worried about was that it was red, warm and felt like there was liquid building up under my skin. Hector took me to the doctor more because he was so interested in what the bite was than anything.  The doctor told me it was probably a spider that bit me while we were up in the mountains and I should take some medicine and Ill be fine in a couple of days.  So that means Wednesday was probably the best day of my life between throwing up and getting bit by a spider.

For the rest of the day I went downtown and looked at all the shops they had there with some people and then last nite we had a BBQ at the school with the Venezuelan students.  I should be thankful though that my spider bite wasn’t so serious because another student got such a bad parasite from something that he left today to go back to Minnesota.

Oh I also got a cell phone here, you can call it from Skype for 20 cents a minute.  The phone number is 04247181798.

Im Safe

May 20, 2009

Just incase there was people that wanted to know. After waking up Monday morning at 1:30 for our flight to Caracas, then getting to spend 6 hours in the Caracas airport and an hour and half bus ride to Mérida, it was long. But the flight to Caracas was the nicest and largest plane I have ever been on. There was in flight movies and every seat had its own screen.  One of the features the screen has was a map of the flight; I watched it the entire time.  We were greeted in Mérida by our host families and with out running water.  Apparently in Merida it is very common for the water to shut off for a couple of days.  Oh well, least everyone else will smell as bad as I do.  

My host family is really nice, they live in an apartment right by a McDonalds (which sells arapas instead of french fries) and its just the two of them. I share a room with Danielle; she hasn’t had Spanish since high school so slowly I have become the translator.  The view out my room is amazing and pretty much all of Merida.  I have never seen mountains like this before.

This morning my host dad walked us to school, he said it was really close but it ended up being a 50 minute walk, half up hill. So Danielle and I decided we would walk in the mornings and take a taxi at nite more just for the safety factor plus a taxi is only $2.My first day at VenUsa was orientation, placement testing and sitting around getting to know the other 36 people. We got to do lunch on our own, so a group of us found a restaurant. It was a pretty nice one inside a medical school. For lunch I had soup, rice, fried yucca (a potato like starch that has been part of the South American diet since the Incas) beef, salad, juice and flan.  Not bad for roughly $4.

After our placement test we went on a tour of the city. The guide told use that Mérida has over 900,000 people.  The city is huge.  The guide took us to some city squares but also to two ice cream shops.  The first one was really good but the second one not so much.  The second one has over 900 flavors of ice cream; some people got ham and cheese or baby corn, I being the adventurous person that I am got lemon.  My stomach is going to hate me in a couple of hours but the first ice cream was totally worth it.

Tomorrow we get to go see waterfalls, I’m really excited. I have internet at my house, so I will be able to skype and everything so if anyone has a skype, let me know!

Oh I forgot, Dad this is more for you.  VenUsa is right next to a Renault store and have a ton of pictures of their F1 cars.  Its not Indy Cars but I was excited.

I miss everyone!

Meaghan

An Introduction

May 13, 2009

I thought this would be a good way to keep in touch while I am in Venezuela for the summer.  I will try my best to keep up with the blog, post wont be too long (except for this one) and not everyday. I thought I would answer some of the questions I commonly get about my trip:

*What will you be doing?
    Besides becoming best friends with Hugo Chavez, I will be taking some classes, hopefully either teaching or volunteering and traveling. I am probably most excited about the idea of getting to travel to some parts of South America.  I hope to travel to Caracas just because it was the starting place of Independence movement of South America and Simon Bolivar lived there.  I would love to go to Colombia but the only way I would be able to this is if my host family would take me, so I have my fingers crossed.  I have five days between my two sessions, which I would like to go to Peru for.  Since third grade I have wanted to visit Machu Picchu (no one probably remembers my diorama of Machu Picchu with Polly Pockets).  Also in Peru I would like to go to Lima and Cuzco.  If I have any other free time I would LOVE to make it to Buenos Aires, just so I can pretend to be in the musical Evita but also Buenos Aires and Argentina has a whole different feel then the rest of South America so it would be really cool to visit. And there is always Cuba, but that will have to wait to its legal to travel there, probably. 

*Why Venezuela?
    As probably most of you know I am a Spanish and Latin American studies major (and Public Health but that didn’t factor in) so I cant really study in Spain.  I wanted to study in Mexico but as we know that wouldn’t probably be the best idea.  The public health side of me thought it would be an amazing time to study there but the U of MN and many other people tend to disagree.  The U of MN offers a program in Venezuela, which happened to have the last Spanish classes I need and Venezuela has a very interesting history, so I decided it, would be the best place for me to go.

Where in Venezuela will you be studying?
    I will be living in Mérida for three months. The city is located directly south of Maracabio and a twelve-hour bus ride from Caracas It is a very interesting city because it located at the beginning of the Andes, so it is surrounded by mountains and has a relatively mild climate (65-70 degrees).  I will be staying with the host family with one other student.  My host dad is a lawyer and my host mom is dietician.

 

If you guys have any questions, let me know!

Hasta próximo tiempo,

Meaghan