Singing Children´s Death Songs is Just One Thing I´ve Been Doing

Well, its officially rainy season here, and the rains come quite predictably, between 2-5 everyday, cooling everything off and making my life happy. It of course made me think of the ever popular children´s song:

It´s raining, its pouring
The old man is snoring
jumped in bed, knocked his head
and couldnt get up in the morning.

Wait, what? Have you EVER paid attention to the words to this? Poor dead old man! and why? just because it was raining. I taught this little ditty to my students and they were utterly disturbed by this. One student told me ´Mexican childrens´ songs tell you you SHOULD jump in bed!´Well, buddy, not in the USA. We know that jumping into ones bed only results in concussions. (how do you spell that?) Not only does this english children´s song have undertones of death, check out the next one, about people dying in the plague:

Ring around the rosy, pocket full of posies
ashes ashes (or in britian, a tissue, a tissue) we all fall down!

Both have a similar sounding spanish equivalent, but the lyrics go something like:

It looks like its gonna rain
The sky is getting cloudy
Its looks like its gonna rain
Oh, mom, Im getting wet!

and the other simply says ´we´re going in a circle, a circle a circle´, or something rediculously innocent like this.

My students were appalled. haha.

One more-
Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water
Jack fell down and broke his crown and Jill came tumbling after.

My god! and they were so young! (weren´t they? now that i think about it, it never says, maybe they were 60)

Anyway, I have fallen off the earth and started to really get used to this place, meaning Tuxtla, which is good, it means i am less homesick, but also, i have had no motivation to write a blog. Many important things have happened.

One of these being that my friend Bree came to visit me!!! She stayed for about a week and while she was here we did all sorts of fun things. We went to the zoo, visited indigenous villages and San Cristobal, went to the movies, rode a boat in the canyon, swam in turqoise lagunas, etc etc etc. Read her blog for a better account of that: http://the-bree.blogspot.com One day when I am less lazy I will post pictures.

Also while she was here, someone stole about 400 dollars from me. How? I´m not quite sure. But I suspect someone entered my apartment when I left for 5 mintues with the door unlocked to make a phone call. My fault, I shouldn´t be so trusting, but still, it has put me 400 dollars in the hole.

I am taking an art class in drawing with pastels. I am drawing still lifes of fruit, and the fun thing that that in a regular class in the US you draw apples, grapes, etc, but here we draw mangoes and papayas, which i have never drawn in my entire life! My teacher just expected me to know by nature the shape of a mango, ha! I totally needed to see the real thing. My class is going excellently, and my teacher is a gem. She calls me Muneca, or ´doll´. As in, okay, doll, see you monday!

I´m keeping real busy with my classes, trying to be a good teacher and have things graded on time. I am suffering through yet another climate induced cold. I have seen several movies, including Pirates of the Carribean 3 (insanely popular here) and The Curse of the Yellow Flower, bloody and evil, but an excellent movie. There seems to be a Chow Yan Fat theme happening in my life...

In other news, I´m very happy because I have weekend plans to go out with a former student. This may be another friend! I am trying to start a collection. So far I have one friend, she will be my second. haha.

last but not least, I am currently applying for an Americorps position that starts next April in Louisville (a year commitment) and that is working with refugees and immigrants. So, please hope and pray and cast magic spells that I get it! eh?

Speaking of magic, i told my students that many people in the US think Harry Potter books are diabolical, and this was the most rediculous, shocking thought to them. Why, teacher? They asked me. They are good people and they love Harry Potter. Ah, Bless their souls.