some responses first. james, you are cracking me up. your view on life down here is definitely right on; grunt, point, shake your head, toss a few hand gestures and you are in there like swimwear. the mountains are pretty steep around here, but i hope to hiking maybe this weekend or next. i cannot find anyone around to roll with me. ¨what? mountains? coffee? silly american, why would you want to go up there? no no, hill people live up there, no one else goes!¨ some things do translate, people down here are scared of the hill people too.

ames, we do have a movie theatre in town. currently the film is the longest yard. will firefly make it? highly doubtful. in salina cruz there is a slightly larger selection, but i am still doubting it because they only play the biggest movies (they are dubbed i think). other than that, everyone in america should go see firefly! maybe it will come back on t.v.!

cuba, thank you for the page of arrested development quotes. i spent over an hour laughing and laughing and laughing. i can still picture and hear each person as they say their lines. A little over two weeks without even seeing a t.v. has been great. i miss movies. i have not had cable in about two years, so i really only miss movies. and the flag library. they had some great mysteries! morse, poirot, where are you?

as for the dancing, well, pretty much you need to get me in a group of people who i am pretty much guaranteed i will not see again. or, a group of people who can say whatever they want and i cannot understand. when both those situations occur simulataneously? yahtzee.

a large part of me wants to go to salina cruz this weekend and hang out with the other prof´s. but, it just means i will spend more money and speak less spanish, so i may just hang out here again. also, i really want to buy a comfortable chair for my room. each night i study for about three hours and i have to lie on the bed and it gets pretty uncomfortable. i do like the evenings because i go for a walk around town when i get home around 7:15 or so and then victor does not return until 9 mon thru thursday because he goes to a gym in town. i am tempted to join but i like having a few hours alone in the evenings with him. i go to bed by 10:15 or 10:30 nearly every single night and i get up around 6:45. i think i am just so tired from reading all day long. i am either typing some sort of lesson plan, finding a lesson plan/activity on the internet, checking e-mail, or reading and practicing writing spanish for about 12-14 hours a day. i read through lunch even.

also, i do not watch the telenovellas(spanish soap operas that come on at night) with victor. i can hear them in my room. predictable, high-tension music, loud talkers. it is actually kind of nice though because they speak without accent and quite clearly (drama!) so i can often understand them. i am almost to the point where i can predict what some will say next, and i can tell what kind of music will come on next. pretty funny stuff. i can´t believe he watches them. well, maybe i can. he is super nice to me, but what exactly does he have going on? nothing. not to be harsh, but seriously, how can you only have a microwave and nothing else. no hot plate? even in college dorm life i had a hot pot thing. i guess most single guys eat out down here. oh well.

back to the chair idea, i am bummed because there is nothing evening resembling a used furniture store around here. victor made me repeat what i was asking like five times in different ways before he even got what a used furniture store was. so, needless to say, nothing round here. i emailed all the profs and asked if they had an old chair they did not use. i have not had a single reply. there are numerous furniture stores in ixtepec, but they are all pricey. what do people do for cheap stuff? i have not figured that one out yet.

did i mention the earthquakes yet? the first time i visited campus exactly two weeks ago, yeah, two weeks, i was here for ten minutes when i noticed a small disturbance. i had not eaten anything in about 12 hours or more, so i assumed i was just hungry and dehydrated. then the two ladies who were with me asked me if i felt the shake. there are small earthquakes here fairly often. most i don´t even feel. as of today i have really only noticed 3. pretty weird, huh?

i think i a going to the city of oaxaca (an old, colonial city, capitol of the state i live in and supposedly an incredibly cultural place) with my roomate in a one week. we get the 16th off for holiday here, indepence day or something similar, and so a three day weekend. victor´s brother lives in a town just outside of oaxaca and we will have a free place to stay with them. the bus ride into the mountains will be interesting because the town is at around 8 or 9 thousand feet. there are some big mountains in between with, from what i hear, very very narrow roads, so the bus has to go slow (i hope). it should take about 5 hours one way, so i will have plenty of studying and resting time! i am pretty sure the bus we will take is one of the really nice ones so it should be very comfortable indeed.

i brought my own lunch today because the food is somehow getting worse. cheap, but worse. so granola and an apple it is!

have a great weekend, write me something if you check and have time, and go hokies!