You Better Get Ready for War...

The last week has been hectic, in a serene sense. It's like one of those slow motion war scenes where people are being blown to bits, blood is splattered on the lens and you can see people screaming and dying and crying out, but they cut the sound and set it to some nice, soft, classical score. That's kind of how I would describe the last week.

One of the teachers at the school was fired. Why...who knows? Another teacher rarely shows up. And there is apparently no such thing as a substitute teacher in Mexico, or at least not that I'm aware of. Our coordinator was gone two days on business, and my roomate was, sadly, at home Monday through Wednesday for his grandfather's funeral. Needless to say, the war metaphor is sufficiently adequate in this situation.

On top of that, every night for the last two weeks, I've spent my every waking, non-school hour correcting 35 essays written in broken, garbled English. And while the actual stories were, for the most part, intriguing and ultimately fantastic, the path there (grammar, spelling, punctuation - those little things) were like a path littered with landmines and shrapnel. But, I meticulously corrected each first draft, just as I did in my short stint at Rushville High, treating each paper with the same care as the last. And now, they are all finished, and final drafts have been turned in, and the results are astonishing. It's another small moral victory in an otherwise cataclysmic battle.

Each Friday night, at least for the last two Friday nights, a group of teachers from the school have been meeting for dinner and drinks. Last Saturday (as Friday didn't pan out), we met at Las Alitas, a sports bar type place (think Applebee's with less crap on the walls). This past Friday, we met at Sierra Madre Brewery, a very nice, very lively restaurant with their own brewery. We originally had eight people that grew to fifteen by the end of the meal. It was fantastic. Despite some of the struggles at school, many of the students and especially my fellow co-workers make the job very enjoyable. Many of the elementary teachers, the secondary teachers, the art teacher, the PE teacher, the librarian, and the cafeteria lady are all stupendous individuals. Sitting around, enjoying a relaxing meal, laughing, sharing stories, doing impressions, and really getting to know each other outside of the school walls is something that I will really cherish from my time here. It's the respite, a little R&R away from the trenches.

The best thing that has happened is I finally, finally, finally stopped feeling sick. The nozzle in my nose stopped running like a drunk waterfall and my sleep habits have improved (I actually go to bed at a reasonable hour. What has happened to me?) And so I started lifting and boxing for an hour each day, in addition to running. But the best part - I joined the school's basketball league. Several of the teachers and a few parents are in a weekend basketball league. I stayed after school each night this week to practice, and to be able to play the sport that I love more than anything again has really, really made me giddy. We had our first game today, which, mother fu****, we lost, 61-58. The teams that play in the league are no slouches. We have two former college players and a semi-professional player on our team, and we still lost. I played about a quarter. It felt good...real good. I had five points, including a nothing but a sizzling net three-pointer. Mi amiga Ashley took some pictures:

The first picture would be the sweet lay-up I made, courtesy of a nice assist. The second picture would be my three-pointer in mid-air. As you can see, my form is hot as shit. Alright, so not really, but damn it feels good to be a gangsta. And the view from the gym ain't half bad either. When's the last time you played in a gym on the side of a mountain?

Today, I went with a student of mine and his father to a Monterrey Rayados game, the local professional soccer team. It was incredible. We sat up high, but when the venue (Estadio Tecnologico) is "only" 40,000 seats, any seat is good. It's was incredible to see just how big the field really is. It's twenty yards wider than an American football field and a 120 yards long. And live soccer is actually very exciting, even if the pace seems slow. The fans are crazy. It makes professional sports fans in the US look pathetic. Really pathetic. It reminds me more of a crazy high school or college game, with dancing and cheers and screaming and instruments and all that jazz. And Rayados beat Puebla, 2-1. Very, very cool experience.

Alright, another ball game in 11 hours, and so I must go. But I will return tomorrow with another update on some other very cool happenings and so forth.