pinatas, parades, punta dancing, oh my!

What a week.

The last blog entry I made was amidst quite a chaotic week. It was calming to write my routine into my blog, while diverting from the routine every few days for a variety of fun and exciting anual activities.

Monday was Dia de los Ninos. Children's Day. All the kids came to school ready to beat pinatas, eat candy and ice cream and drive their teacher's insane. First thing in the morning the maintenace guys took the partition between my classroom and the 5th grade classroom out. The fifth grade classroom is about 2 1/2 feet higher than my classroom, which makes a nice stage for school assemblies and other prodctions. Let the games begin! I had to ask a 7th grade boy to translate for me as I explained the game "heads up, seven up" to my precious little second graders. The kids were captivated by the game for about 20 minutes and they decided it would be WAY more fun to jump off of the make shift stage into our classroom. This kept there attention for at least an hour. Ice cream was served. More jumping off the stage. Lunch was served. More stage jumping, dancing to radio, spinning, swinging, trust falls, etc. Cupcakes were served. Pinata time. We slaughtered a rabbit pinata in the exact amount of time it takes 17 second graders and 10 third graders to each have 5 wacks of the pinata. Fancy that! We teachers are smooth! After the kids all got their goody bags (full of candy, cookies, chips and plastic toys) it was time for them all to go home. When we saw our loyal POS school bus pull up to take us home, we saw it had a blown out tire. Never fear! It was only one tire of the dual wheels in the back so we were fine to drive back the 30 kilometers or so to Sigua with only three tires in the back. We made it and had a nice bonding session at the tire repair shop just outside of Sigua, where we waited 30 minutes or so until the tire was fixed. I remember in the states how kids had to deboard the school bus if it was ever getting gas. Here the kids stay on the bus while a tire is changed. You just can't ask questions. If you do, your head will spin right off.

Next day outside of routine. Friday. The elementary school marches in Anniversario Parades all over the country. My job was to keep the first and second grade boys in two perfect lines for the mile or two of the parade route. Yeah right. It was worse than hearding stray cats. But everyone had a great time and the weeks of practice our school's band put in paid off. The baton girls were also great, and I was especially impressed with my second grader, Kensy, who learned the routines in one day's time AND was able to twirl better than the older girls. Hector and and Erik, two of my favorties, didn't have the right uniform so they wore their PE clothes and we pinned red crosses to their backs. They were the water boys and were able to run up and down the road giving water to their schoolmates. The cracked my up the whole way.

As soon as the parade was over on Friday we went home, made some food, had some cocktails, and headed over to our friend Karla's house for dinner and dancing in honor of Dia de los maestros - Teacher's Day - which is actually observed with a day off school on this coming Monday. We had our fill of cocktails before we left for Karla's and once we arrived she was eager to serve us more. Let me just say that my Spanish was awesome last night! I had such a good time talking to all sorts of people who I don't usually talk to because they don't speak English. They were all patient with me and excited that I was giving it a shot. We danced to all sorts of music and I followed the steps as best as I could. By the time we found ourself at the discoteque later in the night I was able to baillar just fine. The disco was dead though because they weren't serving alcohol in honor of Independance Day.

Which brings us to today. I dragged myself out of bed at 8:00am to go downtown to watch the Independance Day Parade. This is a much bigger deal than the Parade yesterday in Taulabe for the little kids. All the high school's march and they have some spactacular marching bands, flag carriers, baton twirlers, etc. We found Karla and her kids watching the parade so we joined them and sat in the morning heat and sun. It was really great! Karla said that she hasn't had fun quite like last night in a long time. We will have to have a Dia de los Maestros fiesta at least once every two months!

Tonight I'll take it easy, because tomorrow Mr. Quinton and I are off on another adventure to La Esperanza. Pease out my friends.