Monday Funday

After a wonderful Spanish class, I sat down and dominated my homework while waiting for my Mexican culture class to start - such a satisfactory feeling to have your homework done before you even go home!! In Understanding Contemporary Mexico we talked about legal immigration and the process and facts behind the system. Unfortunately my notes are at school - so maybe I'll share a report tomorrow! I came home for lunch and my mom had the best surprise ever!! A beautiful Tres Leches cake decorated with fresh fruits on top! Katelynn and I have been at the supers (grocery stores) before and marveled at one thing in particular... cake prices. For this exquisite and large cake, it cost only 110 pesos... Just over 9 dollars. Can you imagine what we'd pay in the States? So after lunch my mom and I indulged. I hope she's planning on giving away part of the cake, or we'll both be sick by the end of the week! In the afternoon, back at school we had an optional workshop/meeting with Val to discuss how to market your experience with study abroad in an interview or on your resumé. It was really helpful information, and Val has been in the hiring position before so she has some of that insight as well. It's true that these days many applications are filled out online, making it hard to show personality, so we have to use the right words when given the chance to express anything. And resumés are looked at for about an average of 30 seconds before the decision is made to send you to the next pile or not, so you need to make yourself look good (but we talked about not being too shy/humble, yet not get to the point of being arrogant and obnoxious)! I think I took away some good things and it's frightening how soon applying for real jobs will come up... We all sat around and joked (as we were in childish and energetic moods) that it seems impossible to believe any of us would ever get a real job :)

This evening Juana, Kayla, Austin, Sawyer, Katelynn and I went downtown to wander/shop a little, and then go to the most impressive dance presentation ever. On Monday nights, at Plaza Grande (the main square), there is a show of traditional Yucatecan/Mexican dancing. Absolutely beautiful and so talented! They did a series of short dances for a whole hour - and I was amused the entire time!! Jarana is the typical dance here in the Yucatan, and that was a lot of what the couples performed! Take a look at the YouTube clip I uploaded: Traditional Yucatecan Dance

After watching the show we headed to a restaurant. Some people got a light meal, others just beverages - the most delicious fresh fruit juice - I had papaya! The waiter LOVED us. I think he was just surprised at how outgoing we all were! We also had a student, Miguel, from Spain with us, that was a language assistant at Central last year and is here on his vacation visiting another language student that is native to here! A wonderful night, and such a fun day!!

Live band and dancers!

Beautiful dancing and costumes

The gang out to eat