February 2007

Many people ask what I do for a social life. We watch lots of movies at home and often go to the mall (very modern) for dinner and a movie and occasional shopping. The movies are usually 2-3 months behind the ones in the states, and most are in English with Spanish subtitles. Good for me. :) This is a picture of Eva and the other Miriam at one of the malls. The store to the right is called Soriana; it is much like our Walmart.

Here are some pictures from our 2nd floor patio. In the first picture you can see the kids walking down the street to the orphanage after classes have been released. It's about a 3 minute walk.

Here you can see our guard dog Hershey. She sleeps so much during the day that she seems quite worthless, but at night...boy does she do her job. I like her. In this picture you can also see the houses on our street. The black tanks on top hold and heat water for showers.

Across the street is the workings of our parking area and Came's (my neighbor) future kindergarten.

These are my youngest students. Asael, Angel, Yareli and Gilberto. We are planting our lima been plants after growing them and studying about the parts of the plants. This is the only patch of dirt on the school grounds. The rest is cement. I hope it doesn't get covered, because I need it for some science projects. :)

February was a difficult month in saying "goodbye" to Mr. Poo, our beloved rhino beetle. After losing him once in the trash can (that was a close call) and noticing an increasingly lethargic and unsocialble attitude about him (not to mention a stinky classroom due to the old fruit we were feeding him), we decided it was time for his release. These animals only live 4-12 months and we had him for 5. It was time. The release was emotional, but we know it was best. Unfortunately his release was not well planned and I think we may have shortened the already short life span because of it. (See the gut-wrentching video here www.myspace.com/miriammw) Here the secondary students are saying goodbye. The second picture should tell you something about the unfortunate release which resulted in what I diagnosed as a broken leg and possible concussion. Poor Mr. Poo.