The second week saw the continuation of learning more from my classes and from my time with my host family, some good and some I am not proud of, but overall beneficial. The main highlight was the weekend excursion, which proved to be another wonderful way to see what kind of interesting things Mexico has in terms of culture. More than anything this was a week full of learning from different sources.
The classes built up more from the assignments from last week and I am feeling like things are moving full-force in terms of homework and projects. We have some big presentations in my Spanish Communciation class for fourth year and I am a bit nervous since they seem to be a bit on the long side. Since I am in my fourth year in Spanish, I believe it should be expected. It is actually funny since I sometimes have a hard time giving a presentation in English, but Spanish is a whole different beast. If there is one thing I have learned from my classes though, it would be that the environment can make a huge difference in how one feels about talking. My class is composed of just two students and the teacher. In this way, I feel like it is easier to voice my opinion and the things I want to say in general. While I am still nervous about what I will present. I feel like the informal, smaller size helps to ease the pressure a bit. The other class for writing helped us to learn more forms of tenses and other ways to better understand writing and the like. We ended up having a mid-term which I ended up doing well enough in. I can tell our teacher understands that we are learning, and I know full well that I need to study to do better (which is easier said than done, especially when I am used to turning my brain off in the summer time). In our ESOL class, we presented a cultural backpack and it gave us the chance to see how our cultures shape ourselves. I liked how I felt like I could really show who I was to my peers. It is something I do not normally do, because I always worry I am too different and I cannot relate to anybody at all. Everyone liked my presentation and I loved everyone’s presentations as well. I like how we learn more about culture and what we can do to make culture something meaningful in the class. I still wonder how can I make culture a meaningful thing in my class one day…Only time will tell.
As for time with my host family, it has been very good from my experience. I find that the environment gives me a feeling similar to my own house in Oregon. It gives a sense that everyone is fairly independent, at least in my case. I know they are usually busy with their kids every day which leaves them exhausted and tired. I also try talk to them when the time comes, though sometimes things get busy for everyone. The busy factor was the reason why I did not mention an incident involving some broken class in my room. I was not quite sure how it happened, but I tried to clean it up and take care of it myself. I think my host mother thought I was trying to hide something, but I did not want to disturb her when she was busy. I think we had some difficulties with communication this week. I do not think it put a strain on the relationship, but the difficulties are hard for me at times. I am not a fan of making mistakes. I am feeling better from the little incident though. I feel it is one of many important lessons about the importance of communication. My host my says that I am still young and that it is all right to make mistakes. It’s always so funny how much more hard I am on myself compared to other people.
Eventually, we went to the museums in Mexico D.F, which was the capital if I am not mistaken. We had our hotels reserved and ready and we were able to visit a few museums over the course of a few days. I am not too fond of museums or history either. However, I was able to enjoy some of the sites to an extent. I could see the intricate designs of the rocks, the faith in religion that is very rich in Mexican culture and the like. One of our professors named Alejandro gave us the history lessons about Mexico such as the origin of the paintings and the establishment of the country via events like Cortes and Indigenous people. The best part of the trip by far was visiting the pyramids and enjoying how well designed they were and the views that came with climbing. It left me even more worn-out than the trip to Bernal. It took a while to get back, but I was happy to return and see the family again. Since this trip took the whole weekend, I have plenty of catching up to do for my classes. Summer is always more difficult when homework is involved.
