I'm still alive.

Blogging is like laundry, the longer you put it off, the more you have to do and it gets to the point where you don't want to do it. But unlike laundry, you don't have to be naked when you don't blog for a while. Thank goodness.

Speaking of being naked....just kidding, Mom. But really, clothes here become your worst enemy. It is just so hot you don't want to do anything or wear anything. But I'm not a total weirdie, so I still wear clothes. The hottest I've ever felt in my life was not this weekend, but the week before when we went to Chichén Itzá. There was not a cloud in the sky, and we were there at noon day so finding trees to hull under was just a big joke. We were there for 3 hours and everyone drank all their water in the first hour so it got real rough near the end. The sun just poses a problem in general for me. If I'm out longer than fifteen minutes, unless I'm wearing my trusty SPF 70 sunscreen, I will get sunburned. But it also poses a problem when you are just continuously sweating off any sunscreen you put on. Every fifteen or twenty minutes I would use my shirt and wipe my face, arms and chest off so I could reapply.

Chichén was a crazy experience, other than being ridiculously hot, there were some other things that caused me to think how I really felt about the experience. When I first got there, I was just so stoked about the whole thing. I mean, this is one of the main reasons I came on the study abroad it is a once in a lifetime opportunity to see one of the "new" seven wonders of the world.

First hiccup. New? Isn't the point of the seven wonders of the world to be kind of, oh what's the word, wonderful? We're going to take the seven coolest things we could find, but don't worry, you'll have your turn too. Why not just have a or magazine, or TV show or movie devoted to all the cool things of the world? Oh wait, that's what National Geographic and Discovery Channel and Planet Earth are for. Why choose 7, then change them? I guess I had just never really thought about that before.

Secondly. There were workers on the temple givin it a little touch ups. It was so weird to see and we were talking with our professor about it and he was explaining that everything on the temple was reconstructed. It's not even the original! The Mona Lisa was destroyed, we have Bob Ross' version instead, puzzle edition. What are the criteria to be a Seven Wonder of the World, anyway? I keep thinking the big deal about these ruins is that they've stood for thousands of years, but no. They have all been reconstructed using the original stones and glyphs according to the records they have. Meaning if it's not explicitly detailed in the record, they don't reconstruct it. So it is exactly as it would have been in the ancient days, but it's still reconstructed. The ironic thing is the people working on the temple were most likely Mayan....I'll let that one simmer for a while.

Thirdly. It was a hay day for street vendors. I assumed there would be street vendors, but on the street, not within the archaeological site. But come to find out (to the best of my understanding at least) the property is not owned by the Mexican government, but privately by a family. So I'm guessing they don't really regulate the "Hand Made Crafts" that are sold there (Hecho en China was printed on almost every one of those dang crafts). It just made it worse that earlier in the trip in my Mayan Culture class we had a professor talk to us for a bit on human trafficking and how it is a real thing and at places like Chichén if you see little children walking around selling goods, most likely the people they report to are not their parents but someone that has contracted them to sell these crafts each day to earn enough money to take back to their parents. He advised us to not buy from them because in a way we are in turn supporting human trafficking.

Now look at all the cool stuff I did so I could take pictures and make everyone see how cool I am.

One of these things is not like the others.

Just makin some friends in the biggest ball court in Mesoamerica.

Something famous? Someone take a picture of me doing a cartwheel in front of it.

I don't know exactly what I was expecting to get out of that trip, maybe get more in touch with my Mayan side. You know, feel closer to my ancestors. Maybe I was expecting to want to become an archaeologist. Booooring. But none of my expectations were met. I'm not saying at all that I didn't love the experience, I just learned different things than I was expecting. Which I kind of love in and of itself. I love having to search for a lesson. When it's not laid out in front of you, you have to stop and look around, stop talking and just listen. Maybe there's something better than you ever thought. I didn't learn a whole lot of profound life changing things, but I still learned something. Bring 2 water bottles. Parasols don't look so dumb anymore. Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.* Tourism is a huge market all around the world. Always bring cookies. Tourists are attracted to shiny objects, kind of like kittens. I'm not good at taking pictures, so I just leave that up to everyone else.

*One profound thing I learned, I had already learned from Ferris Bueller.

Sweaty Sunday.

Blogging is like writing a message in a bottle. Someone may read it, maybe nobody will ever see it, but I sure get a kick out of it.

First off. I miss Bart. I promised this won't be an "I miss Bart" blog. But let's be real. I love that man, he's pretty wonderful. I'm so grateful for Skype and the chance it gives us to still talk. Although his letters are possibly the greatest things I could ever ask for. He's such a great support to me and I am the luckiest girl alive.

Secondly. I don't know what it is about being in Mexico, but only certain of my music is playable in my iTunes. Also, Pandora doesn't work in Mexico either. So my music for the past three weeks has consisted of Disney and Christmas music. For some reason that is pretty much the only music on my iTunes. I'm a little outraged. But hey, life moves on, right?

Have I mentioned how sticky hot it is here? I woke up from a nap sweaty. I haven't done that for a real long time, and it's disgusting.

Spanish is coming along. Slowly but surely I'm gleaning a little bit here and there, words and phrases are starting to come together. I would say I understand about 85% of what is said around me. But some people just talk so fast. I think everyone does, just some people slow it down for us gringos. I love listening to Elisa talk to us after dinner or lunch. We usually have sweet discussions on education or marriage and family or morals. Our host family aren't members of the church, but they are such rock stars. They have such high values and they just get it. They get how we're supposed to live our lives. She always has such good insights and I love it when she just starts talking and we just get to sit and listen. One of my favorite things she has told us was the first night we were here (I'm almost halfway through already, crazy). We asked her why they decided to host exchange students, this is their 7th time hosting extranjeros, her answer blew my mind. She said it was to teach her girls, Elisa and Ximena, that there are different people everywhere you go, but they are all good people. She wanted her girls to see that from all parts of the world there are good people and they don't need to be afraid of people that are different from them. I love it. She also said she has adopted family all over the world, well most of the students she has hosted have come from the U.S. or Canada. She still keeps in contact with most of them and she always tells us that when we start having kids, we need to come back and visit so she can meet our babies and spouses. She always tells us to say hi to our family and boyfriends for her. She is just such a great person and I hope to uphold the things she has taught us: marinating chicken and pork is the best way to prepare it. No, I've definitely learned more than that from her. She's just a great lady, real nice. Maybe one day I'll write a blog just on the fam. They are all so great and I love them all.

We went to the Zoo on Friday.

A. It's FREE. I asked how they are able to take care of the animals and everything if it's free. Apparently the government is in charge of zoo upkeeps. Pretty cool.

B. When they told us it would be free, I wasn't expecting a whole lot. But it was sweet. They had jaguars, Bengal tigers and hippos, oh my. They had all sorts of awesome animals. I was wondering if they would have any animals that threw me off by being in the Zoo. And boy did it. Raccoons. They had raccoons in the zoo. We all had to laugh. Those things aren't only not rare in the states, but they're impossible to get rid of. I was telling Elisa about how they would come and eat our cat's food then wash their mangy little hands in her water dish. Elisa thought it was crazy. The ones they had in the exhibit were just as shifty as the ones back home. Their cage things was only about 4 feet high, easily escapable. They kept looking up at us with those scheming eyes of theirs and they just looked pissed. They wanted to rob me, I just know it.

C. I stayed outside the snake exhibit. There was no way I was going in a 6 foot tall 4 foot wide enclosed tunnel lined with glass cages of snakes on both sides. I'll hang outside and look at the cute turtles and birdies, thank you very much.

I was missing my family hard core today. In church today there were a couple of little kids that were cuh-razy. It made me miss my dad because I know he would have gone nuts. Crazy as in playing the piano during Sacrament meeting and a drum set during Relief Society. I'm not saying my nieces and nephews are like that at all, on the contrary. I love how great they are. Eva, Whitney, Annabelle and Emily. Man those girls are precious. And the boys of course. All of them. Man. I can't wait till I get to see them again.

Is it sweaty here?

Even though I'm not feeling particularly witty this morning, I figured I should write about my adventures this weekend. I'm sure my sarcasm will be sure to make someone laugh. And if not, I get a kick out of it. So don't mind if I do.

We went to some more sweet Mayan ruins this weekend. A little place called Uxmal. First sarcastic remark. Uxmal is not small. It's about 1,200 square meters. And the entire place is covered with Tolocs.

Tolocs, as you can see by Audrey clearly indicating, are iguanas. They're actually all over Mérida too, but a little more prominently at Uxmal. 

Let's have a little pronunciation lesson before we get too ahead of ourselves. Uxmal=Ooshmaul.

Moving on. 

The most famous thing (since I'm an ignorant American, that's all I care about. Clearly.) is a temple that is known by a couple different names. Most prominently "The Pyramid of the Sorcerer". There is a pretty sweet myth behind it. One of the girls in our group, Marie, studied Mayan culture before we came on this study abroad and wrote out the legend for us before we went to Uxmal. 

"There was an old woman who lived in a hut that was located on the exact spot where the finished pyramid now stands. This old woman was a witch who one day went into mourning that she had no children. One day, she took an egg and wrapped it in cloth and placed it in a corner of her small hut. Every day she went to look at the egg until one day it hatched and a small creature, closely resembling a baby, came from the enchanted egg.

The old woman was delighted and called the baby her son. She provided it with a nurse and took good care of it so that within a year it was walking and talking like a man. It stopped growing after a year and the old woman was very proud of her son and told him that one day he would be a great Lord or King.
One day, she told her son to go the House of the Governor and challenge the King to a trial of strength. The dwarf didn't want to go at first but the old woman insisted and so to see the King he went. The guards let him in and he threw down his challenge to the King. The King smiled, and told the dwarf to lift a stone that weighed three arrobas (75 pounds). At this the dwarf cried and ran back to his mother. The witch was wise, and told her son to tell the King that if the King would lift the stone first, then he would lift it also. The dwarf returned and told the King what his mother told him to say. The king lifted the stone and the dwarf did the same. The King was impressed, and a little nervous, and tested the dwarf for the rest of the day with other feats of strength. Each time the King performed an act, the dwarf was able to match it.The King became enraged that he was being matched by a dwarf, and told the dwarf that in one night he must build a house higher than any other in the city or he would be killed. The dwarf again returned crying to his mother who told him to not lose hope, and that he should go straight to bed. The next morning the city awoke to see the Pyramid of the Dwarf in its finished state, taller than any other building in the city.The King saw this building from his palace and was again enraged. He summoned the dwarf and ordered one final test of strength. The dwarf had to collect two bundles of Cogoil wood, a very strong and heavy wood, and the king would break the wood over the head of the dwarf, and after that the dwarf could have his turn to break the wood over the King's head.The dwarf again ran to his mother for help. She told him not to worry and placed an enchanted tortilla on his head for protection. The trial was to be performed in front of all the great men of the city. The King proceeded to break the whole of his bundle over the dwarf’s head, one stick at a time. The King failed to injure the dwarf and then tried to bow out of his challenge. In full view of the town’s great men, though, he knew he had no choice but to go ahead and let the dwarf have his turn.The second stick of the dwarf’s bundle broke the Kings skull into pieces and he fell dead at the foot of the dwarf, who was hailed as the new King (Ranney 80-1)."

It really is an amazing sight to see. Though most of these buildings were reconstructions, we were not able to climb them.....There goes my interest. Obviously I'm kidding. It was an amazing experience and we had a tour guide that has studied these sights extensively and he was telling us all about the significance. Most of the representations on the facades and on the frieze (you can thank Humanities 101 for those handy terms) were of the Mayan rain god, Chaac. There were many sacrifices to him pleading for the blessing of rain. 

The reason we couldn't climb to the top of the temple was it is just too dangerous. The stairs you can see in this picture up the middle of the temple are probably about 6 inches deep and 10-12 inches tall. This was so when people would climb to the top they could not look up directly to the top into the eyes of the gods. And when they were coming down, they could not turn their backs directly to the gods either. You have to go down those suckers sideways. We did get to climb to the top of another building, but it was a little intimidating coming back down. 

I'm living with a couple of 6 year olds.

After exploring, then having some lunch/dinner and swimming a bit in the restaurant pool, we went back to the Nunnery Quadrangle and watched what is called "Luz y Sonido". It's a killer light show (sarcastic comment alert). Not so hot. It would have been cool, if you could understand what was being said. The narration was played over some speakers you would likely find playing Blink 182 at a middle school dance and the lights just faded from green, to blue, to red. When we got real lucky, the lights outlined the serpent along the wall of one of the buildings. That actually was pretty cool. Overall the coolest thing about that was there were fireflies all over the courtyard. I had never seen a firefly in real life. Cute little things. 

Life continues to be wonderful. I laid out in the sun for a solid half hour today after a quick dip in the pool. I was telling Morgan, that's the first time I've done that since I found out about my chronic disease that limits my sun exposure. Experts like to call it "fair skin". It's a hard life. But sometimes I like to live life on the edge. I'll only put on SPF 55 instead of 70. And I'll only reapply ONCE. There's no stopping me, I do what I want. 

Yep, here´s one of those "feeling" posts.

This past couple of days has been so good for me. The four of us girls have had some great experiences that make me realize the real reason I came down here. It wasn´t just to learn Spanish, eat delectable food, and sleep in a hammock (as much as I would like to think I could just do those three things all day every day), but to grow spiritually as well as intellectually (let´s hope not physically as well, Elisa just cooks too much good food!).

I have come to understand how blesed my life has been, and continues to be. I was born into an outstanding family who loves me and has always been there for me. Especially my parents. I don´t think I could ever thank them enough for everything they have given me and more importantly what they´ve taught me. I owe them everything and maybe one day I will be able to sufficiently express my gratitude to them.

I have been able to receive an education. A lot of people cannot finish high school for one reason or another and I have not only been blessed to do that, but also continue on to a university. This is something I am truly coming to cherish. In college you learn more than what is taught in the classroom, but you learn about the basis of who you are. Being out on your own forces you to figure out what you stand for and what you won´t put up with.

And let´s face it, as much as we complain about American government, and the economy, and Provo police pulling you over...nope, that one is still valid, I hate those guys...we are truly blessed to be born into a country where we experience freedom. During the Mexican elections we have been talking with Elisa about politics a little bit. I know, who knew I would be talking about politics? She was telling us how The U.S. has a bit of say in who wins the elections. We had no idea. She just went on to talk about how it isn´t really a matter of who the best politician is, but the least bad. The conversation kind of boiled down to Americans believe in their government. We trust it has the people´s best interest in mind. That may not always be the case, but for the most part it´s true. I´m not trying to start some political debate or anything of the sort. It´s just a couple of experiences I´ve had in the past few days. (This means I´m an ignorant American and if you post anything involving politics, I will not respond. Ignorance is bliss, right?)

And most of all, I am so blessed to have the gospel in my life. I was telling Bart (that handsome devil) how crazy it is the difference you can feel in your life when you are diligent in your faithfulness versus when you are just casual or not even doing the day to day things. The first couple days of this trip, I was pretty bummy. I just felt lost and like the upcoming 7 weeks were going to be so hard. I honestly wanted to go home, I just didn´t feel like it would be worth it and that I wouldn´t be able to hack it. After a couple of days of moping, I changed my attitude thanks to years of my mother´s words resounding in my ears. Who knew I would be admitting my mom´s advice to change my face actually worked. I started being more diligent with my scripture study and prayers and things just got brighter. We´ve had a couple experiences in the past few days that have just rocked my testimony, in a good way. It´s been as simple as having the faith that a simple prayer can help us exactly in the way we need it. I know the Lord is waiting to bless us with anything and everything, but we need to ask. I just love having a bigger picture in mind. I´m not just praying that we make it home safely, I´m building my testimony that will be the foundation of what I believe and in turn who I wish to become.

Props to you if you´re still reading, this has turned into a longy long post. This trip has just given me great time to think. We ride the bus for at least a half hour total each day to and from school. When I´m not trying to have a conversation with the poor soul next to me (I set a goal to talk to someone every time I get on the bus), I just have unlimited access to thinking. That sounds dumb, but when your mind is so focused all day on understanding what you´re reading or hearing, you don´t have much room for transcendentalism. Speaking and listening to Spanish all the time really messes with your head. When you go back to using English, your brain has a hard time translating and pretty soon you can´t find the English equivalent so you just say it in Spanish. I´m turning into one of those pretentious return missionaries that says something along the lines of, "Oh, I can´t explain it in English. You just wouldn´t get it.".

When the party begins

Okay now this is the vacation I signed up for! Kickin it at the beach, eating tacos al pastor and checking out some sweet Mayan ruins. Not to mention the swimming. Oh man.


Today we went to the Mayan ruins Dzibilchaltún. I'm just going to start by saying the Mayan people were absolutely genius. Dzibilchaltún is famous for a temple called "El Templo de las Siete Muñecas" (the temple of the seven dolls). At the spring and fall equinoxes the sun shines directly through the two windows on the walls of the temple. 

It was such a beautiful thing to see and really humbling. It was fun to speculate the correlations found in the Book of Mormon. 

"This city was once lead by the administrative and religious elite". Reign of the judges, anyone? 

At one point my roommate Morgan stopped and just said, "I wonder if we're standing where King Mosiah stood?" 

It was just cool to think that one day we will know the mysteries of the world. But until then, look at more cool pictures of me climbing on stuff. 

When we came into the site, they said we could climb on everything. Challenge accepted. After I climbed on the temple, I felt super guilty. Just like I had disrespected an entire civilization. Who do I think I am climbing on an ancient Mayan temple? 

"Everything you see here is a reconstruction, the temple was destroyed long ago and this is a representation according to records we have." Let the climbing resume.

After we had time to check out the ruins and climb every rock in sight, we went over to what is called a cenote. It is basically a sink hole and they are all over the Yucatán. 

The Yucatán has tons of underground rivers. Every once in a while there will be access to them from the surface. They are the most refreshing thing I have ever swam in. Perfect temperature and great ledges to jump off of. 

Being a Brown, of course I had to jump. That's just what we do. So I did, backwards.

Terrible form. Also, sorry for the immodesty.

It was so sweet and tons of fun. Sometimes I forget how much I love being in the water. It's just pure bliss for me to swim. However having a fish swim with you, inside your swimsuit is not so great. Guh-ross. Speaking of fish. I couldn't wear sunscreen while swimming because of them. Since cenotes are natural water resources, there are fish that live there. And apparently sunscreen is pretty lethal for them. Luckily I had already put on three applications when they told us this.

Once we had our fill of the cenote, it was off to the beach. We went to a beach house of one of the host families that was literally right on the beach. We ate tacos al pastor and played ultimate frisbee in the Gulf. We're Mormon, what else are we supposed to do? Provo meets Mexico. It was such a beautiful day. After a while in the gulf it actually got hot. I had to get out of the water because it was too hot. We're not in the Pacific anymore, Todo. It was crazy.

I live with the 3 tannest girls in the group. What a joke.

So much to be grateful for.

So this whole week has been pretty chill for us four. I should probably lay the background of my stay before we get too far ahead of ourselves in this lil adventure of ours.

First day of school!

First off, I'm living with three other girls that are on the study abroad as well. Morgan Hawkes is on the left then Alli Reitz and Audrey Woodland. Why yes she always has her eyes closed in pictures, I'm glad you noticed. I could not have asked for better companions on this trip.

We started classes on Wednesday, and boy we started them. We are diving right into Mayan culture in one of my classes and I already have a presentation on Tuesday of next week for my Spanish class. As much work as it is, I am loving it so much. I forget how much I love learning things I'm interested in. I know this is what I'm supposed to be studying because I just get so excited about learning new words and learning their culture poco a poco. This is seriously the best experience I could ask for and I am going to learn so much.

¡Bienvenidos!

I realized my true heritage yesterday in our travels. I am through and through a Brown. We get frustrated with inefficient travel time and we like to take charge when no one else steps up to the plate.

Travel started Monday morning at 4 when I woke up from a terrible dream that all possible travel woes happened. But this dream was in Gayleen format so there was a sketchy character that was threatening one of my family member's lives. This took the form of Alli's creepy old grandpa that was on an episode of Criminal Minds stalking on my sister. 


Once my fears were quelled and we got to the airport by way of my fantastic sister Michelle, all went well. We caught our connecting flight in Phoenix and were Mexico bound. The real fun started once we got to Mexico. We were a pretty big group so it would turn out to be tricky to coordinate everything. We flew into Cancún and were going to take a bus to Mérida. Long story short, we bought kind of the wrong tickets and had to let our director know where to pick us up. It wasn't a big deal, our host families just had to re-route their pick up destination. 


After 9 hours of traveling (that doesn't count the tiring time spent trying to figure out how to get where we were going, that is pure air/bus time), we made it to Centro. Our host parents, Carlos and Elisa, were waiting for us with their two precious daughters, Ximena and Elisa. Upon arriving at their house, we met Cici and Dana, their two dogs. I am sold. I adore this family. Elisa told us we are to consider ourselves as part of the family. She then counseled me to take sunscreen with me everywhere I go. Don't worry, I have 7 bottles with me. Not even a little joking. 


I'm trying to put things in perspective here and get the most out of my experience. I have 7 weeks to go to the beach and go shopping, but the time I spend with our host family is priceless and every moment I can be with them and glean from them is precious to me. There are beaches all over the world and just so I can say "Thanks, I got it in Mexico" is no reason to miss opportunities that are all around me. 


We spent 45 minutes playing Telefono Descompuesto (Telephone) with the girls and Elisa and it is something I will always remember, cheesy as it sounds. The girls are rock stars at English so we would mix it up Spanish to English and back. All this while drinking legit Jamaica. 


Bring on the humidity and bugs (and reptiles-so help me-that eat the bugs). I am loving every nasty sweaty moment.