Happy Canada Day!

New euphemism:

Instead of saying "#2" (ala Francisco) or any other term for pooping, we're going to call it "feeding the cockroaches". Yup. That's what I've decided. The cockroaches in my outhouse now seem to be awake and active 24/7 (or taking shifts -I wouldn't be surprised either way), hiding when I come into the letrina during the day but running out of their little hiding spots to crawl all over the inside of the toilet as soon as I sit down. Lovely 'eh? Annie moves out on Canada Day and I probably won't have all of my stuff moved until the end of the week, but I'm going to start using her toilet as soon as Tuesday hits because I'm going nuts at my place. UGH. So yeah, "feeding the cockroaches" from now on.

So this week I started getting into the nitty-gritty of my job. I got all of the spreadsheets of data about the loans program since 2005. It's a disaster to say the least. I have at least a month ahead of me of trying to decifer it and calculate basic indicators. It's a little awkward because I'm worried about stepping on the toes of the woman who has been inputting and "keeping track" of the data...but it has to be completely overhauled and I'm going to have to run a training on data organization. Things like making sure account number and names are spelled the same way and that you should use the same name for the same person everytime you record data on them. Here, a lot of people have two first names and two last names. I have discovered that any combination of these four names can be used for the same person. Not to mention that people have guerrilla names that are 100% different from the names they legally have and people use both. Ay ay ay! I'm happy to be busy with the work, though, and it's mostly numbers, names and Excel, so my lack of Spanish isn't holding me back at all except to ask about why certain things are listed the way they are.

Monday was my Canada Day. Tom, one of the students from Western, came back to visit on Sunday night. We had dinner and I invited him and his friend T[h]eresa to to come by for pre-Canada Day dinner and drinks on Monday. The power was out so we ate a veggie omelette and drank Brava by headlamp light. (Headlamp = key) Then we swung by Valentina's and played Uno with some Italians for a few hours. Not really a traditional Canada Day, but I'm really glad I got to have it! My actual Canada Day will likely consist of handing out Canada stickers to kids during the day, and, at night, drinking a beer, listening to Metric and the Barenaked Ladies and reading articles for my research. I party hard.

My boss's birthday was on Tuesday. We aren't particularly close since he doesn't know a word in English but I was walking down the street on my way to Annie's and Luis drove by. He told me to come along to the party, very insistant that I let him buy me a beer. So I hopped in and we drove less than half a metre (no joke) to the tienda right in front of my house. I was the only woman and the only person who was not middle aged, so I was basically ignored. I drank beer and ate chicken sausage, talking to Luis (in English) about his time in the States and about what needs to be done in the cooperative. A little awkward but I timed myself well, I think, and scampered back across the street after two beers and left the men to get drunk with each other.

Bought a bunch of tourist-y stuff! I love the headbands they sell here -now I have 3- and I got a necklace and bracelet on Wednesday made of seeds and wood from the Petén rainforest. Here's a picture that doesn't really show my full tanned-ness but you get the idea and you can check out my new purchases (kind of awkward to show the bracelet in the self portrait)! I don't remember ever having been this tanned in my life, actually. My lips look too light for my face, haha.

Trying to hold out on most my shopping for when Mom gets here...August 8! Her ticket is booked booked booked! Now I just need to figure out our plans in Mexico. On Tuesday or Wednesday I'll head over to Flores. There was a Mexico guidebook up for exchange in CoolBeans which I really should have taken when I was there -hopefully it's still there! I'm going to go through a travel agency to get our bus tickets and hotel, probably. So excited for the visit! It'll be my first opportunity to actually travel. I've only been in this very, boring bubble and I'm eager to get out and see Chiapas, Tikal and maybe Yaxha, if we have time and energy.

If I really want to get rumours started...Gave this child a piece of duct tape which proceeded to tape his mouth up with after playing with Jeffrey's calculator for like 20 minutes. Then he won't onward through the community, selling corn with his duct taped mouth. Oh my...I could hear his muffled voice down the street while people were asking him why he had tape on his mouth "MMMhmmmrrrmmm". Haha. He's 7. I swear I didn't suggest it! I just had duct tape (KEY: people who have not left on placement yet, BUY A BIG ASS ROLL! I've used mine for a million things) on the table because I was fixing a mirror that Joanie had (no, I didn't break the mirror, haha).

Getting into research mode. My lunch times and after work have been filled with reading this week about cooperatives in Guatemala. And that's what I'm going to do now after I get my lunch!

Today, the hotel must have been packed for breakfast before I got here because every single table was dirty. Fortunately, I am now on a first-name basis with waiter Juan who cleared a sweet table with wicker chairs for me on the patio. Woot. Pretty happy because we had a little chat about how busy it was and how I'm living here but I'm from Canada and I completely understood his end of the conversation and he understood my Spanish. Very promising!

I've been reading a few newspapers a week and watched Horton Hears a Who dubbed in Spanish (no subtitles!) this week. I also have Kung Fu Panda which I haven't watched but loaned to Arnulfo and I want to buy a couple more children's movies today. I still have a lot of work to do, especially with the future and subjunctive tenses, but I'm doing pretty well!

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