In which I confess...

Every morning this week I have gone for a run as soon as I get out of bed. I live right next to the soccer field, which makes it convenient. You can’t run anywhere else here- the roads are too rocky, I’d probably break an ankle. Well, even parts of the soccer field are too rocky... and there are cow patties all over it... but it’s do-able. It’s not easy for me working out after waking up. I’ve never been accustomed to doing so. And I end up feeling tired the rest of the day because of it. Hopefully that goes away when you get used to doing it all the time.

So when I get to the soccer field- all the kids in the houses above it see me down there and they all come running down to sit and they just watch me run in circles. It’s cute how fascinated they are by me. I try to play with them a little after I’m done if I have time. They had a blast copying me and doing all of the stretching exercises I was doing. Cute kids.

I went to my neighbor’s house today and helped them make pan (bread) in a huge adobe dome oven... it was cool. Those ovens cook things so much faster than the conventional kind. It was tasty. But I saw them put a huge block of lard and a huge bag of sugar in it. Of course it tasted good!

Washing my clothes by hand is becoming more and more annoying. It takes soooo long. And then it takes two days of hanging it out in the sun to dry.

Even more annoying are my encounters with the rats in my house. This week I walked in my house after having dinner with Chepito and Marinita and found newborn baby rats. The first time it happened there were 3 of them just laying on the ground. And then the second time it was just one- but it was in my frying pan on my stove! Gross! I eat food out of that! I just laughed about it though and took pictures. I have never seen baby rats before. Don Chepito took them outside and whacked them with his machete. Marinita was with me both times that i found them. She told me she is so embarrased about it. I told her “Naw, don’t be! I’ve had rats in every house I’ve ever lived in. It’s normal.” Lie. I just wanted to make her feel better. Truth- I’ve never seen a wild rat before! I’m surprised- it’s really not that big of a deal. I am slowly becoming immune to the “Ewww” factor when it comes to critters.

There’s something I did a while ago that I feel really bad about. It was my first morning here in San Jacinto and Marinita was giving me so much food for breakfast that it would have fed me for the entire day. I finally made it through most of the food on my plate... when she brought me a cup of chocolate milk. It was milk straight from the vaca- which means heavy and fatty... and I just couldn’t fit it in. I was in this frame of mind that I had to eat everything she gave me to get her to love me and for her to think I loved her. As i’ve said before... it’s a big deal here how much you eat.

Well- I had heard about a volunteer that will put food in her pockets are feed it to the dogs, and make it seem like she ate it all. As bad as I feel about wasting food- In that moment, it sounded like a good idea. I couldn’t drink it. But I couldn’t put a beverage in my pocket. I was on the front porch- and I saw the grass to the side. Ahhh, I’ll just dump it in the grass when she’s not looking! I thought. I talked myself out of it and back into it several times. Finally when she walked inside I went for it... and dumped the milk onto the ground over the short fence that perimiters the porch. Uh oh. There was concrete on the other side of it... no grass. So there was a huge mess of splashed milk and quickly came all the dogs and the chickens to lick it off the ground. I still don’t know today if they noticed. What a terrible idea. I felt really bad. Ever since then I have decided to just not eat the food and risk Marinita being offended. It’s better than possibly being caught wasting it. And still when you walk on the side of the porch... you can see white drip stains from the milk... Evidence that something weird happened there. I tried to clean it up and scrub it when they were out one day, but now it’s baked into the concrete from the sun, and looks like bleach spilt or something. Lo siento mucho for that.

Well I have a big day ahead of me tomorrow! I’ll be presented at the community assembly where there should be a ton of people. I’ll probably have to give a little speech on a microphone. Yikes. OK bed time!