Jueves Poselero

Writing blogs is so tiring as in me cuesta mucho empezar y convertir mis ideas en palabras, and think about what I should or shouldn't write about. I'm still staying with my tutora (the teacher I'll be assisting), a middle-aged lady who did her doctorate in Manchester, England but who's from a small town in the north I believe of Guerrero state. Today she was telling me how the planes used to fly over the pueblo incomunicado every week and the kids would try and chase them. They spoke a "different" Spanish in that town she tells me. Just one story she's told me since I arrived. Yesterday, I met the students and teachers at the school in which I'll be teaching, la Universidad Autónoma de Guerrero (Acapulco Campus). 

A couple students asked me if I was single, which of course started the others in the class off hooterin' and hollerin'. Another asked if my parents were Mexican. Most of those who spoke spoke very well English. I was rather surprised. One of the students, Cristian, actually had lived in Phoenix for some time and I swear he spoke almost perfectly.

So twice I've happened to get a ride with a taxista that has lived in the US for some time.  Miguel Ángel (¿miguelángel?) told me about how the police stopped him 3 times except the third time he "lost" them.  The subject came up because I asked if there was a seatbelt, which a lot of cars and taxis don't even have here.  So I told him basically to be careful with my life and we got on the subject of Acapulco drivers.  Turns out he got in a car accident in the states that he swears wasn't his fault.  From the collision he was hospitalized and after a few months had to come back to México.

Another taxi driver, whose name escapes me, showed me some photos that he keeps in his glove compartment of him and his son living in Oklahoma.  They were pictures of them fishing because apparently they lived near a lake.  He also had a random photo of a local news anchor taken off the television who was so "buenota" he had to take a recuerdo of her home.  In Oklahoma it was just him and his son as they had left his wife and daughter hence they decided to come back.

Current Mosquito Bite Count:  10...oh wait 11

Number of times lost: 2

Number of times assalted: 0 (just kidding, but knock on wood)

Just a little bit about Acapulco... It's all constructed from the coast up into the mountain, or cerro, so walking down to the beach, about 30 minutes, is pretty easy.  However, going back uphill is a different story, which is why there are varios camionetas that charge about 3 pesos to drive you back up, as well as the old public buses.  The metropolitan area is divided into Old Acapulco, where a lot of the older hotels are and also the famous cliff divers, while New Acapulco is around the mountain near the airport and further down the coast.  I havn't seen too much of the more modern section of the city but I do remember passing a Costco and a really nice shopping plaza.

Acapulco is definitely not as big and spread out as Guadalajara, which has a population of somewhere around 6 million depending on the source you consult, so hopefully I'll be able to memorize and get to know a lot of the neighborhoods and colonias.