Hola mi gente! 

Let's see, what's happened since i last wrote?hmmm, ok well the whole volunteering thing has been a bit sucky because Christian has decided that he doesnt like me!! WHATDA???? DOESNT HE UNDERSTAND THAT HE HAS TO, TO MAKE ME FEEL GOOD?????THIS IS ABOUT ME RIGHT??? :-)He refused to come with me on Thursday and the little one Josue, who was keen at first, also lost interest cos we had no where to study other than the playground - which is fine except that the other kids kept jumping ontop of us as we were trying to do our alphabet.   Definitely not an alphabet friendly environment.  So whereas he was able to write his name at the beginning of the session, he had no idea by the end:-)  So all in all, it was a complete and utter disaster!!  This is why i'm a childless accountant and not a mother of 3 kids who teaches at the local school.  FRUSTRATION!! 

Jessica and I decided, once again, that due to the difficult living conditions we had to pamper ourselves soooo we decided to go to a hair salon and get a hair cut!  I figured that i'm travelling for the next 2 months so this is a good opportunity for me to get all the crappy split ends (i.e most of my hair) chopped off.  It's to my shoulders - when it's straight so imagine what i look like when it's curly...  I'm never happy whenever i goto a hair salon in a developed country, so i'm not sure why i thought it would be any different in a developing country.  It all comes down to this: about 99% of the people here have straight hair - the only species with curly hair are genetic abnormalities or the flea-stricken stray dogs on the street.  So needless to say i was not a happy bunny once he was done with my hair and i did not try to hide it either.  Nevertheless, it did cost me $10 so i shouldnt really complain.  I've just never been a fan of the triangle look, u know?  I hate looking like a triangle, i really do! But ok, i'm just gonna eat all my greens so it grows quickly.

Here's a pic of the hair - it's straight tho so may appear longer...

CONTINUED...The dogs here are FREAKY!  I don't know how else to describe it other than that they have no souls...completely lifeless!  They walk around like they are in despair, just looking to survive.  U'll see them lying by the side of the street like they're dead but they're just napping. Oh and they're soooooo skinny.  They rumage through the bins at nite in packs of 10 and even if u pass by them, they'll just look at u as if to say " what are u looking at, can't u see we're having dinner? Now shuffle along.".  They walk past u like they own the joint.  I'm usually terrified of dogs but these "things" don't even bother me.  If u're a dog person, i can imagine this is probably upsetting.  Good job i'm not!:)This is what they look like...

I do my laundry once a week.  It's a pain in the ass cos I have to drag all my clothes over there but the alternative is that i wash them myself.  No thanks.  I don't have time, I have to stare into thin air and find myself!!  The guy in there is about 55 and his name is Jacinto.  He's super friendly and just so in love with my name.  .  He's worked there for 12 years he says but has never met anyone with my name and as such, would like to take a picture of me and put it up in his house...Of course i nodded politely and said "si, si, claro, sure, por que no" thinking "that's just weird...".  I had images of an A4 picture of me in his house, surrounded with roses in a heart shape around it, with an incense candle burning underneath it, preparing how he's gonna kidnap me (too much CSI).  But when i looked away(out of embarrassment)I noticed that the walls had pics of hundreds of people posing next to his washing machines.  They had special names too?  I guess if ur washing people's underwear all day everyday, u have to get ur pleasure somehow.  So i feel better now - he's not a psycho after all.  He just takes pride in what he does.  I'm really excited to have my picture up on the wall - I will make sure i wear my best outfit.  Afterall, it's not often that i pose with a washing machine.  I asked him what his name was and instead of just telling me, he wrote it on a piece of tape and stuck it on my arm.  okay...(he's still not weird Luma, really, he's not weird).  i forgot to take it off though so was walking around with it on my sweater for days.  I definitely know his name now.


The whole bin system is weird too.  Once a week, a big giant truck drives through the street and 2 guys run behind it picking up all the garbage bags from the side of the street and throwing it into this moving truck....Just watching that is tiring!!!  I mean they can run for hours!  I wonder what the interview process is for this job.  "Sir, run.  Just show me how long u can run for".  Poor guys.  I would definitely hate that job!


To continue with the pamper theme, we decided to goto a place called Las Cumbres, advertised as a thermal spa, with a jacuzzi and Sauna in every room, a fireplace.  It sounded gorgeous and just what we wanted!  So we hopped on a chicken bus and off we went.  Again, i got an attack of the giggles as we got on the bus:-)  We must've been the only women on there and there were about 200 eyes staring at us as I practically sat in the driver's lap and Jessica was trying to not get in the way of the gear stick.  They shuffled us to the back where, due to the fact that Jessica is so tall and everyone is so tiny in comparison, she was able to maximise space by skilfully placing her legs between a guys shoulder.  Think of it like a jigsaw.  It was so awkward to see but that's what they do here - we're just fitting in with the locals!:-)


We arrived at Las Cumbres and basically it was a disaster - nothing like it was advertised...  We thought we were going to die from Carbon monoxide posioning cos the fire was CRAP.  Although there were 2 beds, we ended up sleeping in one cos we were SOOOOOOO COLD (i.e we could see our own breath) and decided to take the covers from one onto the other.  Power in numbers.  and body heat! In the end, we slept with 7 covers and I had a t shirt, my pj's, my sweater and ski socks on!!  The tv was broken so we couldnt watch any tv...lucky i had a movie on my laptop but that was over by 9pm!!  The shower broke half way when Jessica was taking a shower and the jacuzzi had cold water - UGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGH!!!! Here's us enjoying the jacuzzi...

By the morning time we were GRUMPY!  Apparently they offered massages but as Jessica put it "they'll probably just lock us in a freezing cold room with refried beans on our face so let's just go home".  I was so happy to be back in my abuela's house...!!  I had a full on pamper session when i got back.  I even used my teeth whitening strips which are a necessity when travelling to a place like this (don't ask me why i brought them).   There was one good thing about this place and that was that it had a squash court!  i haven't played in years and luckily Jessica knows how to play so we played twice.   Of course i kicked her butt but it was so fun.  I sweated it out and i'm achey today - but a nice kind of achey.  Here's a sign I saw at the sauna - i had to read the spanish version to understand what they're trying to say:-)

On our way back, we didn't have to do the whole jigsaw thing on the bus so that was good cos we were not in the mood.  We were supposed to change buses but we decided to walk part of the way home and that's when we saw it....A MALL!!!!!!!! YES! A FREAKING MALL!!!!!  I don't understand why peeps here hid that gem from us!!! They even had "payless shoes" and a proper supermarket and a "wendys"!!!  Man, we were pumped!  I am home.


Voila, my adventures so far.  Tomorrow i plan on going to the school and trying again with Christian. I want to try to talk to the teacher and see if there's anything i can do for him to help his situation so we'll see.


I just wanted to say thanks to u all for reading and for all ur funny comments.  They make me smile:-)I would love to write back to u individually but like i said, i have to stare into thin air and find myself.  Just know that i'm really happy that u guys are reading this and following me and enjoying it! it's very flattering and means a lot!!


More later - baaaaaaaaaaaaaai.xoxoxoxo