Week 8: Great expectations

I learned the perfect tense last week, which brings the Spanish verb tense count up to ten. To use an English verb as an example, ten verb tenses is the equivalent of saying the following:

I learn, I am learning, I'm going to learn, I will learn, I used to learn, I learned, I have learned, I had learned, I will be learning, and the command, "Learn!"

I still have the subjunctive and the conditional to go, which are kind of tough from what I've heard. But for the most part, the tenses I know now are more than enough to get my point across. What is still lacking is the vocabulary and the speed; I speak very simply and about as slowly as someone with Broca's aphasia.

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Friday was Cathy's birthday. She is one of my host sisters, and she turned 22. In typical Guatemalan style, we lit off fireworks in front of the house at 6am, and that night she had her friends over to the house for a party. Dinner was chorizo tacos. Here's the preparation: a flat, floppy fried corn tortilla with about a tablespoon of ground chorizo, topped with pico de gallo, diced cucumber and onion, salsa de aguacate (avocado sauce), salsa verde (a spicy tomatillo-based green salsa), and chirmol (another spicy salsa made from charred chile zambos). They are served three to a plate, and are super tasty. About forty people came, so the preparation was pretty extensive, e.g. my mom cooked up fifteen pounds of chorizo, and fried about 150 tortillas on the plancha.



Other than perhaps the fireworks and the food, the party wasn't much different from other birthday parties I've attended. Perhaps the biggest difference was that presents aren't opened at the party; kind of like a wedding, they're usually opened the morning after.

In other news, this week is going to be crazy. It is Independence Week, so there are parades, pageants, fairs, and concerts galore. The big days are tomorrow and Wednesday. Independence Day is Wednesday, but on Independence Eve there's a free concert with bands playing everything and everyone drinking everything. At midnight the mayor gives a long speech called the "grito de independencia", and afterward everyone continues drinking. To aid in the latter, the bars remain open all night long. The next day most of the city, probably hung over, heads to the fairgrounds. We don't have class that day, so I will probably sleep in and spend the day studying (our school is planning on going to the fair on Thursday).

Friday is a big day too, because I'll be heading to the airport that day. The airport, you say? Yes, the airport. Because...strangely, crazily, ridiculously enough, I'm flying to Canada to spend a week with Caleb!

What the heck, right? Well, it turns out one of his papers was accepted at a conference in Lake Louise. He emailed me a couple days ago saying that, if I wanted to, he'd help pay for the ticket from Guatemala to Calgary, which would make it cheaper than than paying for a week of class at Pop Wuj. He'd cover the car and hotel, so I'd just have to pay for food. How could I say no?

We'll be at this hotel for four days, and probably driving around Banff trail running, climbing, and hiking for two days before and two days after.

This trip is quite serendipitous, because I was planning on taking time off during that week, anyway; I had decided that I needed a break from continually cramming in new Spanish grammar and vocabulary, and needed to take a week to organize things in my head and cement what Spanish I had learned. So I'll still be doing that, but I'll just be in Canada, with my boyfriend, whom I haven't seen in 3.5 months. FYI, when I get back I'll still have the same family and the same teacher.

I'm looking forward to this week :)