Today as I was walking to Laura’s house, a student from the school, who is 14, walked with me. After she asked the usual questions such as ‘Tiene un novio usted?’ (Do you have a boyfriend?), I decided to turn the question back on her. She said ‘si, pero el es mucho mayor que yo’ (yes, but he’s a lot older than me). ‘Ah’ I said, ‘Cuantas anos tiene?’ She replied, ‘trenta y cuatro’ (thrity four). Why did people ever find Lolita scandalous?
They don’t believe in either flattering or sheltering your ego.
One family, who Laura and Alex ate dinner with, proceeded, after dinner, to tell Laura, in front of Alex, how she was much better than him. This was based on the following three assertions:
• She speaks better Spanish
• She ate all her dinner
• She’s better at dancing bayoneta
One day the father in my house asked me why I didn’t have a brace when my teeth are so crooked. And then he demonstrated it by forming his hands into a crumpled shape. By which point I mocked offence, hiding genuine offense, said I liked my teeth the way they were, and then got out the house sharpish.
One of the English teachers (who can’t really speak English so, to my disbelief, we fare better in Spanish) managed to string together the words,
‘When you came here you was fat, now you thin’.
I tend to give less to the cats these days so I’m not sure how long this will last. After it’s reached the one month mark, the food doesn’t seem so bad. Today I happily ate bland rice with chopped up noodles in it with potato. Carb overload. In fact, Alex pointed out that yesterday he was actually looking forward to oil and rice. Plus dipping fruit in salt has taken an agreeable turn.
Goodbyes are hard. I said goodbye to the family who I give private lessons to. They are very nice people and they are the only ones who have fed me salad.
I went to the aerobics dance class and wiggled away for the last time to the steps of the very gay Latino Bayoneta-loving instructor.
This week I have hung-out with some more students from the university. I went to a romba (party) last night. I found it funny that my friend called their house ‘un mansion de extranjeros’ (mansion of foreigners). But when we arrived I saw why, because the exchange students live in an ex-drug lord’s house, with ornate banisters and a luxurious patio with a swimming pool.
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