He terminada!

AY AY AY! Yo acabo de terminar mi segunda clase y yo totalmente estoy terminada. I apologize for not posting to this baby for awhile, I have missed it. My life had been a little bit taken over by spanish compositions & early morning class time. Por supuesto no quiero salir esta ciudad. This is my last weekend left in Merida and I absolutely can NOT believe how fast the time has gone by. A group of people are traveling to Los llanos this weekend but I decided it be best to stay in sweet Merida and dance in las discotecas por la ultima vez. I feel a little bit bad for not going to Los Llanos but the group of people who I've gotten to know best are staying here and I also need to save my money for my EXCITING NEWS::: Instead of going straight back to Chicago after 6 weeks, I will be making a pit stop with 5 other people in Margarita Island for 4 nights. If you google Margarita Island you will understand just how excited I am. My plane tickets: set. My money: exchanged. My classes: done. I have a feeling that this last weekend will be the best one yet and things will just get sweeter once I'm laying on a beach and learning how to surf. I love and miss you all! It's not too long until I return to the windy city ;) Less than 2 weeks!

Mercado Principal

El mercado principal. Definitely not like your average mall. I'm not lieing when I say that the culture here in every way is rich because even their mercados have so much life to them.

It has been raining a lot in Merida and on Friday night it rained so hard Krista and I got charged extra for our taxi ride because one street literally resembled a scene from Day after Tomorrow. Yikes. So much rain. Today when we walked and got our late lunch of pizza it was raining yet again but this time it was nice and almost comfortable. We had an amazing meal of pizza and cheesecake and then on our walk back Krista took a photo of a incredibly interesting mariposa that was resting on the ground. The photo now serves as the only remaining physical proof of the butterfly because one second after we took its picture a crow swooped down and devoured it. :-(

Right now it's pretty late in terms of Venezuelan time... but I don't have class until 2pm tomorrow which is a nice relief. As much as I love to learn spanish I always feel apprehensive before jumping into my intensive schedule that totals up to 22 hours total of classroom time. Dios mio. Good night, Buenas noches & I shall continue on my Venezuelan journey for my remaning 2 weeks, :-(

Wherever did the time go...

Spirit

Bueno,

The beautiful picture that I added at the top was taken at Choroni Beach. The beach was a beautiful rather remote location that I would love to go back to. We went to the beach last weekend and this weekend was action packed with dancing. Salsa, tambores, and reggaeton. Honestly the more that I stay here the less I want to leave. This trip has confirmed my passion of exploring and seeing new places immensely. Walking in the Mercado Principal this past weekend was delightful. I walked through the aisles of guitars, dolls, fruits, jewelry, clothes, scarfs, and wine. All of the vendors greeted us by saying "a la orden" aka at your service and most stalls had some Shakira song playing very loudly. All of the products are piled up to the ceiling and I was quite overwhelmed as I tried to look at everything the Venezuelans were trying to sell. Today is the perfect lazy Sunday and a period of rest after a lot of dancing. I will go get pizza with Krista, write my composition for class that is due tomorrow, and then pasar un rato con Derek and Adam with their host mom. Tonight we plan to casually drink some wine with cheese and watch UP.

Querida Venezuela

Querida Venezuela,

Tengo una confesion
Pienso que estoy enamorandome contigo
Yo quiero estar mas de amigos
Me encantan tus montanas hermosas y gigantescas
Me fascina la rica cultura
Es una lastima que yo necesite salir en menos de 3 semanas
Yo me extranare mis nuevos amigos americanos y venezolanos que les conoci aqui
Yo necesito comentar, que tus playas especialmente Choroni que yo he visitado son las mejores del mundo
Las arepas, las empanadas, la pan de azucar, el chocolate, las panaderias, LAS DISCOTECAS y BARES, LOS TAMBORES!!
Me encanta todo que me ofreces muchisimo muchisimo
Yo acabo de darme cuenta que no quiero salir
No voy a salirte mi amante fantastico, nunca voy a salir

Sinceramente,
Amelia

Demasiada Tarea

Hola mis amores,

I have SO much homework today. Today is my last day of class and Monday I will begin my second class which will be 6 hours a day of intensive spanish communication and continued written composition. Thankfully my teacher is giving us 3.5 hours today in class to finish our "trabajo final", which includes a summary in response to an article we read about reading comprehension and the constructive process of writing, a short composition, and a detailed list of vocabulary definitions. All in Spanish of course. I'm going to be very happy to be done and I will celebrate the conclusion of my 3015 Spanish class with a beautiful group trip to Choroni Beach. YAY. It's going to be quite the trip, we leave tonight around 8:30 on a 10 hour bus ride to Maracay, then another two hours from Maracay to Choroni Beach. Our group is staying there for 2 nights in a hostal and we won't return until very early Monday morning.

I'm most excited for the chocolate because I have heard numerous times that the Cocoa there is beyond believable. And I read that to get there we travel through the cloud forest mountains of the Henri Pittier National Park before descending to the sea. I can't wait to see what this weekend has in store, I just need to get through my rigorously intense academic day and then I'm home free. Plus, and this is a big plus, there are many African-Venezuelans at Choroni and it is custom for them to play tambores on the beach and dance in the sand. Viva Venezuela, Viva, Viva.

I'm going to get back to frying my brain with Spanish but I hope that everybody has a wonderful weekend. I'm only bringing my disposable camera this weekend but I'll be sure to share pictures that other people take of the beautiful scenery.

One last note:

Top 5 things that I miss back home
1. Family and friends
2. My bed
3. Being able to flush toliet paper
4. Thai food
5. The gym

Algunas fotografias