Mexico Breaks Stuff

A lot has happened since my last post. I will get to all of that, but what consumes me at the moment is that I am going to flip out if one more thing breaks. My guitar case, my flip-flops, and my camera have all been casualties of the last few days (though I must thank Isobel for discovering the other zipper on my guitar case). Apparently sand is not good for cameras, and the life expectancy of Old Navy flip-flops drops dramatically to about five weeks once you cross the border.

On the last night of the course, class gave way to a pretty intense party in the courtyard of the school. The lines between students, teachers, and course tutors suddenly no longer existed as the nearly unbearable pressure of the past month was finally released. Eventually the party moved to the beach. Things get a little hazy at this point, but I did wake up the next morning (afternoon) with the ability to fake my way through salsa dancing.

The following week was all about the beach. Sometimes it rained, but the rain made us sleep now and then. We finally got to do a lot of the things that we talked about doing all the time but never had time for during the course. This included things like not freaking out all the time and watching the sunrise over the ocean. We also decided that we missed our students and began stalking them after class and making them come hang out with us. Some of them are now close friends.

Our friendship soon bore some pretty amazing gifts. First Irma took a few of us snorkeling in a cenote (basically a cave with water in it. Wikipedia informs me that it is actually a type of freshwater-filled limestone sinkhole). The next day Guadalupe invited us to have beach and fish where she works about half an hour from Playa. I sware it was the most amazing meal I have ever had. I ate three whole fish by myself. They just kept putting fish in front of me. I think I could have eaten five.

With all major travel plans being constantly pushed back by indecision, five of us set off to Tulum with a three person tent (oh, yeah, the tent was also broken). Tulum is about an hour south of Playa and is absolutely beautiful. I volunteered to sleep outside of the tent (though that is more of an inevitability when you travel with four girls) and was rewarded with some amazing stars and a lot of being really cold. Also, in case you were wondering, sleeping on sand is not nearly as comfortable as one might think. I am doing it again tomorrow night for some reason, though. After the threat of rain pushed us off the beach, we walked over to the Mayan ruins of Tulum. The city was built on the cliffs overlooking the sea which creates a pretty spectacular effect.

I have plans! Well, I have plans for the next four days at least. I am going back to Tulum tomorrow for snorkeling, fishing, and fish partying. From there I will head back to Playa for a couple of days, and then Karen, Irene, and I will be flying to Mexico City on Saturday. I hope to spend parts of the next couple of weeks in Mexico City, Cuernavaca, some city that I can't remember the name of, and Puebla. This is the point where things may get a little nutty. At this point I am hoping that I will have a better of idea of how long I would like to travel and when or maybe where I would like to teach. I plan on passing out resumes along the way, and if I really become attached to one place, I may just stay there. If I have had no such revelations, however, the tentative plan will be to pass through Queretaro and then take a long bus to check out Monterrey. From there I hear that there is this town called Austin that isn't too far away that might be a pretty cool place to be for New Year's.

This is all just speculation, though it is a pretty feasible plan. Returning to Austin will certainly not mean the end of my adventures, but it will let me relax, think about what I really want to do, and get rid of all the crap that I brought with me that I don't want to lug around anymore. There are any number of directions I could go from here, most involving the purchase of a proper backpacking backpack and going to see volcanoes and monkeys. One of my favorite scenarios involves driving my car back to central Mexico, though that would be much better if I had some company. Takers? Mexico? Donations? Good times for all.