HOORAY!

No fever, no cough, no symptoms whatsoever of having the flu and dengue this past week, I'm off to Los Angeles for the weekend and Oaxaca for the week!

One of my friends from college, Michelle, is getting married this weekend in Malibu. I'm so excited to be reunited with good friends and be with Michelle on her special day. Don't worry, mom and dad. I will abstain from drinking alcohol putting myself at risk of getting a relapse.

BON VOYAGE!!

Influenza

Pulling up to the next hospital is a different story all on its own. I asked the security guard how to get to the emergency area for adults. He quickly picked up my accent and commented I'm not from here. He asked if I had the flu, I nodded, and he pointed me in the right direction. After turning the final corner, I stood dead in my tracks. Looking into an open outdoor space of about 100 people coughing, wearing masks, bloodshot eyes and crying babies, I felt like I was in a movie. I had no idea how much of an issue the flu and Dengue was in Guadalajara. I was suddenly thankful of the horrid mask I too had to wear. Who knew what all of these people were sick with standing around me. All I knew was I wanted to get in the office, get my medicine, and get out FAST.

I pushed my way through the crowd with numerous, "Disculpe," and "Perdon," until I finally got to the main room. There was a small table with two 20-something y/o "nurses" or "helpers" sitting at the table and giving out numbers (currently at 110 for adults and 46 for pediatrics). I waited in a line of three people for about 20 minutes before it was finally my turn. I took a seat at the table, asked if they spoke English (which of course they did not), handed them my lab results and doctor's note, then waited... and waited... and waited. About 30 minutes later of sitting in the same chair directly in front of them, while they tended to other patients, I finally asked the male if there was something I needed to do. Or what the next step would be. He told me he needed to fill out a form with my information and diagnostics. OK...

Granted, I let it slide for about 1 hour of just sitting in the chair. Looking around me and listening to the people coming up to the table, I convinced myself there were people who were in much more dire need of help than I was. A mother was cradling her 6 month old wailing baby with a huge mask over her face. Another mother carried her 10 year old child through the waiting room asking for help. Who was I to take away help from these people?

One hour later I looked at the female "nurse" and asked if I was waiting to be helped or if I needed to take a number. She told me I did not need a number and that there is a lot going on. Thirty minutes later, I felt tears begin to stroll down my cheek. Again, this was a very emotional day for me. I was sick, I was fighting to understand medical jargon and explain my condition to others, stuck in a room with sick people (not good for a hypochondriac like myself), and all I wanted was to get my medicine and get OUT!!!

Luckily, the tears worked. The nurse took my file and began to ask my for data. With relief, I gave all my info and they took my temperature. I knew it was bad when the nurse read the thermometer, looked at me with her eyes almost popping out of her head. I wanted to say, "That's right! I'm sick! And you have been making me sit here for over an hour!!" Instead, I sat like a lady and gave a concerned look (I had a temp of 40 C which is about 104 F). She turned to her colleague and whispered something in his ear. They both then tried to act out taking a pill and rubbed their stomachs. I probably should've told them I do actually understand Spanish, but the charades things was kinda humorous. I told them I had not taken anything up until this point because I was there specifically to get medicine. They handed me two pills and told me to take them immediately. The nurse told me the doctor would be with me in a minute (yeah right).

Next issue at hand would be taking these two pills. I knew it would help bring down my fever. The dilemma was that I have a really big problem with swallowing pills. It takes me about ten minutes to force even one down. I excused myself to the bathroom, which was located in the main building about 200 yds away), and took the pills in a bathroom stall. Upon return to the infected area, I bypassed the crowd, went straight to the office again and sat on the floor. I was EXHAUSTED. All I wanted was to go to sleep and I was trying to fight my fever which was hard to do in an unairconditioned room filled with other ill individuals. I decided to pull the really sick card again. I stood up, leaned against the wall, and started to fall asleep.

The male "helper" looked at me, took my form, walked into the doctors office and placed it directly on her desk. SUCCESS!! Finally, after an hour and a half I would be next up! Of course they were out of the medicine the other doctor requested. After a quick 10 minute check up, the new doctor signed a form, handed me a pack of meds, told me I am not allowed to leave my apartment for five days since I'm contagious and sent me on my merry way.

Today is day four of my apartment "quarantine". The whole thing ended up being for the best since I'm not allowed to leave my apartment and all I do is rest. The last four days have consisted of me being in and out of consciousness with a few movies in between. Tomorrow is my last and final day of having to be kept inside and forgetting what fresh air or the sun feels like.

And today... well today is the first day where I actually almost feel normal again. I hardly have a cough, I'm not as exhausted and I have a lot more energy.

Spotted Mosquitoes

After turning the final corner, I stood dead in my tracks. Looking into an open outdoor space of about 100 people coughing, wearing masks, bloodshot eyes and crying babies, I felt like I was in a movie. I had no idea how much of an issue the flu and Dengue were in Guadalajara. I was suddenly thankful of the horrid mask I too had to wear. Who knew what all of these people were sick with standing around me. All I knew was I wanted to get in the office, get my medicine, and get out FAST.

Rewind...
Wednesday morning: I woke up to a weird ache on my lower back. After close examination in the mirror and with the help of two friends, we decided it was either a rash or a bite. The rash was raised, swollen and red, yet I had absolutely no idea where it came from. It was so big and painful there was no way I could simply forget bumping into something, being burned by a candle, or drunkenly injuring myself without knowing. All options were out of the question. This odd rash simply "appeared." I let it be and boggled my brain the next two days about where it could have possibly come from...

Thursday: I began to develop a cough and my muscles began to feel sore. I didn't think this was too out of the ordinary due to my weak immune system and the fact of about 50% of my class being sick with something.

Friday: Went to school utterly exhausted. I thought this was because I went out three nights in a row with friends. Although, I did not drink too much any of the nights so maybe it was just exhaustion. I began to think... Wow, turning 26 does feel a lot different. My poor body can't take it anymore. On the walk home from school, I explained to Gabi how every muscle in my body ached. How my eyes seemed like they were burning and had an ache all on its own. I got home at 11:30 a.m. and slept until 4:30 p.m. After waking up to eat something and find out what my friends were doing, I crawled back into bed around 7 p.m. and did not wake up until the next morning at about 9:30 a.m.!!

Saturday: Sick, sick, and more sick. I decided I should probably go to the doctor to get checked out for Dengue Fever (a fever people get from mosquitoes carrying the illness which causes aches, burning eyes, exhaustion, lack of hunger, etc.). My good ol roommie accompanied me to the emergency room where they proceeded to do a blood test and cotton swab swipe of my nose. We were informed to come back in at least 2 hours for the lab results. Of course on the way home, the hospital called and said they needed another test since the cotton swab test had too much mucus on it! So, three rounds and back at the hospital, I waived my doctor down, who looked at me and said, "I have bad news... come here."

WHOA WHOA WHOA!! First off, you do not tell a sick patient, "I have bad news." Do you know how many crazy things went through my head? I thought they were going to say I have cancer or something!

Diagnostics showed I apparently have Dengue Fever and the Flu. Right now there are six types of different flus floating around in the Zapopan area alone. The nasty rash I noticed Wednesday morning, however, was the mosquito bite of a Dengue Fever carrier. So of course, I of all people get two different types of illnesses, both attributed with fevers, at the same time!

The first sign of Dengue is an odd rash on lower extremities (check). Next up are symptoms which include dry cough, headaches, pain in the eyes, exhaustion, lack of hunger, and body aches (check, check, check, check, check, and check). During my chat with the doctor, after joking around about being the "special patient" with not one but two flues, I let out a few coughs. All of the doctors gave my doctor "the look." She came back to me with a surgical mask in hand, looked me dead in the eyes and said, "I'm sorry. Please don't hate me, but you have to wear this for the next five days." ACK!! Of course I started crying (there was a lot of emotion going on during the day. I think it was from being exhausted, feverish and sick). After filling out a bunch of forms and getting some medicine, my doctor told me I would now have to go to another hospital to get some type of a transfusion/medicine. Who knows, a lot gets lost in translation.

My doctor escorted me outside and asked a valet guy to give me a hand so the taxi driver would not up the charge for being a foreigner. The gimmick ended up being him telling the driver I just had surgery and couldn't talk. This way he would never know I was from the States! The drive ended up being a lot of gestures, nods and shakes. Interesting...

The next hospital visit is a story all on it's own.

Another One Bites the Dust - Monica and Spike

Yes, I'm at that age where it seems like everyone around me is getting engaged/married. A HUGE CONGRATS to Monica and Matt who are recently engaged within the past 24 hours!!


So happy for the two of you and wishing you the best of luck!

p.s. it was actually Spike's idea to incorporate a top 10 list every week into my blog. Too bad I've slowly nodded off on all the updates.

I'm in LOVE...

With my new school!!! Long story short, my group had to change schools since our previous one already had an English teacher and we are required to teach one hour of English every week. So this morning while we were at school at the university everyone was pretty nervous we were going to have the same situation where the teachers questioned why we were there, complained they didn't have time for us, and didn't want to help us.

This new school is also two bus rides away except for it seems a lot closer than the last one. It's still located in my Zapopan "hood" and probably takes 45 minutes max. We arrived a bit early so we grabbed a few tacos and strawberry cheesecake at two places across the street from the school. Shortly after we arrived at the school, the principal came up to us and welcomed each and every one of us. Then we were each taken to our new classrooms which we will be in through December.

Luckily, I'm still in my favorite grade (second) and I only have 34 kids which is more than a 10 person difference than my previous 46! The teacher carried on with her lesson and absolutely blew me away. Here was a teacher which took one comment from one of her students about having 6 dogs and 2 cats and turns it around into a full out math situation for 2 hrs! She had control of the class, the children were respectful, they didn't run up to the teacher and interrupt her nor did they ask to go to the restroom every 5 minutes.

Half way through I began to think it was too good to be true. When were the kids going to get so bored they would start playing loudly, scream or stand on their desks? When was the teacher going to stop teaching and gossip about her kids in front of them about the multiple learning disabilities and personal lives? When was the teacher going to tell me that I'm wasting my time and should go home?

Never - Such a sigh of relief. When the school bell rang, I walked out smiling, hugging and my hands were shaking out of shock and complete happiness. Then the principal approached me in the play area and asked me to come with her to her office. I began to think, ut oh, what did I do wrong? Then, I walked in and she handed me a little box with flan! Although this school still lacks some resources, they are 110% change in the positive realm. So happy to be there and can't wait for the next 3.5 months.

Next week I am teaching Art, PE, English and Math each for one hour. My first actual lessons in front of the classroom, all of which are going to be in Spanish. I also volunteered yesterday to take on an additional class to teach one hour of English each week. So instead of having to only teach my second graders, I will now also be teaching a third grade class how to speak English. Super nervous and still creating the lesson plans. Hopefully it'll all go over smoothly.

Side note: When I first sat down in my class, I heard a whistle, looked over from where it was coming from and realized it was towards me. About 10 minutes later, the same little seven year old boy walked over and gave me candy with a wink. The rest of the class time he spent either staring at me or at my legs. They definitely start the whole flirting and wooing thing early down here!

Guanajuato

Hello there beautiful town of different colorful buildings and cobblestone streets. Located about 3.5 hours away on a bus from Guadalajara, I made the trek to Guanajuato with six friends in my program two weeks ago to this quaint little town.

Isolated between a few "mountains" or hills, lays the town of Guanajuato. When we first arrived, we wandered around trying to find a place which would be able to accommodate such a large group for the weekend. We ended staying right near al centro at the Hostal Companero which had a dorm room with six bunk beds. Short one bed, Alex volunteered to sleep on the floor because he's "done it so many times and had worse." Alrighty, we all got settled in and then headed out to wander around the city and grab a bite to eat.

We ended up chowing down at a restaurant called Van Gough, only about a 5-10 minute walk away from our hostal located right in the main square. Mariachi bands circled the restaurants and played occasionally as we ate some of the local foods. After our delicious meal, we wandered around town to have a greater understanding of our surroundings. Exhausted from a long day, we went back to our hostal early and called it a night.

Saturday... a full jam packed Saturday. First we ate breakfast at a cute little place called Calipso. The food was decent and more Americanized. Then we were off to tour the city and see all it offered.


First off... the University. On the way to one of the museums, we stumbled across the local University. Knowing that our program was considering taking place in Guanajuato, we all looked up the huge stairs leading up to the main entrance in awe. After taking a mental picture, we then kept going to the house where artist Diego Rivera was born. The house included original furniture and collections of art amongst one of the three or four stories of multiple houses converted into one.

From here, we made our way to find Callejon del Beso. The story goes that two star crossed young lovers (think Romeo & Juliet) met their fatal end in the little alleyway. Legend has it that you must kiss your loved one on the third step or receive bad luck/fatal end to your love affair. After a quick pic with the girls, we trekked across town and uphill to check out the mummies. They are naturally mummified due to the soil content, temperature and humidity (I think). Some of it was creepy and other parts were cool. Just take it for what it is and I think it's enjoyable.


Afterwards, we ate and got ready for the night. Since it was one of our member's bday, Alex, we all attended a free modern dance and folklorico show put on by these girls we met at breakfast from NY. The performance was pretty impressive - displaying mainly the two types of dancing.

On Sunday, we ate brunch and took the funicular up to El Pipila before making our way back to GDL. Talk about a panoramic view: