In Mexico At Last!

Hola mis amigos! Finally, I get to write about the good stuff, for I am finally officially on my exchange! I am writing this on the third night of my exchange. I've been so busy I haven't even been able to post my first night experiences! I left Calgary, Canada August 10th at 11:00 am, and arrived in Puerto Vallarta around 3:30. The perks of being on the same continent is that 1) the flight is super painless, and 2) there is no jet lag whatsoever. Anyways, I sort of awkwardly stumbled out of the airport (it's quite difficult hauling a bloated backpack, and two heavy suitcases through an airport by yourself, who knew), and immediately noticed two things. 1) The dreaded heat and humidity, and 2) my first host family! They were holding up this fantastic banner, and immediately after approaching them I was enfolded in a whirlwind of hugs and kisses. Somewhere along the way my bags were taken off, roses were handed to me, and an enormous sombrero ended up on my head. Promptly thereafter around 20 photos were taken of me and various members of the family.

My host family meeting me at the airport with a gigantic banner! Left to Right- Hector, Hiram, Hector (my host dad) , Eliu, Rubi, and then Sandy (my host mum)!

We established that I could actually carry on a conversation in Spanish, and understand as long as they enunciated every word. They were pretty surprised at the level of Spanish, actually, I guess it is not very common for exchange students to speak Spanish at the start. (I actually cannot express how happy I am that I had a tutor for two months before I left. It has made life so much easier already. Despite Spanish being very similar to English and therefore fairly easy to learn, knowing a decent vocabulary right from the start makes deciphering the rapid fire conversations they have here much easier.) We went to dinner in this restaurant by a marina, and I was generally confused with what was happening. It was all good, but my host dad said something about a drink I didn't quite understand. Being an exchange student, I was all Si, Si! and so I ended up with some delicious drink I still don't know the name of. The same happened with the food. I didn't know what anything was, so I tried to explain I was potentially the least picky eater you could get, and that I just wanted food. And once again, I received a random assortment of food containing what I believe was shrimp and kalamari. Not too sure, but it was delicious. Not bad for a first meal! I also had some good conversations with Rubi, and Hector, my host sister and oldest host brother. The entire family was really nice, very patient with me, and super excited to show me things.

A flustered Wendy and a yummy assortment of food

Following that, we walked along the boardwalk of Puerto Vallarta. It was super cool, they kept pointing out club after club, along with traditional street vendors. There was even some impressive sand sculptures! It was really amazing to have everything explained to me, I was overwhelmed enough without also having to figure out was everything was! Everywhere we walked, people were staring at me a little bit, and trying to sell me assorted goods. I even got offered a tattoo from this random man sitting on the wall with all his equipment. Not even remotely sketchy! I was also mildly disconcerted by the fact that you have to pay to go to the bathroom here, and they don't supply toilet paper. I never thought I was taking public washrooms for granted in Canada! It ended up being around 11:00 by the time we ended up in Starbucks, where I finally messaged my family and let them know I had arrived safely (oops, sorry parents). 11:30, we began the drive back to Tepic. I got more and more tired as my nervous excitement slowly drained, and finally ended up curled in some terribly uncomfortable semi-fetal upright position on the seat of the van. At one point I woke up and looked out the window only to see a sign that said "Disculpe por las molestias!" In my sleep-addled state I was a bit worried. I wondered why there was a sign on the road saying sorry for the molesting. My host brother explained it meant nuisance. But dunno, I thought it was amusing that the word has a fairly significantly different meaning in each language.

By the time we got home, I was exhausted, and my linguistic abilities had gone to crap. I could nod and say si, but that was about it. I was shown around the house, which is absolutely GORGEOUS, but all I could get really excited about was my bed. Until my host brother leaves for Germany and I can take over his room, I will be staying in my host sister's room. It's super nice of her to give up her room for me, and it's pretty awesome she has her own bathroom! I also (sarcastically) enjoy the excessive amount of Justin Bieber paraphernalia covering the room. I wake up every morning with not one but two enormous Justin Biebers smirking at me. Also, he endorses a singing toothbrush, who knew?
In conclusion, it was an absolutely fantastic first night, and my host family seems downright amazing. Can't wait to get to know them better!

Cheers,

Wendy