Adventures with Mexican Plans

So one of our students, Adamary, has been super excited to invite us over. She said that her dad was going to buy us some obsidian necklaces. There is a ton of cheap obsidian stuff in Tulancingo, which is like 20 minutes from Pachuca. And that was super nice of them to take us! So we left school to go with them for what we thought would just be buying obsidian necklaces. Nope. It turned into a six hour adventure, which was super awesome, but it would have been nice to know what we were doing so we could be prepared. Making plans with Mexicans is always extremely interesting. If we make real plans with parents, then they usually don't happen, but if they just say, "Hey, I want to invite you over." Then it always turns into an elaborate adventure. If I've learned anything here, it's to always be prepared. Have good shoes-chacos work for everything, water, and snacks just in case!

So we started off going to an old aqueduct. It was huge, and the super cool thing is that it's kind of like 4 corners. Because it has the borders of 3 states in the area. So I got a cool picture of myself in two places at once: The states of Hidalgo and Puebla. The other teacher took the pictures of us, so who knows when I will actually get them.

Funny story: while we were chillin on the aqueduct after walking around for a while, Adamary and her dad were telling us about a place we could see in the distant mountains. And they were trying to tell us what animals were there, but Adamary didn't know the English word for it. So she was describing it. I asked, "Owl?" She just looked at me questioningly. So I said, "Hoo, hoo," like owls say. And she said, "Yes! That one!" Then the other girls broke out laughing, but hey, it got the point across! That's how we communicate her in Mexico.

The Queen of Corn etched into a rock near the pyramid.

Then we went to a place pretty much in the middle of nowhere, After driving on some sketchy dirt roads and hiking up the mountains some more we came across some ruins. More pyramids. They must be all over Mexico in random places. I've definitely had my fill of rocks in the shape of pyramids, but these were pretty cool because it was the middle of nowhere, we were the only ones there, and the pyramids were kind of grown over and blended into the landscape of the mountains. It looked more natural. They are the pyramids of Xihuingo and in Tepeapulco. And there was this super cute puppy there that followed us around while we walked around. It was a ragged little thing, but still super cute. I wanted to take it home!

After looking at ruins, we finally went to look at obsidian necklaces! The thing we knew about finally happened after 4 hours. I picked out a quartz crystal necklace. I like it a lot. As if buying us all necklaces wasn't nice enough, then they took us out for chalupas and oreo pie. The food definitely was worth it. I love Mexican food. I will definitely miss it, but I'm excited to eat American food again too.

Happy Birthday Dad!