Carnaval in Barranquilla, considered to be one of the biggest in the world, has come and gone and I can no longer tell students at my schools that my saturday community English classes will start "despues de Carnaval". I taught my first week of classes this past week and they were carried out with varying levels of success. For now, I'm only teaching 6th grade and it is the first time that they have had English lessons so "novice" would be a generous way to describe their proficiency level. Pair this with a class size of 40+ students with little to no discipline and you get a very nervous and tired Carla with no voice. Things can only go up from here, I suppose.
Carnaval was incredible and I'm sad it's over. Excited, because things will actually start happening at my school instead of everyone putting things off until after the festivities (I too, fell victim to this, it's pointless not to play along). For example, teachers are now required to have a curriculum for their classes! What they were doing in class for the past month is beyond me. I'll have to devote an entire post to the wondrous Colombian public schools when I figure them out. I was really happy to be back in Barranquilla to spend time with my former host family and enjoy the festivities. I miss my big crazy host family in Barranquilla and I think that I'll always consider them my family in Colombia. I, of course, say this after only a month of living with a new family in Santa Marta but still. A definite highlight of Carnaval was that we got free front row tickets to the Marc Anthony concert. In a sheer testament to good karma, 3 other PCVs and I found ourselves in the right place (a grocery store, buying boxed wine and litre bottles of water) at the right time. Definitely a highlight of the weekend. The rest of the weekend was filled with music, street parties, parades, feathers, foam, corn starch, and aguardiente. My goal for next year is to be IN the main parade. I'll keep you posted.
I'll sum up the rest of the past few months in a list of random observations and opinions about Colombia and Santa Marta thus far.
1. I discover a new fruit almost every week. It promptly becomes my new food obsession until I either get sick from eating 5 fruits in one sitting or I find another one. My current fix: Zapote (a.k.a. mamey)
2. Showers are cold here and I love them. Nothing beats hopping in a cold shower after sweating profusely all day.
3. It's hard to make Colombian friends. Everything revolves around family so people don't seem to have many "friends" outside of siblings and cousins. I have, however, met a few gringo friends who also live in Santa Marta.
4. I am going to become very patient here. I guess this is a good thing. It's been a painful process though. I'm yet to go to the grocery store and get through the line (be it 8 people long, or 1) in less than half and hour. No one here is ever in a rush or on time, which I'm sure isn't news if you've ever visited a developing country.
5. It hasn't rained once since I've been in Santa Marta…WHHAATT?!
6. I have A LOT of free time. I hope that in the future this free time will fill up with various secondary projects that I develop for my community...
7. In the meantime, I go to the BEACH. There are lots of beaches to choose from in the area and I've tried to take advantage of their proximity by taking dips in the cold water at least once a week.
8. While very unique and creative (as so many phrases and vocabulary in Spanish are), I do not like Costeño Spanish. The Spanish on the coast is very fast and hard to understand and littered with jargon that makes people sound uneducated. It's good to know what the words mean but I have no interest in using them myself.
9. I love looking Colombian. I never get a second glance on the street and people generally don't try to mess with me in terms of prices for cabs or fruit on the street. WIN.
10. I was never huge peanut butter fan before but there's nothing like being away from America to spark and full blown obsession. It's expensive here and definitely one of my biggest splurges. But so worth it.
