Nothing has really happened here. School. Homework. Being sick. The usual.
I ate elote (pronounce ay-loh-tay) last night. I will never be able to eat normal corn on the cob again. It is corn on the cob, with a stick in it, slathered in mayo (which has lime in it), Parmesan cheese, and chili powder. Sounds and looks disgusting, possibly one of the most delicious things I have ever eaten.
Happy election day 2010!
Elections are today. Up until last week school closures had been for a day or two and nothing more. This was supposed to be the last week of school...to go onto the next grade you need to receive some papers. Well the teachers decided to use their power to get the vote to swing their way and put into effect a closure that would last for an undetermined amount of time. As in, school is not officially done until they say, and people cannot move onto the next grade until they decide to let schools open again to get their papers. Not a huge deal for kids staying within the same school or going from one government school to another...but apparently going from a public primary school to a private secondary school is very popular and due to the circumstances right now, very difficult. Thankfully the teachers have FINALLY left the Zocalo because they were starting to smell--garbage everywhere and many, many unbathed people.
Campaigning for elections must end five days before elections. You better believe that they were out campaigning like no other on Tuesday. The candidates even have to completely take down their web pages during this time period! Basically you need to make a decision by this time or you will not be able to find any information on the candidates to be able to do any research during this time.
The city has been DEAD the last two days. As you may know, laws in Mexico really don't exist. Blowing a red light is the norm. You cross a street wherever you want. Drinking on the streets is actually legal here. But the one law that these crazy people decide to enforce and abide by is the Ley de seca for 48 hours before elections. As in after 11:59 pm Friday, alcohol is not to be sold ANYWHERE (including restaurants, bars, clubs) until Monday morning. Great 4th of July weekend, eh? We were in the Plaza de Santo Domingo last night around 9 pm and everything was closing. A very odd sight in the area as most places usually stay open until 4 am or so, especially on a Saturday night.
We are more or less on "lock-down" in our homes today as our director doesn't know what the situation will be like in the city. She took the advice of one of the senora's and said we can go a few blocks, but to generally stay in our homes. We've left all of our homework for today. I think at some point I'll have to leave to get a soda and some snacks (because honestly, doing homework and not munching on food is impossible) but other than that I think I will be sitting in this chair in front of the computer all day. I'm quite positive that actually doing my homework won't happen (there is no motivation to do homework for a class whose grade does not matter and I do not need the credit for) and therefore I will probably end up finding new and exciting facebook games (hello, Frontierville), reading Harry Potter y la camara secreta (or one of the 3 other novels I bought in Spanish yesterday), screwing around on StumbleUpon (addicting if you haven't discovered it yet, especially when looking at the food/cooking sites... anyone interested in letting me experiment for them when I return home will possibly receive a delish meal), and sleeping. I would add a depressing job search to that, but after my bad few days I think I will avoid adding more bad to my life.
If the PRI candidate wins (the candidate that the teachers do NOT want and who is basically the chosen successor of the current, corrupt governor) things could turn very ugly in the city. In 2006, during the last elections, things turned very violent...and stayed violent for 8 months (this includes all government public schools being closed for the entire time period). My senora said that the two girls she had staying here then were taken by the U.S. Consulate and forced back to the U.S. Let's hope it doesn't come to that. We currently still have school tomorrow but we've been told that if we encounter large groups of people on our way we should turn around and not worry about going. A part of me hopes that I run into something (can you tell how completely done with school I am?).
2 weeks from now and I will be sitting at the tiny Oaxaca airport, waiting to head back to the land of beer, squeaky cheese, and brats (mmmm brats).
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