Southwest Studies: I went on the food and culture trip to Santa Fe with ten other students and it was really fun, even better than I expected!
Monday-
* drove to Santa Fe- It is such a pretty drive!! Our campus is right on the edge of the mountains and forest, and as you drive West it just gets better and better.
* Once we got there we visited two international markets, Target, and Starbucks (STARBUCKS!!!!! It was really exciting).
*We made fajitas for dinner (yummm)
Tuesday-
* first stop: Farmer's Market- really cool, there were some seriously delicious foods and A and I met this really sweet woman from the UK who gave us a jar of organic lavender honey that was wonderful.
* Drove to Albuquerque to visit Talin, another international market. it. was. HUGE. I even found some Russian treats :)
* lunch at a Mediterranean restaurant- boy have I missed hummus!
* drove back
* dinner- Caribbean Macaroni Pie- yummmm
Wednesday-
* Morning shopping trip and more Starbucks (!!!!)
* Lunch- Senegalese dish with rice, fish, and vegetables- really good, and I don't even like fish, so that's saying something
* Two more international markets
* Protest at the Roundhouse (the Capitol) for shutting down the San Juan plant here in NM. It's a big energy plant which uses coal and lets out a TON of emissions which are not only bad for the environment but also for the local people. It was really cool, I've never been to anything like that. We also got to see a lot of the second years and some other first years and it was really exciting. I hadn't realized how close we'd all gotten in one month and how weird it was to not see people for just two days. I don't know what we're going to do over Christmas...
* Movie night!
Thursday-
* Morning of Service at the Food Bank- it was fun and we were very productive!
* Senegalese lunch- another rice dish with vegetables and shrimp, but different from the first- also really good
* shopping!!! (we went a little crazy... but hey, it's our only chance to shop this semester!)
* Dinner- Indonesian fried rice and apple cobbler- yummm
Friday-
* Cleaned up the house we rented
* A's birthday- I baked her brownies :)
* some more shopping at the outlet mall. two words- NIKE OUTLET.
* lunch at an Indian restaurant
* drove back
So basically we did a lot of cooking, eating, and shopping, but I think we all learned a lot about each other's foods and a little about New Mexican culture. It was good!
Oscar Olivera is a Bolivian activist working for the de-privitization of water in Bolivia. He visited out school last week and spoke about his experience. Basically, the government sold the water companies to private groups, who pushed the prices to extremes- as far as 1/5 of a family's income goes to water costs! It's crazy (they even made collecting rain water illegal) and has caused a lot of health problems and deaths in the country. Olivera and his organization have been fighting this for years and, though it's been a long and hard fight, they have made some progress and hope for more just conditions in the future. He also spoke completely in Spanish and I was excited because I actually understood almost all of it!
Family! My mother and little sister had the opportunity to come out and visit me here at school and it was soooo great to see them! I stayed the night with them once and filled them in on a lot of funny stories and crazy personalities that we have here at school and they were happy to meet a lot of my friends and teachers throughout their stay. They also brought me some Russian food from home and honestly, I never appreciated home food as much as when I didn't have it anymore. It. Was. Wonderful.
I gave them a tour and they loved the campus and surrounding area- it really is beautiful, I invite all of you to come visit! It ended up
Sunday we drove back to Santa Fe for church. Sash and I had gone there before with my godparents and we were very, very warmly received by the community- it was incredible and I realized it was another experience I missed from home. Just walking into the building and smelling the incense nearly stopped me in my tracks. And the people were so nice; they've offered to set up a system to pick up me and the other two Orthodox students on campus once in a while. It was great!
Unfortunately, I had to say
Buddy Dance- This is UWC-USA tradition and its a little crazy, but really fun! Basically second years pick a first year (boys pick girls and vice versa) who they don't really know and get to know them! The process involves submitting to two second year planners a list of 5 first years, then you're assigned one of those. BUT the first years don't know who their buddy is until the night of, and half the fun is sending/receiving hints/presents/"assignments" to/from your buddy. For example, the week before Buddy Dance I received a spongebob party hat in my mailbox and had to wear it to dinner one night, take a picture with it and some kool-aid i got, and I got several emails and some chocolate. So the whole week everyone's going crazy wondering who their buddy is and then... the night finally arrives! Most of the second years sent their first years on scavenger hunts around the campus to find clues about where to meet our second years (this was NOT fun in the dark in high heels). My buddy (E, and several of his friends) decorated a room in the castle and made us all dinner (which was really rather impressive for teenage boys) and we played games and hung out before going to the dance. It was really fun and definitely a great way of getting to know people you may otherwise never have talked to!
The Council- Every year the entire UWC International Council and all of the UWC Heads get together in a big meeting. They alternate locations and this year its USA's turn! Since Tuesday, guests have been arriving and it has been really fun. While they're pretty busy throughout the day, the council members have meals with us and sit and talk and are really interested in this college as well as us as individuals. I've met one woman who's British and went to Atlantic College but lives in Spain, the Headmaster of Costa Rica and his family, and the Executive Director of UWC International (he sat next to me at dinner and I didn't even know who he was until afterwards!) as well as many others in passing. They all have great stories and experiences to share and its fun, as always, to share our school with others :)
So it really has been a very busy couple of weeks (this week is midterms too :P) but now you know what's been going on. Hope all of you are well!
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