Since I had to go to Casa del Sol on Monday, my first English lesson with Pamela was on Wednesday afternoon from 4-5. After classes in the morning, I came home and ate lunch before walking to the bus stop to take the first bus en route to the grandmother’s house. At this point, I can either walk four long blocks to the street of the house, or I can take a bus. Since it was a beautiful, sunny day and I was early, I decided to walk. I still arrived a couple of minutes early, but Pamela and I got started right away. We just talked for the first 10-15 minutes, exchanging and translating ideas from Spanish to English. Then, she had an English workbook from school, so we did a few pages from the book, before I made a memory-type game with compound words. I don’t now what exactly I need to be focusing on with her, but I am sure that any chance that she has to improve and use English, it is beneficial. In future lessons, I will try to come with a theme of the day and some sort of game to play or song to sing, in addition to working on pages from her workbook. I left around 5, and told her that I would see her the following Monday. I knew that this weekend with the excursion and homework, I would want some free time on Sunday, and did not necessarily want to commit to spending the day with the family again. So, maybe we will do something next weekend over the long holiday weekend.
After the lesson with Pamela, I was in a bit of a hurry, since I had my first cuisine class at 6, and we had to be at the school at 5:45. So, I took the bus for the four long blocks, and then waited for the next bus that would take me back to the stop near my house. On the way back, the bus stalled out, so we had to wait for another bus to come up behind us and everyone hustled onto the alternative bus. This seems to be a common occurrence with the busses in Puebla. I quickly made the 15-20 minute walk to the Ibero from the bus stop. Thankfully, I got there with a little time to spare, and I was not the last one there. A few minutes later, Chef Maricielo Arellano picked us up in a van and we went to her large kitchen/catering area. It is about a 10-minute car ride from campus, but it is nice that we will be allowed to use her facilities. She is apparently a famous caterer in the Puebla area and you can often see her face on vans or billboards advertising the company. So, it should be great working with her. This first night we talked a little bit about Prehispanic utensils, many of which we still use today, and had the opportunity to use that evening. That night we made panuchos, which are typical of the Yucatan area of Mexico, tostados, and salsa roja. We all split up the duties and cooking, and Kendra and I were in charge of making the salsa. Although this sounds quite simply, it was actually quite a process that included frying/grilling the onions, chilies, cilantro, and tomatoes, slicing all into extremely small pieces, using an ancient bowl and stone to smash the salsa more so, and finally adding some final ingredients and stirring. After we were all done with our individual tasks, we had a delicious looking meal in front of us! Everything was very good, and I am definitely looking forward to future courses this fall.
No comments:
Post a Comment