Orientation Weekend

I’m finally moved into my host family’s home. It is huge. My host parents have three sons living at home and are currently hosting three American students (including myself), and this is not a full house for them. In fact, I have two twin beds in my room, and I don’t even have to share. I also have a deck (with a terrible view, admittedly), and a wall of closet space that I couldn’t fill even if I had more than 49.6 pounds of clothes (according to the airport – barely made it!), and an extra light switch above the bed, and wireless internet. I win.


These are much better conditions than the place I was living this weekend. All of the BCA students were split into groups of four and given bungalows right down the street from the language school, which are maybe a minute’s walk closer than my host family’s home is to the school. They were cute and fun, but more run-down – more similar to what I was expecting to experience the whole semester.

There are 20 of us BCA students; 16 females and 4 males. It’s the biggest group that Rob, the program director, has ever had. One reason for the large number is that Messiah College didn’t allow students to go to Ecuador this semester because it was decided to be too dangerous. Sorry, Victoria. I wouldn’t change your plans until Greg gets stabbed or something, though.
Orientation consisted of discussions about how dangerous Mexico is and how we should be very wary of making friends with Mexican males and the best self-defense moves if one of us happens to find ourselves in a formidable situation like making eye contact with someone of the opposite sex. We also have spent a lot of time walking around Cuernavaca. It is a gorgeous city. I can make it easily to the downtown area, but there the twisty streets lose me. There are a lot of brightly-colored buildings and plants. And the weather is fantastic. Cuernavaca is aptly called the City of the Eternal Spring.