San Cristobal

We left for Chiapas yesterday morning at 7:00 am. We finally got to our hotel at 10:45 pm. It was a day filled with bus rides... 3 different busses, a total of 11.5 hours on the bus, with 2 "layovers". We're going to be in Chiapas (a different state) for a week, exploring this part of Mexico, which is much greener than Oaxaca. The city we're in right now, San Cristobal, is pretty high in altitude, which means COLDNESS. Which we really weren't expecting, even though our teachers and parents warned us about it. At night we actually NEED to use the blankets, and I wore sweatpants to bed yesterday, which was extremely weird. Also, it rains here. Every day around 3:00 pm. Today I was in my room when it happened, just sitting, when suddenly I heard it... Raindrops. RAINDROPS. It was RAINING. I'm sorry, I know that to most people who read this will be like, "You are dumb Ashley. Rain is nothing special." But honestly I hadn't heard rain in almost 3 months. It was like a little piece of home had come to me, and it made me extremely happy.

But anyways, after our excursion to an indigenous town today (where many of us spent our pesos on beautifully woven… indigenous… things) we came back and had a nap… okay I actually didn’t nap, I talked to Tyler for awhile and then tried to read some articles, because even though it’s a SATURDAY, we still had class. Dumb. Then Abby, my roomie for this trip, and I decided we wanted dinner early (which is normal time for people in the US- 6:00), and asked around if anyone wanted to come with us. They all said it was too early. OH WELL! So we went out and got some food at this cute little restaurant and then decided to go find a movie to buy, as they sell movies here for EXTREMELY CHEAP (10 pesos= less than $1), which turned out to be an adventure in itself. We walked around and followed the directions of our waiter from the restaurant gave us, and saw San Cristobal as the sun was setting… absolutely beautiful. There are colonial buildings everywhere painted bright colors and filled with all kinds of shops. We walked past the main plaza and saw gorgeous churches, as always. I still have a fascination with the churches, even though I’ve seen so many churches here, more than I’ve probably seen in my entire life, and even though I’m not really religious. Every single one is different and absolutely beautiful.

But anyways, so Abby and I finally found a market, and after walking around being distracted by pretty things, but not finding movies ANYWHERE, we finally had to ask someone. "Where are the movies?" “The market! They’re at the market, keep walking straight.” Umm, okay… as if THIS isn’t a market? So we head off in the direction of the RIGHT market, and finally find our treasure… in fact, they were selling 3-in-1 movies for 15 pesos… So I bought the one with Pearl Harbor, Poseidon, and Titanic. I have yet to discover if they’re in Spanish or English. Abby, of course, being the grown-up child that she is and teacher-in-training bought Finding Nemo and Sharks, and some other under-the-sea movies. Love that girl. So we were extremely happy with ourselves as we began to head back to our hotel, when we stopped by the fake market again and spent several minutes looking at presents for our dads. After amusing ourselves there for a while, we continued our walk through a Mexican town in the dark and the rain (SO WEIRD), completely and absolutely content with our lives, holding Spanish movies in one hand and our present in the other. We made it back to our hotel, and now we’re gonna get in our beds (queen sized!) and watch one of our movies. Queeeee perfecto :)