Whatcha

"They are going to suspend classes on Friday, the day before Semana Santa. All you have to do is stop by on Friday and sign that you taught your classes" the union rep advised me. I went up to the school around three to sign for the classes that I didn't teach and the school was deserted. For once, I was the late one. The few people that remained were literally running for the parking lot to cars that were packed with wives and kids, ready for the long journey back to the precious pueblos they had left behind years before to head for the job filled metropolis of Tijuana.

En Mexicali ya había tenido oportunidad de echarle un ojo a esa gente. Gente sin vida, es lo que digo. Como cuerpos sin alma, quiero decir.

I was glad they were going home.

I asked Profe Josefina where she was going for vacation before everyone left. "We're staying here. My husband's family is coming up from San Luis Potosi. We didn't have enough room for all of them in the house, so my husband built an extra room off of the side".

Alec and I drove south, fighting over who had control over the stereo. We spent our first night in Ensenada. I love cable TV. For some reason I have ended up watching one boxing movie or another on more than one of my stays in Ensenada. This time, Raging Bull. "You didn't knock me down...you didn't knock me down..." Robert DeNiro hisses at Sugar Ray Robinson, his nose plastered across his face and eyes swelled nearly shut. It's really a sick scene, but I'm not big on being knocked down either.

On we went, toward the fantastic, Dr. Seuss desert that surrounds the small cluster of buildings that make up the town of Cataviña. Oddly shaped cacti and neon yellow desert flowers dotted the mountains. Men sold gas from jugs on the side of the road. My car thought it was a good time to start acting weird and glow some of its danger dashboard lights at me around dusk. It reminded me of the time my sister's car broke down on us in the Petrified Forest in Arizona. I decided to just turn it off and we stayed at a hot pink little hotel with a slouchy mattress and a curtain for a bathroom door. Isn't it funny how places that advertise themselves as "linda" never are?

Though I loved the desert scenery, I felt sorry for Baja California. Even dusty roadside taco stands had menus in Spanish and English, anticipating tourists that used to come and clearly weren't arriving this year. Gun toting soldiers stopped us in the military checkpoints that line the transpeninsular highway and politely waived us through.

The car felt better in the morning and stopped shining those lights at me. For a '97 Mazda, it really seemed to take to those dirt roads. We drove through massive salt fields that made Baja California look like the arctic to arrive at the Laguna Ojo de Liebre. I really wanted to see more whales. From our little boat, gray whales and their whale babies humped their way through the water, blowing a weird orangey smoke out of their, um, blowholes. I really wanted one of them to turn our boat over. I am not really sure why, I didn't want anyone to get hurt and I didn't want to get eaten by a whale, I just wanted to know what it would be like.

We were supposed to turn back there, head north, but we went crazy instead and kept heading south. Actually, southeast, through San Ignacio and on to Santa Rosalia - a French anomaly mining town that looks like the Marigny or Dominica, but in Mexico. And further south, to Mulegé. And then to the crystal clear beaches south of Mulegé with big white faced birds that looked like Dick Cheney.....Some gringolandia developments started popping up. And we saw some of their inhabitants in Mulegé. But they were the other kind. The mysterious kind. Older, with four wheel drive vehicles with plastic gas cans strapped on the back and skin like brown leather. People that knew the whole history of Mexico and referred to their homes in San Felipe. They reminded me of Australians. A little rougher than ordinary Americans, wilder, but people that share our humor and redneck qualities more than our English brethren. I can't say that I entirely approve of the Baja expatriates, whether they live in McMansions in San Felipe or rusted RV settlements in southern Baja, but will say they are a different sort of tourist and generally extraordinarily friendly and helpful.

I realized that Tijuana is perceived as the eyesore of Baja California. When hotel proprietors would ask us where we are from, we would tell them that we are from Atlanta but have been living in Tijuana. "Oh no..." they'd say "you'll like it much better here". Poor TJ. It just can't help itself.

We had to get heading north. We went crazy again and took a detour to Bahía de Los Angeles. I expected another pretty, crystal bay or feared San Felipe, but instead found a more savage place with deep blue water and wild waves. Alec and I started plotting how to get back there and headed north the next day.

Military checkpoint after military checkpoint. The car was searched every time. Thumping on side panels, flashlights in air vents, please open your trunk can I see inside your luggage? All cars going south get the waive through. All cars going north get searched. "Write down your name and the make of your car" the soldier instructed me. I am almost afraid to say it, knock on wood, but the soldiers are actually really polite. I watch them when they search my stuff but have never had anything but honestly, a pleasant experience with them.

We got back to TJ late Thursday night. After washing my clothes, Alec and I went to a park near our house on Friday. It has a little zoo. Tigers, pumas, lynxes. Some really big bears that can stand on their back legs beside a wall that is way too low where we stood and observed them. One time, Alec saw a tiger ride by, being towed from a truck in a little cage, in the middle of traffic in Tijuana. I saw a llama in an intersection in Ensenada, riding through a four way behind bars. "I saw this tiger in a cage" the husband of another exchange teacher told me. "It was right in the middle of traffic. The thing was, the bars just seemed too far apart, like the thing could just swipe at you if you came too close. You know, a kid or something!".

I love Mexico. The park is basically in the middle of a series of giant roads, pollution, madness all around. A lot of the people I work with don't seem content in Tijuana. They want to be home, where they came from. There is violence here, bad violence, drug wars, soldiers, men in ski masks patrolling the streets. The Mexicans chased their kids through the park, bought snacks and laughed. Their capacity for happiness amazes me. It's as if the pollution, noise and grime just vanishes away. I love how they can't eat a bag of chips unless someone pours a quart of hot sauce directly in the bag before serving it to them. That my male students carefully cut out pictures of soccer stars from magazines and glue them to the front of their notebooks. That five gallon jars of hair gel take up a whole aisle in the supermarket.

As I rode the trolley north to San Diego to catch my flight back into Mexico to get to Mazatlan to begin my second week of vacation, I was filled with love for my students. Their faces filled my mind as I sat by a big cholo guy that no one else would sit next to, listening to Tijuana's greatest hits on my ipod. The job thing is a little on my mind. I have options. In that moment, the thing that felt most comfortable, the most natural, was to stay in Tijuana.

I did a plane tour through the southwest United States, changing in Phoenix and on to Sinaloa. I knew we were in Mexican airspace when I started seeing messages to God written on the sides of mountains. "Whatcha!" my cab driver said to another man, before continuing his sentence. You Spanish speakers may be accustomed to "Mira" as a way of saying "Look". Here, and in Sinaloa, "whatcha" does just fine. My super asombrosa family met me in Mazatlan for the rest of my vacation, while Alec returned to work in TJ and the rest of the world avoided Mazatlan because of the state it is in.

More cable! I turned on the TV late in the afternoon and caught CNN español. Sismo? 7.2 in Baja California...epicenter Mexicali...phone in my hand, "Alec, was there a, um, earthquake?". "Yeahhhh," he answered cautiously. "I didn't want to worry you. The floor started shaking and I thought 'shit this is an earthquake' and I got in the doorway. Then I realized in ten more seconds I could be out of the house and I ran outside. The whole street was out there and the road was moving, people laughing hysterically and dogs barking like crazy."

We took the boat to La Paz traveled and west toward Los Cabos. Okay, the Americans did not get the memo down there. BAJA CALIFORNIA IS DANGEROUS. STAY HOME. There may be beautiful beaches there, but BAJA CALIFORNIA IS DANGEROUS AND ALL GRINGOLANDIA EXCEPT ME MUST STAY HOME. Oh well.

I flew back to TJ Friday night. I offered Alec 175 pesos to drive my car to the airport and pick me up and was super surprised when he did it and had to cover my eyes from the passenger's seat while he drove through Tijuana to get us back home. "Keep the bottom lock on the door unlocked" he instructed me. "When the house starts shaking you're gonna want to get out of here".

*Malasuerte en Tijuana, Hilario Peña, READ IT

I speak for the trees

Three more days, two more days...the week before Spring Break is so long. I remember when Alec and I arrived in Tijuana, we were struck by how environmentally unfriendly it is. You can see the smog hanging in the air and feel it in your lungs. "They need to plant some trees, build some parks!" we commented to each other, over and over again. Shopkeepers here will seriously put a toothpick in a plastic bag, as if you couldn't handle it without one. I was surprised to see that Mexico seems to be aware of the situation. My students are taking an ecology class where they learn better environmental practices. I was also assigned an environmental theme for my second unit this semester. As Spring Break got closer, I decided to show my students "The Lorax" by Dr. Seuss. I always loved that video when I was a kid, the screaming mustached Lorax and his crazy town with the day-glow Truffula trees. We ate candy and watched it, the students liked the seventies style songs and the goofy animation.

Under the trees...in our Bar-ba-Loot suits!

I, on the other hand, was getting uncomfortable. The depicted town looked a lot like Tijuana. The Lorax screams about the destruction of trees while the Once-ler buildings factory after factory that belch black smoke into the clear skies of the former Truffula forest. People flock to the new town to get jobs in the factories and their houses eliminate all of the green spaces. I was squirming in my chair. The scene looked like the maquiladoras of Otay. A garbage truck dumps trash directly into a river. Oh no, like that river in the center of town that rarely actually has water and when it does, it is black and polluted. As the Bar-ba-Loots walk in a line out of the town, carrying some of their members because the forest is no longer sustainable, images of the lines of migrants I have seen in the desert in Arizona flashed through my mind. Hopefully I was reading too much into it. It was supposed to be a fun day, not a direct criticism of their town.

So I quit my job. No! Not my job here, my U.S. job. I declined my contract for next year. Yeah, it is a little nerve racking to quit a paying job during millennium style Great Depression II, but I did it anyway. What will you do? Stay in Mexico? Teach in some other school in Atlanta? People want to know! As would I....but I think I will just drive around Baja California for the next couple of weeks in my pre-millennium Mazda while I figure that out.

*The Lorax, Dr. Seuss

Bien nice

I have a car. My car. In Mexico. My parents, being the doll faces that they are, decided to take a drive, in my car, from Atlanta to San Diego. Before you say it, yes, I know that I am spoiled.

As I dropped my parents at the airport and drove down the streets of San Diego, I actually felt like I was at home for the first time. Down the highway I sped south, Spanish oldies on the radio via 102.9. I was a little nervous about crossing in San Ysidro. I don't have a copy of my car's registration and I didn't get stamped out of Mexico again on my work visa, mainly because there does not appear to be an office that does it on the Tijuana side. And, I had a bad experience with the American migra Saturday morning.

Long, slow moving line. I always pick the slowest one and I knew I was going to be late meeting my parents. I watched American morons stepping up to the agents with driver's licenses and birth certificates, which always slows things up. Is it really that hard to get a passport if you are going to cross regularly? They were searching bags at the passport check, instead of at the X-ray machine. Finally, it was my turn. I presented my passport. "What are you bringing back from Mexico?", "I live in Mexico, I'm bringing..." and was interrupted. "Why do you live in Mexico?" the agent demanded. "I am on a Fulbright grant...", "A full what?" he asked, incredulous. "It's a State Department administered grant" I answered. It's weird. I never mention the exchange when the agents question me about my presence in TJ. I feel like I am holding something back and finally decided to just tell them, only to clarify things, to let them know that I am legit. Not to brag, just to clarify. "Where do you live in Mexico?" he continued. The line was at a standstill. "Tijuana. Aren't the two questions up?" I asked and added a little laugh to soften my remark. "Whoever told you we could only ask two questions was wrong. We will ask as many questions as necessary!" he boomed. "I was just kidding" I said, attempting to diffuse the situation. I had no idea that I was Public Enemy Number One. "What do you do in Tijuana?". "I'm a teacher" I answered. "Why are you so nervous?" he demanded. Because, dude, you are kind of freaking me out. "I'm sick of being in the line" I responded. "Have you ever been arrested?", "Yes" I answered. "For what?". Yeah, I did something stupid in my early twenties. Something victimless and non-violent. And obviously, I have never been arrested again. After I explained, he sat and typed on his computer for at least three minutes. "That's not all you were arrested for!" he stated, mentioning another charge I received for the same incident. "That charge was dismissed. I wasn't convicted. Search my stuff. I am not doing anything wrong" I answered. "The State Department sent you to Mexico?" he asked, as if I were a bank robber. Actually, sir, that would be a presidentialy appointed board that sent me to Mexico. "Yup. And they paid me" I responded. He finally let me go. I feel as though our country is being protected from all possible threats, including smart ass, passport carrying teachers on Fulbright grants. We are the ones you really have to watch out for. We're tearing the place apart.

I was waived into Mexico without even tapping on the brakes.

I decided to drive to school, give it a whirl. As I zig zagged over the road dodging potholes, I heard a walking student exclaim "La profe!". I seem so hapless most of the time that they probably think I don't know how to drive. I kind of like it. It's like off roading.

I am scrambling to get everything ready before our two weeks of Spring Break. As I sat in the teacher's workroom making lessons, I saw a teacher speaking to another teacher whom everyone says is a nurse. I believe she teaches one of the factory classes. I kept working, then noticed that the nurse teacher had inserted an IV in the other teachers arm, hanging the little bag on one of our lockers. The ill teacher sat for about fifteen minutes, while the contents of the bag emptied into her arm. People walked in and out, "Are you sick?" a few asked. When the bag was empty, I asked her if she was feeling better. "Bien nice," she answered "mejor".

Qué padre

"The flight is delayed about forty minutes" the Interjet clerk informed us. The Tijuana airport is not the worst place to be at 1:00am on a Friday night. Unfortunately, it is not the most useful airport. Most domestic flights have odd take-off times and our 11:55pm flight to Puebla finally made it into the sky around 1:15am.

It had been a long day. I ventured into a project with my three hundred students, something I have avoided in the past for fear of grading them. "Profe, how do you say light-skinned in English?" I was asked over and over again while the students attempted to describe themselves on their poster boards. I have entertained this question multiple times with my African-American students in my Spanish classes in Atlanta. I was surprised to learn that in Spanish, not only are there morenos and people with piel claro but that they also have skin that is moreno-claro, which apparently means dark-light. How could I tell them that they are a fine group of Mexican bobcats, no matter how dark or light they are?

I actually slept, only to be roused by wheels hitting the ground in Mexico City around 4:00am. Due to a two hour time difference, the sun was up and Saturday had already begun. We caught a bus to Puebla and I promptly went back to sleep. Alec jostled me awake to see a smoking volcano on the outskirts of Puebla.

Who knew Puebla was so nice? All cities should have at least one ash capped, smoking volcano that is visible from the depths of an attractive, colonial city. I was completely swept up. I could go there - I saw universities, what the hell am I doing in dirty old TJ when places like Puebla exist? I found myself plotting, contemplating. When I've pondered extended, expatriate style experiences, I always imagined going to attractive places. I'd trot around, exist in a lovely environment and live an exotic, culturally different life that would wow my friends and neighbors. "Oh yeah," I'd say, "my apartment is 500 years old. The Spanish built it! Feel like getting a coffee?" Something tugged at the back of my mind. Anyone would want to live in Puebla. Or Madrid. Or countless other attractive cities worldwide. But could I do my superwoman antics there? Though I am obviously attracted to the pretty places, something in me wants to stay in the ugly places. It makes me feel useful. Not that I am saving anyone in TJ, but I feel like maybe I could if I could ever get my shit together.

We met up with some other teachers from the exchange and got a pinche awesome tour from one of our fellow exchangers who is living in Puebla. We ended our day at what must be the smallest volcano in the world. Mexico specializes in odd things. When I studied in Guadalajara during my undergrad, I was privileged to see the smallest mummy in the world in Guanajuato. I have now also seen the smallest volcano. An impromptu carnaval celebration erupted in the street by the volcancito. Mexico is not so hot with time. Apparently, even something like carnaval can be celebrated, well, really late. An extremely friendly woman with a series of biblical names - Maria Magdalena Guadalupe de Jesus y Moises - or something like that, started chatting us up. Things got a little awkward when she mentioned that Haiti got hit by the hurricane because they are voodoo devil worshipers. I really wanted to ask her which biblical sin Mexico committed in the eighties in order to merit their devastating earthquake, but just kind of said mucho gusto and wandered away.

As we sat on top of the smallest volcano in the world, I heard the chirp of my crap ass amigo phone. "Hey..." my sister said "have you gotten any weird emails this weekend?" she asked. "Huh? I'm in Puebla, sitting on a really small volcano. What's up?" I answered. "Some consular workers were murdered in Juarez" she told me, "They are evacuating the families of the embassy staff in a bunch of border cities, including Tijuana". No matter where I go, TJ just can't keep it's paws off me. I could see where she was going with this. Was I going to get sent home?

We picked up a paper and saw some pretty grisly stuff splashed all over the front pages of all of them. "OBAMA INDIGNA" one screamed. "71 MUERTOS EN UN FIN DE SEMANA". Apparently, Mexico went crazy again this weekend. We hopped on Diego, our Volaris plane, and headed back to the border. Soldiers screened our luggage to see what we were bringing north. I actually don't think they were looking for fruit. We passed the federales and drove along side the border wall as we pulled out of the Tijuana airport and through the maquiladoras that line Otay.

I was tired this morning. I trotted into school at my regular hour, 1:15 in the afternoon. The streets were mysteriously devoid of walking students and there wasn't a line at the gate to get in. Profe Rafa was already teaching in his classroom. What the hell was he up to starting class fifteen minutes early? How did he get the kids in there? Few teachers were in our workroom. Finally, I asked...¿Qué hora es? "Two fifteen" one of them answered. What....? "Come with me" one of the teachers requested. "I'll go with you to the office to explain that you didn't know the hour changed". "It changed in the United States" the secretary told me. Yeah, but I live in Mexico. I don't have some heat seeking radar that just knows what happens in the U.S. "Don't you watch TV?" she asked. "No, yes" I stammered, "I wasn't in Tijuana this weekend. I was in Puebla. The time didn't change there!" "Ohh," she said. "The rest of Mexico didn't change. Baja California has decided for the first time to just change with the U.S. Having different time from San Diego really messed up all the people that cross to work". I felt pretty crafty. Down right clever.

It didn't really matter anyway, they went ahead and canceled a lot of the classes. One class was canceled for Día de la familia. Each group of students had to bring in food items and one lucky member of the group got to take the whole basket home. The students screamed and clapped while each winner walked up to collect a basket full of toilet paper, Corn Flakes, pasta packets and canned tomatoes. Kids in the U.S. probably wouldn't have even picked up the basket if they won. I found it weirdly touching when these kids smiled and grabbed their baskets with a look that said "Thanks. My family could really use this shit. I'm taking it".

I never got that email.

The Happiest Girl in the Whole USA

I just can't seem to get in the swing of things. I have less than four months left. And then it's back, back, back to the inevitable question: What am I going to do next? How have I pissed away so much time?

Almost every time someone gives me a present, it ends up making me sad.

My anxiety has been building. I haven't done half of the things I wanted to do here. I didn't do half of what I planned to do in Madrid either. Just when I might be getting it, it is time to go home. This happens to me on ordinary vacations too. I know the last day is going to come and I am going to be miserable to return to work. I tell myself everyday to make the most of it, ENJOY EVERY MINUTE. But it doesn't help. The last day is still miserable.

It has rained four Saturdays in a row, killing any hope of getting out of the house. Last Saturday, I was determined to do something. Tijuana may become unlivable in the rain but San Diego does not. We visited one of the museums in Balboa Park. Even though the trolley is full of creepy people, I like riding it. I like the yogurt advertisements at the 5th Avenue station. Big cones of strawberries and blueberries filled with brightly colored yogurt. I have no interest in trying their product, I just like the pictures. I like the trolley service area too. All those big barns where the trolleys go to sleep at night. I always sit up at those parts of the ride.

School can't get into the swing of things either. In addition to two sick days and the two days I had to spend in Mexicali, enough classes have been canceled to add up to an additional three days. Classes have been back in session for four weeks, minus seven random days of class suspensions. I never thought I would complain about something like this. But, I have come to love my students and I want to leave them with something. Every time I get some momentum going, we take a day off. Or two. Or fucking seven.

We have next Monday off and Alec and I are headed away from the border and off to Puebla. The weekend after that, my parents are coming to San Diego. After that, two weeks of Spring Break that I will spend all over the Baja California peninsula. I like the busy times, the travel times.

It's just the normal times when I get a little crazy.

*Holden Caulfield, The Catcher in the Rye.

Stockholm Syndrome

"You are invited to attend the opening ceremony..." the email said. I had to think about it. Go to school at 8:45am for some ceremony though I didn't have to work until 1:30? Hmmm. But, generally when they say "invited" they really mean "required". I decided to go. I was out sick last week for two days and figured I had better make an appearance.

As soon as I entered, I was hustled to the front by my principal. "I want to introduce you to the crowd!" he announced, referring to the six hundred odd students standing in the sun. I was placed in a line with the superintendent of our school system, a representative from the federal education system and the police chief. And then, I was introduced and told to address the crowd. Something happens to me when I am forced to speak in front of hundreds of people without notice, in Spanish. For the second time within one week, I became a mumbling, unintelligible mess. "Gracias!" I ended, and ran away after about thirty seconds of gibberish.

Quite a lot of folks were there from the superintendent's office in Mexicali. One approached me and asked if I was going to Mexicali with them, that day. Huh? "We'll take you by your house so that you can pack a bag", they instructed, "We'll be back to get you in an hour!". I ripped damp clothes off of my clothes line, forgot my contacts and a hair brush, and was whisked away to Mexicali. Four solid days without a teacher for my students. Oh well.

We stopped by a couple of nice hotels in the centro so that my drivers could collect their things; they had stayed the night in Tijuana. As we headed to the highway, we passed another campus of my school system that is basically right around the corner from where I live. Muddy, dirt roads lined the neighborhood and shanties lined the paths. Uniformed students poured out of the school. It reminded me of some of the rural areas in Laos. I was surprised that such third world conditions existed in Tijuana. Not completely surprised, but to say the least, saddened. "Look!", one of my cohorts called, "There is the academic coordinator's daughter!". Banda music played on the radio and the border wall twisted and turned on our left as we drove to Tecate. We ate some carne asada tacos and stopped by the bread place to pick up some of Tecate's famous bread. We passed through the military checkpoint and headed for La Rumorosa.

"We're going to visit another plantel" my drivers told me. "It's an extension". We pulled into the town of La Rumorosa, something that I didn't know existed. And for good reason. "No one stays here" they told me. "There aren't any jobs. Everyone goes to Tijuana or Mexicali or the U.S. But there are some kids here and the community asked us to start a school". We pulled up in front of what used to be an abandoned orphanage. There were three classrooms with some chairs and tables and beaten up whiteboards. It was freezing. People were wearing winter coats and stocking caps, inside. They have a student population of 50. I was shown a rickety kitchen with a sink and an old, tiny four burner stove. "The tourism students practice culinary arts here" they told me. Everything became very clear to me at that moment. I knew that I wanted to work there.

They told me that they would take me to another extension. They said that it was in a "humble" neighborhood near Tecate and that Americans had helped build whatever semblance of a school was there. I was curious, very curious. But for now, we headed to Mexicali. Música romantica played on the radio. We arrived at a hotel and I was told to call them if I needed anything, but might want to avoid going out alone. I waited for their car to pull away, put on my coat and headed out. As it was 6:30 and I had nothing to do, I decided that I needed beer and nail polish.

Breakfast with the superintendent, 8:00am. Or 8:20am, Mexican time. I barely ate. He wanted to smooth things over about my schedule difficulties. I told him that changes were made after I contacted Mexicali. "Good, good, good, we want more exchanges!" I was told. I told myself to be confident and attempted to drive my point home. I wanted them to understand that if they were willing to treat me, their exalted guest, so badly, the superintendent really ought to think about how the Mexican teachers are treated at that school. Deaf ears. "We want more exchanges!" was the only thing that rang clear. I know it's not my place. I had to try. I worry that I didn't try hard enough.

"The roads from Mexicali continue in Calexico" I was told. "We used to be one city". We were driving to the big event. We arrived at another plantel that was cloaked in students and press. The governor was coming. I was escorted to the front row. The governor of Baja California was introduced to the crowd along with another slew of distinguished guests. And then, I was introduced. At least they did not ask for comments. I have to admit that I wasn't too comfortable being within five feet of the governor, considering the nature of some of the violence here. I was especially concerned when we had to pose for huge group pictures and I was thrust at his side, sporting a ridiculous thumbs up! I got to sit in on his press conference. "How do you feel about the recent announcement from the U.S. that Americans SHOULD NOT visit Baja California and that Tijuana is one of the most dangerous cities in Mexico?" was the first question. Oh God, what did my government do now? I was interviewed afterward by a reporter. The inevitable question: Do you feel safe in Tijuana? "Nothing has happened to me yet" I answered, and stared back at her. Yeah, the hype about Tijuana is overblown. Come one and all? Well....no.

We never made it to the extension near Tecate.

The love that won't shut up

I haven't been walking to school. It's a bad habit to start taking taxis and I decided to break it yesterday. As I walked, the soldiers came into view. Straddling both sides of the street, camouflage, ski masks, armored desert vehicles, automatic rifles, a guy manning a gun turret. I slowed my walk.

You're wondering now, what to do, now you know, this is the end...

Cars were stopped and trunks were open, a soldier abruptly thumped the base of his rifle and I raised my hands and slowly walked through. It was endless. And then I saw the taxi. Full of my carpooling students. Five, seven of them, crammed into one cab. When the soldiers stopped them for revision, instinctively, I stopped. I am an adult. I am their teacher. They are just kids. I was paralyzed. I am a foreigner. I knew I had no say here. I'm used to having to take care of my students. But here, we are all on our own. The soldiers let them pass as the kids waved at me through the windows of the cab. My ipod kept singing to me.

And he's related to you, he's related to you, he is waiting to meet you...

I am starting school just like I started it the first semester, on the shit list. I received a horrible schedule that I have been fighting both tooth and nail. It wears on me. My fellow teachers have been rallying around me. "This is shit" they tell me "they are taking advantage of you when they should be happy that you are here". After going up the chain by meeting with the principal, academic coordinator and union head, I was still getting stonewalled for schedule changes. Teachers started slipping me the phone numbers and email addresses of the superintendent of our school system. "Call him, write him" they advised me "Just don't let them know that I was the one that gave you the number..." I told them that I would write an email and bring a copy to school so that they could proof read it. I presented it to Profe Julio when I arrived. Throughout the day, teachers were knocking on my door. "Can I see the copy?" the asked. "Can I bring it to Nora? She wants to see it...put in a word for us. They treat us like shit".

I am not here to stir things up. But, I have always had a problem with relinquishing my rights. Even if teachers don't have any in Mexico. Why don't they strike if they are so unhappy? I have one word for you: Oaxaca. I am in a weird position. They want me to stand up for myself and in turn, stand up for them. I can do that. I can tarnish my career aspirations to vocalize our mutual discontent. It just kills me that the only reason I have a voice is because I am not from here.

My odd sanctuary has been the classroom. It never has been before, if anything, it was the highest point of stress in my life. The kids have been happy to see me. They weren't sure if I was coming back. While teaching a lesson on adjectives, I asked them to think of an adjective in English for every letter of my first name. "H?" I asked. "HOT!" the boys called out. Ay, Díos mio. Sometimes I think I am my best self in the classroom. I keep my demons in control, I am not too crazy and I am polite. My darling Gloria hugged me when she showed up for the first time on the second day of class, because she heard that I had asked where she was. And she still tells all of the other students that I am her mother. While revising the attendance list from one of my devilish electronics groups, I saw a heart drawn on the paper. "La profe y yo" was written in the middle.

I don't know how I can leave them.


*Title lifted from the Opal Foxx Quartet
*You're Wondering Now, The Specials
*Nude as the News, Cat Power