Mexico ASB: Day 6

I have been away from any interweb for the past two nights. So I'll be brief as I tap this post out on my smartphone.
Day 4 was filled with lots of work. From putting a roof on an outhouse to excavating a hillside for the installation of classrooms. It was a nice day. But that night we split up into pairs to stay with families in the community. Truely a wonderful experience and I will write more about it once back in the states.
Day 5: Waking up in a foreign speaking household is interesting. Once again I'll detail that later on.
But this afternoon we made our way up to a hermitage that overlooks an active volcano at 11000 feet msl. What a spiritual experience. Also more to come.
Day 6: My birthday. This was possibly my best birthday on the books just yet. I let no one know ahead of time that today I am 23. Last night a few of us decided to sleep outside under the stars. I found myself gazing for over two hours. We also had the intention of seeing the sun rise. We did. Truly amazing. Going through a day without anyone wanting to make my day special just because it's my birthday made everything that more special. We had an amazing reflection tonight with the group. Michigan state is also here. I'm making many friends there too and I cannot believe tomorrow is my last day here. Suzanne saw on Facebook that today was in fact my birthday and everyone surprised me tonight after we got back from playing soccer. She found out at 6 pm tonight and the team here was able to get cake for me. What a night. I got both versions of happy birthday and then we had cake and sang songs until we were forced into bed as we have an early wake-up call in the a.m.

I thank you all for your thoughts, prayers, and well wishes as we travel. Also special thanks to my family and friends for all their special birthday wishes. Sweet dreams ya'll.

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Mexico ASB: Day 3

There is nothing better than waking up to the sound of music and laughter. From our house to the streets of Puebla there is always a smile to be shared.
Today was our first day of working. But here it is not just work, but it is a cultural learning experience. Learning about the culture here and why things work as they do. Starting out hearing about the local issues and how the government interacts make it all seem so surreal at times. The people here really use every resource as if it was not going to be useable tomorrow. Nothing goes to waste.
Community links also has a partnership with a school for the blind. Just being able to see how things work and to be able to hear from on who is blind really made me think about is sight really all we think it is. I'd pick the ability to hear anyday over being able to see.
Our first real project was to clear an old corn field to prepare the land to be tilled. We stacked all the chopped stalks and placed them into a pile to be moved and used for food for local cows. Nothing goes to waste. Well I am off to bed. No posts tomorrow as we will be staying with residents throughout the community.

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Mexico ASB: Day 2

Nice lazyish Sunday today. Everyone except for myself and Sean woke up early. We had a nice egg and tortilla dish breakfast. It was nice as we finally got to meet Michigan state which arrived late last night. We cleaned up and got ready for a day on the town seeing the local culture and the like.
We started out by going to mass. Missed the first two readings but caught the gospel which all was in Spanish. It was pretty neat to be at a non English mass. And the church was beautiful. All churches here are gorgeous and there is literally a church on just about every street corner. After mass we went and looked at a couple of other churches around the one we went to in the center of town. Navigating here is pretty easy as all streets follow some sort of naming system that is sequential and the town is much like a grid.
Following the grid, we made our way to the market where everything from birds to fresh fruit were on sale by local peoples. It was very cool to see what they had to offer and what we don't really have in the states.
And along the lines of new culture, we made our way to the local museum to see local artifacts. But seeing the artifacts was just a small taste of what was to come. About a 20 minute walk from the center of town yielded a beautiful church built on top of an old pyramid. It was very neat to see what had been excavated of the old pyramid and to hear a little of the history surrounding the site. Climbing to the top was not much of a challenge. The top did yield a 360 degree view of the city and local volcano which towered into the clouds. This was really the highlight of the day. Closing out the day was a little bit of local shopping and dinner. A little bit of rain but tomorrow the real work begins! We have no clue what we'll be getting into, but I'll be sure to report more tomorrow!

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Mexico ASB: Day 1

WOW! What a day today has been. It's now a little after midnight here in Mexico and all I can say is today has been quite a whirlwind, from leaving Blacksburg this morning at 4am without any sleep to one of the many airport delays at Charlotte and Dallas. I'm happy to be in my bed in Cholula.
Our group is absolutely fantastic. Fifteen in all and what a day. Our flight out of Charlottle was delayed for 3 hours due to mx issues and working on changing reservations for our group was a fun task to do over the phone, especially with a plane full of less than happy customers trying to do the same. But all became well with our flight, landing in Dallas a little early. We were able to catch a delayed Mexico city flight and our bags were with us when we arrived! I of course got searched multiple times today. From Charlotte to Mexico city, I must be a huge risk to national security.
Once in Mexico city and clearing customs after being searched, we all grabbed our last semblance of food as we know it and boarded a bus for a two hour ride to where our hosts would be picking us up. The ride was nice. We all noted Mexico city's lights went on forever, really hitting home how big the city really is. The bus also had free wifi allowing me to make a few Skype phone calls. But once at the bus station, we all met Arturo and went with him back to our house. The house is quite nice. Nothing fancy but just a nice place to sleep. I will update more tommorw. Sleep now. Sweet dreams :)

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Brief Update

So I'm two weeks out of uploading my blog posts.  I guess as amount of fun increases number of blog posts goes down, who woulda figured.  I did just upload a bunch of pictures to my picasa page.  Sometime tomorrow I will get to uploading everything. 

And Happy Fathers Day Dad!!! 

Day Seven: What Goes Up, Must Come Down

Seeing as I slept just about all of yesterday and barely got a quick dinner in with Mary at the Peak, today I would surely need to expel all of that reserved energy.  Being it is Sunday and sunny, the four of us went out for breakfast at Wagyu.  Alasdair commented on my particularity when it comes to food and all I could do was laugh.  He's learning my ways quite well.  I had the typical American breakfast: eggs, sausage, and toast with a glass of orange juice to wash it all down.  It was quite nice to have a taste of home.  But this was just the start of a great day. 
Mary and Alasdair were itching to go on a hike and I was glad to come along.  We made our way to the MacLehose Trail in the New Territories of Hong Kong.  The drive to our start point was just over an hour and once in the national park, we began our journey.  With Mary's hiking enthusiasm and Alasdair's never ending outdoors drive, I knew I was going to be in all sorts of interesting places on this hike.   We started out walking up a road which only taxis can take.  Apparently taxis are a way of cheating a bit, so no cheating for us today.  Once we get to our first trailhead, there was a sign warning of landslides, so we took the higher and less traveled route on the MacLehose Trail.  Let me put it this way, it was like walking through tall grass with a one foot wide piece of broke concrete to walk upon.  You could tell not many take this section of trail.  It was steep inclines, which I don't really mind, but the sections of steep declines, my body just doesn't like.  About 10 km through, we stopped at a local village for some fried rice before making our last section of trail.  The last part of the trail we walked had what I could call a never ending slope, I really thought I was going to be passing some folks bound for heaven.  But sure enough, the inline stopped and once again I had to go back down.  Mary and Alasdair pulled on my gullible side with saying we had to swim a mile back, but even I saw through that one.  I really think a swim would have been a nice ending the the hike.  All in all we hiked about 15 km (about ten miles).  A very good day, next time I just need to drink more.
Things to note:
I miss the humidity of New Orleans
Mary and Alasdair both think I should do a RTP race

Day Five: Nice Hotels in Hong Kong

We made our way to the Mandarin Oriental hotel after work today to attend the Unique Estates property showcase. There were some gorgeous properties there and trust me, Nicolette can sure entice anyone into thinking they can buy one of her properties.  I went for the wine and hors d'oeuvres.  I primarily socialized with the property agents that were more of my age, and the Australian accent was definitely growing on me.  The sheer popularity of such events surprises me.  But if you got the money, why not spend it? 
And it is a Friday evening, but I hear my bed it calling my name. 
Things learned today:
Private airstrip is a must.