OC Transpo - 1 Shannon - 0

Until today, my ramblings about OC Transpo have been contained to isolated incidents with fellow passengers. I had chosen to keep the general tardiness of this public transport service and the rudeness of some drivers to myself. I also chose to keep to myself the times when some of the drivers (they know who they are) were kind and waited for their passengers, and therein lies my mistake.

Apparently, something angered the OC Transpo Gods and today, they got their revenge!

I had just finished closing my umbrella, opting to not look like a tool since it had stopped raining. No sooner had I snapped it closed than the infamous bus number 14 slowed to turn the corner, hitting a puddle and sending a tidal wave of dirty water onto my head, and entire right side!!

Oh how it must have looked from inside the bus or from up or down the street! I would have much rather been a witness than a paricipant!It was just like this, but imagine a slightly smaller bus, a slightly larger puddle and a cute redhead caught in the midst of the insanity!

November, already?

So, I can't believe that it's that eleventh month already! I can't believe that in two weeks I will be waiting to enter my kindergarten class to share the teaching responsibilities until December 21st! This is crazy stuff!

Well, other news in my life would be that over the past couple weeks, I have been lucky enough to have been visited by one friend from Winnipeg and some of the friends I made in Korea. It was a welcome break from the monotony of my lacking social life seeing as I am attempting to complete all of my assignments and therefore rarely seeing the light of day. It also helped me deal with some things that, as you can tell from my previous post, I had not yet moved past.

The roomies as Indiana Jones and a Brazilian Model

For Halloween, the roomies went out while I stayed at home as I had a science presentation to do the next morning at 8:30am that I wanted to be prepared for. That did not stop our class from dressing up to win a prize from our student council. A couple weeks ago, we won the prize for the most people wearing their pyjamas which got us free Tim Bits (I am not so much a fan of donuts, but I am all about the free). This time though, we lost to a group of people in the middle school or secondary school division...punks! At least we had a good time! The spread

We also had a potluck on Tuesday the 30th because we spend the entire day in one classroom. We invited our professors who gladly came and we had a lot of fun! I am really lucky to be in Group B, we attend all of the classes together and we share each other's stress.

Jo getting ready to eat

The people in our group, for the most part, are open-minded and just amazing people. The profs have said that they can't believe how good of a group we are, which could be because they wanted to be invited to the potluck...but I will take the compliment none the less!
Sarah and her amazing punch!

Lyzanne and I

Bus tale #2-The Ultimate Crazy

This is another tale promoting the use of an mp3 player on the bus...because it is another tale based on me forgetting my mp3 player before taking the bus!

This time I got on the bus and it was completely silent. There was nobody recounting their exploits from the previous evening on their cell phone, no roommates discussing who should buy what for dinner, just the whir of the engine. Until Crazy decided to start mumbling to himself.

Seated in one of the handicapped spots at the front of the bus, Crazy was a young man of some unknown ancestry. He seemed like any other person riding the bus...until he decided to speak:

"I'm going to kill myself" he said first.

Now, having only just boarded the bus, this sudden utterance disturbed me, because it's not something one hears on a day to day basis (even while riding bus #2). I quickly looked around to see if my reaction was shared by the other people on the bus....the consensus: if the others heard him, they ignored him.

But Crazy didn't care if you heard him or not...no sir, he had some ideas in his head and he needed to share them. Here are some other pearls of wisdom from Crazy:

"I only got my driver's license so I could become a suicide bomber"

"Come and sit on my knee little boy, it's my gay day...just kidding, it's my straight day"

I learned a lot about Crazy that day, more so than I was prepared to and I was happy to say goodbye to him when I got off the bus...and surprised to see him when I got back on the bus to go home!!

The only difference was, whatever he had been on earlier that morning had lost it's effect. He was no longer slouched over at the front of the bus mumbling to himself and the rest of the bus. He was standing, holding onto his Subway sandwich, and wearing his Ipod. Sometimes even Crazy needs to block out people on the bus.

Angry thoughts

Do you know what really bothers me? People who say one thing to your face but then say another thing behind your back. Especially when I myself try hard to avoid doing it (I am human, so I still slip up...but it's never to be spiteful).

What triggered this?? Well in Korea I had the misfortune to become the target of such drama, more than once, and it still bothers me to this day. The feeling that people I considered friends are making fun of me and saying things about me that they can't grow some guts and say it to my face were horrible. It wasn't all in my head either because I did have some people who had consciences tell me somethings, even apologize later.

It has happened in other situations, just not to the same extent and now, as I prepare to go into teaching, I hear stories about teachers leaving after only 3 years because dealing with the brats and their bratty parents is too much. It can be a profession where all people do is take advantage of you. When did respect go out of style?

It does make me wonder though, what's the point of even being nice if it means you just get taken advantage of? When did people stop having consideration for others (not everyone, I know, but quite a few that I have met)? When did being nice become such a rarity? What inspires others to be the worst that they can be towards another person? What makes them think that they can be forgiven so easily and their slate cleaned by simply saying "I'm sorry"?

Blogging

So, it's not that I haven't had thoughts to blog...it's the lack of time that has been killing me. Considering that I just got a new job too, things are not going to be looking up, though, as always, I will promise to do my best.

My apartment in Ottawa is nice, a little humid sometimes due to the fact that we are in the basement and not all the windows open, but nice. I share it with two people, one in Law and male, the other in Arts and female.

Here we are ready to go out to celebrate my birthday and our first week completed. I have yet to have any critical situations (à la Evamu) and I am very grateful for that...though Law still owes me 10$ but it's also my turn to get milk and potatoes, so I might just ask him to use that...and get me a coffee to even it out.

My real stories lie in my travels on the bus here in Ottawa. I live on the outskirts of the lesser fortunate area known as Vanier. The further in you get, the sketchier it can become. So, it stands to reason that the bus coming out of the heart of Vanier, heading towards the university will sometimes have people of interest on it...and that is the bus I take to school.

Bus tale #1-The Surfer Savant
It was a warm September morning as I waited for the bus to take me to school at 7:45am. The sidewalks were relatively deserted, except for two men walking towards me. One was round (he was like a giant circle) and wore headphones to a discman that he carried in his hand, he was arguing with the other man who had a stack of 14 books in his arms and wore a hiker's backpack.

Upon their arrival at the bus stop, the book carrying one asked me if I could help them settle their argument, I replied that I could try my best seeing as it was 7:45 in the morning. He then asked me if I knew the root of the word Origenism. Now, I suggested Latin, because I felt that it was the safest bet. Truth be told, I was expecting their argument to be over something a little more mainstream...such as ...well anything other than the root of a word that I had never heard of until that point.

Circle man decided to walk to school, thus leaving me alone with the hiker. I was looking through my purse discovering that my mp3 player wasn't there, when I was once again invited to converse with him. He deduced I was a student not just because I wore a school bag, but because I was drinking from a student association mug and when he found out I was in education he said, "Then, like, you MUST know, like, the root of the word pedagogy!"

Of course...that's exactly what we cover in education...no such thing as strategy for teaching elementary students..we study linguistics instead!

For those interested, it comes from Greek words meaning To lead children...or so I was told.

At that point I decided to ask some questions of my own, so I inquired about the large stack of books he was carrying...well quite the interesting story:

"Oh these? Yeah, it like really sucks, man, because here the library only lets me take out, like 75 books at a time. so I have to bring some of them back if I want to take out anymore, so the rest are in my bag. It's such a drag, because, like, back home they let me take out over a hundred."

I am not exaggerating with the overuse of the word "like" as this guy sounded like he came straight out of a surfer movie. But, 75 books at a time?? These weren't Dr. Seuss, they were philosophy!

Thankfully the bus came before I would have to make anymore friendly banter...and to think, this all could have been avoided, or missed had I remembered to bring my mp3 player with me.

Capital City

Hello! Well, after a long absence, where I worked my butt off in Winnipeg, I am now in Ottawa, Ontario, the capital of Canada, doing my studies at the University of Ottawa. Yay, more working off of my butt! The whole reason that it has taken this long to post something is that this adventure is not like my Mexican one, where I spent most of my time on my ass and on the internet. Here, I do go online to check my e-mails....sometimes to reply...though, rarely and some minor chatting to freshen my mind...otherwise known as procrastination.

But I can't allow for much of that seeing as my program is so intense. I am actually doing La formation à l'enseignement, so all of my courses are once again in French. The thing is, I am the only one who's two parents are English, in my class, so I am at quite a disadvantage, and I barely speak in class, unless I have to. Though today I did, of my own free will because we were talking about being part of tragedies and I represented by mentioning the flood of '97 , the Tsunami in Thailand (ok, wasn't in it but was still there when it happened and my parents were freaked until I was able to contact them), the floods in Korea, the crazy domestic filipino airplanes....I warned everyone to keep a couple metres away, just in case lightning decides to strike in and around me.

Anyway, this is a one year program and is insanely intense. I have an assignment due everyday next week, except Wednesda...but it's not due on Wednesday because it's due the Sunday before!!!! I am really worried about one course because my partner, who is very intelligent...is more suited to the high school division, because he is stubborn and doesn't know how to make things simpler for kids. I did not choose him...it was assigned and he tests my patience beyond belief!!! My stress level goes up twenty points before I sit down next to him. But enough about him, because it will hopefully be over soon.


Anyway, right now I have to run, but these are pictures Jason took when he was here and I promise to add more and update this thing a little more regularly, to give some of you something to do at work. :) The other people are his co-workers that made the drive up with him and we walked around the Capital. Enjoy!!!!

Home

Well, I am indeed back in Canada, specifically, 'The Peg' as we call it here. I have been home since April 13th and had to endure the painful process of looking for employment (just to tide me over until I start school), re-establishing myself amongst my groups of friends, getting re-acquainted with the family, and not always being as independent as I would like. There are two things that stand out as being harder than the rest of the challenges, one is, of course, doing the distance thing with Jason, my boyfriend who is now in the States, and fitting in. When a person goes away for a couple weeks or a month, they generally have experiences that can be recounted within a short period of time after their trip. I have not been home for longer than a month in FOUR YEARS!! Since I left, my friends have married, become engaged or pregnant. They have bought houses, rented apartment and put on additions. Some of them even have careers. It definitely is a challenge to try and relate to these new lifestyles that I still feel are not too soon in my future. Thus begins the reverse culture shock. Being adaptable to other cultures is one thing, but to re-adapt to your own is another. Things are more expensive here than in Mexico, bars in Winnipeg don't stay open as later as they did in Seoul, it's not as easy to get around with public transportation as Paris. So what do I do? Tell stories about these things...but after a while, people stop wanting to hear them too. Now, is it their fault because they don't want to hear about my tenth story that starts..."One time, in..." or is it my fault for wanting to share my experiences with these people. I think it's neither's fault, just both have to make the effort to realize the other has changed. It doesn't make them better or worse, just different and we should appreciate each other for their own separate growth. It's hard coming home, and the longer I stay in places, the harder it is to leave them.

Update #2

Just to let you guys know, I will be coming home on April 13th to try and find a job in Winnipeg. Things are good with Jason here, though Ana has become really sick, but the vet gave her antibiotics and we go see him again tomorrow and then Monday again. So keep your fingers crossed.
It has been really hectic around here, as Jason had to move from his other house, in with his buddy Ricardo, who has two dogs already. A Dachshund's named Bono and a dalmatian named Jack.But to top it all off, this past week has been Spring Break, where some lucky people have had the week off, like Jason and his housemate Ricardo. So, Ricardo's girlfriend and her parents, and their two dogs came to stay in the house as well. Cecilia also is the proud owner of Bono's brother, Rocky. Very cute.

So they were always kind and invited us along so we got to ride around the countryside and consume so much food and alcohol. But it was also really traumatic for Ana, who got sick this week, so it's nice to have some peace and quiet again.

Here's a ranch with a sense of humor.

Anyway, I will try to post more pics before I go, otherwise, I will see those of you in Winnipeg when I get there.

Update

Sorry guys, recently I have been having internet problems out here and when have come online to post pics, it hasn't worked out. But now I will give you a picture summary of what has been going on here in Mexico.

Well, Jason and I have been spending a lot of time together. My first weekend here before I started teaching we went to a beach called La Manzanilla, which was beautiful and peaceful.


I also have made friends here with a girl named Alex who is from Saskatchewan and doing an exchange at Jason's school. So we went out together with some of Jason's older students to celebrate her 22nd birthday. She's the blond in the white shirt. We smoked from what is called in Spanish a Shisha.


Here's a shot of the two volcanoes of Colima. The one that isn't such a pronounced hill is the dormant one that Jason has climbed and the other one is actually an active volcano.

The really big news would be the arrival of Ana, a dog that decided to adopt us. We came home one day to find her in Jason's walled in yard, all happy, friendly, and peppy. We cleaned her up, started feeding her, and put out an announcement in case anyone had lost her. When nobody claimed her, we kept looking for a home for her, but eventually decided we wanted to keep her. If all goes well then she will be going home with Jason to Texas in May.

Hey there, Hi there, Ho there...

Well, I must definitely apologize to my readers (I think the count is now up to five) for my lack of writing as of late. I moved to Colima, Mexico as of February 15th (well, arrived here at 1:30am on the 17th after a bus breakdown...but who's counting, really?) and have kind of been avoiding the internet like the plague. I know I owe many people e-mails and phone calls and that will all be coming in time.

Jason has a cell phone out here which allows me to call anywhere within Canada, U.S. and Mexico without worries (though if I am calling a cell phone, it eats up the minutes in seconds). Hopefully this means more people will be getting calls, but those outside of these three countries are out of luck...unless you call me :).

Last weekend, we went to the beach where I got nicely sunburned while wearing SPF 45, but also found a store that sold The Miami Herald-Mexican Edition (the English newspaper generally distributed throughout Mexico), USA Today, and The New York Times. Needless to say, I was in crossword heaven! As well as quite well informed.

Othere than that, I have pretty much been hanging out with Jason, we try and go swimming everyday to stay active. Thursday I swam 1500 meters!! Nothing compared to his 3200 but amazing for me! I am also looing for more work as I currently only have 4 hours at the one academy where I work and that's Saturdays which really sucks. If I don't find anything soon, I will have to head home early which means Jason and I will be back to doing the distance thing...which isn't fun at all.

Anyway, I promise to post more pics once I take them!

ROCKY!

My name is Shannon Best...and I have a dirty laundry problem. I, at one point, had a lady wash it, but that meant that I had to lug it to school...not fun! There is a laundromat in my town, but it's got some weird hours and is on the other side of the tracks, so I just gave up trying to make them work with my schedule (9am-7pm with a two hour lunch).
Finally, I decided to take my laundry to the laundromat in Salina Cruz (where my friend Dahmnait lives). She said they were trustworthy, though they did lose her jeans, but they bought her nw ones. So, as I returned from Puebla, I stayed on the bus all the way to Salina Cruz and got to see a very pretty sunrise.All this, you ask, for laundry? Well, I do pride myself on my clean appearance, and I do enjoy the fact that the people there know my name and are indeed very charming. But there is another attraction that keeps me loyal, and that would be their smiling dog, Rocky.
This fuzzy little friendly guy always greets me when I get in and is generous with the kisses to anyone who will give him attention. Really, how can I not keep coming back?

Puebla Pics

This past weekend, I boarded the bus at 9pm and headed North to the city of Puebla and around that time, Jason was boarding a bus in Guadalajara. At six in the morning, or there abouts, we both arrived and merrily began our search for a hotel. We went to the centre of town where we saw one of the most beautiful cathedrals, made even better by the fact that there were no tourists around so it was really peaceful and calm.

We went around to a couple of hotels, but due to the long weekend, and an unbelievable amount of elder European tourists, the first two we went to were completely booked up. The next one we went to either had a room with a balcony but two single beds or a room with no balcony, in fact barely even a window, two single beds and a massive depiction of Jesus on the cross opposite the very lacking window. So we decided on one of the higher end hotels that was 2km from the centre but that gave us a really pretty view of Puebla since it was higher up.

Puebla was established in 1531 and is one of the bigger cities, though it was knocked out of the top 3 by Guadalajara. It's much colder here as opposed to Oaxaca, due to the elevation and, when it's clear, you can see one of the 3 snow topped mountains that surround the city.

We then wandered around our area because we didn't want to hang with the tourists in the Zocalo so we went to a new shopping mall that was built over some ruins but they kept them intact and placed Plexiglas over them so you can look down at the display. There wasn't a lot of shopping to be had, but I did find some English books and magazines, so I was happy. Then we saw a movie. We had dinner at a sushi restaurant, where Robert, our server, who looked like a Mexican sumo wrestler, made us a special order as Jason is allergic to shrimp and crustaceans. He then presented me with a rose made of a napkin (I know, this is all cheesy, but felt I would share it anyway).Sunday we walked around the Centre and admired the colonial architecture. Everything is so fancy, they even had the fast food restaurants done up nice. We started watching the Superbowl at KFC then rushed back to the hotel to watch it on the giant plasma one in the lobby with a bunch of older Mexican men. I was cheering for both, had to show some Manitoba pride for Israel Idonije, but I also knew that Peyton Manning had yet to win a Superbowl (that would tidbit would be from my NFL guru...my brother).
When it was over we had to head out, but that's when my stomach infection decided to return. So, needless to say, um, that 13 hour bus ride was much less fun than I had expected. But I did have an awesome time and now I am just counting down the days until I am officially out of Ixtepec and in Colima!

Bus Stopped

First of all, you must know that the university I work at is not in the center of my humble little town of Ixtepec. It's actually located about 15 minutes outside of town...in a very rural area (hence the presence of snakes, lizards, tarantulas and scorpions-though the scorpion count is still 0). This means however, that transportation is not as accessible and usually there is only one bus an hour and very few taxis to shuttle you back if you miss it.So, every night I race out of my office at 7pm to quickly punch out and cross two lanes of oncoming traffic, a meridian, then two more lanes to get to the shoulder where my bus is waiting for me. This has been a common occurence since my co-worker left back in November and I had to rely on the good graces of my bus driver to wait for me so I could get home.

Monday night, however, a change appeared to be brewing as there were two buses waiting across the street on the shoulder of the road, apparently the two regular night drivers had finally decided that buses were not supposed to double as sardine cans. But to our surprise, there was a third bus, and this one was not across the road but right at our front gate. I had always thought that this bus had headed into a town away from Ixtepec and was about to head toward my bus when my friend stopped me and suggested I get on.

Well, I was not the only person who shunned our regular bus driver and this did not go unnoticed. As the new bus crossed the street and did the U-turn to head back into Ixtepec, it was forced to stop by the other bus drivers, as they stood in the road, shouting at the young entrepreneurial drivers who were cunningly stealing their business.my friend then decided to get off the bus, and as I was not about to be left alone on a strange bus, I did the same...and crossed over to my regular bus. I was not alone but as I am whiter than your average Ixtepec resident, it was definitely noted. More professors climbed on the regular bus and our bus driver climbed on, ready to take the wheel while the other regular driver fought with the new bus.

The new drivers were not going to take this sitting down...so they continued to argue with the bus driver while manoevering themselves to block both lanes of the road, therefore preventing, the bus I was on, to pass. I was in a Mexican chicken fight, where apparently, the lives of the bus passengers would have to wait until this was settled.

My driver, obviously being experienced in these sorts of things, reversed us all the way til the break in the meridian and drove us down the wrong side of the road until the next break where he drove us onto the right side of the road. He then gunned it to get to the next big money stop, which is the hospital. We gathered the people from that stop, but while they were getting on the bus, the new bus driver realized what was going on and overtook us, making sure to drive extra slowly to block our way.

The rest of our ride proceeded like this with one bus getting in front of the other, then driving slower before being taken over. Finally, we made it back into town where the passengers were reminded to stay loyal to their bus driver, because he always comes to get them, and isn't a fickle young guy looking to make a quick buck.

All I can say is that it beat any dvd I was planning to watch that night, and made living in the stix, all that more exciting!

Sick! :(

So as of Monday night, I was not doing so hot, suffering from stomach pains which later transpired in my body ridding itself of all the food inside itself in two ways...both involved me rushing to the bathroom. I woke up on Tuesday feeling feverish and not much better in the stomach department but after taking some pills I was just left fatigued and feverish.

Luckily, I am not teaching class anymore so, when the sitting at the computer got too much for me, I would lie down on my office chairs (which are suprisingly as comfortable as my cot in the apartment...if not more so). When the work day finally came to an end I happily returned home, cautiously ate some cereal and was in bed by 8:30 and asleep by 9! Talk about an early night!

Minus the 5 o'clock wake up call thanks to my neighbors downstairs (...seriously, who leaves their cell phone outside in the laundry area and then ignores the alarm that everyone can hear) I slept through the night. Today I am still feverish and lightheaded, and I tried to eat some breakfast but didn't really have much of an appetite, obviously I was too anxious.

Anyway, that is the news for today, that and this weekend Jason and I are meeting up midway between the two of us and going to Puebla. This of course has made my week a lot more bearable! YAY!!! I will make sure to post tons of pics :)

Mini Break

Well, last week I was very lucky to have been granted permission to have Thursday and Fridayoff, as well as Wednesday afternoon. With my spare time, I trecked out to Colima to visit Jason and see what the job possibilities were out there.

Now when I say treck, it's not just an exageration on my part. I left my town at 2:30 so that I would make my 4:00 bus from Juchitan (pronounced Hoo-chy-tan...yeah, I thought it was funny too). Juchitan is a much larger city than my Ixtepec so more buses go from there.

Instead of waiting til 7:55pm and going straight to Mexico, I caught a 4pm bus to Oaxaca City and then a 9:15pm bus to Mexico City's Northern terminal at 3am. I then took another bus to Guadalajara and got in at 12:30pm. Here I became very disoriented by the sheer size of the bus station, so, Oscar, my new friend with the ETN bus company walked me across the parking lot to where I would catch the bus. We chatted a bit and he established that Jason should be the one visiting me, not the other way around. A good man that Oscar was, if only he knew Ixtepec, he might have changed his tune. Eventually I got to Colima, riding in on a bus that had headphones, music, pillows, sandwiches and two bathrooms.

I got to spend two nights and two full days with Jason which were wonderful (yay!) and while he was at work Friday, I went around Colima trying to find some work. I have already been hired to teach French at a language academy and they are trying to get me some English classes as well. I am also in the running for a coordinator's position at a high school, but they would want me to stay later so I am thinking about that. Then there are at least two positions that I have been offered in Guadalajara (3 hours away), but I am not so sure about those because they are far and Guad (as we call it here :p) is one of the three largest cities in Mexico, and I don't know if this small town girl can handle it.

I had to leave Saturday night and it was so hard because I really didn't want to go back to Ixtepec, but I did want to get my work done, which will be mainly the end of this week and then it will jst be tutoring my students who have exra exams and then the 15th is my last day here...WOO-HOO!

Oaxaca Pictures

The weekend of January 12th, D and I took the night bus at 12:30am early Saturday morning from a town called Tehuantepec, between our two towns, to Oaxaca City. We were very proud because we bought our tickets a week in advance, definitely an event that needs to be pointed out because we generally plan to go, expecting that none of the Mexicans will buy their tickets ahead of time and we end up making frantic phone calls when there are either no seats or only two or some crisis such as that. It's our little tradition.

Anyway, Oaxaca City is where most of the problems were but they have kind of cooled down as a lot of people were arrested when they started to burn down buildings. But the police were still in the main square with barrigades and riot gear, but nothing happened.


The 5 hour bus ride was at night and we slept and then got to take full advantage of our hotel's continental breakfast because we were there early enough to have it both on Saturday and Sunday. We wandered ate at cafes, went to two museums (that would be D's influence taking hold) and enjoyed our very hot showers.


We left Oaxaca City at noon and got to see why most people prefer to take the bus as opposed to driving. Those roads are scary because you are going through the mountains, but you do get some great views, and it was the most fun I have ever had in a bathroom...by myself, trying to pee while we are going over a speed bump or winding around a corner.

Here is our Cafe Oalla being boiled on the stove. It's the traditional coffee from Oaxaca City.

Aview of the garden of our hotel where we had our breakfast.



Me sitting at a cafe with the Cathedral behind me. Later in the day I would be attacked by an aggressive pidgeon at a different outdoor cafe and would think twice before eating lunch there again. But here, I am happy.


The cathedral from the front.

This is me getting artsy. It's a piece from the anthropological museum we visited, but the sepia gives the scene a little more I think.

Sometimes Mexico surprises me. This was in the bathroom of the Anthropological museum. Not only is it a water saving campaign, it's also comedic reading material as you work.

A very big tree right by the cathedral. There is another one somewhere in Oaxaca that is the oldest living organism, but we chose to go to museums instead of searching for it. So think that it looks like this, but older.

These are the plants they make Mesqual (a rougher form of Tequila) and Tequila from. There are farms of them all along the drive back.