Monterrey

Hola a todos, I’ve been in Monterrey a few days now and each one of them has been crazy in its own little way. After flying in, I hailed a taxi to take me to the hostel that I had reservations at (turns out I didn’t). This man was perhaps the fastest speaker of the spanish language I have ever met, which made our conversing look something like the scene from Billy Madison in which the gardener tries to teach Billy Spanish and all he is able to say is “slowwww downnnn”. We eventually found the full hostel that I didn’t have a reservation at, but I survived. I woke up in the morning, looked out a window, and saw the mountains for the first time, which provide a pretty awesome vista from almost anywhere. It is much like living in the foreground of a postcard.

Here are a few pictures http://picasaweb.google.com/RJandsomenumbers/20090108FlightFirstDays?authkey=Y0nJfYM_yU8#.

All of the international students are awesome, there’s about fifty of us form all over the world, and in meeting them I have learned a lot. First and perhaps foremost, never tell an australian the the coffee you are drinking is very good, unless it is Australian coffee, which, by the way, was described to me as a latte. After they tell you in the nicest little australian accented way that the great coffee that you are drinking sucks compared to an Australian latte, DO NOT tell them that you know what a latte is and that you drink them from starbucks frequently. If you do, you’re in for a thirty minute coffee lecture.

I’m very partial to the french students because I’m fluent in French. When I say that I’m fluent in french, I mean that Isabelle Bouchard taught be how to say “I don’t know where my hat is” and that I remembered for some strange reason how to say “I am not in the garage.” from 7th and 8th grade french class. I’ve found that all one has to do to start an interesting conversation is approach, say bonjour, and as fluently-sounding as possible, state one of the previous facts. This will result in a confused look followed by an awkward pause, at which point I will state the other. By now, the frenchie with whom I am speaking has figured out that I don’t know french and laughter ensues. I now greet my french friends by reiterating that I am not in the garage.

They speak spanish in Mexico, which I realized as soon as I tried to do anything that wasn’t in the airport. This has been going pretty well. Taxi drivers as universally hard to understand, but I have been hanging in there. I received perhaps the biggest compliment that an American can get in Mexico the other day when Carlos from Chihuahua told me that I am not a gringo. This made me happy. Mexican slang is pretty awesome, I’m starting to pick up on that. My favorite saying is “no mames juey”, literally meaning “don’t suck me dude”, which is the mexican equivalent of “no way”. Unfortunately, the things one learns in spanish 1, a class that I paid no attention in, are extremely important. I’ve had to re-learn how to say the alphabet (I spell my name for someone 4-5 times daily), the days of the week, and numbers. Luckily, I retained “Dónde está el baño”, which I use quite frequently, and “Cerveza, por favor”, which I hope to utilize soon.

The food here is phenomenal. I eat at the café at the university for lunch, where one gets a bowl of soup, a plate of rice, beans, and a beef or chicken dish that changes daily, a dessert and a 16oz fountain drink for 54 pesos, or 5 dollarsish. By far my favorite part about mexican food is that no matter what is on one’s plate, it does not matter if it touches, mixes with, or is consumed at the same time as whatever else is on one’s plate. This fascinates me, and I often draw pictures with my food as beans are very malleable.

They insist in playing the most horrible american music here. So far I’ve heard Celiene Dion, that song from grease, and soldja boy, amongst others. This saddens me profoundly. On another americana note, all taxi drivers in monterrey know who the atlanta falcons are. Everyone else knows atlanta for coke and CNN. One of my roomates, Juan Pablo from Chile listened to my band’s new song last night and loved it, so I’m hoping to fly the boys down for low end honey’s Mexico world tour 2009. A new song from our recording session is up at http://www.lowendhoney.com .

There is much more that has happened and is happening, which is fun and exciting, so I will keep you guys updated with a post later this week.

-Randall