PicoCrickets and Spicy Food

Today, we had a very exciting session. We started with “I declare a war…” a Mexican game that the Casa Telmex facilitators taught us yesterday. Sometimes we see some Casa Telmex facilitators playing the games that we teach them during their workshops and that makes us happy, so decided to use a game that they taught us. We had a lot of fun and after Reyna led an activity called “Charades” During this game there was a person that acted out a word related to leadership but without using words and the other people on his team had to figure out the word. The activity was a bit challenging because the students picked really hard words but the students who acted (Karla, Luis, and Mario), all did a good job. Karla actually didn’t know what her word meant, but Reyna described the word to her and Karla still acted the word out well.

After, the students started their PicoCricket projects. In pairs, they thought about a product that they wanted to make and they used the PicoCricket program to help them. They have not yet finished their products and they are going to have more time tomorrow. Some examples of the products are: a robot (by Brenda and Diana); an amusement park ride (by Julio and Osiris); and a car (by Luis, Dorian, and Patricia) that will move when someone claps. Everyone else also had a good start and everyone is excited to finish their projects.

After the session, we return to Xallepan with a few facilitators. I think this restaurant is probably the best in Tuxtla. During lunch, we talked about the meaning of some vernacular words like “chava” and “buenota.” In the dictionary, chava is the same word as girl, but apparently it can sometimes have the same meaning as girlfriend. The word “buenota” isn’t even in the dictionary but it seems to me that the word means something like really attractive. Also during lunch, I ate something that was a bit too spicy and I had to drink other people’s rice milk because I had already finished my glass of rice milk. Besides that, the food was quite good.

When we returned to the hotel, we relaxed by the pool (which we call the “piscina”, but apparently in Tuxtla, the people use the word “alberca”). Later, Kyle and Lauren went for a run, while Taylor and I remained at the hotel to work and to relax a little more. This week was a bit tiring and it’s passing by very quickly but the sessions have been going great!

Dave: 109
Kyle: 108
Lauren: 76
Taylor: 70
YeSeul: 29