Aranzazu Catedral Guadalajara

... crawled across my chest. I instinctively brushed it off me, but I was still half asleep and it was too dark to see what it was. All I knew was that whatever it was had been big enough to wake me from my slumber.

Yet last night I had forgotten all about this incident and drifted off to sleep as normal - only to be woken once again in the small hours of the morning by something crawling along my back. This time I was quick off the mark and reached for ...

... Minnesota called Antonio, and a group of Mexican amigos. Chapala is the largest lake in Mexico and only an hour's drive from Guadalajara, making it a popular weekend resort for city dwellers here.

Armed with several crates of beer, we took an exhilarating speedboat ride out to the "Isle of the Scorpions" in the middle of the lake. We had a great time despite not actually seeing any scorpions there, and as ever in Mexico, the ...

... time. Sadly I forgot to bring my sombrero, but I still felt suitably like a cowboy as we rode along dirt trails through the forest in a nearby park. It was great fun and the horses were surprisingly easy to control, but on ce they start galloping it is not the most comfortable experieince for male riders!

Guadalajara has a huge student population so there is a plenty of local nightlife to be sampled. In the first few days I met loads of other international students ...

... my room, makes my bed, and opens the windows. When I get back home, sometimes very late, I find a pot or frying pan of soup or pasta sitting on the stove, ready to be heated up.

As charming (and convenient) as this arragngment is for me, it didnīt come easily. After two or three scoldings, I stopped trying to wash my dishes, or even use any of the kitchen appliances to make my own food. After several days of steady progress, she now allows ...

It's about 9-30 in the morning, and I'm sitting at the communal computer in
Hospedarte's living area with a cup of instant coffee, trying to figure out how to type a colon on this keyboard (and failing, as you can see!). People are shuffling around, making breakfast, and watching a Mexican version of "Cops."


Guadalajara! I got in Thursday night after a super quick flight from New York, and saw for the first time the city that is going ...

... not from here, you are not from here”. This went on between everyone in good humor. Everyone was friends, both up the top and the bottom. There as a fat woman who had been attending the event for as long as anyone could remember and because the people who sell corn on the street in Guatalajara are usually fat women, the Pobre’s up the top would yell down at a fat lady “you sell corn on the street”, like clockwork she would stand up and start ...

... in my shorts, flip-flops and sweaty t-shirt. I find myself secretly indebted to an Israeli couple who are up for a big one, and bid goodnight to Eli as I leave him in their much more capable hands. There's a bang on the door at 8:45am telling us the Tequila tour leaves in 15 minutes, something Eli apparently organised the night before. Not interested in a tequila binge at 9am, I decline and head out on my own to get a feel for the city. Sitting in ...

... and really take the time to help him understand when needed. The hostel we stayed in called Hostel de Maria was gorgeous. Almost too good, I think Shay expects them to all be that beautiful and that clean, we even had free breakfast and it was only $15. We met a good few people there. A girl from Switzerland, another from Australia, a guy just starting school in Guad. for economics from Norway, and a woman from Eastern Canada, I think where Beth is from but ...

... on his face as he described "that crazy 16-hour peak, whooooo boy, those were the days, we thought it would never end" was totally worth coma-inducing museum videos. He said this book called īBe Here Nowī (by Baba someone and Tim Leary, describing their acid-induced spiritual revelations) was one of the few possessions he hesitated over selling because it changed his life. Also he tagged all his stories with the disclaimer "but my mindīs been expanded quite enough ...

Getting worn out. Too many cities, too much running around ... So I promised to tell you about El Tajin eh? Well them was pretty cool ruins, they all are. What distinguished this one from all the others was the outrageous number of ballcourts, some with pretty shweet reliefs carved into stucco on the walls, and a pyramid of niches, also known as pyramid of square holes about yay big. There are 365 of these square holes carved all around the pyramid. I'll let you guess ...