Casa Cantarranas Tehuacan

We arrived in the town of Acatlan at sunset, exhausted from a long dusty ride through the mountains and desert.  We decided to find a cheap hotel and call it a night.  We went out and ate tacos and got a good peaceful rest.  The next day we decided not to move, exhausted from the workout two days earlier.  it was a nice break, ability to re-organize the bikes and meric took an opportunity to do some bike maintenance.

... home of the crazy cactus. This place is a little micro-environment of its own as the mountains create special weather patterns. The area is crammed with an amazing array of cacti, all different shapes and sizes but the most inspiring were the tall skinny (the classic cactus) that are about 3m tall and big **** spikes.....hopefully the photos turn out! They were awesome and huge and everywhere. Ian and I walked around awestruck for a while and then he decided ...

... of us..game on!!! When we left the bar, we walked to see this little tourist bus in the shape of a Tequilla barrell (photos attached) and we all cracked up laughing at the stupid tourists that'd be getting it....we should have known it was gonna be for us. So, with heads firmly between our legs we got on and set off for the distillery. The first distillery we went to was that of the La Gofradia brand, a massive onw here and in the US but ...

... be useless if I drank too much in the heat. Afterwards I sat in the main square, where the church is, for a coffee and to watch the world go by. As in other parts of the world Saturday is weddings day. One bride was just getting into a taxi to leave as I arrived and another wedding party was just coming. Green seems to be the order of the day in Tequila as both brides had a green theme. Caught sight of a bride in Guadalajara this evening and she and her bridesmaids were in pink.

... as he did with the third graders. In 5th grade it was similar, except the children were learning how to play the guitar instead of the recorder. Daniel asked me (as we were walking into the school!) if I would do an activity with the kids in English, so I pulled out my trusty "Let's make a rainstorm" activity. It's great for any age group and it doesn't matter if everyone speaks the same language. The kids also had recorders and I accompanied ...

... that one of the girls in the second class seemed to know the song already. She seemed very frustrated when I kept stopping the song to teach notes and words so when it came time to ask how many claps for each verse I asked her. I didn't realize how much time it was going to take to teach the English lyrics. I hardly had any time left at the end for the to sing the song with the drums for the claps. I want to focus on when a ...

... practiced each one in advance and then they performed it. Some of them (particularly the boys) consisted of things like pretending to hit yourself in the forehead to the beat, but you work with what you've got! :-) On the other hand, the second group was very creative in their patterns. I had one girl who partnered up with the girl next to her to do a sort of "secret handshake" pattern. With many of the kids I ended up making up patterns and then having us "perform ...

Music Practicum in Mexico - Statement of Concerns, Action plans, and Goals Concerns: I have two primary concerns for this practicum. I am worried that I will not be able to come up with enough lesson plans, particularly varied lessons, and I am concerned about the language barrier. I only have limited resources to put together the lesson plans with. I wish I had more ...

... had it he could say he didn't. Even though he had it almost the entire round of the game! I finally had to stop the game and speak to them about it. It didn't help very much, but at least they knew they weren't fooling me. Although, to tell you the truth, it was very clever, and funny! I just couldn't let them know that I thought that. I need something that I can do to get their attention when they start running around and misbehaving. I know I can say "Uno mas ...

... good to him and he would give back to God. The church is now one of the finest in Mexico. Its rose colored exterior is crowned with two ornately carved towers that dominate the city. Inside, gilded ornate altarpieces cover the walls. A beautifully ornate organ on the back wall was thought to have come from Germany, but recently it has been discovered that it came from Spain. We were given a talk about the silver at Plateria Tono and allowed to shop for 30 ...