My first week in paradise

Ok, if you are reading this, it is because I want you to. Or, you were really bored while surfing the net and came across this blog... So, here it is....

I landed one week ago today, Saturday, August 3, 2013. I flew into Cancun and got right onto a bus to take me to Playa Del Carmen and then into a taxi to take me to my new home, well at least for now.  The studio we are in is a good size for a studio apartment and is very clean with hot water, air conditioning and wife (sometimes). The area it is in is very interesting. It is at the end of a neighbourhood called Colosio, which is on the outskirts of town.  I am about one block behind the big Paradisus resort and in fact, that is the beach that I go swimming at.  It takes about ten minutes to walk to the water from my front door.

What is very interesting about this area of town is that it looks like a slum, but it actually isn't.  You see places that are all run down and falling apart right next to big beautiful homes behind large walls. Also, home that from the outside might look like shitboxes, are actually not... I am learning.  We are hoping to move closer to the centre of the city, but just need a chance to get there to look.

My school.  My school is also an interesting place.  First things first. The campus is amazing. Check it out
Instituto Tepeyac Xcaret
And the other teachers are phenomenal people.  They are all like a family.  Everyone hangs out together, helps each other, goes to the beach after work together. Even the directors and principals are all supportive and familial in a way that I have not seen before, not in any school in Canada. Almost immediately, one of the teachers realized that she drives by my neighbourhood, so I just have to walk to the federal highway and she picks me up and drops me there every day.  I have already been invited out to the beach and to people's homes without question.  I have yet to do that as I am still settling in and doing my chores around here that must get done in order to be able to start working in one more week with the children.
Education in Mexico is... different.... they are only now beginning to think they should teach in a more similar way to the way that I learned how to teach in teachers college 11 years ago.
This will be an interesting year.....

Another interesting thing I have noticed here...
In Toronto, when it rains, it cools everything down.  Here, when it rains, everything gets hotter...