Ultima de Valle de Bravo.

This is the last post about Valle de Bravo. The first two photos show the small (very small) cabin Genny and I stayed at.
The rest are from the grounds. Flowers, tree trunks, etc. Something was happening with the light. It was cloudy/rainy and the colors look strange....

Genny (girl's discipline prefect), Tae-Kwon-Do Professor, and me. It's incredible, we have worked more that a year together, and I can't remember the Profesor's name. Everyone calles him "Profesor de Tae-Kwon-Do". I feel bad about it, but that doesn't make his name pop into my head.
Anyway, we enjoyed the trip. Next year I will not be going because I'm being changed to fourth grade. After five years of going every single summer to camp with the sixth graders, it feels strange to be changed. But I know it'll be a great year and changes are good.
So hope you have a good night and Hasta Mañana!!

Valle de Bravo III

The following pictures were taken at "El Centro" (downtown) of Valle de Bravo. Compared to other places, Valle de Bravo is actually pretty small. There are lots of trees (mostly conifers), and since it is the rainy season, it is pretty humid at the moment, with cold temperatures at night. From "El Centro" you cannot see the lake. You have to make your way through some streets to be able to see it....

One of the main streets.

An ice-cream shop overlooking the small plaza.



View from the ice-cream shop.

This is one side of the "Parroquia de San Francisco".
I like old, stone, buildings very much.

The other side of the church......




...and the front.

As everywhere in Mexico, there are many street vendors.
This small stall attracted my attention.
Inside each cup there is a ball of "chamoy".
Chamoy is hard to describe. It can come in a liquid sauce, or a think paste or ball.
It is sweet, sour, and hot (many kinds of chili).
And it has a fruit base. Most chamoys in Mexico are
made of the tamarind fruit.
The cups have a chamoy ball. Into the cup you squeeze
the juice of the lime, and add hot chili sauce.
The ball dissolves with the juice and sauce...
.....and is eaten with the spoon. Wierd, right?

Valle the Bravo is famous for its paragliding.
All day long you see these people glide over you.

A small street...

..and a lady coming from the market with her
alcatraz flowers.

Almost done with Valle de Bravo. Tomorrow some views of the camp.
Hope you're having a great day...

Ultimo Día de Clases.

Last day of school!
I hope you can understand my enthusiasm for this day. Now don't think I don't like my job, I love teching kids, but a teacher needs to charge batteries to be able to do a good job. And this year was pretty hectic with the swine flu. So again I say, last day of school!
At most schools in Mexico, the last day is celebrated with a ceremony in which awards are given out, and the kids get to do a presentation (dance, peotry, singing, whatever) for their parents.
My son's school was no exeption. My son got to dance something typical from the state of Jalisco, where Guadalajara is. I love the costumes. They also recieved their awards. My son got 2nd place in academic acheivement (It is given to the three highest averages in each grade), and in Faith Formation (religion). So I can say I'm very proud of him.
And, of course, here are photos of the celebration. I will continue with the Valle de Bravo series tomorrow...

I'm so proud of you!!

These kind of events are very formal, and they start
by doing honors to the flag and singing the National Anthem.
Here my husband is handing the flag
to the flag bearer.

Marching to the place of honor. These are Jr. High School girls.
Every year there are competitions to choose the "escolta"
that best marches and gives out orders.

My son with his fifth grade classmates.
I was pretty far, so these are not clear.

I love the twirling of the skirts!

One more!!

This is my son's best friend, Jennifer.

And that evening, all of my fellow teachers decided to go out to a "botaneria" to celebrate the beggining of summer vacation.
Let me explain "botanería". It's like a bar, but more family orientated. You will see kids running around if it is not too late at night. And it comes from the word "botana" which means the food served with the drinks. Peanuts and chips were the original staple, but now it is elevated to a higher goal: stuffing you till you burst. You see, with each round serverd, food from a menu is also served, and at this place we ate shrimp tacos, carnita tacos, shrimp broth, chicken flautas (a hard rolled up taco), guacamole, beef fajitas, and on and on. All of this is included in the price of the drink. These places are very popular here.
Anyway, we were supposed to be about eleven techers getting together, but for some reason (I imagine they were in a catatonic state upon realising we had vacations at last, and could not get themselves to move), only THREE of us showed up. Nevertheless, we had a good time drinking, eating, and listening to live music.....

This place is called "La Esquinita Botanera". There was a live
Norteño group.

I love this type of furniture. It is called "equipales"

There was also a live group singing pop songs
(including Michael Jackson's hits, of course).

And here are the three lonely teachers.
Profesor Palomino, Claudia, and me in the center.

We had a good time remembering funny events that happened during the school year.
Now we have a few weeks to rest and get ready for the new school year. We, teachers, go back to school on August 17, the kids one week later.
So tomorrow, I'll show you the rest of the Valle de Bravo photos.
Hope you have a good afternoon....

Valle de bravo II

The place the kids stayed at in Valle de Bravo is called "Campamento Icaros", but most of the time we were visiting different sites near the camp like this cascade or waterfall.
It is called "Velo de Novia" (Bride's Veil). It is not a big waterfall, but the trail leading to it was beautiful. It goes along a small stream, and since it was a weekday, there was only one more person, besides my students, visiting the place. So it was really nice and quiet.
Again the photos are not the best, but I tried.

The waterfall at a distance.

The falls are not in a big open space.
It is more like in a crevice (is that word correctly used?).



A bit closer.

I could not take a picture of the waterfall without people.
The students were constantly posing in front of it.
So I only got photos like this.

There was another, smaller fall
further back from the main fall.

View from the other side. I liked this one a lot.

Some shots of the creek.

The air felt cool here.

There was lots of moss and fallen leaves.

I even got to see this guy peeking through some leaves.

This is a very nice place you should visit if you ever come this way.
Tomorrow, more stuff.
Buenas noches...

Valle de Bravo.

Where have I been? Besides finishing off the school year (although I still have to go on Monday and Tuesday) I went to a camp at Valle de Bravo with my sixth grade students. This is something that is done every year. It's like a graduation trip.
Valle the Bravo is located in Estado de Mexico (the state, not Mexico City). It is a small town on a lake with conifer forests all around it. It is a really beautiful place.
But me, just having gotten home from the six hour trip, will at this moment give you some photos and go to bed (yep, I'm tired).
But I promise to post more about the place tomorrow.
Meanwhile enjoy a few...







Not the best, but tomorrow's photos will be better.
Loved the place, but I'm glad to be back home.
Hope all of you have been well.....
Till tomorrow.

Mandala.

Another activity I did with the kids was coloring mandalas. I downloaded thirteen different mandalas, and had the kids color them with crayons or colored pencils (the waxier, the better). When they had finished coloring them, they had to wrinkle the paper with the mandala.
Afterwards the mandalas were covered with tempera paint, and let to dry. The idea was to have the paint get into the cracks that was done when the paper was wrinkled. This technique here is called "crackeling".
Once the paint was dry, the mandala is "washed" to remove the excess paint. We took the mandalas and the boys to the bathrooms (here the bathrooms are outside, with the sinks in plain view). The day was windy and the boy's mandalas were ruined. So I took the girls to the teacher's bathroom (with only one sink!) and had them wash the mandalas one by one. These came out great.
After letting them dry, they were cut along the line and pasted to colored posterboard.
The boys made some new ones, but didn't want to wash them.
Whew! Kinda long explanation. Hope I didn't bore you.
Anyway, here are the photos of the process.

Coloring a square mandala.

This one looked like a snake's skin.
(At least up close.)

After the wrinkling, tempera paint is applied.

We used different paint colors.

Here the mandalas are drying after washing. This one
has red paint.

Purple....

...and green
(pretty obvious).

These two were not washed....

....but these were.





All lined up.
We think they came out pretty cool.

Kids also enjoyed this activity. I give the boys three cheers for being great sports, and coloring again after their first try was ruined.
Tomorrow another activity.
Hope I don't get you snoring with all this art attack, though if you're suffering insomnia, you have just found the cure.
Have a great beginning of week!