Bilingual Dreams...Sueños Bilingües

it is funny what happens to your dreams when you are learning a new language. In my dreams, I never hear voices but people are always talking. They are expressive (all the anger, happiness, and boresdom is never lost) and when I talk, I feel the words coming out but i never hear them. Last night, it was the same in some parts but in Spanish.  The parts where I was speaking to my neighbor, yola.  It was weird how my life in mexico city ended up on vacation in my head somewhere in the tropical part of the united states i think but im not quite sure.  And in that vacation was yola and the machas. 

Let Your Booty Bounce....to the cajon

hey kids, 

last saturday I went to the inauguration of the III FESTIVAL INTERNACIONAL DE CAJÓN PERUANO

 There is still alot of time to catch these events commemorating the cajon.  Just go to the Centro Cultural de España


recentemente, i have been super into the sounds of the cajon.  When i'm down about Lima, i think about this instrument because it is so peruvian, it is so african, it is so simple and takes my body and mind to places that I are familiar and comfortable that I just can´t help but feel good.  

And i kind of have unmotivated dreams to learn how to play, take my own cajon back to d.c. and play on 14th and park.  Way too romantic and unrealistic but every day since taking my festejo classes, i have slowly fallen in love with that box that makes sounds that make your booty bounce.

No nos llaman ¨cafe con leche¨

i can´t really tell you how many times someone has screamed or muttered under their breath that phrase to chuya and i.  But it has happened alot and each time I´m kind of in a plane of disbelief that someone really referred to my steady and I as a beverage.  But i guess i´ve been called alot worse.

Today it happened again...this time at the rez de San Felipe.  We went to the laundromat to enjoy the nostalgic beauty of washing our dirties.  The laundromat overlooks this huge construction project to renovate the plaza in the rez.  I guess usually don´t go up to the second floor of that commercial plaza so I´ve never seen the construction workers on the site because a huge fense blocks your view of what they are doing.  But yeah this time we did and honestly it could have been a scene from an 80s movie...a bad one... because I would say that a full assault of whistles, hisses, yelps and all sorts of cat calling by at least 30 guys in orange construction hats and vests assailed us.

We ignored them but I just felt really angry and annoyed that these guys were all up in our space like that.  So i think next time I have to think of something witty to say en vez de ¨tu madre¨...which i did not say but wanted to say really bad.

Your trash is my treasure

yesterday in my food sickness delirium, chuya and i went to the do it yourself lavanderia in the rez.  After endless nights of drooling all over her bed and buckets of sweat and other unmentionables, we thought, yeah it is time to wash these sheets. Usually we just go to Daniel, the guy 2 blocks up from us on Brazil that washes our dirties and we only have to pick them up.

But since you kind of need sheets every day and we only have one set...we thought let us try that joint. And yeah, it did not disappoint.  You pay 14 soles to wash and dry your clothes.  They give you detergent.  They give you sofas to sit on with a lovely coffee table of trashy fashion magazines staring the spanish speaking world's creme de la creme--who usually have the skin color of cream.  It makes me miss my laundromat adventures with friends and family growing up.

So yeah this post was not supposed to be about my nostalgia over laundry mats.  Because what i saw on the way to the laundromat was also interesting.  in front of my neighbor's house, there were 6 nice chairs and a desk waiting to be taken--or at least in the states, setting something outside your house like that means you want other to take it.

So I naturally say to Chuya ´´You think that´s free. It's really nice´´

´´No, there's not really a culture like that here.  Jesus the 2nd (our roomie)'s dad went to the states 15 years ago and the only thing he ever talks about from his time in the U.S. is all of the beautiful furniture people leave out for you to take´´

I think to myself, my house in d.c. would not be the alice in wonderland dream castle i love without that kind of ´´your trash is my treasure´´ culture.