Day 15 in Oaxaca, Mexico: Reflections on Puerto Escondito and the remainder of the trip
I can´t believe the weekend flew by so fast. This past weekend I went to Puerto Escondito with my group and it was such a blast. We went to the beach first and the water was really warm surprisingly. I was expecting the water to be super chilly but then again the beaches in the United States are freezing. After the beach we went out to a nice Italian resturant in town and they had the best seafood I have ever tasted. I really wish the United States had fresh seafood like Mexico because the food doesn´t feel heavy. Usually when I eat fish in the states it feels very heavy because of all the added hormones and chemicals. The only downfall of the trip to Puerto Escondito was the hotel because it was six people to a room and that´s not what we booked for. Honestly, I can´t believe this is my second to last week here in Oaxaca because I feel like I just got settled here and I´m used to my daily routine. I love chatting with my host mom daily, I love the people here in Oaxaca, I love working at CORAL I love the food, I love my classes, and I love the atmosphere. One thing I´m definently going to miss when I go home next week is how Oaxacans greet you everyday on the street with a ¨Buenas diaz¨ or ¨Buenas noches.¨ Simple greetings like that for me personally  boost my day and I know in the United States not many people would do the same. Another thing I´m going to miss is chatting with my host mom everyday during dinner because she tells me what´s going on in her life with her children and how she misses them. I share with her with the spanish I know what´s going on in my life and what things I like and what I see myself doing in 10 years. Lastly, I´m definently going to miss CORAL because I loved observing the therapy sessions and participating with the children. I love how when I walk into the sessions the children remember me and greet me with big bear hugs. I´m glad that I´m able to put a smile on their face and leave a good memory for them. I really want to come back to CORAL once I finish college so I can work longer in the clinic and do more community outreach and fundraising. Well, I´m going to make these final twelve days last and the best.

Day 14 in Oaxaca, Mexico: Excursion to Teotitlan Women's Weaving Cooperative
I don't even know how to put in words how amazing this day was. Today me, my group and my professor went to Teotitlan to learn about the Women's Weaving Cooperative and how they make the designs on the rugs they weave. I'll be honest I thought it was going to be boring at first but it wasn't at all. The ladies there were very friendly and welcoming and they were pleased to see how enthusiastic we were to learn about their cooperative. One thing that I found really interesting was how they make the colors on the rugs. When one of the women was demonstrating how she makes the colors she said for example to get a tan looking color she would use nuts. I love how mother nature is so useful not only for nourishment but for practical uses as well. Another thing I found interesting was when the woman  explained the challenges that many of the women faced to have their own cooperative. One challenge was the language barrier because the women in the area spoke Zapotec, an indeginous language, not spanish. Another challenge was trying to get the government involved for support financially and for recognition. After many attempts the women stopped trying because it wasn't benefiting the cooperative. Generations later, the cooperative managed to transform the organization that their husbands and fathers disliked into an organization that they are proud of and help their wives. I found it interesting that these women were able to make a drastic transformation in the mindset of their loved ones because it gives me hope that in other countries, like Eritrea, a change in mindset could happen. There is oppression toward women in Eritrea when especially when they want to be independent. I hope to one day in the future help women in Eritrea become independent and boost their self-esteem.
After the women at the cooperative explained the history and gave us a demonstration they performed limpia on us. Limpia is a healing ceremony that occurs when the person is cleansed with different herbs. Apparently over 100 herbs can be used for this process and some healers use mezcal during the ceremony. During the limpia I admit I was a bit nervous that I would do something to mess up the ceremony. When I put the herbs on my forehead, arms, and neck I did feel a powerful vibe. I'll admit I was stressed out that day because I was thinking about how to plan the next few weeks and manage my money like I always do but after the ceremony was over I felt the stress leave my body. It was scary and refreshing at the same time. I usually do yoga or pilates to ease the stress but never did I imagine herbs like basil, sage, and thyme could get rid of stress.

Day 12 and Day 13 in Oaxaca :)

Day 12 in Oaxaca, Mexico: Reflections
Well as it approaches midnight here in Oaxaca alot is going through my mind. Today's seminar on Susto: A Folk Illness was really interesting. I love how my professor talked about Ataque de Nervios.
According to the discussion we had in class, ataque de nervios is "an idiom of distress particularly among Latinos in the Caribbean, but recognized among many Hispanic groups." When my professor discussed the symptoms that are commonly reported such as "screaming uncontrollably, attacks of crying, trembling, heat in the chest rising into the head, and becoming verbally or physically aggressive" I couldn't help but having a flood of memories hit me harder than I imagined. I'm not going to mention names and I know I'm not of Latino descent but I have experienced ataque de nervios in my personal life. I remember when I would get into bad verbal fights with this person about things such as letting me live my life. This person is overly parnoid and overprotective and I've done nothing but work hard my whole life in school and I keep my GPA over a 3.5. It was frustrating when I would go out with my friends and have a million missed phone calls saying "where are you?" I always told this person where I will be and that I'm safe but I personally felt like a prisoner and trapped because when I go out I would always be nervous and check my phone constantly because I would worry this person would bug me and ask me when I will be home. When I would get home we would get into very bad verbal arguments. After we fought I would go to my room and when that person wasn't home I would go into a rage start throwing things, punching my wall, and crying. I didn't feel like Sofya anymore. When I was in seminar listening to my professor talk about this part of susto I felt like I was reliving the experience all over again because I was sitting in class with anger bottled in my chest. I still hold alot of resentment towards this person but I didn't think those feelings would pop up after a discussion on susto. Don't get me wrong I loved the seminar cause I was able to apply it to things in my life as well as learn more about the Oaxacan culture and this is not to say I was mad the topic was brought up. After seminar I went home read alot and then went to spanish class and honestly I was embarrassed when class finished. The reason I say that is because I found myself stumbling on the conjugations which usually isn't a problem for me but I was stressed cause I was thinking about getting my paper done and how much more reading I had left to do along with fieldwork at CORAL. My spanish teacher wasn't mad at me he told me not to worry and I did correct myself when i found myself messing up but I still felt embarrassed because I was afraid that he would think I don't care about the class and that he might stereotype me as a stupid American or something. I sometimes have a tendency to worry that something I might do by accident might be misinterpretted or offend someone when I'm in another country. Honestly, I guess I have susto in that moment when I worry like this but I am human after all.

Day 13
Today was pretty exciting I woke up at 9am to go to CORAL and continue working with the children there. I must say that my favorite part of working there is getting to know each child. One child that stood out to me was Ernesto because he was so open,friendly, and full of life. I met him on the first day I went to CORAL but I don't think he was comfortable to interact with me. Surprisingly when me and my friend Ashwini went into the room to observe the therapy session as soon as he saw my face he jumped out of his seat and hugged me tight. I couldn't help but feel so happy inside because I'm glad that he felt comfortable enough to hug me instead of view me as this stranger from another country. As the therapy session went on I couldn't help but notice how Ernesto couldn't speak in coherent sentences and it was hard for me to translate what he was saying cause it sounded like scrambled spanish. It hit me after the session that I forgot that he is deaf and he communicates his spanish better with sign language. I'll admit sign language was hard for me the first time I learned it at CORAL but I found myself to speak better sign language spanish than verbal spanish. I am good at both but I find it not as difficult to do sign language spanish. When I used my sign language spanish with Ernesto I couldn't help but feel a personal satifaction for being able to communicate my thoughts to him and his thoughts to me. I really am starting to feel like Oaxaca is my home away from home and I can't believe in two more weeks I'll be back in the United States. I wish this program were longer.

Day 11 in Oaxaca, Mexico: Excursion to the outskirts of Oaxaca to learn about Amaranth!
Yesterday was amazing and educational! Me and my roommates shaili, katie, and lauren woke up very early to meet the group and professor for our excursion to learn about the grain  amaranth. I remember hearing about the grain before on television but I never payed attention to it. When we were heading to the farm I'll admit the scenery was gorgous. I'll admit I love taking pictures of mountains and anything that has a countryside feel to it. When we got the farm we met with a farmer who is from pensylvania but has helped for a while on the farm growing this essential grain. I found it interesting when he said that amaranth is loaded with protein and high in folic acid. I never knew that and what surprised me even more was how scarce it was. After the farmer lectured us on amaranth and what the group does we met with the locals to learn about the different soils that are used to grow amaranth and which ones are not good. After learning about the different soils and the plant I'm considering gardening again because I love having my own vegetables at my convenience instead of going to a store to buy it. After learning about amaranth me, my group, and my professor started planting amaranth seeds. It was daunting at first and it was hard because i saw these huge crickets that were freaking me out but I mangaged to put that fear aside. After we planted the amaranth we were taking to another site to harvest them and that's where things got interesting. I remember picking up a handful of amaranth and freaking out because I saw these weird bugs. Don't get me wrong I like the the harvesting but I hate bugs. After we brought the amaranth back for harvesting we were fed lunch that had the grain in it. I must say out of all the foods I've had here in Oaxaca I loved the lunch we had yesterday. We had pasta with amaranth in it, black beans, meatballs, and a tasty drink called chata. I had three helpings and the amaranth made the food not only tasty good but fill me up very quickly. The chata is composed of milk, rice, and amaranth. It tasted like the rice milk I have back in the United States but the drink was definently sweeter. I hope I can find chata when I get back to the states otherwise I will be disappointed. Overall, this day was amazing and I can't wait for the next excursion!

Day 10 in Oaxaca, Mexico: CORAL

I can't believe its already been ten days that I've stayed in Oaxaca. I hope the rest of the time goes slowly cause I love Oaxaca! Today I went to CORAL and the first 2 hours were pretty boring cause it was just organizing books again. After the first two hours my supervisor Mariyana came up to me and asked me to draw a picture of the ear with the hearing aid in it (she gave me a visual to assist me in drawing it). At first I was thinking how terrible my art skills are and the last time I drew something nice was back in middle school. Surprisingly my picture came out nearly perfect to the visual aid she gave me for drawing the ear. After I drew I continued to observe the therapy sessions with the children. I'll admit my heart sank when I saw the kids getting upset if they made mistakes during the sessions but as the therapy went on they got better and better. I definently want to come back to CORAL in the future to do more global public health work to help assist in providing these services for the children and their families. After I observed the kids in therapy me and my classmate Ashwini were being taught sign language for an hour. Ashwini was amazing at picking up sign language but I wasn't as good and to top it off I'm still learning spanish so learning sign language in spanish was a bit harder for me. Hopefully it will get better but I'm not going to worry too much about the sign language part I'm more focused on learning spanish in my spanish class. I can't wait for what's going to happen tomorrow.

Day 9 in Oaxaca: Field work at CORAL and Spanish Class
Well its day nine in Oaxaca and I would definitely have to say that it was the greatest day of my life! So I woke up for desayuno (breakfast) at eight thirty a.m to some tasty pancakes, cantelope, and yogurt. It was delicious as always and I can't wait for my host mom to teach my some of the tricks for cooking Oaxacan dishes. After breakfast me and my friend Ashwini took the bus and then motor taxi to CORAL. I must say that I'm proud of myself because I overcame my shyness today and spoke Spanish to the staff and children. My Spanish turned out perfectly and I didn't mess up too much with my verbs and tenses today while speaking. At CORAL I'll admit the first three hours were boring because all I did was organize toys and type on excel what books CORAL had and organize those by category. However, around 12 p.m things got exciting because I got to sit and observe individual therapy sessions with the staff and child. The one child that stood out to me was a little boy named Luis Jesus. The reason he stood out to me was because he not only had a hearing impairment but he also was mentally disabled as well. When I sat in the therapy session with his mother and the staff member he was such a happy carefree little guy. I'll admit I was scared that he would get some type of anxiety around me since I'm not from Oaxaca but he was fascinated by me. He was touching my hair and smiling every time I cheered him for building a mini tower. In the end he did cry because he didn't want to go home with his mom and he wanted to continue playing with me. I can't wait to see him tomorrow so we can bond more. Another thing I enjoyed today at CORAL was the group therapy session with luis, brenda, and alfredo. During this session the staff member instructed me Ashwini to build a house using sticks, glue, and confetti. I'll admit Ashwini's house came out much more organized than mine but I found the activity fun because it reminded me of when I was in first grade. I loved crafts and I always loved getting messy while making stuff cause I knew that meant I put in a lot of hard-work building the piece.
After CORAL me and Ashwini rushed to meet up with our group because we thought we were going to be late for Spanish class. We all ended up making it in time and the great thing was the staff at Amigos del Sol didn't get upset or anything what a relief! During Spanish class I couldn't help but feel proud and anxious to know what I would be learning next. I was proud that I answered alot of questions better than I did the first day and with fewer mistakes! I was also anxious to know what's next so that I don't mix up my tenses or verbs. My teacher Estaban is awsome and I wish I had a teacher like him in high school because the language teachers in my high school never really cared about the class. It was disappointing because in high school I wanted to learn italian but I had to teach myself since my teacher was aloof and disorganized. Overall, today was amazing and I can't wait to see what tomorrow is going to bring!

Day 7 Oaxaca: Seminar and Spanish Class

Yesterday officially marks my seventh day in Oaxaca and I can't believe it. Time flies so fast when you busy. I had my first seminar with my professor and it went better than I expected. I was expecting seminar to very boring because my past experiences with three hour classes were super boring. The class was nice because we started with an activity of defining culture and then discussed different subfields of anthropology. One thing I found interesting in our discussion yesterday was when my professor was discussing the concept of culture.  According to my professor "culture powerfully influences cognition, feeling, and self concept. Cultures shape emotions, there are universal ones but some cultures emphasis some emotions not others. For example, women can’t express anger in Latino culture. My professor also mentioned that there are no anger diagnoses in the United States. Intermittent Explosive disorder is the closest to being considered an anger diagnosis. The reason I found this interesting was because I'm a psychology minor and I've never come across any anger disorders in any of my psychology courses. It makes me wonder why the United States doesn't want to come up with any diagnoses because that can lead to a lot of problems for the person. That person may not be able to get a job because of their impulsive personality and have marital problems in the future. Another thing I found interesting was when my professor was talking to the class about how his approaches culture. My professor said "I believe in culture, I think it exists and is an important, if not always conscious, force in shaping social life. We understand culture through lived experience not only an abstract set of ideas." I agree with my professor because when I think about it culture has shaped my social life greatly. I'm Eritrean American and even though I was born and raised in America my actions do reflect both my American and Eritrean side. For example, if I'm out with my friends for dinner and they are ordering lots of greasy fattening foods I'm usually the one who tries to look for the healthiest option on the menu since I was raised eating alot of traditional Eritrean foods. Eritrean food is composed of grains, vegetables, and lean meats and in my opinion is much better than American food.
Besides seminar, I had my first Spanish class yesterday and I really loved it. I'll admit that's where most of my anxiety came from when I arrived to Oaxaca on the first day. I've studied Italian for four years in high school but never took a Spanish class in my life. When my Spanish teacher started teaching me Spanish I managed to understand 80 percent of what he was saying because a lot of the verbs and phrases are very similar. I can't wait to learn more Spanish and I feel that I'm absorbing it more since I hear it everyday from my host mom and around town.

Day 8 in Oaxaca: CORAL
Today has been super busy. I woke up at 8:30 to have desayuno (breakfast) and head out at 9am to get to CORAL at 10am. I'll admit that I do get nervous on the bus only because I hate when the buses end up side by side or when one bus is about to hit the other from behind. I'm sure the drivers are very experienced but its still scary. Me and my classmate Ashwini managed to get to CORAL early and the staff gave us some work to do and discussed our schedules. First we organized the toys and then we got to sit and observe the group therapy session with the child and their parent. Personally, I loved observing the group therapy session because I got to interact with the child and their parent in Spanish and learned about how CORAL helps these children who can't hear practice hearing with their aids. I was hoping to go to the clinic in CORAL to see how they diagnose the children who have hearing problems but it was the first day and the staff wanted us to observe and become well adjusted to CORAL. I can't wait to see what happens tomorrow!