Today is the orientation day. The group is meeting at 6:00pm, and I can only assume that we will be going over the class schedule and finalizing the details of the semester. The two groups, UoG and UoSask, will finally be united.
Before I can even touch on whatever has, or is happening today, I’ve got to tell a quick story about yesterday. I figured out how to access money and work my cell phone, perhaps the two most exciting things aside from being in Antigua. A big group arrived, I was glad to see they all made it unscathed, despite a 10 hour layover in Texas. Once people had more or less settled, some souls decided you head out to enjoy an evening on the town. It began with a phone party around 4:00, with everybody exchanging everybody else’s number on their brand new mobiles, which cost only 110-160q. After that, the logistical challenges started to get worked out. Maps were laid, marks drawn and tentative plans were set. Shortly after dinner, we would head out, and start to collect more members for our outing, out posse if you will. When the time came, many decided that they would prefer a night in, resting and catching up on the sleep they had missed on their journey to Guatemala.
After getting twisted and disoriented next to some ruins, the seven of us made it out to the Rhum Bar, claiming some seats on the top floor lounge. The lounge consisted of cushions on the floor, cast around tree-stump tables light by candlelight. The bar was cozy warm and inviting, and supposedly served the best mojitos in Antigua. I guess mine was pretty good, but I’m no connoisseur. What I can say was that it had the freshest, cleanest mint I’ve ever tasted in a…well ever. The rest drink was not too sweet, not too strong with the most mint flavor waiting at the bottom. I had a quick chat with the bartender. In the last four years that he had lived in Antigua, he has opened a language school, a bar (the same), a cooking school called the Free Bean, helped finance another restaurant and is opening his pizzeria in the next four months. He used to work in a Wall St hedge fund as an oil market specialist. As he handed me my mojito, he said something like “ …and I prefer to be doing everything here, rather that doing nothing in the States. So – I guess that makes me an entrepreneur.” Just goes to show, one of the most important aspects of self-preservation is to get out when the getting is good.
The one downside was…everyone spoke English…succumbing to the temptation. Although we all took an informal vow, more or less, to only speak Spanish starting on the 4th. We’ll see how that goes. Untill then…hasta luego.
The Rumbar: http://www.rumbarantigua.com/
p.s. here are some photos taken during my wanderings during the second day in Antigua.
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