The majority of my Monday was spent lounging in various uncomfortable positions in the Houston airport, waiting out my 10 hour layover. The kind family friend who gave me the third book in the Stieg Larsson series was a true hero, as I passed many of those hours getting over halfway through the 600pg book, alternating only with breaks for the requisite layover naps. I finally got to the dorms of the Universidad Iberoamericana Puebla at 9 or 10 that evening, and promptly discovered that dorm noise-levels are a little bit louder than I am used to, and I think quiet hours are nonexistent.
The coordinator of my exchange program, Igancio Diez Elortegui, or "The Big Ig" as my friend Liz refers to him as, had asked me to meet him the following morning and he conducted a pseudo-orientation, and we started working out some of the details of my internship. He then drove me to the hospital where I'll be working, formerly known as the Hospital UPAEP, though recently bought by a Texan corporation, and therefore renamed as Hospital Christus Muguerza - UPAEP. I didn't bring my camera with me, but a good picture of the hospital is here: http://www.upaep.mx/hospital/index.htm.
We met with the man who will be my supervisor (Roberto, no good nicknames yet,) shown at the right, who I was surprised to learn was actually the head of their marketing department. I told Ignacio that marketing was neither a strength nor an interest of mine, but he assured me that was not an issue. I felt even more confident when we actually met with Roberto, and he outlined some of the projects he had in mind for me, like thinking about how to make admission forms for indigenous non-Spanish speakers and the illiterate population, working on a new breast cancer prevention campaign, helping out on weekend trips out to el campo for medicine/care distribution, and maybe one day per week spent with the General Director of the hospital (one very friendly Lebanese anesthesiologist.)
We decided in our meeting that I would start my internship tomorrow, Thursday, due to the fact that today is Cinco de Mayo, commemorating a battle that took place in Puebla - so this is the place to be today. However, I was informed by my taxi driver from the airport that the celebrations have been halted for the past couple years and this year due to construction projects and H1N1, so everyone in Puebla still has off school and work today, but the celebration itself was mostly just a parade. I couldn't figure out what time the parade was supposed to be at, but someone mentioned that noon might be about right. I think it actually was much more towards 9 or 10 in the morning so I missed the parade, but i did get to wander around city for a while with all the other Cinco de Mayo tourists.
These two pictures are of the zocalo, which is the central square area.
a really cool mural above some department store
a lot of the buildings had some variation on this brick/tile facade, i thought it was very beautiful, though a little busy.
Some street performers - I missed most of their show I believe, but did catch the end of it.
Mas noticias, por favor!
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