HOST FAMILIES

I need help with this post, if you have a picture of your host family, send it to me and I will publish it in the blog.

GOOD MOMENTS & MEMORIES

It is good to keep memories of the good times we have and the good people we meet during our trips. This post is a gallery of pictures with the things we will remember forever. If you have pictures of your host family or anything that happened during the trip that you would like to share with the rest of us, email it to me and I will add it to the blog.

Remember that the fu

ll album of pictures can be found at our facebook group Instituto de Español Moderno.

UXMAL Light & Sound

This post is a bit behind, I guess with all the activities, I did not have a chance to put it together for you but "mas vale tarde que nunca" (better late than never) so here it is, the visit to Uxmal with pictures and descriptions in Spanish by the Saratoga students.

Uxmal is a beautiful archeological site and a very ancient city of the Mayan world. Most students like Uxmal better than any other archeological site they visit in Yucatan. With less influence from other Meso-American cultures, Uxmal has a unique architectural style known as "Puuc". This style provides the buildings with more baroque decorations. The Rain God "Chaac" was most important for this area and you can see the dedication to this deity by looking at the hundreds of masks representing Chaac through out the site.

Considered a magical city in Mayan mythology, Uxmal was a cultural center, where arts and knowledge flourished over two thousand years ago. Among the Mayan stories related to Uxmal you can find: The Uxmal Dwarf King and Zac-Nicté.

Student Report:

Ayer en Uxmal vimos muchos pirámides. Están muy bonitas e interesantes.

También vimos un espectáculo de Luz y Sonido. La información era muy interesante pero no entendí mucho.

Comimos en un restaurante y yo comí una sopa de pollo y pollo frito con arroz. También tomé una limonada.

Me dormí a las once de la noche y hoy me levanté a las 6:30 de la mañana, estoy muy cansada.

Laila Ghahghahi

A wonderful view of the city of Uxmal, photos taken by Saratoga students.

Saratoga girls take a moment to rest at the foot of a pyramid.

The light an sound show is very impressive, the pyramids at night and the story of princess Zac-Nicté provide the audience with the ambience to transport themselves to ancient times, when the Mayab lived a golden age and Uxmal risen as a political power. According to the legend, Zac-Nicté, princess of Mayapán falls in love with Price Canek, ruler of the Itzaes (Chichen Itza). Zac-Nicté had been given in marriage to the Lord of Uxmal, Prince Ulil.

On their wedding day, Canek breaks into the ceremony with his best warriors, stealing the bride. With his actions a civil war starts in the Maya world, leading to the end of Uxmal and Chichen Itza.

This allegory provides clues to what may have originated the civil war prior to the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors, Mayapan, romantically represented by Zac-Nicte, had become apowerful economic market and brought a new economic order to the area. Chichen Itza, traditionally the most powerful City State, pushed to control this new city, leading to a conflict with the second major power in the area, Uxmal.

By the Spanish arrival, the civil war had already weakened the Mayas and this fact provided better conditions for the conquistadors.

CELESTUN

We closed our immersion program in Mérida, Yucatán, México with a day at the beach. At 9am we took off for Celestún, a natural reserve located at the north west tip of the peninsula.

Celestún is the natural habitat for over 550 species of birds. The Yucatan Flamingo is our main attraction, flamingos populate the Yucatan peninsula from east to west and they do not migrate out of our State. For nesting they prefer to live in Rio Lagartos, at the very North East tip, but they find more food at Celestun, where it is more likely to find them throughout the year.

Closing Ceremony

Everything has an end, even if it is very good.

Today, friday Feb 18th is the end of classes for the Saratoga group, we had normal classes, the Spanish 4 and 5 groups went to the market on a "Treasure hunt" activity and all the kids received diplomas and an appreciation gift from the Institute of Moderns Spanish (their Mayan birth symbol--Zodiac).

We had music and our traditional hammock making workshop. We closed the classes with a wonderful Yucatecan meal (Panuchos y Salbutes, cooked by our friends Beny & Javier from Tixkokob) and a visit from special furry and slimy guests that we all enjoyed, check it out!!

Chelsie Steele received her diploma for 25 hrs of Spanish instruction. The cultural activities, guided (in Spanish) tours and host family stay, made this 10 days of immersion a full time job for Chelsie and her friends.

Gabriela, Pavithra and Uttara also received recognition for their hard work.

Way to go girls, keep practicing your Spanish and learn as many (languages) as you can.

Congratulations to all Saratoga students. You all did a great job. Here we have Nicole, Jaya and Sachi, receiving their diplomas.

Amy, Sarah and Gina also received recognition for their hard work making sure everyone in the group was safe and having a good time. Saratoga has great teachers with deep dedication to their students. Here at the Institute of Modern Spanish we open our doors for them any time they wish to come and as a reminder we sent home with them our "Maya House", please keep a light inside to represent the warmth of our Yucatan homes, "mi casa es su casa" is a phrase we really mean, please come back.

Our Institute of Modern Spanish Administrative Director, Miguel Cerón presents Arnaldo Rodriguex (Spanish teacher from Saratoga High) with an appreciation gift, The Mayan mask. We hope that to you and all of your wonderful students, the Institute of Modern Spanish was able to exceed any expectations in the class room as well as with the host families and the excursions we prepared for you.

As part of our celebration we received the visit of various very special friends. The Institute of Modern Spanish promotes the protection of nature and brings students close to our animal friends. We believe that the biggest barrier for the learning process is fear, once the fear factor is out of the equation, people can learn and experience many wonderful things in life. For languages, it is very important to travel and meet the people that speak the language, live the culture, eat their food and see the world from their perspective, no book can teach you that. Without fear, everything makes sense and we can venture more into new places, new people and new languages. The same concept works for our animal friends, an iguana does not look as threatening after we hold one in our hands, or pet a spiky "Erizo", or even play with a scorpion. Never be afraid to visit new places, see new things and meet new friends.

Dzibilchaltun & Progreso

Finally, THE BEACH!!

Everyone was exited about this trip and there was a lot of anticipation about going to the beach on a nice sunny day.

After classes, we took off for a new adventure and stopped at the archeological site of Dzibilchaltun. There we visited the "Templo de las 7 muñecas". This building is very important bucause it marks the equinox by catching the Sun in the middle of its central door.

There was a wonderful Cenote at Dzibilchaltun with crystal clear water. We rested for a while by the Cenote and some of us could not resit the temptation to dip in, but after a short while we were ready to continue our trip to the beach.

At the beach, it was a total blast! we went into the waters of the "Golfo de Mexico" and played in the ocean for a long time. We can say that by now, we have Yucatán and the Mayan culture "in the palm of our hand"

El Museo de Antropologia e Historia

February 15th 2011

The visit to the Anthropological Museum during the afternoon gave the Saratoga students the opportunity to learn more about the ancient Mayan culture and the advances this civilization had in the areas of mathematics, astronomy and religion.

the museum is located in a beautiful building we call "Palacio G. Cantón", which belongs to a golden age of the Yucatán Peninsula (late 1800, early 1900's) where the Heneken plant became a world wide commodity, making the City of Merida a "city of millionaires". We had more millionairs living in Merida in the early 1900´s than any other city in the planet.

After visiting the museum we took a short walk on "Paseo de Montejo", this is the main boulevard of the city. This boulevard was design to resemble the Champs Elysées back in 1888.

Today our city government keeps a permanent open art gallery on the boulevard with esculptures and visual art made by artist from all over the world.

Once we had enough art and pictures of the mansions of the Paseo de Montejo, we stoped to rest at "Sorbetería Colon". This sorbet establishment has been in operation since 1902 and it is a tradition in Mérida.

Report by:

En el museo de antropología aprendimos muchas cosas interesantes de la cultura maya. Aprendimos que las Mayas eran muy avanzadas por esa época y que usaron lo que tenían. Por ejemplo en Uxmal no tenían cenotes de agua entonces los Mayas pusieron un hueco grande para conseguir el agua de las lluvias. También aprendí que los Mayas distorcionaban las cabezas de sus hijos porque una cabeza larga era algo casi sagrado para los Mayas. El museo también tenía altares de piedra muy antiguos e interesantes. Uno de estos que me interesó mucho fué el aro del juego de pelota que jugaban los Mayas, y otro que me facinó fue chac mool.

Descripción del museo de Antropología

Report by:

El martes fuimos al museo de antropología. Seguimos un guía que explicó los fotos y artifactos. Vimos vasillos, huesos, modelos de edificios de Maya, y fotos. Aprendí que los Mayas hicieron estructuras como cenotes para guardar el agua de lluvia para usar. También aprendí que los padres pusieron piedras en las cabezas de los niños para distorcionar el craño.

Me gustó bajar las escaleras de marbol. Las escaleras eran maravillosas y me sentía como una reina. Ya fuimos a Chichen Itzá el sábado y por eso era muy interesante aprender más sobre la cultura maya: eran muy avanzadas por el tiempo y la tecnología que utilizaban. Era muy ingenio. Me gusto mucho el museo y quería pasar más tiempo allí.

El Museo de la Antropología

Report by: Uttara Sivaram

Aprendí mucho sobre la cultura Maya en este museo. vimos los craneos de niños y adultos distorcionadas por las piedras porque la gente creyó que esto era una forma de belleza. Tambiñen vimos muchas estatuas de Chac Mool que pertenecieron a nuestra clase de literatura. Aprendimos la importancia de este Dios y las varias creencias alrededor de su significancia a las Mayas. Fue muy interesante ver las fotas de os aventureros que encontraban a algunas personas Maya, y me sorprendió que la gente de esta civilización era tan baja. También me sorprendió que los artifactos están en tan buenas condiciones.

Fué un placer visitar este museo - me permitió pensar sobre el pensamiento de una civilización tan anciana, pero muy avanzada.

Muchas gracias por esta oportunidad.