"Ma-Say-Oh"

I’m heading back to South America after a 2.5-month break in the U.S.  Last year I taught English in rural Colombia to 6-8 graders in the coastal pueblo Santa Ana.  It was an enriching and humbling experience and I am truly grateful to have had the opportunity.  If you would like to read more about that you can check out my other blog at http://penningfromapeninsula.blogspot.com.  Though just to warn you there are only a few posts.  This year however (thanks to the requests/demands from my friends) I am committing to post at least twice a month.

My life during my break at home has been rather spoiled to be honest.  I have spent a lot of time with family and friends, eaten copious amounts of cheese, and enjoyed the simple pleasures of life in the States like hot showers, comfortable mattresses, and air conditioning/heat in every building.  It has been a comfortable stay and great to see people whom I missed last year, but I do feel ready for this new experience.  Though I hope my time at home hasn’t made me “soft;” I hope I can still handle the intense heat, the inconceivable amount of people that pack into sweaty buses, and the plethora of creepy crawly bugs (more on this to come, I’m sure).

I will be teaching at Universidade Federal de Alagoas (UFAL) in Maceió, Brazil.  Maceio, pronounced “Ma-say-oh”, was one of my top choices.  I wanted to be on the coast and preferably in the Northeast. After living in a tiny, rural, village last year I was ready for a bit of a change.  Maceió is a medium-sized city of about a million inhabitants.  Lonely Planet describes it as “One of the hot, up-and-coming destinations in the Northeast, Maceió is a navigable modern city set on some truly beautiful beachfront. It has a small but buzzing bar and restaurant scene and fairly laid-back streets; it’s also the gateway to wonderfully idyllic shoreline to the north and south. On the city’s beaches, vivid, emerald-hued water laps the powdery sands that are lined with palms and brightly sailboats.”  Sounds like a pretty good setup to me.  If you want to read more continue to check out my blog; as I mentioned I will be posting on the regular.  Right now I am focusing on packing/squeezing a 9-month supply of sunscreen, toiletries, and my closet into a few suitcases because certain things are supposed to be outrageously expensive in Brazil.

My luggage. . . yes it's as heavy as it looks.