Friday, March 14

Fish outta water: no me digas gringo

no me digas gringo

I hate the term "gringo." It's racist, no matter how you cut it. I tell them, "no - soy estadounidense. Te puedo llamar frijolero?" Nope. I also don't like "güero" that much, but for that there at least exists a two-way street; I can call them "morenos." Also, "gringo", though slight, carries with it a negative connotation; it's derogatory. It also exhibits the same traits as other words that are incontrovertibly bigoted in nature.

Tuesday, March 4

Kooba

We were planning on going to Cuba for spring break (Semana Santa), but hadn't saved up enough dough to accomplish such a task. So, we decided that perhaps the summer break would be better. By that time we would have received our "fondo de ahorro," a fat yearly payout of the money they take out and match from our paychecks. Instead, however, I'm going to make a trip to Pensyltucky to see the folks (it's been a while). After making this decision I read an article in Newsweek about the conditions in Cuba and what the author, a Mexican talk-show host, had to say about some of his callers and their perspective on Mr. Castro as his resignation has made the news recently. It was interesting to read how disparaging the views where between those callers who had visited the communist island and those who had not. Those who had had nothing good to say about the place, quite frankly, placed the Cuban plight squarely on the shoulders of the stubborn dictator. The other group however see the victorious revolutionary as an icon of American resilience; a proletarian hero in the face of insurmountable odds. The difference of opinion between these two groups obviously turns on first-hand experience of the place. Who are you to believe? On a related note, the more I've learned about Cuba, the more I've grown to scoff at those who sport Che Guevara shwag.

Stupid Gringo, you can't go to Cuba! On the contrary. American Law disallows spending dollars in Cuba without a license. I wouldn't have been spending dollars. How can I spend what I don't have? I earn good ol' Mexican pesos, amigo. That's what I'd burn. Besides, the Cuban authorities don't stamp American passports. If they scare off American tourists by documenting your stay, then they don't get your money. But, you can't enter the country without a visa. The solution (between the horns) is stamping a card that you can carry with you! All this aside, I'd be returning to the US after mah main man Barak Obama is in office, the dove I've been hopin' for.

more stuff

    We knew which classes had to be taught considering who passed and who failed last semester, so we planned around that, only to get the hours that we can teach English and which students are available throughout those hours the day before classes actually started. I caught a lucky break because what I ended up having to teach was what I was already planning for. The other two teachers had to change one of their levels.

A new teacher just came aboard. There are two campuses in this region and it was understood that he would be needed at the other campus. This was the plan according to the head of human resources and the assistant vice dean. Both of them have just quit. So, the only person who knew about it was the English department head of my campus. Lo and behold, when Chachi McClueless foreigner gets to the other campus, they're like, 'who the fuck are you?' If I were in his shoes, I would have flipped. Unlike me however he speaks perfect Spanish and seems somewhat passive in nature.

The nice thing is that we handle our own department. We teach what we want, when we want, and with whatever material that we want. We've planned our own system and I think it works pretty well (it's modeled after the Cambridge system).

I've just implemented an online learning resource. Using an open source suite called Claroline. It seems being somewhat Linux savvy comes with its benefits. After talking with Potosino university students as well as those here, using the internet as a learning aid is unheard of. From my perspective, it's unheard of that an online learning resource is unheard of.

I've also just learned that we are qualified to produce state sanctioned translations of official documents written in English en lieu of a university English teacher status. Boy, that's like driving drunk for me.

Saturday, March 1

Look. I've written something.

    A couple people – literally, two – have complained about how far behind this blog has gotten. I hope this update will shut you up.
    I've been teaching at the Universidad del Papaloapan in Tuxtepec, Oaxaca for about three months now, and as far as things go that concern me, all's well that is well. I qualify this with that concern me because quite frankly, I think the school's system is badly broken. Symptoms of it's dysfunction are found in the fifty percent fail rate, passing grade – sexual favor exchanges, the dismissal of the assistant vice-dean, and a tightfistedness over that which shouldn't be in the face of a laxity over that which should.
    I maintain, though, that all really is quite well because what ought not be forgotten is that I'm to maintain a Germanesque non-interventionalist perspective on things. I'm nothing but an “active observer.” So that is to say that I'm admittedly part of this jacked-up circus of a so-called public university but certainly lack the cultural membership or political clout to affect any change, at least directly. I do however sometimes revel in the – albeit presumptuous – thought that perhaps other departments look upon our language center, of which we're given virtual sovereignty, as an example of ingenuity, diligence, and organization. Having come to understand a certain strange Mexican social dynamic here though, leads me to believe instead that we're despised and plotted against.
    This dynamic has been explained to me by means of three variations of the same a joke by three different Mexicans. I understood the first person who told me this story to be apologetic, and the other two told me as a warning – to watch my back. It goes something like this: There's a vendor walking down the beach with two baskets of live crabs. One has a lid and the other does not. A beach goer asks for some fresh crab. “Which do you want? Japanese crab or Mexican crab?” asks the vendor.
    “Well, which one is which?”
    “The Japanese crabs are the ones in the basket with the lid on it.” The customer inspects the two baskets of crabs and chooses.
    “So,” the customer says to the merchant, “why do you keep a lid on the Japanese crabs and not the Mexican ones?”
    “Well you see, just like any trapped animal they want to get out. I don't have to keep a lid on the Mexican crabs however because when one is about to succeed and escape, the others grab him and pull him back in.” The story is meant to be descriptive, not explanatory; I don't know what it says about the social psyche, just that this is what seems to happen here, though I've yet to witness it personally (I have a suspicion though that it may apply to the dismissal of the assistant vice-dean, who actually resigned though under force). A testament to the ubiquity of this story, aside from that I've heard it from three unaffiliated Mexicans, I shared it with one of the other foreign teachers here and as soon as I mentioned crabs, he finished the story. Somebody had told him already.

... Later I'll substantiate what at the moment seem like bald claims.