The Amazing Race!

I was working on my lesson plans the other night and I realized I needed to print something before I could create the other part of the materials.  It was already 7:30pm and my host mom was cooking my dinner, so I told her that I was gonna go to the cyber really fast.  Well of course I decided to run because I don’t like walking sometimes and I needed to be fast.  I had flip flops on, but what the heck.  So I took off running down the street and it was pretty dark, but the street lights were on.  There were a bunch of young boys in the street playing and they started shouting “Corre! Corre! Corre!” which means “Run! Run!”  So, I shouted back “Vamos!” which means, “Let’s go!” and they started running with me down the street.  It was hilarious.  I turned the corner and headed down the main street to the cyber and the race evaporated.  I then realized that I get plenty of attention being a gringa walking down the street, but now that I was running (which no one ever does here) I got a lot more attention.  I didn’t really want this extra attention, but I also needed to travel quickly, so whatever.  I just ignored it.  So, I got my copy in time because the cyber was still open yay :)  On the way back I decided to run as well because it felt good.  I need to exercise more and it felt great to be running again.  Anyway, I ran down the main street and then rounded the corner onto my street and there were a couple little boys sitting on the sidewalk and they started shouting at me again, so of course I encouraged them to join me by saying “Vamos!” and they took this as an invitation to a race.  The next thing I knew, I was in a full on sprinting race down the cobblestone street in the dark with little 8 year old boys in my flip flops.  I kept thinking I was going to trip or run through dog poop, but fortunately neither happened.  The race did have to end because my house was at the corner, and sadly I don’t think I would have won if it had continued, but I blame my flip flops and the cobblestone.  These kids have the advantage of playing in these streets every day.  This is one of those experiences that I’ll never forget.  I’m glad I’m still able to be free and have fun being myself :)