1 month.

We're in the final steps now. One month.

I keep repeating it to myself and feel nothing but wanting to throw up. I have so much anxiety built inside that I fear I might have to hit the next person who asks me "So, when are you leaving?" I think you can guess I have nothing figured out yet. I sent the check back to Mexico and hopefully they will be putting the money in my account very very soon. I need so much more money than that, the more I look at it, the more I seem to need, the more I seem to need, the more I spend here at home. SIGH.

I haven't found a house yet, that's what worries me the most, I did find a very lovely and affordable room the other day, by the next day it was gone. I keep browsing through the different sites trying to find something nice and cheap but mostly near the school. The only place I have found within walking distance it's this house shared by an old guy who I just don't seem so comfortable with. Also, I realized can't for serious have a house until I'm there, I'd have to check out the place before signing a contract. This are the criteria I have so far:
- Cheap. (and by cheap I don't mean 100 pounds cause I know it will suck, I'm okay with it being around, or less, preferably less, than 350)
- Location, location, location. Close to either the city center OR the school. If I live near the city center I can walk to mostly EVERYWHERE, I did find one place right across the Sheffield church, and get this, it's St. Peter and St. Paul's church. I was BORN on St. Peter and St. Paul's day! It's the reason why my mother named me Paola, it must be a sign, right? Right? But I'm not really looking forward to an hour or MORE commuting, so...
If I live close to the school that means waking up later, WALKING to work and not spending on buses, BUT then if I wanted to go out to the pubs, or simply go shopping I'd have to take the bus downtown and come home early cause it's farther away.
- It must include ALL bills. I don't really want to deal with how much we need to pay for the water, I'd just rather pay more for rent.
- INTERNET. I might go insane if I don't have a way to communicate home. They must have wireless internet.
- Washer AND dryer. the dryer part is important. I don't mind washing the dishes/cleaning around/washing my clothes, but I do need a dryer.
- If I'm going to share the house with more people (which let's face I'm going to HAVE to) at least one of these people will have to be a female. I don't care how clean the guy is, I need at least one girl I can talk with/overrule the guy out.
- A clean space, nice roommates, and a room where I can lock myself into whenever I need to get away from it all.

That's it, I know it's a lot to ask, but if I could find something like that I'd be forever happy. Maureen Johnson posted a blog about 'How to move into a dorm' today, I need someone to post a 'How to move into Sheffield' blog.

Yesterday was John Green's bday. If by now you don't know who the guy is, you clearly do not know me at all. He and his books are almost entirely to be blamed for me moving away.

"Francois Rabelais. He was a poet. And his last words were "I go to seek a Great Perhaps." That's why I'm going. So I don't have to wait until I die to start seeking a Great Perhaps."

"Thomas Edison's last words were 'It's very beautiful over there'. I don't know where there is, but I believe it's somewhere, and I hope it's beautiful."

-- John Green, Looking for Alaska.


God, I adore this man.

I started re-reading the Harry Potter series, I want to finish before I go because I won't be able to carry all the books with me, but that might be impossible. I'm off to visit my favorite cousin, we're gonna watch Scott Pilgrim and make very important decisons about her life as well as mine. I'll keep you posted on what we decide.

TTFN.

Sexy: John Green. I really need to stop myself from being attracted to older man, married AND with kids. enough, enough now.
Unsexy: This anxiety that's eating me inside.
Song of the day: place to hide by Mhazz. So appropiate for these times, it's not in youtube, but you can find it on itunes.
"I can say I'm sad to go, but the future's bright, or so I'm told."




On a much sadder note, nerdfighter, brave star, and just awesome person and inspiration, Esther Earl , passed away earlier this morning. I never knew Esther personally but the impact she made in the community, the hope and inspiration she gave to us all, was so big. I watched/read her blogs and despite being ill, she always seemed happy and had a smile on her face, you couldn't help but to like her. As Kristina Horner said, my wand is raised to Esther and her family.

"To the well organized mind, death is but the next great adventure."

Singin songs of love to pass the time

I hadn't blogged in a week, and this week has been so amazing, I can't believe it.
I had spent most of the time complaining about the food and feeling homesick, but then I found some great people who made me have a great time.
Monday and Tuesday, although very informative, were kind of boring in the seminar. On Wednesday we had more activities and interaction which was great, by Thursday we started to realize those were our last days together so we all got pretty emotional and we wanted to see and do everything in the DF but we were in the seminar from 9 to almost 5 or 6 everyday so that left nothing else to do but have dinner together.

I shared a room with 4 other girls who were very sweet, but I did not get to spend much time with them, I met some great people from Colima, GDL and Yucatan who were the ones I spent most of my time with.
This seminar made me get very VERY excited for what's in my future, but also made me get completely terrified, there's just SO much left to do, so many information I recieved and so much money I'll be needing, but at least now I can see that I'm not alone in this, there are going to be a lot of mexicans out there who will probably feel the same way as I do.

I guess what I'm most terrified about is changing a lot. I talked to Moni about this yesterday, all of the people we know who have gone away for a while have changed a lot, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse but they change and we change and our friendships are never the same. I know for a fact I'll continue being friends with her and with Aixchel because we're related and meant to be in each other lives for ever and ever, but I'm worried about my other friends, the ones I feel I'll be leaving behind, because, whether I like it or not, they will be leaving me behind too :(
I WANT this change, I want this adventure, I just hope I don't change so much that we won't have things in common anymore.


Today I went to the mall where the place I used to work is, I couldn't help to feel nostalgic, I spent two years of my life in that place, and even tho I hate to admit it, I'm going to miss it a lot.

All of my partners from the seminar are filling my facebook home page with messages about the seminar and pictures and being depressed about having to leave Mexico city. So I decided to make a list about the things I'll miss the most about the seminar:
- Waking up early/going to sleep late to get in line to shower/iron my hair/use the bathroom
- Having the girl on the bed above mine moving all night XD
- Having cereal/yogurt/watermelon/toast and coffee for breakfast EVERY morning.
- Not getting enough food at lunch.
- Mrs. Valerie (who organized the event) getting mad at us for any little thing and yelling and making a scene then calling herself Führer
- Ale Alejandrooou (from Valerie's team), he was always distracted so she was always yelling at him, but he always ALWAYS had a smile on his face, he won us all :)
- listening to Luis Miguel's song a hell of a lot, it was definitely the soundtrack of the seminar. And now I can't stop singing it.
- looking out my window and seeing the Catedral. :)
- all the wonderful people I met from North&South&East&West of Mexico.


As I said before, this past week was amazing and I will never forget it. The most wonderful thing happened too! Just as I was getting all SAD about leaving everybody and I started feeling lonely/panicking about boarding an airplane again, I saw one of my favorite people in the world! Aixchel was in vacation in Cancun and she was taking the exact same plane as i was taking in Mexico city! Talk about fate, there really is a huge angel watching over me. :D

I have one more month left here at home. HOME, it feels weird to say it, seeing as I'll be leaving it soon.

TTFN



Sexy: The amount of people telling me they miss me, I wish I could hug them all. Oh, and sleeping back in my own bed :)
Unsexy: How incredibly hot it is here in Monterrey, yesterday it was 10pm and we still had 30ªC
Song of the day: Songbird by Oasis, cover by the lovely Psychedelickk

Hello Sunday

I'm sorry this is becoming a "today I did..." type of blog, but there are some things I'd like to remember for a while so, on to that...

On Friday I ditched the other guys and went to the ripleys museum, which was ok but not as good as I expected, right in front of it there was the wax museum which I really liked, this is where I regretted not going with someone else, I really really wanted pictures with a lot of figures there, I also made a wax hand lol. After that I went to El Templo de San Hipolito, it's a catholic church where they, I don't know how to say it, show their respect to St. Jude, the saint of lost and desperate causes, I'm not very religious but since I was little I figured, if I'm going to have someone on my side when I'm praying to God, I want it to be this guy. He has never let me down and my mom believes in him a lot too, so I went and prayed for everything to turn out okay, this is where I felt the most homesick.

Yesterday I went to teotihuacan with a couple of girls from the program, we walked around 4 km just to get to the pyramids, I said I wanted to go up on at least one. We went to the moon pyramid first since it's the most important and mainly because it's the smallest of the two, it was a bitch to climb up bu totally worth it. Then we rested for a while, ate something before facing the big one, the moon pyramid has around 700 steps, I think and first I promised myself I'd at least go up to the first level. I'm not in the best physical condition but I managed to go up, then I just went 'just one level more' on 'we're so close to the top' so after a little while we went all the way up. The view is magnificent and I'm so glad I went, I even saw a girl blogging with her video camera and regretted not thinking about that.

I'm so sore tho, and sunburn, I hadn't seen myself his red in my whole life, I hope it goes away soon, it hurts like hell.

I'm off cause I have to leave this hostal and move to another one and the check in is in less than an hour away. The seminar starts tomorrow and I'm nervous, but hey, only six more days til I get to go home.
Ttfn I hope I can blog again soon


Sexy: sleeping for more than five hours :)
unsexy: sunburns, more aloe Vera before I leave ouch.
Song of the day: mr blue sky by elo. My get happy song.

From the moment I wake...

I haven't been listening to music a lot these days, it's making me sad. :(
today, I went on a tour around Mexico city, I had never been on a double decker bus and I never thought I would get on one here. I feel so naive around these people, they all seem older and more experienced than I am.
Mexico is alright, it just seems ... Smaller than I thought. The independence angel for example, I thought it would be huge but it's actually pretty small. We saw the Spain soccer team taking pictures there, best part of the tour :)


I forgot to say I went to the uk consulate to apply for a visa, it was a whole show I didn't meet the people from the program til this morning and thank god I did, I filled out the forms wrong but they helped me get them right, lucky me printed everything twice. Now I just have to wait for their decision.

Song of the day: mmm... Shiver by Coldplay

I'm aliiiiive!!

So I guess I missed two days of blogging, I knew something like this would happen. BUT I'm typing this now on my iPod so that should make it up for it.

What happened lately? Oh well I signed my resignation, said goodbye to my family and friends and got on a plane to Mexico city. Now I don't think I've shared this before but I have an irrational fear of flying, so it was pretty much a big deal for me to get on a plane by myself. I'm alive, and right now sharing a room with two other girls and I haven't met my teammate yet.

I've had this weird feeling all day of nervousnes and I just know it won't go away until I go out from the uk consulate tomorrow, wish me good luck!


Sexy: sorry to say this but, blackberry cobbler with vanilla bean ice cream. The best dessert I've had in my life, it was made by an old lady I used to work with and hayley's blog reminded me of it, yum.
Unsexy: airlines. I hate them and their planes and delays and employees and everything.
Song of the day: New ground by Blue Skies

I needed to cross an ocean,
I needed to find some time,
sick of being in slow motion,
I'm tired of writing the same lines.

luggage and stuff.

Today I finally went to pay for my plane ticket to Mexico City. As I was handing the guy my credit card I did not want to give it to him, not because I wouldn't trust him or because it was too much money, I'm actually terrified of this trip.

To top that we went to buy luggage for when I go to the UK. Now, we have always had bags, but they were used by my mother/father/sister/me whenever we went out of town, hell if we weren't going to spend a lot of time in another place we even shared one for everybody. I've never had one I could call my own.

My mother told me she would buy me one as a birthday present. Today, I recieved that belated birthday present. I went with the Samsonite XSpace 26", which was bigger (I figured one big bag would be better than a couple of small ones) and more expensive than what I had thought it would be but mother suggested it and I thought the colour was okay.

Obviously with a thing like that they don't "pack" it or put it in a bag, they just put a sticker on it and let you walk out of the store like that. Our car was all the way across the mall and I had to drag that big ass thing around all day. We hadn't even left the store when I was already getting compliments on it, one lady even told me if it were hers, she wouldn't even use it just because it was that beautiful, she was so positive and friendly and optimistic; I hate people like that, the kind of people who randomly start conversations with other people at the mall and decide it's okay telling them what to do with the things that they just bought. Sigh, sorry, stress again.

And now I have my bag right here next to my bed, as a constant reminder that I'm moving to the other side of the world pretty soon. I'm kind of hating it already.



Things I have to do tomorrow*:
- Fill out the applications I printed today.
- Go get my photograph taken for the visa.
- Go shopping, specifically: white shirt, tights and uw. (I know you wanted to know)
- Do the freakin´laundry.
- PACK.
- Say goodbye to my friends who I wont be able to see on Wednesday morning.
- Call my job and see if they want me to go sign my resignation this day seeing as they didn't call me today.


ttfn


Sexy: the Hello Kitty tee I'm wearing. I'm not even a big HK fan, but it says "I don't know why you say good bye when I say hello" Beatles<333
Unsexy: Gastritis. I wouldnt click it if I were you.
Song of the day: Break your little heart by All Time Low. But I recently wanted THIS acoustic cover by Lex Croucher who has made me fall in love with her version.

I’m gonna break your little heart
Watch you take the fall
Laughing all the way to the hospital
‘cause there’s nothing surgery can do
When I break your little heart in two

BEDA

Blog every day in August? here we go.

So what did I do today? I went to Las Grutas de Garcia with my father, which are some caves inside one of our mountains. I believe I had been there onlyonce before in my whole life and we're like 25 min away from it, father had never been there. I had a blast, I think he had fun too. Neither of us are outdoor people, and after the first climb he was ready to give up, but I encouraged him to keep going, we walked and walked and finished exhausted but these are the kind of things I will look back and remember I did with him. He truly is the best father in the whole world cause no one else would follow me in my crazy adventures, no questions asked, no complaining.

I went there because I needed some pictures for this presentation I'm making, from my home state. I think it's coming out okay, if I can I will post it here once we're done with everything.

Things that I have to do tomorrow:
- Call old job and go sign my resignation.
- Get my old uniforms ready to give back to my old job.
- Upload grades from my last two courses.
- Buy tickets to Mexico City, since I'm leaving on wednesday.
- Scan a picture, and send it to the SEP.
- Print my visa application and gather all the documents I need.
- Print board game I made and put it together.
- Take a shower.
- BEDA.


God, I'm gonna be busy.

Blog every day in August?

I must be insane.






Sexy: Tyler Oakley.
Unsexy: Sweat, heat, gross.
Song of the day: Leon by Kinky.

Toma bien mi mano,
brinca para aca,
escapemos de las garras de esta gran ciudad,
busca tu refugio en mi paladar,
un mundo sin ti es una fiera sin domar.