never a dull moment

This week never really had a chance to get off the ground. Anna was here last weekend, so I was cranky going into Monday, and then the Monday through Wednesday shenanigans went down. I did actually teach on Thursday, but then on Friday, I noticed Marcela wasn't in the teachers' lounge before my one class (B). No one had seen her, so I figured maybe she was sick and hadn't told me. When the period started I stopped by B's classroom (remember, except for me, the kids stay in their classroom and the teachers move around) and...it was deserted. The chairs were up on the tables, no signs of life. I thought they might be on some kind of field trip or something, which would be weird, but whatever. I went to the inspector's office.

"Liliana, where's primero B?"

She looks at the schedule. "They're with Marcela."

"No, they're not. The classroom's empty, and no one's seen Marcela today."

"Oh. They must have left, then."

Friday's B is always a little antsy, because English is their last class. So, lacking Marcela, they just bailed for the day.

See what I mean about routines being difficult here?

I had the usual one person for English Workshop, and then I headed over to Vina to meet Steve, Allison, Corrie and Brandy for a bit. I went with Corrie to help her buy a new laptop, and back at Starbucks the others had made friends with an American girl and her Chilean professional magician boyfriend, who was doing really excellent close-up card tricks. And then. THEN.

I finally found a capoeira class, where people actually show up and it doesn't happen way up in the hills on the other end of town. It was awesome. It's so much fun.

Now, I find its martial value...questionable.

This is just the best of several YouTube videos along those lines. It's not hard for me to see brutally effective aikido responses to capoeira movements. But physical conflict doesn't seem to be the point with capoeira: it's more about connection, rhythm, movement, and community. The movements are familiar, because similar things have crept into my aikido falls over the past few years as I've gotten stronger and more flexible.

I'm sore and satisfied enough today that I bailed on going to Santiago to do aikido. Yay.