the travel bug

(monday, february 9th, 2009)
today i had my first female student. i met with her in the afternoon at the same company where i've been teaching. she's the HR director of latin american. she was so much fun to talk to. we talked about all the differences of corporate america vs. corporate latin america.

she met me at the front door and she walked me through the office to the break-room to get us coffee. the floor is made up of mostly IT staff, which happens to be all male. when we walked through the cube farm (mass of open cubicles) she made the comment on how all the men blatantly stared. she said "did you see how they all looked at you" and I responded in a very non cocky way "isn't that normal".....meaning that latin men have no trouble at all hiding the fact that they look at women. i was also the new girl on the floor, of course they were curious to see who i was, attractive or not. she said this would never happen in the u.s....and i agreed. men will look at you in the states, but they're discreate; they keep it on the dl (down low).

we also talked about how people from the states will beat around the bush when tring to tell you something unpleasant where latin americans will just tell you. also americans are very professional / stiff / politically correct at their jobs where latin americans are passionate, loud and animated when speaking. she said she feels like she had to 'tone it down' when she travels to the states.

mid-day i went for a cappuccino at a near by cafe and the cafe really messed it up. i told the waitress that she accidentally gave me a hot chocolate, not a cappuccino. she said they put chocolate in it, so she added more coffee. umph. it was terrible and a waist of 13 pesos, but i did get to read some spanish magazines.

in the evening i went to a friends house where we made the rest of the empanada mix!!! yeah! now i just have some left over crab and chicken to make. i had a very nice evening. they have the same traveling bug as i do. it makes me happy to think that i could continue to live my life without ridding myself of the travel bug.