Intro to Panama

I arrived in Panama on Monday early evening after a pretty uneventful flight. I want to once again thank my wonderful brother for my 1st class treatment on the way here.  It was a great start to my trip. As I got off the plane, I was hit by the wave of humidity... yes there was rain too. I also decided in that moment that I would be embracing my curls for the next week.

Today was a great day of seeing the whole area of Panama City and surroundings. I saw downtown, Avenue Balboa, the Causeway, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, the CANAL and more. Jutty and Bill were great guides and we had lunch at the Miraflores Locks... no ships coming through there, but we did see some going through Pedro Miguel locks as we went up to see their house out of the city. The whole area that used to be occupied by US troops still looks like barracks building, but they are being used for all sorts of interesting things.

Photos to come tomorrow which will be a day to do some shopping. :) It will be so hard to choose a couple of Molas. Tomorrow night I will be staying in Gamboa (rainforest) and then on Thursday taking a tour of the flora and fauna by boat and by aerial tram of the canopy. Friday the plan is for me to take a boat to nearby Isla Taboga (Island of Flowers) for a relaxing day exploring on on the beach.

Halloween

As of yesterday afternoon, I was going to school for today's Halloween celebration dressed as a yoga instructor with my mat and all. But then everything changed. My roommate Claudia and I went to a local costume shop which turned out to be a bit different from what we expected. Everything was folded in plastic bags behind the counter and having no real idea what to ask for we stood around for a bit peering at names on the bags. After a bit, we asked the sales lady what else they might have for adult women besides superheroes which were not school appropriate costumes. After she went to look, we came home with a smurf (los pitufos) for Claudia and a bunny rabbit for me. My other roommate Adam went as a lumberjack with his "axe" and all.

There was a costume parade at school today as well. Some very interesting costumes were there. A group of girls dressed as the 7 dwarfs, but the winners were 3 students dressed as the Yip yips from Sesame Street.

Everyone have a Happy Halloween weekend. Get ready for Dia del Muerte photos next week.

Late addition from last nights party... my roommates (Adam and Claudia) Paul Bunyan and his blue Babe

Back in Mexcio

Back in Mexico.  I arrived yesterday and began the big job of unpacking my room. All my things were in my closet plus the bags I brought with me. My bathroom is in pretty good shape except for needing some drawers and such to help organize it. My bedroom needs a lot of work still including some more furniture to put out stuff on. :)

This morning, Adam (my roommate) and I came to the school and have been here in meetings. Tomorrow will be more of the same. Have lots of work to do so time to jump in.

ISTE11 Top 6

So the last days have been filled with meeting lots of people... some new and some I already knew digitally (via Twitter and blogs), posters, presentations, discussions and the like.

These are my 6 highlights so far:

#6 - Walking around the exhibition hall and seeing presentations from many vendors including Google, Adobe, Livescribe and more.

#5 - Volunteering at an ASK ME station on Sunday afternoon. After I finished I knew my way around this huge Philadelphia Convention Center.

#4 - Attending sessions of all kinds, from ISTE Unplugged, Poster sessions, Google Educators talking about Google Apps for education, international initiatives of ISTE, Music and Tech (great presentation by people I follow on Twitter - lots of good ideas even for non music people), Learning Tools Family Feud (all the stuff was crowdsourced ahead of time - so cool).

#3 - Doing #edchat live from the Newbie Lounge. It was cool to meet the #edchat moderators and be sitting next to people while tweeting them... though also a bit odd. It was nice to throw in some verbal conversation in between tweets too.

#2 - Winning a FLIP by playing Reflex math game with Explorelearning once in the morning and then being in the top 5 at the end of the day to compete... and then win the FLIP. I also won a free 3 month trial of the software to use with my class in the fall.

#1 - Meeting people and having impromtu discussions is the best part of being at ISTE. Continuing the discussions over lunch and dinner.

Knit in Public Week

So from June 11 to 19th is World Wide Knit in Public Week and it just so happened that our group here in Mexico City was meeting last Sunday June 12th. Most of us were crocheting, but we meet at a coffee shop or the like once a month to hang out and knit/crochet. 


Here are a few photos from our outing.

Summer Reading Challenge 2011

So from Sharon's Garden of Book Reviews I was turned on to this BookSparks Summer Reading Challenge 2011. (Thanks!)  This is a really cool summer book club for adults... kinda like the Scholastic project for kids. There are even prizes and such along the way.

I would love to keep up by reading a book a week, but since they say you can read just 1 or as many as you like, I will do the best I can. My 2 limitations are: as I live in Mexico City and it will not be easy to get all the books unless I decide to break my Kindle budget and time due to end of year writing exams, grading  final projects and grading exams.

Was able to buy week 3: The Last Letter by Kathleen Shoop, week 4: Here, Home, Hope by Kaira Rouda and week 9: The D Word by Liz Fenton & Lisa Steinke books for my Kindle without spending too much. :) Most others are available on the Kindle but at $9.99 or $12.99 each will break my book budget soon. Hoping can get some from the library when I hit the US in a few weeks for summer vaca. Might have to bite the bullet for week 1. Hmmmmmmm.

Anyone want to join me?

Back in the 30 Day Shred saddle

Sorry I have been absent for so long. Had some news to deal with and then a fab visit from my brother. All of which took me away from writing here.

Today I woke up too late to make it to my yoga class, but decided it was time again to let Jillian whip my butt for a while. So I got dressed and did Level 1 30 Day Shred workout this morning. It felt great as I did not feel like I was going to die like the first time I embarked on this workout. All the walking/running on the treadmill (I did make it to week 3 of couch to 5k) and yoga have definitely made me stronger. I am excited to make this 30 day pledge again.

For me I will pledge to either do a Jillian workout or take a 90 minute yoga class every day for the next 29 days. The end of the school year is always a stressful time with exams to write and grade and grades to finish and last teaching to complete and family day and a million other end of year obligations plus apartment hunting (new Mexico City digs) and moving. This is my pledge to take care of myself despite all this and to keep my stress level a bit more under control.

Here I go!!!!