Dia de Independencia

This past Wednesday we celebrated Mexico's Independence Day. 

Here is the pinata that I made...

It took me 3 hours to make and my shoulders were aching when I was done. I was a little sad to see it torn apart later on. It should've been hung as a decoration only! :) :)

We had to go to market early on Wednesday morning to buy food and things for the party that night. 

This is lard. It looks totally gross but actually we do buy it and use it to make tamales. 

(Should I really be admitting this?? No one's going to want to visit us ever again. ;)

Mmmm! I love lard. Ha!

After we got done shopping and getting everything we needed we went to our favorite place to eat at in the market and got gorditas and quesadillas. A gordita is basically a thick tortilla with salsa, onion and crumbly cheese on it. A quesadilla is kind of the same thing, but folded in half and it has more stuff in it like mushrooms, string cheese, pumpkin flowers (flor de calabasa), and fried lard. (Umm, really it is chicharron, but I don't know what that is in English and this is what my translator said it is. Fried lard. Pig skins? I don't know...but it's crunchy).

Then we had to go to the papeleria (mini Staples down the street from our house) to pick up some tape. The lady that usually helps us was on the phone so her son came around in front of the counter and asked us, "How can I help you?" It was so cute!! I told him I needed some tape so he went around and opened a drawer and pulled out two different kinds for me to pick from. Look at this tiny little guy!! He's a good little worker :)

When we got home we started decorating right away. Nicole finished up her pinata (which we ended up using as a basketball) and I blew up balloons. Over 100 balloons. My cheeks and jaw were so sore the next day.

Here is Juan Carlos and Nicole watching the guys play basketball.

Nicole, Veronica, Maribel, and Alicia

Me and Anahi

Best dressed!! Sarai!!

The game of the night: Try and throw confetti in someone mouth when they open it to laugh. 

No one ever got me, but I did get covered in confetti and flour :)

Here we are, the young people

More young people...

El Pastor serving himself some arroz con leche, which is hot milk with rice in it. 

We eat this all the time for breakfast. It's one of our favorite things to have with tamales.

There was a ton of food!!

Here I am with one of my favorite things in the world. Fireworks!!

Speaking of which...today I got convicted by a Smokey Bear commercial on the radio. 

I kind of have this "thing" for explosions and fire...but today I was told to "get my Smokey on"!!

It's a good thing I don't live in California, I would probably go to jail for accidentally starting a wild fire :(

But anyways, when we were at the market I totally LOADED UP on all kinds of "bombs"/fireworks. 

Now these aren't your typical pretty little things you see in the sky on the Fourth of July in the U.S. 

Mexican fireworks are LOUD and they make a HUGE mess with all the newspaper they are wrapped up in. 

Here is El Pastor lighting one.

This one was one of the few pretty ones. (I did not buy this one by the way. To me if it's gonna sparkle, it's probably not going to be fun...as in mind-numbingly loud or scary).

Here is Mom doing the candy rain and Miguel getting mi pobre pinata ready to be destroyed.

Trying to catch some candy...

Miguel and my pinata

El Pastor

Daniela killing it!

Little Judah

Oooh! Here's where it gets FUN! 

After the party was over El Pastor took a bunch of us young people down town to El Zocalo, which is the center of town. This is where they do "El Grito". The governor goes up into the balcony of the Governor's Mansion and yells "Viva La Virgen de Guadalupe, Hidalgo, Morelos, los niños heroes, etc..." And the people repeat after him. 

At the end he yells, "Viva Mexico!!" 

And the crowd yells back, "VIVA MEXICO!!!!!!" (Long live Mexico!)

It is quite the experience. If you are lucky you'll get eggs smashed on your head or sprayed with foam. 

We all went downtown to see this. Nicole and I love to pretend we are Mexicans. We were just as enthusiastic doing "El Grito" as everyone else. 

We arrived right as they were starting. We were all running down the street towards the huge crowd repeating after the governor, yelling, "Viva Hidalgo, Viva Morelos!" 

It was all decorated so nicely!

When we got to the crowd, it was absolutely packed with people, but we wanted to make it to the center so we could get a good view of what was going on. 

This is Nicole smashed between people.
This really was a scary experience. For a little while there I got a little bit panic-y. I absolutely could imagine what it would be like to be trampled to death. No joke. 

My two prevailing thoughts were "I have got to get out of here ASAP!!" and "I should just get out my phone right now and call all of my closest friends and family to tell them I love them and say goodbye."

I've NEVER seen so many people in all my life. 

Wouldn't it have been so cool to just start having church while all these people were right there? 

I'd feel like I was in Ethiopia or somethin'!

Nicole and I getting smooshed to death in the crowd. 

I KNOW it looks like we're having a blast...

It's because we were!!! Haha :)

There are 2 very important talents that you need to acquire if you are going to live in Mexico for any amount of time, or if you happen to be like us, pretending that you are one of them.
The first talent is called "PUSHING" and the second one is called "Being stubborn and not letting anyone get by".  

I don't want to brag, but I have to say, I am very good at this. I was the leader in our group. So I was the head pusher and shover. Let me just show you how good I am:

This is where we started out:

And we got closer...

..and closer...

...until we got right up in front!! 

We got lots of dirty looks, but I felt like I deserved a trophy by the end of the night. :)

Here are the guys trying to get a better look at what was going happening.

But after all that hard work of being rude and practically shoving people into the ground, the concert REALLY got started and the skimpy dressed dancers came out with their worldly music. Bummer. 

So we got out of there. More pushing and shoving, but this time with no destination. It's not as fun. 

Later on, we went to the back streets and walked through the market that had been set up for the occasion. 

There was every kind of Mexican food imaginable, artwork being sold, games, and lots and lots of people.

Feliz Dia de Independencia, Mexico!!