A star is born

This is 'The Barrancas', which literally translates to ravine. It's a mountainous area near Guadalajara.

So, a couple of nights ago I was walking to dinner with a friend when a couple of guys approached us with a camera. I immediately thought, oh what fresh hell is this, because if someone approaches you with a camera, guaranteed you're going to be asked to act or model. I can do neither. They said they needed a "couple" to act in their short film for a school project. We just had to go to a bar across the road and shoot a couple of scenes. Now, normally this is something I would absolutely say no to. I cannot act and although this theory has not been tested very much, if ever, I can imagine that I am quite wooden in front of a camera. However, as the saying goes, when in Mexico, star in a short film. The first thing I asked them if if it was a speaking part (no it was not), all I had to do was sit at the bar, pretend to be hit on by a guy who wasn't my boyfriend, boyfriend in said film gets angry, hits the guy who 'hit' on me and ta dah (I think that was the general gist of the plot)... I think my first Oscar nomination is in the bag. We also got a free beer but I'm expecting royalties when it blows up. I asked the people who filmed it for their number so when it is cut together (not really sure on the correct film techno lingo), get your popcorn ready (depending on how great my acting is, but lets be honest, I'm a Meryl Streep in the making).

You descend for about 2 hours. As we were going down, the people who had already gone down were coming back up covered in sweat and panting. I can't decide whether the descent or the ascent was the hardest bit. 

This is where you're trying to reach. A red bridge. Is it worth it? Hmmm, yeah but maybe for the views and not the bridge. However, I did learn it was either the first or second bridge built in America.

The weirdest thing for me in this whole exchange is when the guy approached us and was explaining to my friend what he wanted us to do, I could understand everything that he was saying. I've been in Mexico for a while now and it never fails to amaze me how weird the feeling is when you begin to understand a foreign language, especially because when I arrived I could barely say 'hello'. I'm not suggesting I'm anywhere near fluent but... I've begun to understand adverts on the radio and when I walk past people on the street having conversations, it's no longer an incoherent babble.

However, there are still many things I am struggling to master, and one thing that is being particularly evasive is the damn 'r's'. The have two ways to say 'r', one is the rolled 'r' and the other is a kind of trill; not a complete roll of the tongue but almost and for the life of me, my mouth just does not want to make the sound. I feel the English 'r' is a lot softer and the tongue tends to lie flat on the base of your mouth whereas in Spanish, the tongue is a lot more active. A much more expressive tongue if you will, some may even go as far to say passionate. And alas, I'm not sure if my tongue is ever going to be that passionate.