Written by Anne Gayley Gabbert

I am Ana (or Anne), the English teacher at Otoch Paal Community Montessori School in Akumal, Mexico. Akumal is in the state of Quintana Roo on the Yucatan peninsula. We are 62 miles from the city of Cancun, one mile from the Caribbean Sea, and almost 1,500 miles due south of Naperville and Chicago! Check on the map — you’ll see!

There are 85 children at our school and we all enjoy the wonderful warm weather here the whole year round. Many of the families in this area of Mexico are also of Mayan descent, and so are some of our children at school. The Mayan language is different from Spanish so when I am teaching the children English, for some of them it is actually the third language they are learning! It is believed that the Mayan language has been spoken for almost 5,000 years.

We live in a beautiful place and many people from all over the world come to visit. A lot of the parents of students in our school work in hotels or resorts, and sometimes we go on field trips to practice our table manners and learn how to eat in restaurants in our fancy clothes. Here is a picture of all of us in our traditional Yucatecan dresses and outfits for a “Desayuno Elegante” (elegant breakfast).

In the Mayan language, Akumal means “Place of the Turtle.” This section of the Caribbean Sea is a turtle sanctuary, which means they are protected and safe here. The sea turtle nesting season starts in May, and it will go on until October.  We will all be very careful as we walk on the beaches to make sure NOT to disturb the nests! Last year 40,000 turtle hatchlings were protected and released from more than 400 nests that were discovered on the beaches of Akumal.  This is a young turtle swimming in Akumal Bay. Sea turtles can live for 80 years or more!

This is what a nido de tortuga (turtle nest) looks like after it has hatched. Can you see the pieces of shell on the sand around the hole? The mother turtle spends about 2 hours making her nest and burying her eggs … usually there are at least 100 eggs in a nest! The eggs take about 60 days to hatch.

Also close to our pueblo (town in Spanish) of Akumal is a place called Tulum. There are many Mayan ruins all over the Yucatan peninsula, but Tulum is the closest to us and the only one that overlooks the ocean. These buildings are more than 800 years old!

In Mexico we celebrate Dia del Niño (Children’s Day) on April 30. We had a pool party in the school yard and had a big picnic. We ate tamales, empanadas, sopa fria (pasta salad), flan, and pastel (cake). We drank jugo de Jamaica (hibiscus flower juice) and horchata (a milky drink made with rice, cinnamon, and vanilla); both very popular drinks in Mexico. Here we are playing and cooling off in the water.   It was HOT!

The Monarch butterfly migration that you learned about does not come through our part of Mexico, but we have many beautiful varieties of butterflies and moths here since we live between the ocean and the jungle.

We LOVE butterflies! It was one of our favorite things to learn about this year, and we will be doing an English presentation about butterflies to our parents on May 18^th.  The word for butterfly in Spanish is mariposa. Here is Emilio waiting to eat the butterfly snacks that we made — with apples, carrot sticks, raisins, and peanut butter. YUM!

We also LOVE to read books! We read lots of stories in English class and like to hear about different places in the world. We hope to hear more about where you all live! We look forward to hearing from you soon!

Love,

Ana and the children of Otoch Paal