well i'm back at the homestead for a month. a month can be a long time. i hope this one is long.
Christmas time has always been one of my favorite times of year, if not my favorite. i love the way the decorations look and the beauty of new snow. i love the candles and the smells of christmas cookies and evergreen and the fire burning in the fire place. i like the excitement surrounding the day and the way everyone puts in some extra effort to get along. i like the music and giving gifts. but the thought occured to me that perhaps i like the christmas season so much because it is so distinctive from the rest of the year. it has so many of its own traditions and it's own unique excitement. I know it's not wonderful to everyone and it stresses a lot of people out, but I certainly enjoy the predictable change of christmas time.
then of course there is the far more important aspect of christmas- the reason for the season Himself- who we should always keep in focus, especially this time of year. I really like advent because it reminds us that we are not just waiting and preparing for Christmas morning when we remember how Jesus arrived as a baby but also we are waiting and preparing for when Christ comes again. Advent does a good job of putting the incarnation in context. The incarnation itself is rather mind-boggling. God, the supreme being of the universe, completely good and perfect, taking on the form of a man, even a baby. He obviously got to pick at what time and in what place he wanted to arrive- He chose in an over-crowded small city, in a stable amongst the livestock, to a girl who had gotten pregnant out of wedlock. He knew Jesus would grow up poor, and probably the object of some speculation if people in His small town of Nazareth knew about his bastard status. All of this I like to think about during advent. I like to think of how our God humbled himself to this extent so that He could show God's love to us. Christmas is not just about a star, some shepherds, and a manger. It's about God breaking through to us in human flesh so we could know him.
I always think it's cheesy when people say "Jesus is the best present you can get for Christmas" because really there would be no Christmas without him and kids don't really feel like Jesus is much of a present since you can't hold him in your hands or put him in the playstation. Still I do think the sentiment is right, that Jesus is the gift of God to an undeserving world. do we earn our Christmas presents from our parents? I know I never did. I'm pretty sure that even if I was bad they still would have gotten me something. God took it a lot further by dieing for us while we were still undeserving and offensive. There really is no point in Christmas without Good Friday, and no point having Good Friday without Easter. I appreciate the plan and process of it all. It started so long ago- it was the hope of Israel and because of God's goodness and generosity, it became the hope of the gentiles as well. so as we approach Christmas, I hope we can keep Christ in his rightful place at the center. It's always a challenge for me because the other good things are so distracting. Especially this year as I get ready to leave (I feel like I just got back!).
I have a feeling these next 4 weeks of nothing will be very busy. I always manage to make my empty schedule full. If nothing else, I will definitely enjoy friends and family and read some good books.
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Monday, December 10, 2007
a little procrastination
so I should be going over some macroeconomics slides right now but i haven't yet worked up enough motivation. It's finals week and I can't believe how quickly this semester went by. Definitely the fastest yet. Anyway, in a few days i'll be done and i'll get to think about Christmas for a week. then i'll pack and get coffee with a bunch of people, spend as much time with stephen as his schedule allows, make a few bucks doing economics research, and fly off to sweden. it hardly seems real.
right now all i can think about are Peru's economic development policies from 1990 to 2000. i tried to study for econometrics this afternoon but it didn't feel very important. none of my exams really deserve much study time, at least that's how I feel at this point. i'm sick of doing work just like the rest of the student body. wouldn't it be nice if they could just teach us without any testing, sort of a 'get what you want for your tuition' sort of deal? unfortunately that would prohibit them from giving us degrees and i'm guessing that's what most people are here for. so economically, it would not be a good idea for the university, though I would enjoy it.
here are some preliminary thoughts on my trip to sweden which i will someday look back on to compare to my actual experiences. I expect it to be expensive but I really hope I can get over that and not be overly frugal so that I don't miss out on too many once-in-a-lifetime experiences. this is probably the only point in my life that i can afford to deplete my savings on european adventures so why not? the more i think about grad school, the more i think i won't go straight into it.
i will probably be pretty lonely at times. i know some alone time will do me good though I'm not sure how i'll react to being away so long (2 months more than I was in Peru). I'd like to do a lot of reading- more classics and some philosophy perhaps. i'm hoping that swedes sit in cafes and read. in peru it wasn't common at all. if I get homesick I suppose I can wonder around in IKEA or H&M. Too bad the exchange rate these days is pretty poor.
Exchange rates, interest rates, wage rates- all things I should be studying at this moment. It really is true that economics relates to almost every aspect of life. I can't help but look at life in terms of supply and demand, the free rider problem, and diminishing returns. I often wonder how I viewed the world before everything fell into rather neat economic graphs. Note to self: take an econometrics grad course next year.
Okay well perhaps I'll get back to work. Sweden still seems like an abstraction most of the time and the workload sitting on my shoulders prohibits me from ignoring the here and now. it doesn't really feel like Christmas time.
right now all i can think about are Peru's economic development policies from 1990 to 2000. i tried to study for econometrics this afternoon but it didn't feel very important. none of my exams really deserve much study time, at least that's how I feel at this point. i'm sick of doing work just like the rest of the student body. wouldn't it be nice if they could just teach us without any testing, sort of a 'get what you want for your tuition' sort of deal? unfortunately that would prohibit them from giving us degrees and i'm guessing that's what most people are here for. so economically, it would not be a good idea for the university, though I would enjoy it.
here are some preliminary thoughts on my trip to sweden which i will someday look back on to compare to my actual experiences. I expect it to be expensive but I really hope I can get over that and not be overly frugal so that I don't miss out on too many once-in-a-lifetime experiences. this is probably the only point in my life that i can afford to deplete my savings on european adventures so why not? the more i think about grad school, the more i think i won't go straight into it.
i will probably be pretty lonely at times. i know some alone time will do me good though I'm not sure how i'll react to being away so long (2 months more than I was in Peru). I'd like to do a lot of reading- more classics and some philosophy perhaps. i'm hoping that swedes sit in cafes and read. in peru it wasn't common at all. if I get homesick I suppose I can wonder around in IKEA or H&M. Too bad the exchange rate these days is pretty poor.
Exchange rates, interest rates, wage rates- all things I should be studying at this moment. It really is true that economics relates to almost every aspect of life. I can't help but look at life in terms of supply and demand, the free rider problem, and diminishing returns. I often wonder how I viewed the world before everything fell into rather neat economic graphs. Note to self: take an econometrics grad course next year.
Okay well perhaps I'll get back to work. Sweden still seems like an abstraction most of the time and the workload sitting on my shoulders prohibits me from ignoring the here and now. it doesn't really feel like Christmas time.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
turnips and meat stuffing
change always surprises me. thanksgiving snuck up on me this year and as with anything that lacks a long excitement-filled count down period, it passed almost like any other day. don't get me wrong, it was nice to sit around with my family and catch up, but mostly it just reinforced my feeling that everything around me is changing at an ever accelerating pace as I continue to age. Sometimes I feel like the world should just stand still, in time and pose, while I get older and figure everything out. "little" michael, as we continue to call him, wasn't around this year because he joined the air force and is down in Florida training. my brother owns a condo now and when asked what he wants for Christmas, he said decorations for his house. tim and chris are both renting houses and dan will probably move in with chris after he graduates. my sis and tory are applying to college. Are my memories just so vivid? why does it feel like it was just yesterday that we were crawling around in Nana's family room pretending to be zoo animals or serving fake food to all the grown ups from our restaurant?
I still feel like my own life is like the marble I used to drop into the funnel of the marble works; it starts off going slowly around the wide rim of the funnel and gets faster and faster as it spins towards the bottom. again, the change is good, really good. it's just surprising. i keep making decisions that are keeping me on track (for what, i don't know exactly) or perhaps I'm not making decisions consciously so much as going along with what comes. Doing research is a good example. I asked one of my econ professors if she knew of any internships related to econ that I could look into for the summer. she told me she knew the director of the research center at uconn was looking for workers at the moment, sent me to him with a great recommendation, and the next thing I know I'm learning all about connecticut's healthcare system and contacting doctors' and dentists' associations and tracking down data sources. It all just sort of happened.
Sweden seems less real to me than my past trips. brazil, mexico, spain, peru- all were embarked on with the main purpose of serving God. Sweden is for study abroad, for me to travel and "see the world". It almost feels selfish, and perhaps that is why it still seems so abstract. it's also longer. really i get a little freaked out just thinking about it. i know i'll enjoy it but that it will also be hard. i also know that every time I come home, home tastes that much sweeter. when i arrived home from peru, i asked myself why i'm always in such a rush to leave. if this spring semester wasn't the best time, school speaking, to study abroad, i would've seriously considered pushing it back a little further because I've so enjoyed being home these last few months.
i think the change outside me just feels that much bigger because the change in my life seems so big. change used to be gradual. the story might vary a little from time to time, but it always had the same characters and same basic plot. now it has new characters (whom i am very thankful for) and new story lines, and the protagonist keeps running off to a new setting every few months. it is good that everyone else's worlds are changing and growing too- just hard to take it all in sometimes.
we still have turnips and meat stuffing every thanksgiving because my grandpa liked them. he died when i was seven. i can understand why nana still wants to have them tho (aside from the fact that a few of us have developed a taste for them), amidst the change in life, it's nice to keep some little things constant- i think it's calming to the human soul.
I still feel like my own life is like the marble I used to drop into the funnel of the marble works; it starts off going slowly around the wide rim of the funnel and gets faster and faster as it spins towards the bottom. again, the change is good, really good. it's just surprising. i keep making decisions that are keeping me on track (for what, i don't know exactly) or perhaps I'm not making decisions consciously so much as going along with what comes. Doing research is a good example. I asked one of my econ professors if she knew of any internships related to econ that I could look into for the summer. she told me she knew the director of the research center at uconn was looking for workers at the moment, sent me to him with a great recommendation, and the next thing I know I'm learning all about connecticut's healthcare system and contacting doctors' and dentists' associations and tracking down data sources. It all just sort of happened.
Sweden seems less real to me than my past trips. brazil, mexico, spain, peru- all were embarked on with the main purpose of serving God. Sweden is for study abroad, for me to travel and "see the world". It almost feels selfish, and perhaps that is why it still seems so abstract. it's also longer. really i get a little freaked out just thinking about it. i know i'll enjoy it but that it will also be hard. i also know that every time I come home, home tastes that much sweeter. when i arrived home from peru, i asked myself why i'm always in such a rush to leave. if this spring semester wasn't the best time, school speaking, to study abroad, i would've seriously considered pushing it back a little further because I've so enjoyed being home these last few months.
i think the change outside me just feels that much bigger because the change in my life seems so big. change used to be gradual. the story might vary a little from time to time, but it always had the same characters and same basic plot. now it has new characters (whom i am very thankful for) and new story lines, and the protagonist keeps running off to a new setting every few months. it is good that everyone else's worlds are changing and growing too- just hard to take it all in sometimes.
we still have turnips and meat stuffing every thanksgiving because my grandpa liked them. he died when i was seven. i can understand why nana still wants to have them tho (aside from the fact that a few of us have developed a taste for them), amidst the change in life, it's nice to keep some little things constant- i think it's calming to the human soul.
Friday, October 26, 2007
Friday, October 19, 2007
note to self: reduce stress
today i had a killer migraine. woke up with a headache at 9 and it was a migraine by 10:30. luckily I had already planned to skip my 12:00 class. I tried to be productive while laying in bed for a bit (I got this new job doing economics research! really exciting but challenging) but my brain just doesn't function with that level of pain. Just thinking about it brings me back to this summer, one night when I had a horrible migraine and was laying in Gringolandia (the intern room) under the desk with all the lights off between classes. When my class started at 7:15 I smiled and taught, and while my students did group work I went to the bathroom to throw up.
well the fire alarm just went off and I stood outside in the misty night for a while. i'm so glad i wasn't in great pain then like i was the rest of the day. i guess that's a blessing, but this whole day feels like it can be put in the category of "pain management". to someone who spends her life calculating opportunity cost, the fact that i had so much to do today just added to my physical pain.
lessons i should (and hopefully will) take from today and other days like it: think big picture, remember that history and econometrics exams do not validate me, and find ways to reduce stress. remember to breathe. find time for things i like and care about even at the expense of school work.
while trying to get my mind off the pain today i watched 'goodnight and goodluck' about television during the red scare. i appreciate a very ideological movie like that every now and then. the media can be a tool for good but so often sticks to what sells to an entertainment-seeking public. i don't blame them for trying to make money. its just hard for your average citizen to sort through the masses of information out there to know what's going on and what matters. I am often overwhelmed by the magnitude of information out there, so much of which I have a craving to know and understand, but even if I didn't take classes or work and just spent all day soaking up current events and good literature, I wouldn't begin to grasp even 1% of what there is to know (just about topics i find interesting!) No wonder our society is so cliquish- people have to specialize to know anything these days, but at the exclusion of knowing about a wide breadth of topics. I may just have to give up on being 'well-rounded' one of these days. Perhaps I already have.
well the fire alarm just went off and I stood outside in the misty night for a while. i'm so glad i wasn't in great pain then like i was the rest of the day. i guess that's a blessing, but this whole day feels like it can be put in the category of "pain management". to someone who spends her life calculating opportunity cost, the fact that i had so much to do today just added to my physical pain.
lessons i should (and hopefully will) take from today and other days like it: think big picture, remember that history and econometrics exams do not validate me, and find ways to reduce stress. remember to breathe. find time for things i like and care about even at the expense of school work.
while trying to get my mind off the pain today i watched 'goodnight and goodluck' about television during the red scare. i appreciate a very ideological movie like that every now and then. the media can be a tool for good but so often sticks to what sells to an entertainment-seeking public. i don't blame them for trying to make money. its just hard for your average citizen to sort through the masses of information out there to know what's going on and what matters. I am often overwhelmed by the magnitude of information out there, so much of which I have a craving to know and understand, but even if I didn't take classes or work and just spent all day soaking up current events and good literature, I wouldn't begin to grasp even 1% of what there is to know (just about topics i find interesting!) No wonder our society is so cliquish- people have to specialize to know anything these days, but at the exclusion of knowing about a wide breadth of topics. I may just have to give up on being 'well-rounded' one of these days. Perhaps I already have.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
change
if i saw my current life walking down the street two years ago, there is no chance i would have recognized myself. that to say that i'm so glad God is sovereign and that he sees how all the pieces fit because i certainly don't. i feel like i spend so many of my days being pleasantly surprised by the little twists and turns my life is taking, which is doing a lot to strengthen my belief in God's goodness. all this is very vague but we can chat it up if you want specifics. i just felt like I had to capture for myself my overriding mood of this last month and a half which has been "pleasantly surprised". When I finally stopped trying so hard, good things just walked up to me and said "hello". Despite all my busyness, which never seems to go away, in my utmost I feel more restful and at peace than I have in years. If only I could remember that when my overanalyzing mind decides to ponder the future- that undefined set of possibilities.
Time is both racing and strolling along on a beautiful fall day. My life with Stephen is already so completely different than it was without him; that was less than two months ago. I suppose I should just learn the lesson God is teaching me and trust him and the plans he has for me, despite all the unknowns. What was a bit of "running away" to Sweden is definitely no longer serving the same purpose, but hopefully God has a place for those 5 long months of cold and darkness in his master plan.
Time is both racing and strolling along on a beautiful fall day. My life with Stephen is already so completely different than it was without him; that was less than two months ago. I suppose I should just learn the lesson God is teaching me and trust him and the plans he has for me, despite all the unknowns. What was a bit of "running away" to Sweden is definitely no longer serving the same purpose, but hopefully God has a place for those 5 long months of cold and darkness in his master plan.
Sunday, August 26, 2007
weird to be home
It's weird that blogger is in English now, that everyone speaks English, that I blend in with the crowd, that the furniture is moved in my room and what was my brother's room is now the guest room. It's weird that everything is the same but not, that I am the same girl who left her stuff sprawled around the house before I left but I am not that same girl. I've only been in the states for about 12 hours now (if you count my time in the Atlanta airport), so hopefully this weird "I feel like this isn't real" feeling will wear off soon. I actually feel a little sad and out of place. Hopefully getting back into the normal schedule of school will take care of that.
It was so good to see Rich in Atlanta and my parents at the airport. My parents brought me lovely flowers. The journey was tough- I think I threw up about 12 times on Saturday. Poor Chase, I was so dead when I got to the airport to hang out with him. We made the most of it though. It almost feels like that journey needed to be long- sort of a time travel back to my past life.
Well I still have a ton of packing to do and I haven't slept more than 6 hours at a time in the last 4 nights so I'm quite exhausted. It's sad that I have to leave my comfy house so soon but I wouldn't be happy laying around if I was missing school. Cheers for the first day of Junior year!
It was so good to see Rich in Atlanta and my parents at the airport. My parents brought me lovely flowers. The journey was tough- I think I threw up about 12 times on Saturday. Poor Chase, I was so dead when I got to the airport to hang out with him. We made the most of it though. It almost feels like that journey needed to be long- sort of a time travel back to my past life.
Well I still have a ton of packing to do and I haven't slept more than 6 hours at a time in the last 4 nights so I'm quite exhausted. It's sad that I have to leave my comfy house so soon but I wouldn't be happy laying around if I was missing school. Cheers for the first day of Junior year!
Thursday, August 23, 2007
Despididas. Saying Farewell.
Peruvians know how to do many things well, one of these is saying goodbye. Here they call it a despidida. So far I've had 2, and I have 4 more today (if you only count the 'official') ones! Tuesday night I despidida'd with the soccer players in Liberacion Social. We all stood around in the street chatting for a bit and drinking Coke. Last night I went out to Olviedo with Natali and Fiorella which was really nice. Excellent cappuccinos and excellent company. Today I'll eat lunch with Pastor Ricardo and Danni at the church and say goodbye to them. Then I'm having a little party with each of my night classes (and I'll probably swing by Natali's class to join Chase's despidida too) and then afterward we're going to Clara's for a despidida with all the interns. What this all means is that I will say goodbye about a million times, eat tons of cake/drink 4 glasses of Inka Kola, and tell people for the millionth time that I don't know when I'm coming back (or if, but they never like to hear that). Being a realist always makes goodbye more difficult!
Much has happened since I last wrote. I experienced my first earthquake, though here in Trujillo it wasn't serious. I was on the third floor of SALI watching Harry Potter 4 with my class (apparently they're big HP fans) when I felt the building moving. My students squealed a bit and laughed at me for looking so scared. They told me not to worry, that it was just a tremor and that they were pretty normal. Turns out it wasn't a normal tremor at all but a really serious earthquake down in Pisco and Ica, towns south of Lima. The death tole is upwards of 400 I think, and while there is aid pouring in, people are still without electricity and running water, living on the streets. Some people from our mission are going down with supplies today.
I'm really looking forward to setting foot on American soil in just a few short days. At the same time though, I'm starting to feel sad about leaving. I haven't really been that sad, since my "excited to get home, see friends and family, and start school" emotions have really had precedence. Now it's starting to hit me though. I almost cried saying goodbye to the Ferguson's yesterday.
Things I will miss most about Peru: the friends I've made here, the advantages of city life, the exchange rate making my money worth more, guaranteed sanctification (Heather and I were joking about making T-shirts that say "Come to Peru for Fast Track Sanctification." This is funnier because we have "fast track" English classes here for people who need to learn how to speak English in a hurry), getting lots of emails and letters, rice, freshly baked cakes every afternoon, delicious fresh bread for $.07 a piece, roller-coaster taxi rides (if I was a bad driver before, I'm going to be worse now. Cuidate.), and probably a lot of other things I'm just not thinking of right now. There are also things I will not miss, but I shan't get into that here because when I'm home that won't matter anymore. Let's just say I'm excited for the luxury of my dorm room and the American concept of cleanliness.
It's been a good summer; there's been a lot of maturing and growth I think. I've certainly learned a ton about myself and about living in a Christian community. I've also come to cherish being able to communicate! I look forward to speaking English in the street. People will probably ask me, "So are you fluent in Spanish now?" The answer is no. I have definitely improved, but I am a far cry from fluent. I can get around just fine but having a conversation about anything abstract is very difficult still, unless the person is used to speaking to Spanish-learners and talks very slowly. I decided not to take a Spanish class this fall so I haven't been very motivated to learn down here. I'm still looking to take some Swedish lessons this fall, so if you know anyone who speaks Swedish, let me know!
Now to say some more goodbyes...
Much has happened since I last wrote. I experienced my first earthquake, though here in Trujillo it wasn't serious. I was on the third floor of SALI watching Harry Potter 4 with my class (apparently they're big HP fans) when I felt the building moving. My students squealed a bit and laughed at me for looking so scared. They told me not to worry, that it was just a tremor and that they were pretty normal. Turns out it wasn't a normal tremor at all but a really serious earthquake down in Pisco and Ica, towns south of Lima. The death tole is upwards of 400 I think, and while there is aid pouring in, people are still without electricity and running water, living on the streets. Some people from our mission are going down with supplies today.
I'm really looking forward to setting foot on American soil in just a few short days. At the same time though, I'm starting to feel sad about leaving. I haven't really been that sad, since my "excited to get home, see friends and family, and start school" emotions have really had precedence. Now it's starting to hit me though. I almost cried saying goodbye to the Ferguson's yesterday.
Things I will miss most about Peru: the friends I've made here, the advantages of city life, the exchange rate making my money worth more, guaranteed sanctification (Heather and I were joking about making T-shirts that say "Come to Peru for Fast Track Sanctification." This is funnier because we have "fast track" English classes here for people who need to learn how to speak English in a hurry), getting lots of emails and letters, rice, freshly baked cakes every afternoon, delicious fresh bread for $.07 a piece, roller-coaster taxi rides (if I was a bad driver before, I'm going to be worse now. Cuidate.), and probably a lot of other things I'm just not thinking of right now. There are also things I will not miss, but I shan't get into that here because when I'm home that won't matter anymore. Let's just say I'm excited for the luxury of my dorm room and the American concept of cleanliness.
It's been a good summer; there's been a lot of maturing and growth I think. I've certainly learned a ton about myself and about living in a Christian community. I've also come to cherish being able to communicate! I look forward to speaking English in the street. People will probably ask me, "So are you fluent in Spanish now?" The answer is no. I have definitely improved, but I am a far cry from fluent. I can get around just fine but having a conversation about anything abstract is very difficult still, unless the person is used to speaking to Spanish-learners and talks very slowly. I decided not to take a Spanish class this fall so I haven't been very motivated to learn down here. I'm still looking to take some Swedish lessons this fall, so if you know anyone who speaks Swedish, let me know!
Now to say some more goodbyes...
Friday, August 10, 2007
if you plan to read anna karenina and don't want to know the ending, stop reading now
I'm sitting here in the classroom watching my students take their test. I just read the climax of AK and I can't believe that's it. She justs throws herself under the train and its over. All that agony! What saddens me the most is how much of myself and my last few years I found on those pages.
She was uncapable of believing in Vronsky's love, always jealous and working herself up into hysterics. She knew she was provoking his anger, but from pride, could not stop herself. Pride is so destructive in relationships. She was spiteful, and killed herself from spite! It seems like a stretch but after reading all those pages and seeing her downward spiral played out slowly, her suicide seemed to be the only possible conclusion. Now that it's happened, I don't even feel like reading the last 40 pages- there can be no happy ending. Perhaps that's why I love Dostoevsky, even though characters die, there is redemption. Here it was just meaningless death, death because her heart was eaten up with bitterness. What's scary is how realistic it is and the baseness we are all capable of.
If you've never read it, then perhaps this entry is nonsense to you. I just have such strong feelings about it at the moment and needed an outlet. She started off so good and fell so far, without letting herself acknowledge reality.
She was uncapable of believing in Vronsky's love, always jealous and working herself up into hysterics. She knew she was provoking his anger, but from pride, could not stop herself. Pride is so destructive in relationships. She was spiteful, and killed herself from spite! It seems like a stretch but after reading all those pages and seeing her downward spiral played out slowly, her suicide seemed to be the only possible conclusion. Now that it's happened, I don't even feel like reading the last 40 pages- there can be no happy ending. Perhaps that's why I love Dostoevsky, even though characters die, there is redemption. Here it was just meaningless death, death because her heart was eaten up with bitterness. What's scary is how realistic it is and the baseness we are all capable of.
If you've never read it, then perhaps this entry is nonsense to you. I just have such strong feelings about it at the moment and needed an outlet. She started off so good and fell so far, without letting herself acknowledge reality.
Thursday, August 9, 2007
Daddy are we there yet?
It's not that I don't like it here, but I'm really looking forward to getting home and going to school. This further convinces me that I'll probably end up in grad school and maybe get my ph.D for the simple reason that I love going back to school every fall. The summer day when I wake up and think "I'll never be a full-time students again" shall be a very sad day indeed. Perhaps I'll feel differently by then, but for now, I am quite excited to get back into the academic routine.
One thing I've learned from being a teacher this summer, is that being a teacher and being a student are very different things. I don't think teaching English is my calling, in fact, I'm quite certain it is not. Maybe economics someday, but we'll see. Teachers have to do so much grading! Seriously, I think twice about assigning homework because I know I'll have to correct it. Same with essay questions- what a pain. I guess that's why our professors have TA's.
I'm currently sitting out on the balcony at SALI (where I pretty much live). There is an enormous mass of vines growing on the building next door that are blooming in a vibrant shade of purple. I'm glad because on these cold, cloudy days, it's nice to have some life to look at. I hope it's oppresively hot when I get home.
Just a little more than 2 weeks left down here, south of the equator. I'm still taking my spanish classes though now that I'm not going to take spanish this semester, it seems like a bit of a waste. Still, Noemi, my teacher, is so kind, and we've started reading the Bible in Spanish for practice. I understand a lot, it's encouraging to have spanish class if for no other reason than it makes me feel like I do actually speak spanish. I hope to watch spanish movies to hang on to what I've learned so next time I can start a little further along than when I arrived. Maybe I'll go to Spanish club, we'll see.
I can't believe how fast the summer disappeared. I guess I've done a lot but since I tend to gage progress by how many books I've read, I feel like I haven't done anything. When I get home I'll read, though there are so many other things I want to do too. In any event, I feel like I've had a huge attitude readjustment lately and I'm feeling very relaxed. I look forward both to being social (and 21) and having some quiet afternoons/nights with a book. I resisted the urge to put an extra class in my schedule, though so many looked interesting, especially the Middle East film class on Monday nights.
It's not what I expected but I'm starting to reevaluate my supposed love of latin america and moving here after I graduate. It definitely has its charms and I don't mind going without some of the luxuries of the West, but I don't know if I'd ever feel at home here. I'm pretty sure the language barrier has a lot to do with it since it's hard for me to make real deep relationships without enough spanish. Still, I'm not going to run full speed ahead towards such a specific career. I'll see what comes along.
Jenny and I were talking today about state/city pride and we decided that Connecticutians just don't have it. I think I'd like to live somewhere that does, where people are more invested in making their city/state something they can be proud of. For example, people in Boston have Boston pride, as do people in New York City. A lot of southerners I've met down here also have state pride, in Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee. I end up defending CT and feeling proud to be from there only because other people feel so about their homes. It's an interesting dynamic. Living here has also allowed me to test out city life and thus far, I think I can handle a small city. I'm definitely more of a Trujillo girl than a Limanite; more of a Boston girl than a New Yorker. I like the accessability of a city and the community it fosters.
Alright well I guess I should go do something that's actually productive. I taught this morning from 9-10:30 and I don't teach again until 5:45 so I have some time. Perhaps a book? Que bueno!
One thing I've learned from being a teacher this summer, is that being a teacher and being a student are very different things. I don't think teaching English is my calling, in fact, I'm quite certain it is not. Maybe economics someday, but we'll see. Teachers have to do so much grading! Seriously, I think twice about assigning homework because I know I'll have to correct it. Same with essay questions- what a pain. I guess that's why our professors have TA's.
I'm currently sitting out on the balcony at SALI (where I pretty much live). There is an enormous mass of vines growing on the building next door that are blooming in a vibrant shade of purple. I'm glad because on these cold, cloudy days, it's nice to have some life to look at. I hope it's oppresively hot when I get home.
Just a little more than 2 weeks left down here, south of the equator. I'm still taking my spanish classes though now that I'm not going to take spanish this semester, it seems like a bit of a waste. Still, Noemi, my teacher, is so kind, and we've started reading the Bible in Spanish for practice. I understand a lot, it's encouraging to have spanish class if for no other reason than it makes me feel like I do actually speak spanish. I hope to watch spanish movies to hang on to what I've learned so next time I can start a little further along than when I arrived. Maybe I'll go to Spanish club, we'll see.
I can't believe how fast the summer disappeared. I guess I've done a lot but since I tend to gage progress by how many books I've read, I feel like I haven't done anything. When I get home I'll read, though there are so many other things I want to do too. In any event, I feel like I've had a huge attitude readjustment lately and I'm feeling very relaxed. I look forward both to being social (and 21) and having some quiet afternoons/nights with a book. I resisted the urge to put an extra class in my schedule, though so many looked interesting, especially the Middle East film class on Monday nights.
It's not what I expected but I'm starting to reevaluate my supposed love of latin america and moving here after I graduate. It definitely has its charms and I don't mind going without some of the luxuries of the West, but I don't know if I'd ever feel at home here. I'm pretty sure the language barrier has a lot to do with it since it's hard for me to make real deep relationships without enough spanish. Still, I'm not going to run full speed ahead towards such a specific career. I'll see what comes along.
Jenny and I were talking today about state/city pride and we decided that Connecticutians just don't have it. I think I'd like to live somewhere that does, where people are more invested in making their city/state something they can be proud of. For example, people in Boston have Boston pride, as do people in New York City. A lot of southerners I've met down here also have state pride, in Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee. I end up defending CT and feeling proud to be from there only because other people feel so about their homes. It's an interesting dynamic. Living here has also allowed me to test out city life and thus far, I think I can handle a small city. I'm definitely more of a Trujillo girl than a Limanite; more of a Boston girl than a New Yorker. I like the accessability of a city and the community it fosters.
Alright well I guess I should go do something that's actually productive. I taught this morning from 9-10:30 and I don't teach again until 5:45 so I have some time. Perhaps a book? Que bueno!
Monday, August 6, 2007
Saturday, August 4, 2007
If only I had some of those zip-off cargo pants, I'd be a real traveler.
So I went to Machu Picchu this past week, and all the fun tourist towns that involves on the way there and back. I can give a more detailed report of my adventure to whoever asks, but here are the bare bones and highlights of my trip...
July 26th I got on the Super VIP bus to Lima with Becca, Jason, Sarah, Julie, and David. It was weird saying goodbye to everyone at the bus station because I was the only one of our group who was returning to Trujillo. The fact that I can't sleep during a movie has been reiterated to me many times lately, despite that I've seen the movies before, they're dubbed in Spanish, and have no subtitles, I still can't sleep while they're playing. We arrived in Lima at about 6:30 a.m. and went from there to the Lima airport. I got excited about Dunkin Donuts but it was premature- when I tried to order an iced cappuccino (which I expected to be the equivalent of a pretty normal coffee), I recieved a super strong coffee coolata. No worries though, I got my Starbucks iced caramel macciato by the end of the trip.
Okay enough about little things, I'll try not to get bogged down in unimportant details. We flew to Cuzco and took taxis to the downtown. There we sat around at the post office for a good 2 hours waiting for David to get money wired to him (his bank turned off his debit card). The picture below is Becca and I in that taxi.
Once David got his money we were off to the Peruvian bus station (as opposed to a tourist one) and hopped on a local bus for an hour and a half ride to our next checkpoint (for about $1). From there we took a comvi (a public van) for another $.35 for another 20 minutes to Ollantantambo (not sure of the spelling on this one). We spent the night here at a pretty nice hostal- though I had a killer migraine and went to bed at 8:30. This was a beautiful village geared toward Machu Picchu travelers and nestled in the middle of a beautiful mountain range. 
The next morning was stressful because we had to meet a guy at the train station who would give us our tickets and we waited for a good 35 minutes before finding him just in time to get on the train. While we were waiting for the train I noticed that one of the snack vendors was selling Red Bull. If you think about how isolated we were in the Sacred Valley of Peru and how much traveling we had already done to get there, it just seemed so silly to me to find Red Bull there. In any event, we made the train and rode for 2 more hours to Aguas Calientes (yes there are hot springs there). 
Aguas Calientes is what Becca and I liked to call the Disney Land of Peru. Everything was expensive and geared towards tourists. We got massages. You walk down the street and people are pushing menus in your face left and right. "Free pisco sour!" "12 Sole Menu!" You haggle with waiters in the street to determine prices in the restaurants- it's rather ridiculous. I got some decent lomo saltado that night (my favorite Peruvian dish). A menu (pronounced "men" "new") is a course meal that usually includes a weird saladish thing or a bowl of soup plus your main dish plus a postre (dessert) or drink (usually a pisco sour or lemonade). We had a pretty nasty menu in Cuzco for 10 soles (about $3) but sometimes you get lucky.
On the morning of Sunday, August 29th, we woke up at 4:30 am (but then julie said we could sleep another 20 minutes) and left the hostal at 5:20 to meet our tour guide in the plaza. We took the bus up to Machu Picchu and entered the ruins at about 6:00 am. It was really cloudy so we couldn't see the sun rise. We were actually a bit worried that the day would be cloudy and we wouldn't get to see Machu Picchu at its finest, but the clouds are just part of mountain weather.
Our tour guide told us some theories about Machu Picchu and we walked around the ruins in the rain for a bit. There were very few tourists there yet so we could get a good look at everything and feel the isolation of this mysterious incan city. They think that only about 800- 1000 people lived there at a time and 85% of the bodies they have found were women's. One of the theories is that Machu Picchu was a convent of sorts, with women preforming religious rituals in the various temples. They also think that there was a princess that ruled over Machu Picchu and that she was very tall (most peruvians are very short). There was one building that had two basins in the middle. The "expert" conclusions on these basins range from "they were paint holders in an industrial building" to "they were sacred astrological tools". Becca found this quite amusing. It may be out of character for me not to care about the historical aspects of a place, but what I most enjoyed about Machu Picchu was its beauty and serenity locked away in the mountains.
After our short tour we climbed Waynapicchu (the mountain in all the pictures of Machu Picchu). They only let 400 people climb it a day (which seems like a lot, but a lot of people come to Machu Picchu). Climbing that mountain took most of the morning. It was basically the Stairmaster 5000. The Incas must have been very physically fit. We took some amazing aerial shots of Machu Picchu and hung out with our fellow climbers at the very top for a while.
Back down in the main area of ruins Becca and I had a nice chat about God and going home. I ate two of the best oranges I've ever tasted. We met up with the rest of the group at a very high point in the ruins and took some pictures. In all my pictures it really looks like I'm standing in front of a green screen or a bill board of Machu Picchu. After we took more pictures than necessary (which must be a lot for me) we sat around off the beaten path and sang some hymns and RUF songs. I read some passages from Isaiah that I've been collecting to set to music. It was a nice ending to a lovely morning.
At 3:30ish we left the ruins and went back to Aguas Calientes to get our stuff. I was proud of myself for only packing my school backpack for a week-long adventure through Peru. We took the train back to Ollantantambo and then a van to our hostal. It was about 9 p.m. when we made it to our hostal in Cuzco only to find that they had no record of our reservation.
This was our "Mary and Joseph in Bethlehem with no room in the inn" night. We didn't have to sleep in a cave but we did have to squeeze 4 girls into 2 twin beds. Still it was better than nothing so despite my poor night's sleep, I was glad we had somewhere to sleep in that chilly city.
We ate breakfast at Jack's, a delicious discovery in our part of Cuzco. While the rest of the group went to a few museums and cathedrals, I mostly just wandered in and out of shops. I found some beautiful alpaca long coats but they were $300, so I had to let them go. Still I enjoyed seeing some good fashion after being lost in the sea of stretchy polyester and pocketless pants for two months. I do look forward to seeing my vintage clothes when I get home.
That night (Monday) we went to a cool cafe and listened to some live music by a Portuguese guitarist and his lovely back up singer. We sat in the window over-looking Cuzco all lit up. I'm a big fan of Cuzco, it had a lot of charm. If I'm ever passing through Peru again, Cuzco would definitely be worth the trip.
We flew back into Lima on Tuesday morning. We met the reggeaton group Hector El Father in the airport and that was rather amusing. After dropping our stuff off at the Melia (luxury hotel where Becca and I spent the night), we stepped back into the US for most of the day. We went to a huge mall and I enjoyed looking at the high fashion that was slightly more affordable than usual, but still not affordable (even when my $1 is worth three soles). We ate lunch at the nicest Pizza Hut I've ever seen, and Julie was the only one brave enough to eat her salad (lettuce is very hard to clean so we generally don't eat it here- I'll eat lots of salads from the SU when I get back to make up for my lack of salad all summer). We went back to the Melia and said goodbye to Julie, Jason, David, and Sarah. We stood there waving to them as they drove away and it was really sad to think I may never see them again. Weird; goodbye's are weird after you've just spent so much time together.
Becca and I took showers and layed on our big beds. It was a restful evening. I felt the need to put myself together before walking by the front desk again, since earlier they had asked me when my parents were coming! I put on a clean shirt (Becca's actually) and we went out to look for a cafe. We walked the wrong direction for about 7 blocks and finally turned around and found what we were looking for. The people in San Isidro (the neighborhood we were in) seemed a bit stuck up if you ask me. Things were definitely more expensive there- 12 soles for a small cup of gelato! What will I do when I get home? I was cheap before!
Wednesday was relaxing too. We did a bit more shopping (most of this vacation falls in the shopping category) and then chilled in Parque Kennedy for a while. I had some great lomo saltado at Cafe Cafe and an iced caramel macciato at starbucks. The atmosphere at Starbucks wasn't quite as relaxing as in the states though, because there is a guard who stands at the door and walks around every few minutes. We were pretty worried he was going to kick us out when I finished my drink and we were pretty much homeless since we had checked out of our hotel room that morning and it was too cold to be outside. That is the slowest I've ever drunk such a tasty treat, and it was a real exercise in self control. I was overwhelmed by the big stores and comericalism in Lima- it's a real shock to the system after being in Trujillo for a while. Becca and I both said many times that we're so glad SALI is in Trujillo instead of Lima.
Wednesday night was sad because I had to say goodbye to Becca. Becca if you're reading this, I miss you!! I took the Super VIP bus home to Trujillo and arrived at 6:30 on Thursday morning. I was really happy to be back in Trujillo, though by midday I was really feeling the loss of everyone who had already gone. I'm going to do my best not to feel like leftovers. Chase and I are the only ones from the summer crew who are staying for August. I moved my flight so now we are flying home together on August 26th. I'll probably skip my classes on the 27th to recouperate a bit.
For those who have been praying about my crazy stressed-outness, thanks, and I'm quite happy to report that the last two weeks have been a lot better. Granted, I haven't been teaching, but hopefully this attitude will carry over into next week.
I miss you guys back in CT, and I'm looking forward to coming home and starting up at school in just a few short weeks. I hope to have a car which will be a bit life-changing, and I'm planning to road trip/fly south for a few days to see some very sorely missed individuals. Being 21 when I get home will add an interesting twist to my life too, I expect. In any event, the future is bright, but I'm trying to live in the moment and enjoy each day I have left here in Peru. Trujillo has become quite dear to me, in a way I didn't know a small foreign city could.
One of these days I will post some of my favorite songs that we sing on Sundays down here, but until then, hasta luego!
July 26th I got on the Super VIP bus to Lima with Becca, Jason, Sarah, Julie, and David. It was weird saying goodbye to everyone at the bus station because I was the only one of our group who was returning to Trujillo. The fact that I can't sleep during a movie has been reiterated to me many times lately, despite that I've seen the movies before, they're dubbed in Spanish, and have no subtitles, I still can't sleep while they're playing. We arrived in Lima at about 6:30 a.m. and went from there to the Lima airport. I got excited about Dunkin Donuts but it was premature- when I tried to order an iced cappuccino (which I expected to be the equivalent of a pretty normal coffee), I recieved a super strong coffee coolata. No worries though, I got my Starbucks iced caramel macciato by the end of the trip.
Okay enough about little things, I'll try not to get bogged down in unimportant details. We flew to Cuzco and took taxis to the downtown. There we sat around at the post office for a good 2 hours waiting for David to get money wired to him (his bank turned off his debit card). The picture below is Becca and I in that taxi.
Once David got his money we were off to the Peruvian bus station (as opposed to a tourist one) and hopped on a local bus for an hour and a half ride to our next checkpoint (for about $1). From there we took a comvi (a public van) for another $.35 for another 20 minutes to Ollantantambo (not sure of the spelling on this one). We spent the night here at a pretty nice hostal- though I had a killer migraine and went to bed at 8:30. This was a beautiful village geared toward Machu Picchu travelers and nestled in the middle of a beautiful mountain range. The next morning was stressful because we had to meet a guy at the train station who would give us our tickets and we waited for a good 35 minutes before finding him just in time to get on the train. While we were waiting for the train I noticed that one of the snack vendors was selling Red Bull. If you think about how isolated we were in the Sacred Valley of Peru and how much traveling we had already done to get there, it just seemed so silly to me to find Red Bull there. In any event, we made the train and rode for 2 more hours to Aguas Calientes (yes there are hot springs there). Aguas Calientes is what Becca and I liked to call the Disney Land of Peru. Everything was expensive and geared towards tourists. We got massages. You walk down the street and people are pushing menus in your face left and right. "Free pisco sour!" "12 Sole Menu!" You haggle with waiters in the street to determine prices in the restaurants- it's rather ridiculous. I got some decent lomo saltado that night (my favorite Peruvian dish). A menu (pronounced "men" "new") is a course meal that usually includes a weird saladish thing or a bowl of soup plus your main dish plus a postre (dessert) or drink (usually a pisco sour or lemonade). We had a pretty nasty menu in Cuzco for 10 soles (about $3) but sometimes you get lucky.On the morning of Sunday, August 29th, we woke up at 4:30 am (but then julie said we could sleep another 20 minutes) and left the hostal at 5:20 to meet our tour guide in the plaza. We took the bus up to Machu Picchu and entered the ruins at about 6:00 am. It was really cloudy so we couldn't see the sun rise. We were actually a bit worried that the day would be cloudy and we wouldn't get to see Machu Picchu at its finest, but the clouds are just part of mountain weather.
Our tour guide told us some theories about Machu Picchu and we walked around the ruins in the rain for a bit. There were very few tourists there yet so we could get a good look at everything and feel the isolation of this mysterious incan city. They think that only about 800- 1000 people lived there at a time and 85% of the bodies they have found were women's. One of the theories is that Machu Picchu was a convent of sorts, with women preforming religious rituals in the various temples. They also think that there was a princess that ruled over Machu Picchu and that she was very tall (most peruvians are very short). There was one building that had two basins in the middle. The "expert" conclusions on these basins range from "they were paint holders in an industrial building" to "they were sacred astrological tools". Becca found this quite amusing. It may be out of character for me not to care about the historical aspects of a place, but what I most enjoyed about Machu Picchu was its beauty and serenity locked away in the mountains.
After our short tour we climbed Waynapicchu (the mountain in all the pictures of Machu Picchu). They only let 400 people climb it a day (which seems like a lot, but a lot of people come to Machu Picchu). Climbing that mountain took most of the morning. It was basically the Stairmaster 5000. The Incas must have been very physically fit. We took some amazing aerial shots of Machu Picchu and hung out with our fellow climbers at the very top for a while.
Back down in the main area of ruins Becca and I had a nice chat about God and going home. I ate two of the best oranges I've ever tasted. We met up with the rest of the group at a very high point in the ruins and took some pictures. In all my pictures it really looks like I'm standing in front of a green screen or a bill board of Machu Picchu. After we took more pictures than necessary (which must be a lot for me) we sat around off the beaten path and sang some hymns and RUF songs. I read some passages from Isaiah that I've been collecting to set to music. It was a nice ending to a lovely morning.At 3:30ish we left the ruins and went back to Aguas Calientes to get our stuff. I was proud of myself for only packing my school backpack for a week-long adventure through Peru. We took the train back to Ollantantambo and then a van to our hostal. It was about 9 p.m. when we made it to our hostal in Cuzco only to find that they had no record of our reservation.
This was our "Mary and Joseph in Bethlehem with no room in the inn" night. We didn't have to sleep in a cave but we did have to squeeze 4 girls into 2 twin beds. Still it was better than nothing so despite my poor night's sleep, I was glad we had somewhere to sleep in that chilly city.
We ate breakfast at Jack's, a delicious discovery in our part of Cuzco. While the rest of the group went to a few museums and cathedrals, I mostly just wandered in and out of shops. I found some beautiful alpaca long coats but they were $300, so I had to let them go. Still I enjoyed seeing some good fashion after being lost in the sea of stretchy polyester and pocketless pants for two months. I do look forward to seeing my vintage clothes when I get home.
That night (Monday) we went to a cool cafe and listened to some live music by a Portuguese guitarist and his lovely back up singer. We sat in the window over-looking Cuzco all lit up. I'm a big fan of Cuzco, it had a lot of charm. If I'm ever passing through Peru again, Cuzco would definitely be worth the trip.
We flew back into Lima on Tuesday morning. We met the reggeaton group Hector El Father in the airport and that was rather amusing. After dropping our stuff off at the Melia (luxury hotel where Becca and I spent the night), we stepped back into the US for most of the day. We went to a huge mall and I enjoyed looking at the high fashion that was slightly more affordable than usual, but still not affordable (even when my $1 is worth three soles). We ate lunch at the nicest Pizza Hut I've ever seen, and Julie was the only one brave enough to eat her salad (lettuce is very hard to clean so we generally don't eat it here- I'll eat lots of salads from the SU when I get back to make up for my lack of salad all summer). We went back to the Melia and said goodbye to Julie, Jason, David, and Sarah. We stood there waving to them as they drove away and it was really sad to think I may never see them again. Weird; goodbye's are weird after you've just spent so much time together.
Becca and I took showers and layed on our big beds. It was a restful evening. I felt the need to put myself together before walking by the front desk again, since earlier they had asked me when my parents were coming! I put on a clean shirt (Becca's actually) and we went out to look for a cafe. We walked the wrong direction for about 7 blocks and finally turned around and found what we were looking for. The people in San Isidro (the neighborhood we were in) seemed a bit stuck up if you ask me. Things were definitely more expensive there- 12 soles for a small cup of gelato! What will I do when I get home? I was cheap before!
Wednesday was relaxing too. We did a bit more shopping (most of this vacation falls in the shopping category) and then chilled in Parque Kennedy for a while. I had some great lomo saltado at Cafe Cafe and an iced caramel macciato at starbucks. The atmosphere at Starbucks wasn't quite as relaxing as in the states though, because there is a guard who stands at the door and walks around every few minutes. We were pretty worried he was going to kick us out when I finished my drink and we were pretty much homeless since we had checked out of our hotel room that morning and it was too cold to be outside. That is the slowest I've ever drunk such a tasty treat, and it was a real exercise in self control. I was overwhelmed by the big stores and comericalism in Lima- it's a real shock to the system after being in Trujillo for a while. Becca and I both said many times that we're so glad SALI is in Trujillo instead of Lima.
Wednesday night was sad because I had to say goodbye to Becca. Becca if you're reading this, I miss you!! I took the Super VIP bus home to Trujillo and arrived at 6:30 on Thursday morning. I was really happy to be back in Trujillo, though by midday I was really feeling the loss of everyone who had already gone. I'm going to do my best not to feel like leftovers. Chase and I are the only ones from the summer crew who are staying for August. I moved my flight so now we are flying home together on August 26th. I'll probably skip my classes on the 27th to recouperate a bit.
For those who have been praying about my crazy stressed-outness, thanks, and I'm quite happy to report that the last two weeks have been a lot better. Granted, I haven't been teaching, but hopefully this attitude will carry over into next week.
I miss you guys back in CT, and I'm looking forward to coming home and starting up at school in just a few short weeks. I hope to have a car which will be a bit life-changing, and I'm planning to road trip/fly south for a few days to see some very sorely missed individuals. Being 21 when I get home will add an interesting twist to my life too, I expect. In any event, the future is bright, but I'm trying to live in the moment and enjoy each day I have left here in Peru. Trujillo has become quite dear to me, in a way I didn't know a small foreign city could.
One of these days I will post some of my favorite songs that we sing on Sundays down here, but until then, hasta luego!
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Take a bow and say goodbye
Well it’s been a while since I posted. Nothing too exciting has happened. Today is the last day of July classes- I really can’t believe that it’s the end of July already. The lack of warm weather has left me wondering “when is summer going to start?” The weather has been a bit warmer than it was in June though, so I am thankful for that.
I taught Basic 9 and Intermediate 4 this month. I went out to eat with my Basic 9 class on Monday night and we’re going out again for Chifa tonight after the exam. Chifa is the wonderful blend of Peruvian and Chinese food. The best part about Chifa is the names of the restaurants. They’re all over town. The one I walk by to go to SALI is called “Heng Lung”. Becca and I ate at Fuk Hou on Sunday night.
Tomorrow night we’re leaving for Cuzco. We’ll take the fancy night bus (the seats fold down completely flat!) to Lima and then take a flight Friday morning to Cuzco. We’ll stay at a few different hostels and see Machu Picchu on Sunday morning (taking the 5:30 am train to get to it). The 28th of July is Peru’s independence day and they get pretty into it, so hopefully that won’t hinder our travels too much. We’ll spend 2 days in Cuzco and head back to Lima on Tuesday, July 31st. Becca and I will hang out there for 2 days until her flight leaves for the US and I’ll take a bus back to Trujillo for another month of teaching. All in all it should be really good. Everyone I’ve talked to says that Machu Picchu is just breathtaking. We’re going to try to climb the mountain there too. Hopefully I’ll manage to hang onto my camera and take a lot of pictures.
Most of the summer crew is leaving over the course of the next week. Chase and I will be the only summer people staying through August. I have mixed feelings about the whole thing right now, probably just because I’m so sad to see them all go. Maybe I’m a little jealous that they all get to reunite with their families and friends back home so soon. I still have so much reading I wanted to do this summer. Maybe someday I’ll finish Anna Karenina. I expected to have so much down time but the opposite has been true!
Okay more to come later...
I taught Basic 9 and Intermediate 4 this month. I went out to eat with my Basic 9 class on Monday night and we’re going out again for Chifa tonight after the exam. Chifa is the wonderful blend of Peruvian and Chinese food. The best part about Chifa is the names of the restaurants. They’re all over town. The one I walk by to go to SALI is called “Heng Lung”. Becca and I ate at Fuk Hou on Sunday night.
Tomorrow night we’re leaving for Cuzco. We’ll take the fancy night bus (the seats fold down completely flat!) to Lima and then take a flight Friday morning to Cuzco. We’ll stay at a few different hostels and see Machu Picchu on Sunday morning (taking the 5:30 am train to get to it). The 28th of July is Peru’s independence day and they get pretty into it, so hopefully that won’t hinder our travels too much. We’ll spend 2 days in Cuzco and head back to Lima on Tuesday, July 31st. Becca and I will hang out there for 2 days until her flight leaves for the US and I’ll take a bus back to Trujillo for another month of teaching. All in all it should be really good. Everyone I’ve talked to says that Machu Picchu is just breathtaking. We’re going to try to climb the mountain there too. Hopefully I’ll manage to hang onto my camera and take a lot of pictures.
Most of the summer crew is leaving over the course of the next week. Chase and I will be the only summer people staying through August. I have mixed feelings about the whole thing right now, probably just because I’m so sad to see them all go. Maybe I’m a little jealous that they all get to reunite with their families and friends back home so soon. I still have so much reading I wanted to do this summer. Maybe someday I’ll finish Anna Karenina. I expected to have so much down time but the opposite has been true!
Okay more to come later...
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
welcome to peru
First I would like to say congratulations again to a very close friend on her happy news! Even though I’m all the way down here, I’m still sharing in your joy and excitement! It makes me so happy to think of you so happy.
On the other hand, I seem to be on a “less healthy” streak. It’s nothing serious, but I’ve had quite a few migraines since I’ve been here and I currently have a head-cold of sorts. Either it’s a bad cold or my allergy medicine just decided to stop working. The headaches are probably stress related because it seems that I am stressed out no matter my circumstances. Here’s a lovely little example: Friday afternoon I was finishing making my tests (that I needed about 2 hours later to give to my classes) and I simply could not get the new Microsoft Word 2007 to stop making these random lines in the middle of the page. The back button wouldn’t undo anything and I couldn’t for the life of my get rid of the stupid lines across my test for quite a while. After a while I stood up and walked away from the computer and I was really losing it. I sat down again because we were about to start a meeting, and tried a few more times and then there I am, crying at my computer because I couldn’t erase the lines across my test. Poor Matt sitting next to me. He was really nice about it, of course, but I just get so worked up over nothing. It really is a problem, and more likely a symptom of a deeper problem. In any event, I would really appreciate prayer for my health and that I wouldn’t be so stressed out all the time.
WARNING: only continue reading if you are bored, and care to understand the culture and inefficiency here in Peru.
Saturday Becca and I walked all around Trujillo. I had hoped our two errands would take about 4 hours (making allowances for the terrible inefficiency down here) but it actually took us from 12:30 to 7:30 to accomplish our small tasks. First we looked for fabric to bring to the tailor to have pants made. That was quite a fiasco. We didn’t find what we wanted in the town center so we went out to one of the 3 major (underground economy) malls to see what they had. Becca found some really nice alpaca wool for khakis. By this time, it’s already about 2:30ish. I found some really nice navy wool for a blazer, but I want to make sure I know a good tailor before I invest in that because it’ll be pricey. Our next task was to find some tea light candles for the coffee house on Thursday night since Becca and I are in charge of decorations. How hard can it be to find candles in a city of about 1 million people? I had asked a Peruvian friend earlier in the week where candles could be found and she told me in Zona Franca so to Zona Franca we went. She had told me the second floor of the mall so we started there. We looked around, and not finding any, asked someone who worked there where candles are sold. He told us the 3rd floor. On the third floor we didn’t find any either so we asked again. She told us on the 4th floor. So we went to the 4th floor, and another lady told us we could find them on the second floor. In truth, no one had any idea where there were candles, and just keep naming random floors! Finally one lady suggested El Virey, another shopping mall across the street. We went there and finally found candles in a window display! But alas, what a cruel joke- the store was closed. We thought that perhaps it had closed for siesta and decided to come back at 4. By this time it was already 3:30 so we thought it was worth waiting. As we wondered around the third floor of the mall, we saw a place to get manicures and decided we’d go back there and get manicures (for only 5 soles) while we waited as soon as we checked for other candle stores. We poked in a few other stores. I bought a really cute cream skirt with blue flowers on it that I am currently wearing as I write this. But when we wanted to go back to get manicures and candles, we couldn’t find the store! This may seem hard to believe, because we ourselves were bewildered, but we walked around the third floor of El Virey for at least 30 minutes. All the shop owners laughed at us as we walked by them for the 5th or 6th time. The way these malls are laid out is so confusing- none of the stores have signs and they’re so small. Finally we gave up and bought expensive tea light candles from the Indian store. We were both exhausted.
We took a cab to one of our favorite cafes and had a late lunch/early dinner. On the TV in the café they were announcing the Seven New Wonders of the World. Everyone was watching to see if Machu Picchu would win. When they announced it (in English) Becca yelled out “Machu Picchu” and everyone cheered! It’s funny how when you’re in public when events happen, you feel a sudden camaraderie with complete strangers around you. It was exciting to be with a bunch of Peruvians when the announcement was made. I will say though, that if you watched the ceremony, you’d think Peruvians don’t know how to wear suits. All the other countries had their representatives wear suits (the Indian representative did wear more traditional clothing but they actually still wear those) but the Peruvian guy looked like he stepped right out of The Emperor’s New Groove. Please don’t think Peruvians don’t know how to wear suits- they may not be very nice suits, but plenty of people are wearing them.
We stopped in one more fabric store and after a bit of difficulty, I bought some grey fabric. Then, with Sara, we went to the tailor on the other side of town. It took at least an hour and a half to tell the tailor about the 4 pairs of pants that we wanted between the three of us and get our measurements taken. By the time we got back to SALI, I was ready to crash. Thus it was another relaxing Saturday here in Peru.
Sunday night I went to Teresa's house for tea. The tea was tasty but not very hot, and we ate saltines with a little jelly on them (which is actually quite good). It amazes me how different the 'middle class' of Peru is from the middle class in America. I think Teresa would be considered middle class. She is one of 7 siblings and lives in a decent neighborhood. The lighting inside the main room consists of a few exposed light bulbs. The floor is cement (compared to the "poor" people's dirt floors). There are a few chairs arranged for chatting, a big table with more chairs, and a nice cabinet with tea cups inside. That was it though. The walls are bare white cement. There are no interior doors that I could see, only openings. I've been in other houses that do have wooden doors though, or curtains. What amazes me is that having known Teresa for a while now, and she always looks so cute with her straight leg jeans and tacos (high heels), I was somehow unprepared to believe that she lives with so little. Compared to plenty of people she isn't poor, but if she lived in that sort of house in America, everyone would consider her impoverished. She's the first generation in her family to go to university. Teresa and I walk around Wichanzao (the poorest part of Trujillo) every Thursday to visit the women in the microfinance program. Last Thursday we visited Bertha, who makes cakes out of her home. She watches her grandson while her daughter works two jobs and goes to school every day from about 5 am until late at night. They had a packed down dirt floor and probably half of their belongings around the room we sat in. Once you get past the material differences though, everyone here in Peru has the same basic human needs as we do in the US. However, when you are hungry and tired from working all day, everyday, your mind probably dwells more on immediate problems than the more abstract.
We are so blessed in America. I love America for its efficiency, but am frustrated by its selfish luxury. The southerners down here keep reminding me that Connecticut is both the richest state, and the one that gives the least to charity.
On the other hand, I seem to be on a “less healthy” streak. It’s nothing serious, but I’ve had quite a few migraines since I’ve been here and I currently have a head-cold of sorts. Either it’s a bad cold or my allergy medicine just decided to stop working. The headaches are probably stress related because it seems that I am stressed out no matter my circumstances. Here’s a lovely little example: Friday afternoon I was finishing making my tests (that I needed about 2 hours later to give to my classes) and I simply could not get the new Microsoft Word 2007 to stop making these random lines in the middle of the page. The back button wouldn’t undo anything and I couldn’t for the life of my get rid of the stupid lines across my test for quite a while. After a while I stood up and walked away from the computer and I was really losing it. I sat down again because we were about to start a meeting, and tried a few more times and then there I am, crying at my computer because I couldn’t erase the lines across my test. Poor Matt sitting next to me. He was really nice about it, of course, but I just get so worked up over nothing. It really is a problem, and more likely a symptom of a deeper problem. In any event, I would really appreciate prayer for my health and that I wouldn’t be so stressed out all the time.
WARNING: only continue reading if you are bored, and care to understand the culture and inefficiency here in Peru.
Saturday Becca and I walked all around Trujillo. I had hoped our two errands would take about 4 hours (making allowances for the terrible inefficiency down here) but it actually took us from 12:30 to 7:30 to accomplish our small tasks. First we looked for fabric to bring to the tailor to have pants made. That was quite a fiasco. We didn’t find what we wanted in the town center so we went out to one of the 3 major (underground economy) malls to see what they had. Becca found some really nice alpaca wool for khakis. By this time, it’s already about 2:30ish. I found some really nice navy wool for a blazer, but I want to make sure I know a good tailor before I invest in that because it’ll be pricey. Our next task was to find some tea light candles for the coffee house on Thursday night since Becca and I are in charge of decorations. How hard can it be to find candles in a city of about 1 million people? I had asked a Peruvian friend earlier in the week where candles could be found and she told me in Zona Franca so to Zona Franca we went. She had told me the second floor of the mall so we started there. We looked around, and not finding any, asked someone who worked there where candles are sold. He told us the 3rd floor. On the third floor we didn’t find any either so we asked again. She told us on the 4th floor. So we went to the 4th floor, and another lady told us we could find them on the second floor. In truth, no one had any idea where there were candles, and just keep naming random floors! Finally one lady suggested El Virey, another shopping mall across the street. We went there and finally found candles in a window display! But alas, what a cruel joke- the store was closed. We thought that perhaps it had closed for siesta and decided to come back at 4. By this time it was already 3:30 so we thought it was worth waiting. As we wondered around the third floor of the mall, we saw a place to get manicures and decided we’d go back there and get manicures (for only 5 soles) while we waited as soon as we checked for other candle stores. We poked in a few other stores. I bought a really cute cream skirt with blue flowers on it that I am currently wearing as I write this. But when we wanted to go back to get manicures and candles, we couldn’t find the store! This may seem hard to believe, because we ourselves were bewildered, but we walked around the third floor of El Virey for at least 30 minutes. All the shop owners laughed at us as we walked by them for the 5th or 6th time. The way these malls are laid out is so confusing- none of the stores have signs and they’re so small. Finally we gave up and bought expensive tea light candles from the Indian store. We were both exhausted.
We took a cab to one of our favorite cafes and had a late lunch/early dinner. On the TV in the café they were announcing the Seven New Wonders of the World. Everyone was watching to see if Machu Picchu would win. When they announced it (in English) Becca yelled out “Machu Picchu” and everyone cheered! It’s funny how when you’re in public when events happen, you feel a sudden camaraderie with complete strangers around you. It was exciting to be with a bunch of Peruvians when the announcement was made. I will say though, that if you watched the ceremony, you’d think Peruvians don’t know how to wear suits. All the other countries had their representatives wear suits (the Indian representative did wear more traditional clothing but they actually still wear those) but the Peruvian guy looked like he stepped right out of The Emperor’s New Groove. Please don’t think Peruvians don’t know how to wear suits- they may not be very nice suits, but plenty of people are wearing them.
We stopped in one more fabric store and after a bit of difficulty, I bought some grey fabric. Then, with Sara, we went to the tailor on the other side of town. It took at least an hour and a half to tell the tailor about the 4 pairs of pants that we wanted between the three of us and get our measurements taken. By the time we got back to SALI, I was ready to crash. Thus it was another relaxing Saturday here in Peru.
Sunday night I went to Teresa's house for tea. The tea was tasty but not very hot, and we ate saltines with a little jelly on them (which is actually quite good). It amazes me how different the 'middle class' of Peru is from the middle class in America. I think Teresa would be considered middle class. She is one of 7 siblings and lives in a decent neighborhood. The lighting inside the main room consists of a few exposed light bulbs. The floor is cement (compared to the "poor" people's dirt floors). There are a few chairs arranged for chatting, a big table with more chairs, and a nice cabinet with tea cups inside. That was it though. The walls are bare white cement. There are no interior doors that I could see, only openings. I've been in other houses that do have wooden doors though, or curtains. What amazes me is that having known Teresa for a while now, and she always looks so cute with her straight leg jeans and tacos (high heels), I was somehow unprepared to believe that she lives with so little. Compared to plenty of people she isn't poor, but if she lived in that sort of house in America, everyone would consider her impoverished. She's the first generation in her family to go to university. Teresa and I walk around Wichanzao (the poorest part of Trujillo) every Thursday to visit the women in the microfinance program. Last Thursday we visited Bertha, who makes cakes out of her home. She watches her grandson while her daughter works two jobs and goes to school every day from about 5 am until late at night. They had a packed down dirt floor and probably half of their belongings around the room we sat in. Once you get past the material differences though, everyone here in Peru has the same basic human needs as we do in the US. However, when you are hungry and tired from working all day, everyday, your mind probably dwells more on immediate problems than the more abstract.
We are so blessed in America. I love America for its efficiency, but am frustrated by its selfish luxury. The southerners down here keep reminding me that Connecticut is both the richest state, and the one that gives the least to charity.
Monday, July 2, 2007
note to self: go to a L'Abri
Last night at the Ferguson's, Brian told us about how he studied at the L'Abri in Massachusetts for a few weeks a few years ago. I decided this might be a really good idea. If you don't know what it is, check out their website http://www.labri.org/ . Basically it's a Christian study center for people with questions (both Christians and seekers) where you study for a few hours each day from their big library and extensive collection of recorded sermons. You also do chores for a few hours a day, and the rest of the time is spent talking and eating with the other people there. As soon as he mentioned it, I decided it was something I'd like to try. There is one in Southborough, Mass, and also one in southern Sweden... so maybe I'll try to go to the Swedish one in the spring or the Mass one when I get back next summer.
Today has been very relaxing. I didn't get out of bed until 12 because I didn't feel very well, but now I feel better. I'm starting to get excited about Sweden- not that it's all that soon but it's on the horizon.
Today has been very relaxing. I didn't get out of bed until 12 because I didn't feel very well, but now I feel better. I'm starting to get excited about Sweden- not that it's all that soon but it's on the horizon.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
Already the end of June...
Is it just me or is summer flying by? I feel like I've done so much here and yet so little. June classes are over and July classes start on Tuesday. It's going to be weird to celebrate the 4th of July here under the cold and cloud-filled sky. How I long for a sunny afternoon at the beach!
Last Saturday night Becca and I got a taste of Peruvian nightlife when we went out with Fiorella, Natali, and Cynthia. We got to this bar/live music joint at about 10:30 after Becca and I went to youth group at the church. It's called TributoBar and has pretty good atmosphere. It was pretty empty so we could chat. People really started filling in and then packing the place around 11:30-12. At 12:15ish a band started playing a bunch of covers. They were actually quite good. We enjoyed ourselves. One funny thing about Peruvian nightlife is the picture taking. Every 20 minutes or so someone with a badge would come over and ask if they could take a picture of your group. Then they give you a little business card with the website you can go to to view your picture. Here is an example:
Last Saturday night Becca and I got a taste of Peruvian nightlife when we went out with Fiorella, Natali, and Cynthia. We got to this bar/live music joint at about 10:30 after Becca and I went to youth group at the church. It's called TributoBar and has pretty good atmosphere. It was pretty empty so we could chat. People really started filling in and then packing the place around 11:30-12. At 12:15ish a band started playing a bunch of covers. They were actually quite good. We enjoyed ourselves. One funny thing about Peruvian nightlife is the picture taking. Every 20 minutes or so someone with a badge would come over and ask if they could take a picture of your group. Then they give you a little business card with the website you can go to to view your picture. Here is an example:
After listening to the music for a bit we stopped over at this other restaurant/bar/club where we got our fill of really funny 80's music. There was a crazy strobe light that came on occasionally and it looked like everyone was moving in slow motion. Oh and how could I forget the bubbles. All in all it was interesting to see what Peruvian night life looks like, though I don't expect to go back or out like that again. Hopefully we can find a place to do some folk dancing though.
I went out with some of my students again on Wednesday night after their final exam for the month. No mollejitas this time, thankfully. We had chicken-egg sandwiches at a semi-fast food joint. It's been nice getting to know them better.
On a more spiritual note, I was thinking of an old Michael Card song this week. Sometimes I feel like I must be crazy to believe the Gospel, and yet I can't fight the conviction that it is true and there is nothing else. Friends of John and Heather (long term missionaries here) just lost their 2 year old son because he had so much brain damage from almost drowning in their bath tub. They had to take him off life-support and watch their baby die. When Heather asked her friend if she had lost faith because of the events, her friend said "how can I? what else is there?" I feel so blessed to be untouched by real tragedy, but so much pain exists in the world. I ask myself if it's all just a story that we want to believe. At the end of the day though, despite my doubt, I'm just praying that God will increase my faith. Here's the song. It's a great one.
God’s Own Fool by Michael Card
It seems I've imagined him all of my life
As the wisest of all of mankind.
But if God's holy wisdom is foolish to men,
He must have seemed out of his mind.
For even his family said he was mad,
And the priests said "A demon's to blame."
But God in the form of this angry young man
Could not have seemed perfectly sane.
CHORUS:
When we in our foolishness thought we were wise,
He played the fool, and he opened our eyes.
When we in our weakness believed we were strong,
He became helpless to show we were wrong.
And so we follow God's own fool;
For only the foolish can tell.
Believe the unbelievable;
Come be a fool as well.
So come lose your life for a carpenter's son,
For a mad-man who died for a dream.
And you'll have the faith the first followers had,
And you'll feel the weight of the beam.
So surrender the hunger to say you must know,
Have the courage to say "I believe."
For the power of paradox opens your eyes,
And blinds those who say they can see.
Saturday, June 23, 2007
Another Saturday in Trujillo
I have become an expert shopper here in Trujillo. So much for "I should buy clothes before I go because I won't be able to buy stuff there." Last weekend I bought a bright yellow jacket (to keep warm in this especially chilly winter we're having), a really cute brown shirt with cool sleeves, and two long-sleeved T's to keep warm. Today Becca, Julie, and I ventured out again but this time we went with Fuerela, one of our Peruvian friends from Sociedad San Agustin (the Peruvian equivalent of RUF). I bought moccasins at the shoe market - picture an entire mall of teeny-tiny shoe shops all selling very similar wares- and some fun accessories at the Peruvian "Claire's" which is called "Do It". There is one really great store in Trujillo called TopyTop. The clothes are really cute and quite affordable to us (given every dollar = 3 soles). TopyTop is actually a supplier to Hollister and Abercrombie, but the clothes just don't have the brand printed across the front. I did see two shirts that actually said "Hollister" today.
I also found a taylor who makes quite fashionable clothes and said she can have them ready in 24 hours! It'll be an investment, but less of an investment here than in the states, so I think I might have a really cute suit made. Basically I get to design it, and find/draw some pictures and she'll make it happen for about $150 I think. I'm not sure if the fabric costs extra but I'll go back when I have a better idea of what I want. The thought of having my own designs made by someone else for me is really exciting.
Of course I do more here than just shop. My intermediate 3 students took their third quiz yesterday and I went out with 3 of them afterwards to get some food. At this point I had one of my first eat-to-be-polite experiences here in Peru. Usually the food is great, but at this perticular restaurant, all they serve is chicken colon broiled in its juices with a side of yuca. It was soo cruchy and chewy and all I could think about was that I was eating colon and I'll probably get some terrible parasite! Of course, Victor kept saying, "eat more Michelle, it's 'muy rico'." In any event, I had more than enough colon and ate lots of yuca. Good thing there was Coke to wash it all down.
I took my conversation class on a field trip yesterday. We walked down to an art exhibit in one of the old colonial houses, looked at the art, and talked a bit about the history of Trujillo. It's cool "teaching" adults because they can teach me all sorts of interesting things about Peru. The best thing about the walk was that one of my students who hardly speaks in class was very chatty with me on the 10 minute walk each way. Her English is actually quite good but I think she's embarrassed to speak in front the of the class. It was nice for us all to talk to each other in another environment too. I've really enjoyed getting to know them. I'm sad I only have 3 more days with them because in July I'm not teaching conversation anymore. I'll be teaching Basic 9, which I've heard is fun to teach because instead of working through a grammar book, the students read super abridged versions of The Little Princess and The Wizard of Oz, and then you talk about it and work on their writing skills. The students are in each level for a month, which works out to 18 classes per level. It goes Basic 1-10, Intermediate 1-10, and Advanced 1-5 I think. We also encourage everyone in Intermediate and Advanced to take conversation (which is just for practice; there's no grading or out of class work). Ideally, if the student works hard and sticks with the program, he or she can walk into SALI without knowing how to say "hello" and walk out 2 and a half years later totally fluent. The fact that every class above Basic 5 is taught by a native speaker is a real advantage. The other language institutes in the city don't have as many native speakers for teachers and much larger class sizes. We demand a lot of our students; if I was learning Spanish in the US I don't think I would be willing to devote an hour and a half every weekday evening or morning to Spanish classes, plus homework in the workbook every night, and a chapter test every Friday that includes a speaking test. The scholarship kids have to maintain an 80 to keep their scholarships. It's pretty rigorous.
I decided not to go to Chile and Argentina this summer at the end of my Cuzco trip. It would be really expensive and I'll probably be really tired after teaching in July and traveling around Peru for 5 or 6 days. Thus after all the other summer interns (except Chase) leave at the end of July, I'll probably head up to Cajamarca, a mountain town farther north. PeruMission was originally established there, and I can stay with Pastor Ramirez and his family probably. I hear it's beautiful and a good place to relax. Life is a bit slower there than in the city where I live now.
Last weekend we went to Chan Chan, some pre-Inca ruins, with a bunch of SALI students. It was a good time to get to know people better, though only one of my students actually came. Fuerela and Natalie were there though, so we hung out. Here's a picture of us. By the way, that day was the ONLY day in the month I've been here that I could wear a tank top. I embraced the sun- it's almost always overcast here.
I also found a taylor who makes quite fashionable clothes and said she can have them ready in 24 hours! It'll be an investment, but less of an investment here than in the states, so I think I might have a really cute suit made. Basically I get to design it, and find/draw some pictures and she'll make it happen for about $150 I think. I'm not sure if the fabric costs extra but I'll go back when I have a better idea of what I want. The thought of having my own designs made by someone else for me is really exciting.
Of course I do more here than just shop. My intermediate 3 students took their third quiz yesterday and I went out with 3 of them afterwards to get some food. At this point I had one of my first eat-to-be-polite experiences here in Peru. Usually the food is great, but at this perticular restaurant, all they serve is chicken colon broiled in its juices with a side of yuca. It was soo cruchy and chewy and all I could think about was that I was eating colon and I'll probably get some terrible parasite! Of course, Victor kept saying, "eat more Michelle, it's 'muy rico'." In any event, I had more than enough colon and ate lots of yuca. Good thing there was Coke to wash it all down.
I took my conversation class on a field trip yesterday. We walked down to an art exhibit in one of the old colonial houses, looked at the art, and talked a bit about the history of Trujillo. It's cool "teaching" adults because they can teach me all sorts of interesting things about Peru. The best thing about the walk was that one of my students who hardly speaks in class was very chatty with me on the 10 minute walk each way. Her English is actually quite good but I think she's embarrassed to speak in front the of the class. It was nice for us all to talk to each other in another environment too. I've really enjoyed getting to know them. I'm sad I only have 3 more days with them because in July I'm not teaching conversation anymore. I'll be teaching Basic 9, which I've heard is fun to teach because instead of working through a grammar book, the students read super abridged versions of The Little Princess and The Wizard of Oz, and then you talk about it and work on their writing skills. The students are in each level for a month, which works out to 18 classes per level. It goes Basic 1-10, Intermediate 1-10, and Advanced 1-5 I think. We also encourage everyone in Intermediate and Advanced to take conversation (which is just for practice; there's no grading or out of class work). Ideally, if the student works hard and sticks with the program, he or she can walk into SALI without knowing how to say "hello" and walk out 2 and a half years later totally fluent. The fact that every class above Basic 5 is taught by a native speaker is a real advantage. The other language institutes in the city don't have as many native speakers for teachers and much larger class sizes. We demand a lot of our students; if I was learning Spanish in the US I don't think I would be willing to devote an hour and a half every weekday evening or morning to Spanish classes, plus homework in the workbook every night, and a chapter test every Friday that includes a speaking test. The scholarship kids have to maintain an 80 to keep their scholarships. It's pretty rigorous.
I decided not to go to Chile and Argentina this summer at the end of my Cuzco trip. It would be really expensive and I'll probably be really tired after teaching in July and traveling around Peru for 5 or 6 days. Thus after all the other summer interns (except Chase) leave at the end of July, I'll probably head up to Cajamarca, a mountain town farther north. PeruMission was originally established there, and I can stay with Pastor Ramirez and his family probably. I hear it's beautiful and a good place to relax. Life is a bit slower there than in the city where I live now.
Last weekend we went to Chan Chan, some pre-Inca ruins, with a bunch of SALI students. It was a good time to get to know people better, though only one of my students actually came. Fuerela and Natalie were there though, so we hung out. Here's a picture of us. By the way, that day was the ONLY day in the month I've been here that I could wear a tank top. I embraced the sun- it's almost always overcast here.
I've been playing soccer most Tuesday and Thursday nights. It's better now because I know all the guys' names and they know me. It feels good to get some exercise! Not that we don't do a lot of walking around town, but after sitting in Gringolandia all day, I feel the urge to run around a bit. It's weird playing on concrete without any walls around the court. I played on concrete sometimes in Brazil and a lot in Spain, but this whole "no walls" thing makes the game a lot different. It's all about ball control and dribbling past people. We usually play 6 on 6. When the ball goes out, pretty much anybody can put it back in play- no throw in's necessary. Sometimes they roll it in, sometimes they toss it with one arm, sometimes they drop it at their own feet and start dribbling. There's no such thing as a push, trip, or offsides. Really there are no rules except that you can't shoot from behind a certain line. Once you except the fact that no rules apply (though sometimes they call hand-balls), it's actually quite freeing. I think I pulled my hamstring on Thursday but hopefully it'll feel better for Tuesday. What's great is that playing soccer with the guys (and a few girls too) gives us the opportunity to get to know them and invite them to youth group and church, which are right across the street. They all know Pastor Ricardo (he lives right near the soccer court) and his wife and sometimes they play with us. Sydney, Matt, and Joe always play too so I'm not the only gringo. It's a good time.
Okay well I should go do some grading. Now I better understand the life of a teacher! Thanks for all the prayers and sorry I haven't been so good at keeping in touch. My computer hasn't been working a lot and there's always so much going on! To Vista Hermosa....
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
my first homesick night and some amazing pictures
I would rank tonight as my first homesick night. Considering I've been here for close to a month, that's not too bad. I sat out on the top balcony looking at the hazy, yet lit up night sky for a while thinking of the recent 4th of July night sky that looked the same. Even though the sky was completely clouded over, they launched the fireworks anyway and the sky just turned completely green or completely red with each bang. It was a good 4th of July...
Oh so I never finished talking about my trip to Huaraz. On Saturday we drove up into the mountains through this ravine for 2.5 hours. When the road ended we got out of the vans and walked up another 45 minutes to reach the glacier. I'm out of shape and the thin air didn't help. Our climbing sight was at about 5,000 meters - pretty high up. I felt dizzy every time I stood up or sat down. It was so beautiful. The mountains were so majestic I couldn't believe I was observing that scenery in person. Climbing the ice was a real adreneline rush. I watched the other climbers before me so I had pretty good technique and it wasn't too difficult. It's a good thing the ice picks are strapped to your hands though because by the time you get to the top, your hands are just so tired. 
The first picture is me and Matt, with our Israeli friends climbing in the background. Then you have a more distant view where you can see the glacier we were climbing on. Below I am hanging upside down from my rope after climbing. And then there is a lovely picture I took on the drive back to town. Okay, and now to Hops.
Since I'm feeling a bit melancholy, I will venture to say that rather than being "really busy" I am in fact "too busy." I feel the need to stop and isolate myself from the hustle and bustle of the corner of Larco Av. and Espana Av. where the sound of taxi horns never stops. Today I watched some young guys, probably about 17 years old though perhaps older, doing flips in front of the lanes of taxis during the red lights and then asking for tips. Yesterday it was a lady with flags. You know the economy isn't providing enough jobs when strong and flexible young men are doing gymnastics in the street for money (and in all the time I watched, no one actually gave them any so I doubt its very lucrative). Time is just flying by- it'll be August 31st before I know it. And while I'm a little homesick tonight, I don't actually want to leave. I'm really happy here- I just wish I had more hours in the day to do and see everything I'd like. I'd like to spend some time hanging out at the National University just attempting to talk to students. I told the microfinance guys I'd look for micro business training materials. I'm only teaching 2 classes a day now but I spend several hours a day planning for them. I'm trying to play soccer with some of the kids in the church neighborhood every Tuesday and Thursday (and when I say kids, I really mean young men mostly- ages ranging from 16-28 or so- and me and Sydney and a few other english teachers). Additionally there is something going on all the time around here. People are constantly walking to markets and the plaza. Monday I went to this huge market where they sell pretty much every vegetable, spice, herb, meat, etc. and some flowers. I bought a huge bouquet of flowers for 4 soles (about $1.30). In the states it probably would have cost at least $40. Oh that's another thing, we refer to the US as "the states" almost exclusively among the teachers and missionary families. Also, I've added "y'all" to my daily vocabulary- it couldn't be helped. Everyone is Southern.
Tonight we're going to Hops, a pretty contemporary microbrewery, for Jazz night. In fact, Wednesday night Jazz night at Hops is the only night and place you can hear the only live jazz band preform in the entire city of Trujillo. Live bands are not common around here. There are some cellists coming to the opera house to do a concert on Thursday but I think I'll play soccer. So much to do, so little time. I wish I had time to read!
We're planning our trip for the end of July/beginning of August. Right now it sounds like Cuzco and Macchu Pichu for the first few and then Santiago, Chile, and possibly Mendozza, Argentina, for the last few. It might get a lil pricey but I can't turn down an opportunity like this.
Oh so I never finished talking about my trip to Huaraz. On Saturday we drove up into the mountains through this ravine for 2.5 hours. When the road ended we got out of the vans and walked up another 45 minutes to reach the glacier. I'm out of shape and the thin air didn't help. Our climbing sight was at about 5,000 meters - pretty high up. I felt dizzy every time I stood up or sat down. It was so beautiful. The mountains were so majestic I couldn't believe I was observing that scenery in person. Climbing the ice was a real adreneline rush. I watched the other climbers before me so I had pretty good technique and it wasn't too difficult. It's a good thing the ice picks are strapped to your hands though because by the time you get to the top, your hands are just so tired. 
The first picture is me and Matt, with our Israeli friends climbing in the background. Then you have a more distant view where you can see the glacier we were climbing on. Below I am hanging upside down from my rope after climbing. And then there is a lovely picture I took on the drive back to town. Okay, and now to Hops.
Friday, June 8, 2007
note to self: buy pink grapefruit soap from bath and body upon return
Well it appears I'm a slacker when it comes to updating this blog. It's just so much more fun to be out there living life in Peru than journaling about it after. I am currently sitting in a classroom watching my 4 students squirm a little as they take their first unit exam. I personally think it's pretty easy so I hope they do well (I did make it so I might be biased.) I'm really enjoying teaching. I teach a conversation class from 4:15 to 5:15 every day and a grammar class (Intermediate 3) from 5:45 to 7:10 every evening. I spend a big chunck of every morning and afternoon preparing for these classes. My students are mostly university students or recent graduates. One girl in my grammar class is still in high school. The test they are taking right now is mostly testing their use of "have to" to show obligation and "should/must" to give advice. In my conversation class today we talked about AIDS in Africa, whether its better to live in the mountains of Peru or on the coast, and then did some role playing for various situations. We also talked about cowboys in Texas. I told them I might invite Matt or Chase to come to our class since they're Texans and a rather amusing pair.
So last week I went to Huaraz, a bustling little town nestled in the Andes. We took a nine-hour bus ride during the night on a double-decker bus to get there. The bus was pretty comfortable. Even though I took lots of meds I still felt pretty sick when we arrived- though I never threw up the whole weekend even though we were winding here and there on these tiny, cliff-side roads. Eleven of us went together: 2 of the "old interns" and 9 of the new ones. It was a good group bonding experience in addition to the fact that I don't think I've ever in my entire life seen such beautiful, breathtaking scenery.
This was the view from my window at the hostel. Okay now the test is finished and my students invited me to go out to a bar with them so... I'll finish this later! Stay tuned.
Saturday, May 26, 2007
crazy cabs and ancient ruins
hola from peru! I've been here almost a week and everyday has been a new adventure. If you check facebook you can see all the pictures i've taken so far. it's actually not safe to bring my camera around (you're just asking someone to rob you) so the pictures might be somewhat limited.
I arrived in Lima at about 11 p.m. monday night. I had met up with 6 other SALI interns at the atlanta airport so that made traveling more pleasant. I didn't get motion sickness too bad at all!! (unfortunately the medicine that made that possible made me really sick wednesday and thursday). we stayed at a hotel in lima (where they were selling a book about Chuck Norris) and took a tour of lima during the day Tuesday. We saw the major plazas, some museums of artifacts of pre-Incan civilization, and even the Love Park (which has a giant sculpture of a man and a woman embracing and kissing). Apparently every year on valentines day they have a contest there for the longest kiss; last year's winners went over two hours or something extraordinary like that. we also chilled at Larco Mar, a really fancy shopping plaza, where we ate at a really nice restaurant called Mangos and got our last starbucks for a long time. the only american chain in trujillo is radio shack.
tuesday night we took the short flight home to trujillo and moved into our lodgings. for about two weeks (one of which has now just about passed) ill be living with two other interns at the house of Amelia, a lady from the Larco church. We each have our own rooms with huge windows. They tell me my mattress is made of sawdust- which means that since the first time i slept in it there has been and will continue to be a large dent where i sleep. i'm used to a hard mattress tho so it hasn't bothered me too much. Amelia is so nice and makes us breakfast every morning.
Wednesday we got the tour of SALI and downtown trujillo. the major part of the city is encircled by Espana Av. which used to be the site of the wall around the city. SALI is on a major corner, the intersection of Larco, Pizarro, and Espana. To get to our house we go away from downtown down Larco, and to get to downtown we walk up Pizzaro. From where i now sit in the SALI intern room that one of the students named 'Gringolandia' I can hear the constant beeping of horns. The first time I rode in a taxi i feared for my life, actually more like the first 3 days. I've gotten more used to it now and understand that there is a method to their madness, tho this type of driving would never be acceptable in the US. there are very few lights or stop signs, its all about whoever has the most speed and who sticks the nose of their taxi out far enough to stop the flow of traffic. the taxis themselves are tiny and there are very few private cars. I spend an average of 7 soles a day on taxi rides (1 dollar roughly equals 3 soles).
wednesday night i started feeling really sick while we were out at the fanciest bar in trujillo, Hops. the drinking age is like 16 or something tho no one cares but peru mission has a rule that you can't drink if you're under 21 so i will be ordering lots of coca-colas at bars this summer. I continued feeling really sick (i'm pretty sure it was a side effect of the motion sickness medicine i took to get down here) thursday but went on with our activities anyway. we visited the 3 churches peru mission works with- 2 of which they planted. I went back out to Wichanzao, a barrio on the outskirts of greater trujillo and location of one of these churches, to observe a microcredit orientation meeting. i'll be heading back out there as soon as i finish this entry to meet with the same ladies again. right now we have 2 groups that are considering taking out loans. Charlie and Lawson have been working on this project for a long time now, tho charlie is going back to the states in a few weeks. John just arrived and will be working on this project too.
thursday night we had game night at one of the longterm missionaries' houses, the fergusons. Heather Ferguson actually let me borrow anna karenina which i had been reading at home. she said its one of her favorite books and we should discuss it when i finish. all the missionaries and interns were there and we had some great food. stepping into their house was like walking back into america. that's definitely the place to go if i get frustrated or start missing home.
yesterday morning, friday, we visted the Huaca de la Luna in Moche. It was so amazing to see how the adobe bricks have been so perfectly preserved since the early first millenium. The Moche were the dominant civilization in northern coastal peru from about 100 to 800 a.d. The temple we visited had been expanded 5 different times. they said that when a certain very high official/leader died they buried him in the temple and then built a new temple on top. Since they just covered the old walls with adobe, archeologists have been able to scrape away the newer mud to reveal perfectly preserved colored frescos. it's really amazing the entent to which the artwork remains in such good condition considering its age. of course all this is made possible by the fact that we're in the desert and it hardly ever rains. the city really can't handle it when it does; theres no drainage system and many houses and buildings have openings in their roofs.
after moche we went to a nice restaurant that serves very authentic peruvian food. i had tacu taca with lomo saltado romano (steak with peppers, onions, and french fries served on a platform of fried rice and beans) and ceviche (raw seafood "cooked" in the acid of lemon juice). Everything was really good except i didn't like the fried rice/bean stuff. Next time I'll just get the lomo saltado romano alone. Friday night we went to their RUF meeting and afterward I went with a few other interns to watch Pirates of the Carribbean 3. It cost me 7 soles. We got out pretty late and i saw trujillo like ive never seen it before: quiet with almost empty streets.
One thing i'm pretty excited about is having some clothes made. apparently it's pretty cheap to have a tailor sew clothes if you bring them fabric and say what you want. i've also been told that one of the pastors' wives likes to make skirts so I might ask her too.
today we can do whatever we like so that's a nice break from the hectic pace of the last week. if anyone wants to send me mail my address is:
100 Larco Av.
Trujillo, Peru
South America
Apparently there are no zip codes down here. I think i'm adjusting pretty well so far. we couldn't flush the toilet paper in brazil either so i've been doing alright with that. it's a pain that we can't drink the water (only bottled) or eat fresh food from street vendors because it looks so good! I am understanding a surprisingly large amount of spanish so that's encouraging. I'll be taking spanish lessons twice a week and meeting with a conversation partner another 2 days a week so hopefully that will help me improve. When I figure out how to post pictures i will but all the buttons on blogspot are now in spanish so it's making it more difficult to figure things out. All my pictures are on facebook anyway. To those who are, thanks for your prayers! Stay tuned for more adventures and musings...
I arrived in Lima at about 11 p.m. monday night. I had met up with 6 other SALI interns at the atlanta airport so that made traveling more pleasant. I didn't get motion sickness too bad at all!! (unfortunately the medicine that made that possible made me really sick wednesday and thursday). we stayed at a hotel in lima (where they were selling a book about Chuck Norris) and took a tour of lima during the day Tuesday. We saw the major plazas, some museums of artifacts of pre-Incan civilization, and even the Love Park (which has a giant sculpture of a man and a woman embracing and kissing). Apparently every year on valentines day they have a contest there for the longest kiss; last year's winners went over two hours or something extraordinary like that. we also chilled at Larco Mar, a really fancy shopping plaza, where we ate at a really nice restaurant called Mangos and got our last starbucks for a long time. the only american chain in trujillo is radio shack.
tuesday night we took the short flight home to trujillo and moved into our lodgings. for about two weeks (one of which has now just about passed) ill be living with two other interns at the house of Amelia, a lady from the Larco church. We each have our own rooms with huge windows. They tell me my mattress is made of sawdust- which means that since the first time i slept in it there has been and will continue to be a large dent where i sleep. i'm used to a hard mattress tho so it hasn't bothered me too much. Amelia is so nice and makes us breakfast every morning.
Wednesday we got the tour of SALI and downtown trujillo. the major part of the city is encircled by Espana Av. which used to be the site of the wall around the city. SALI is on a major corner, the intersection of Larco, Pizarro, and Espana. To get to our house we go away from downtown down Larco, and to get to downtown we walk up Pizzaro. From where i now sit in the SALI intern room that one of the students named 'Gringolandia' I can hear the constant beeping of horns. The first time I rode in a taxi i feared for my life, actually more like the first 3 days. I've gotten more used to it now and understand that there is a method to their madness, tho this type of driving would never be acceptable in the US. there are very few lights or stop signs, its all about whoever has the most speed and who sticks the nose of their taxi out far enough to stop the flow of traffic. the taxis themselves are tiny and there are very few private cars. I spend an average of 7 soles a day on taxi rides (1 dollar roughly equals 3 soles).
wednesday night i started feeling really sick while we were out at the fanciest bar in trujillo, Hops. the drinking age is like 16 or something tho no one cares but peru mission has a rule that you can't drink if you're under 21 so i will be ordering lots of coca-colas at bars this summer. I continued feeling really sick (i'm pretty sure it was a side effect of the motion sickness medicine i took to get down here) thursday but went on with our activities anyway. we visited the 3 churches peru mission works with- 2 of which they planted. I went back out to Wichanzao, a barrio on the outskirts of greater trujillo and location of one of these churches, to observe a microcredit orientation meeting. i'll be heading back out there as soon as i finish this entry to meet with the same ladies again. right now we have 2 groups that are considering taking out loans. Charlie and Lawson have been working on this project for a long time now, tho charlie is going back to the states in a few weeks. John just arrived and will be working on this project too.
thursday night we had game night at one of the longterm missionaries' houses, the fergusons. Heather Ferguson actually let me borrow anna karenina which i had been reading at home. she said its one of her favorite books and we should discuss it when i finish. all the missionaries and interns were there and we had some great food. stepping into their house was like walking back into america. that's definitely the place to go if i get frustrated or start missing home.
yesterday morning, friday, we visted the Huaca de la Luna in Moche. It was so amazing to see how the adobe bricks have been so perfectly preserved since the early first millenium. The Moche were the dominant civilization in northern coastal peru from about 100 to 800 a.d. The temple we visited had been expanded 5 different times. they said that when a certain very high official/leader died they buried him in the temple and then built a new temple on top. Since they just covered the old walls with adobe, archeologists have been able to scrape away the newer mud to reveal perfectly preserved colored frescos. it's really amazing the entent to which the artwork remains in such good condition considering its age. of course all this is made possible by the fact that we're in the desert and it hardly ever rains. the city really can't handle it when it does; theres no drainage system and many houses and buildings have openings in their roofs.
after moche we went to a nice restaurant that serves very authentic peruvian food. i had tacu taca with lomo saltado romano (steak with peppers, onions, and french fries served on a platform of fried rice and beans) and ceviche (raw seafood "cooked" in the acid of lemon juice). Everything was really good except i didn't like the fried rice/bean stuff. Next time I'll just get the lomo saltado romano alone. Friday night we went to their RUF meeting and afterward I went with a few other interns to watch Pirates of the Carribbean 3. It cost me 7 soles. We got out pretty late and i saw trujillo like ive never seen it before: quiet with almost empty streets.
One thing i'm pretty excited about is having some clothes made. apparently it's pretty cheap to have a tailor sew clothes if you bring them fabric and say what you want. i've also been told that one of the pastors' wives likes to make skirts so I might ask her too.
today we can do whatever we like so that's a nice break from the hectic pace of the last week. if anyone wants to send me mail my address is:
100 Larco Av.
Trujillo, Peru
South America
Apparently there are no zip codes down here. I think i'm adjusting pretty well so far. we couldn't flush the toilet paper in brazil either so i've been doing alright with that. it's a pain that we can't drink the water (only bottled) or eat fresh food from street vendors because it looks so good! I am understanding a surprisingly large amount of spanish so that's encouraging. I'll be taking spanish lessons twice a week and meeting with a conversation partner another 2 days a week so hopefully that will help me improve. When I figure out how to post pictures i will but all the buttons on blogspot are now in spanish so it's making it more difficult to figure things out. All my pictures are on facebook anyway. To those who are, thanks for your prayers! Stay tuned for more adventures and musings...
Monday, May 7, 2007
"be still, and know that I am God" psalm 46:10
So I'm home now and feeling a bit at a loss. It was such a hectic semester with more work than I've ever done in any previous one, but now it's over. I already have a long list of all the things I need to do for Peru, but those things are easy and painless compared to all the research papers- so I guess it's happy summer to me. I feel like I'm forgetting something.
I went to boston on saturday to hang out with a bunch of swedish ladies to get my scholarship for study abroad. they really got me all excited about going and now i'm looking into swedish lessons for the fall. if you know anyone who gives swedish lessons or speaks swedish at uconn, let me know.
on a more spiritual note, i'm really looking forward to the atmosphere at SALI. I know being a Christian is not about "feeling" spiritual or pious, and it's a good thing because I don't. Still, I know I'm not depending on God like I should and desire to, and if I'm honest with myself, I'm really holding Him and His plans for me at arms length. I don't trust that He is good. I know my sinful heart, and I know I deserve wrath- so accepting His love is difficult. Why is it so hard for us to accept grace and mercy? Because they're free? I'm an earner and not being able to earn God's love is an alien concept to my nature. I really hope that this summer I will have some time to just be still, and know that He is God, and to just dwell in His free love and mercy.
I've been wondering about this for the last few days- why does everyone see themselves as victims? I think I'm a victim because so-and-so hurt me, meanwhile so-and-so thinks he's a victim because I hurt him. Our culture tells us to shift the blame, so it's not surprising that we view conflict this way, but how will we ever get over it if we're both harboring bitterness?
I went to boston on saturday to hang out with a bunch of swedish ladies to get my scholarship for study abroad. they really got me all excited about going and now i'm looking into swedish lessons for the fall. if you know anyone who gives swedish lessons or speaks swedish at uconn, let me know.
on a more spiritual note, i'm really looking forward to the atmosphere at SALI. I know being a Christian is not about "feeling" spiritual or pious, and it's a good thing because I don't. Still, I know I'm not depending on God like I should and desire to, and if I'm honest with myself, I'm really holding Him and His plans for me at arms length. I don't trust that He is good. I know my sinful heart, and I know I deserve wrath- so accepting His love is difficult. Why is it so hard for us to accept grace and mercy? Because they're free? I'm an earner and not being able to earn God's love is an alien concept to my nature. I really hope that this summer I will have some time to just be still, and know that He is God, and to just dwell in His free love and mercy.
I've been wondering about this for the last few days- why does everyone see themselves as victims? I think I'm a victim because so-and-so hurt me, meanwhile so-and-so thinks he's a victim because I hurt him. Our culture tells us to shift the blame, so it's not surprising that we view conflict this way, but how will we ever get over it if we're both harboring bitterness?
Thursday, May 3, 2007
a little procrastination
Only 1 more final (latin american history in the national period- sooo much information). It's sad packing up my room here and saying goodbye to friends, though I feel like I'll be back in the blink of an eye.
For those unfamiliar with the song, I named my blog after a song we sing at RUF sometimes. Aside from liking the song, I think "let us love and sing and wonder" is appropriate because those are three of my favorite things to do, and things I always think I should do more of. Here is the song, for those who haven't seen it before:
Let Us Love and Sing and Wonder
from 1 Cor. 6:11, 20; Rev. 1:5
Let us love and sing and wonder
Let us praise the Savior’s name
He has hushed the law’s loud thunder
He has quenched Mount Sinai’s flame
He has washed us with His blood (x3)
He has brought us nigh to God
Let us love the Lord Who bought us
Pitied us when enemies
Called us by His grace and taught us
Gave us ears and gave us eyes
He has washed us with His blood (x3)
He presents our souls to God
Let us sing though fierce temptation
Threatens hard to bear us down
For the Lord, our strong salvation,
Holds in view the conqu’ror’s crown
He, Who washed us with His blood, (x3)
Soon will bring us home to God
Let us wonder grace and justice
Join and point to mercy’s store
When through grace in Christ our trust is
Justice smiles and asks no more
He Who washed us with His blood (x3)
Has secured our way to God
Let us praise and join the chorus
Of the saints enthroned on high
Here they trusted Him before us
Now their praises fill the sky
Thou hast washed us with Thy blood (x3)
Thou art worthy Lamb of God
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
genesis
this is the beginning of my little blog experiment. ive never been good at keeping a journal but i spend so much time on the computer that this might have more success.
so I'm leaving for peru in less than three weeks. i'm excited but it doesn't feel real. i have so much to think about (note to self: reschedule dentist appt., refill allergy spray perscription, find out if my cell phone gets service there) but I also just want to relax and have some fun for two weeks. i also have to decide which books to bring to peru. i wonder if i'll even have much time for pleasure reading- i hope so. i want to finish the collection of dostoevsky's short stories sitting on my shelf before i go.
may 21-aug 31 is a long time. shall be interesting. i think it's good practice for my study abroad next spring (at Uppsala University in Sweden). I hope I don't get too homesick.
well there really isn't much to say at this point. i'm nervous about running a classroom and being charged with other people's education. i'm excited to practice my spanish and meet lots of Christians my age. in any event, this summer will be full of new adventures- hence this blog. i don't promise it will be interesting, but it will serve to keep you informed about how I'm doing and what is going on with me. and to those who are praying for me, thank you so much. It's so comforting to know I don't travel alone.
so I'm leaving for peru in less than three weeks. i'm excited but it doesn't feel real. i have so much to think about (note to self: reschedule dentist appt., refill allergy spray perscription, find out if my cell phone gets service there) but I also just want to relax and have some fun for two weeks. i also have to decide which books to bring to peru. i wonder if i'll even have much time for pleasure reading- i hope so. i want to finish the collection of dostoevsky's short stories sitting on my shelf before i go.
may 21-aug 31 is a long time. shall be interesting. i think it's good practice for my study abroad next spring (at Uppsala University in Sweden). I hope I don't get too homesick.
well there really isn't much to say at this point. i'm nervous about running a classroom and being charged with other people's education. i'm excited to practice my spanish and meet lots of Christians my age. in any event, this summer will be full of new adventures- hence this blog. i don't promise it will be interesting, but it will serve to keep you informed about how I'm doing and what is going on with me. and to those who are praying for me, thank you so much. It's so comforting to know I don't travel alone.
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