I'm just beginning my fifth day in Lima, Peru and things are going pretty well.
My host family has been very nice and good to me. The only one in mi familia who speak english is my host sister, Carla. Everyone else speaks spanish to me...wooooww I really suck at Spanish right now lol But I've learned so much just in my first 5 days! And they're all so patient with me while I perfect the art of smiling and nodding or find that it's near impossible for me to roll my "rr's". Jonathan was trying to help me roll the "rr" so we made up a sentence:
"Espero mi perro este en mi carro caro"
which just translates into, I hope my dog is in my expensive car, but it has me sound out the "rr" in contrast to just one "r" to a similar looking word...we all still laugh at my pitiful attempts.
He also tried to teach me some guitar. I really like it but my fingers are so short! the "SO" note is painful!
I'm really enjoying their pets here too haha they have a cat, Garfiel, which generally I'm not a cat-fan but this one is pretty cool, and then there's Loba, their wolf huskie. She's adorable! She's such an attention whore but she's one of the sweetest dogs apart from my own basset hound.
I pretty much get to go to a different place every night whether it's to go shopping or out to dinner (which meals are different here, the custom is a good breakfast, then at about 2-4p you make a really big lunch which is like the American dinner, and then at about 9 or 10p you have a light "dinner" which usually consists of what our lunches in the U.S. look like)
The food here is really different! Y me gusta. I've tried new breads, frutas and vegetables. Muy muy bien! They have really small banana things here that are really good! They taste better than the bananas at home. I eat a lot of them. I also tried this one purple drink that i wasn't too crazy about called Chica Morada, which is made from a Peruvian purple corn grown here up in the mountains; apparently it's very popular. Another very popular drink here in Peru is called Inca Kola. It's kinda the equivalent of the popularity of Root Beer or Coke (except Peru has Coca Cola) in the US. It's this yellow soda and, to me, it tastes between a mix of bubble gum and cream soda; sounds weird, but it is pretty good. I drink a lot of that considering I really can't drink a lot of the water here, so mi padres bought me a huge water bottle the day I arrived.
(and that's the 7th car alarm i've hear outside my window since I woke up at 7am this morning--city life is very busy here, I've memorized the patterns of the car alarms=P)
Yesterday, con mi hermana Carla, we took a taxi downtown
(yeah a taxi, they're pretty intense, the driving here is crazy! Pedestrians do not get the right of way and I haven't really seen a stop sign yet and you pretty much just kinda push your way thru via vehicle)
anyways, Carla took me to this one park in Surco called El Parque de la Amistad (Friendship Park) which was very beautiful!
http://www.peruinside.com/galeriah/parquedelaamistad/
It has this big arch which according to mi madre is a copie of one in Spain. It has water features, a circus, train, lights and a little flea market inside the park
(note to self: still need to find good wool hat for George..)
I've also seen street markets which remind me kind of of Pike Place Market but more crowded. I've never seen a de-feathered dead chicken hanging from a hook with its head and feet still attatched...or it's insides on display right next to it. Tulio, mi host padre, got a laugh out of my first reaction. They also bought me some slippers una mujer was making at one of the booths in the market, they're really comfi and are to keep my feet warm because they don't walk barefoot in their homes.
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Ok, took a break, it's like 4:45p now haha I went to visit my new school Colegio Santa Rosa de Lima con mi familia and I went to the museum with Carla, Lucas, and Roy.
Wow, I just got a snapshot of how difficult this is going to be =) Everyone was speaking Spanish...I think I'm the only one who can't right now that I know...(DUH) So it's really wierd not being able to join in conversations with people. I found myself a little frustrated that I really can't understand most of what's going on.
Why, oh why didn't I take Spanish in school???
Lucas does so well =) I'm really proud of how well he can communicate, but as for me wow, this is going to be hard. It kinda hit me that right now, I really don't have any friends in this country apart from the ones in my family, and it's going to be difficult to meet mroe people if I don't know the Language.
Well, Jetza y mi madre are setting me up for school, I met my Spanish teacher, and once school gets going, I'm pretty sure I'll be able to get into the swing of things. Like mi madre y Jetza keeps telling me "poco poco!!" ;D
