pedestrian crossings, bowel movements, and a loco 3 year old.

monday, tuesday, wednesday... life here is a blur. it's hard to keep up... with everything. the traffic, the people, the parents, the teachers, the homework, the knowledge, the history, the politics, and especially, my own mind. things seem to be more of a routine now, but occasionally it will just hit me: i'll be walking to school, or perhaps be riding a micro (mini-bus), and all of a sudden i feel like i've been slapped and i get one of those "ah-ha" moments where i realize i truly am standing in the middle of lima, peru. a city of 9 million plus. a city full of spanish speakers. a city where i am definitely a (very white) outcast. and a city that is miles away from what i know. but i still love it all, and i honestly haven't had any moments of dispair or sadness. i just have moments of an extreme desire to communicate in situations that i can't. moments in which i could actually express my gratitude instead of just saying "gracias." and moments where i wish, for once, i wouldn't be looked at as a "gringa," but as a normal, everyday person. but i am what i am, and i can never change my gringa status, no matter how tan i become. and i suppose that is alright. i'll just be a gringa with a rockin tan, and (hopefully) decent spanish.

so, even though i just said i'm not homesick or anything of the sort, i still have composed a small list of the top 10 things i miss:

1) being able to drink water out of the faucet. here i must either buy or boil it. i've always taken water for granted. i must say i appreciate the states easy access to water about 32487328947 times more than i ever have before.

2) pedestrian crossings. here, the vehicles have right away, always. if you get ran over, it's completely your fault. they also don't have many stop lights, so you never know if i car will come barreling through or not. it's quite the game.

3) being able to throw toilet paper into the toilet. here, the sewer systems aren't good, so you must put toilet paper in a little trash can beside the toilet. it gets smelly after awhile.

4) washing and dryer machienes. i honestly don't mind the whole hand washing ordeal. it's kind of relaxing after a hectic day in the city. but i do mind how stretched out my clothes will be by the end of these 3ish months. my pants are already falling off.

5) adjustable shower temperature. i either have very cold, or very hot. it's a tough decision to decide if you want to scald your body with boiling water in the morning, or if you want to have icecicles on your air. i usually choose depending on how sweaty i am when i wake up.

6) i have already talked about this quite a bit, but i miss being able to contribute to conversations. after all the girls left last friday night, my mom said, "you talked so much! i thought you were just a quiet person... but you really aren't." and i was like, "yeah... i'm quiet here because i can't speak spanish."

7) perhaps this is gross, but i really miss solid poops. when will i finally become regular again? no one knows. but i'm really hoping soon because i've become quite tired of this...

8) i miss a great variety of food. not to say the food here isn't good, because it is! quite wonderful, actually. and they have so many different amazing (and a few not so amazing) dishes. but the dishes are somehow always comprised of papas (potatoes), arroz (rice), and pollo (chicken) or some other kind of carne (meat). there are vegetable salad things, and also tons of fruit which is AMAZING. but i miss my hamburgers and pizza. not a lot, but a little.

9) independence. i actually have a lot of it here... but i feel like i've been reverted back to junior high again, where i had to check in with the padres all the time, let them know where i would be, what time i would be home, who i would be with, how i would be getting home... the whole 20 questions game. i haven't had to do this for quite sometime, but all in all, i don't mind too terribly much.

10) i miss not having a three year old around. this girl is a headache. not to mention a complete brat. i have so many stories, i don't even think i can go into them because i would never stop. but to sum it up, she steals my stuff, scribbles on all my stuff, and absolutely loves to fake cry, with tears and everything. i have started yelling at her in english, which makes her listen, but makes her scream with tears. i have come to the point where i don't care. she'll be laying at my feet kicking and crying and i pay her no attention. i feel so mean... but someone has to show her she can't be a brat her whole life. plus, she doesn't understand anything i say, and i don't understand anything she says. so it works out. i must say, we have our moments though. yesterday when i was doing homework she came into my room and sat on my bed and was pretty tame. i even let her listen to my ipod, which she thought was the greatest thing in the world. but it was when i tried to take it away that all hell broke lose... she decided to take revenge by dumping an entire bowl of nuts and dried fruit on my bed. i picked her up and took her to my mother and told her "daniela molesta me!" (which probably isn't correct espanol, but i wanted to say she is bothering me, and my mom got the point and took her away). really, all she wants is attention. and she loves being around me. and sometimes i really love her. but sometimes, i wouldn't mind locking her in a closet.

so yeah. that's my top ten. everything i can survive without, but it is what i miss.

i've found out where i'm going for service. duane has been patiently working with our group. they've been really awesome and have been lining up everyone with exactly what they want, which i find amazing! i thought it was more they just put you somewhere... but no, they've been sitting down with us and even finding new locations for people. it's been great. but anyway, last wednesday we filled out sheets where we indicated places we wanted to go. i decided on chimbote as my first choice. chimbote is a very poor city/town 7 hours north of lima. it is smack on the coast (you can see the ocean from downtown), and it seems to have great opportunities for me. there is a parish there, that isn't hardcore churchy. instead, the parish has a lot of programs set up for all sorts of things needed in the city. you can basically do whatever you want there - if you have a vision, they'll help you carry it out. what i was attracted to was a program they have for gang members wives. i wanted to work with women or children, or perhaps young/teen girls, and i can basically do all those things here. the program for gang members wives is basically to listen to them, hang out with them, show them attention and love... because they really have never receieved it in their lives. and to protect them, because apparently it's a pretty dangerous place. i don't exactly know what i'll do for sure, but i was excited about the parish, as well as the location (right on the ocean? can't get much better than that!).

my second choice was cusco, working at a daycare. i chose that because come on, who wouldn't want to live in cusco for 6 weeks? the only negatives about that was 1) it wasn't exactly what i wanted to do. and 2) right now is the mountains rainy season... and i didn't know if i could stand 6 weeks of rain. i mean, i could tolerate it, but when i know i could be in sunshine, i would prefer that. and 3) cusco is still a city. and not exactly poor. there are a lot of tourists. and i really wanted the whole living in a very poor place experience, which chimbote offered and cusco didn't quite as much. also, as a group we stay in cusco for 5 days on a mini-vacation, so it's not like i won't have an opportunity to explore cusco anyway.

so, those were my first two choices. my third choice was the jungle, and that was soley for the location. i would have been working in kitchens in the jungle, and i don't think i really wanted to cook for 6 weeks... but living in a jungle would make up for it. monday, duane and i were talking, and he said i was the only person who signed up for chimbote, and he didn't want to send me there alone because that location needs two people. so he asked if i would be okay with cusco, and i said i would be okay but i would prefer chimbote if it were possible. then duane said that scott wilkinson was interested in being by the coast, and chimbote was his third choice, so we brought scott over and discussed it with him. scott said he didn't really care what he did, as long as he was by the ocean, so he agreed to go to chimbote, and that was that! so, there we have it. i'm going to be in chimbote with scott, which i'm excited about because he's a nice guy and will be interesting to get to know, in about... 4ish weeks.

on to other things: i really need to stop buying stuff here. it's just so cheap! on tuesday, allison, hannah, amy, sarah, and i went shopping. i ended up buying 2 tank tops and 2 shirts for the equivalent of 15 dollars! we found a store that has tons and tons of imported american clothes (american eagle, alternative vintage, abercrombie and fitch, etc), just sitting in huge piles that you have to dig through. they have clothes with holes or stains for 2.50 soles (about 1 dollar.. in fact a little less), and new clothes for 10 soles (about $3.50). i'm not sure how one could expect me NOT to spend some money in there. then today i went to dubbed movie markets with some girls and i ended up buying juno, little miss sunshine, atonement, and across the universe. i haven't seen atonement or across the universe, but when you're paying 1 dollar for movies, it's pretty hard to pass any up. and then i bought a pair of nice, dressy, flip flop type of shoes. that were actually kind of expensive (7 or 8 dollars), or at least expensive for peru. the woman was being a stubborn bargainer... and i know i could have gotten her to go down, but i was overwhelmed and just ended up buying them for 18 soles. but whatever... i'm supporting peruvian economy.

then on my walk home today, i was minding my own business, and as i passed a man he said, "excuse me, are you an english speaker?" he was obviously purivian, and i was a bit taken aback, and said, "si, yo hablo ingles." we ended up having about a 45 minute conversation right there on the street. he was probably in his 50s, maybe 60?, and he's a selftaught english teacher... if that makes sense. he took some english classes at the peruvian university, and then just studied it on his own, and talked to as many native english speakers as he could find. it was amazing because he spoke incredibly well, especially with annuciation. one of his first questions was, "are you from the u.s., or are you european, or australian?" and when i said i was from the u.s. he became very excited and exclaimed that he rarely gets the chance to speak to northerns, and he was so happy he could speak with me because i apparently know the real english with the best pronunciation. we then talked about quite a variety of things, in both english and really crappy spanish (on my part obviously). he's writing a book, and i was a bit confused, but he was saying how his book is about how women really rule the world. idk, it was kind of weird. but he told me that his philosphy is that god first made man, and then god realized he kind of messed up on man, making them stubborn, and not quite as attractive as they could be, and not as kind hearted as they should be. therefore, he decided to make women without the imperfections of men. therefore, women are more beautiful on the outside and inside. he said the whole god business is a joke, but he's serious about his philosophy that women are better then men. he's hoping that his book makes the best seller list so he can then either obtain a visa because he will be rich, or he will be invited to go somewhere in the world by someone, and he could then travel, because he was never left sourth america (or perhaps peru even ?), because it is so impossible to obtain a visa here.

i then explained to him what im doing here, and the kind of school i go to, and he kept saying i was a lucky woman (mujere con suerte, or something like that). then he asked what i was studying, and i attempted to explain, but it's hard to do when people have no context of a liberal arts school. then he asked what i was passionate about, and i said this point in my life, women's rights and politics. so then we had a huge conversation about american politics, and at the end of it, he said he was excited that he had met the future woman president of the united states, and he would tell all his friends he met me on the streets of lima when i become president. and i said that day would never come because i have no desire to become involved in politics, or at least not like that, and he said i should have the desire because most 20 years old only care about discoteccas, but i'm quite different. and i explained that that is true, yet there are so many others like me... so i'm not that out of norm.

anyway, it was quite a fascinating conversation. he then gave me his card, for his teaching english business or whatever, and told me his name was cesar, and told me i could call him if i wanted and we could have free traded lessons - spanish for me, english for him. idk about calling a man to have free lessons with... although he did seem quite harmless. and is probably 50, 60 years old? and never said any kind of coming on comments, other then mentioning that i must have peruvian boys falling all over me because i am "such a pretty gringa." but in peruvian talk, that's not coming on. but anyway, i would never call him alone. i would first check it out with our peruvian leader, and then i would take cj or some other male figure with me. but it would be quite ineresting to talk to him, because he was extremely fascinating character. and i do think talking one on one with someone who knows both spanish and english, and has a teaching background anyway, would help my spanish tremendously because i've realized that i'm just not cut out for spanish classes - i need one on one learning attention. oh the random moments you find yourself in...

err... backtracking a bit. monday we all went to the beach in callao after spanish class. that was quite the fun time and we requested we do more beach afternoons. then we went to an old spanish fort that is still up and operating. and that was quite amazing to see. you could probably check the goshen blog for more info. on that at some later date. then, monday was joe's 21st birthday, so about 12 of us went out in miraflores for that, which was fun, and i had my first pisco sour (peru's national drink, which yes, is alcohol, and yes, extremely tasty. they have a right to brag).

anyway, i know i have more to say, but i feel like i should stop. i've been typing away at this computer for quite sometime now and i'm getting anxious to watch some of those movies i bought! so, for now, ciao.

(and feel free to write me. i love hearing what is going on at home. and any goshen gossip is always appreciated.)