My First Wet-Dry Vac

I shall post this post in picture book style. Sank you.

My First Manicure.

Etch this image into your memory, because my hands will probably never be this pretty again. I was a little nervous at first, but it turned out to be rather anticlimactic. In the future I think I will just paint my own nails. Unless I want a pretty design on them, in which case I'm sure my sheeshter would happily paint me some smiley faces. I didn't get a wight color, pawticuwawy because I didn't want my wegs to wook white.

Huacayarararancayacapayac (I'm not so clear on the name)

I think this place was where they used to make human sacrifices. It was basically just an organized pile of handmade bricks from some date a long time ago. No offense, but it was so boring that I even tried to sacrifice myself. It didn't really work though because no one volunteered to chop me up and bury me.

The Dunes (of sand)

This was the funnest (I don't know if that's actually a word or not, but I'm in a really weird phase where I'm forgetting English but still don't know Spanish) thing I've done in Peru so far. The sandboarding itself (basically sledding but on a gigantic sand dune) was overrated, but I liked clumping along the dunes with a very loose seatbelt (I almost flew out of the car a few times) in a Jeep that kept breaking down. Luckily when I shouted "It's wounded, get help!" the Hun army appeared out of nowhere with the necessary tools. Also, luckily, our guide had cell service in the dunes, so he used his phone to chat with his friends as he fixed the engine.

Las Dunas (the hotel)

There was a hotel in Ica called Las Dunas. It had three pools and a waterslide. It was fun. (By the way, this is in the middle of their winter)

Cebiche

A Peruvian dish of raw fish, but drenched in so much lime juice that it apparently kills all the bacteria. I don't know if I believe that, but I ate it and it was delicious and I didn't get sick so therefore I am a fan of Cebiche! (It can also be spelled ceviche, I'm not sure why but my teacher told me that it's better with a b).

All right, I really need to pack for my next trip. I went to some other cool places, and I liked them! (This is my doll, and I like it!). I'll write about them some other day.

And now, for the ice cream report! (sorry, no picture for this one).
I tried a new flavor called Guanayamana. Actually I can't remember what it was called, but it's some type of fruit and it reminds me of Guantanamera. When I ate it I broke into song.

Excuse me, where is the fat lady?

In class the other day our teacher Julio decided to give us a chance to apply our classroom knowledge to the real world, so he made us walk around the school, pointed at random victims, and forced us to interrogate them. We had to ask such questions as, "Excuse me, is this the art cafeteria?" as we were standing in the science cafeteria. Or, "Pardon me, where is the sports center?" The people gave us a weird look and pointed to the building right in front of us. He also taught us some important things like which cafeteria has the best desserts (the art cafeteria. Not to be confused with the science cafeteria). During our long walk zigzagging through the school, he pointed out many-a-sculpture that are scattered around campus. One was of a bust of some person, but I don't remember who it was or how you say the word "bust" in spanish. At least I actually now know that a bust is a type of statue, not someone's breast (that's what I used to think). Julio's made sure to show us his favorite statue, which is of a really fat lady, but honestly I didn't find it that impressive. Don't tell him though, I wouldn't want to insult him and make him give me an F. And last but certainly not least, Julio taught us some university lingo - the name of the main campus avenue is Tontódremas, which means Avenue of All the Stupidheads Who Walk On It (AKA the students).

That same day, we also went to this cool place but I don't really remember what it was called. Something about someone named Felipe. It's a fort on the coast that was originally built to keep out pirates (at least, I think that's what I was told. Again, I can't really understand people all the time). Since our friend Evelyn (who works for Holy Cross and takes us on all our trips) couldn't make it that day, our driver Percy came with us instead. He had to drive us there anyway, so it worked out quite nicely! Before we entered the fort, a surly lady told Percy that tickets cost extra money for tourists, so he immediately informed her that Leslie and I were his cousins. I don't know why she didn't just assume that, because we all look so much alike. We went into the museum there to look at some paintings and old armor and weapons (I personally am a supporter of peace, but Timmy would have liked it). Next we went through the stone tunnels and saw the jail where they used to hold prisoners (hopefully they don't anymore). It was very tiny, very dark, and very .... stoney (not because the prisoners were stoned, but because it was made of stone). And finally, we went to the top of a tower to look at the view of the city and ocean, which was very nice. I felt extremely powerful. Even though the only power I had was the power to choose to throw my camera off the edge and watch it splat on the ground. Ultimately, for the greater good, I chose to step down from that position and give up the power. Which has allowed me to show you this beautiful picture:

As you can see, we all look related.
Note: string of hair across my forehead is not my unibrow. It's just a piece of hair blowing in the wind. I was trying to achieve a wind-swept look, but now I know better.

Update on the 8's!

New ice cream flavors:
Caramel pecan (one of my favorites so far), merengue, camu camu (some type of fruit), and white chocolate with maracuya (another type of fruit). Note - I don't actually order all these flavors, I just taste as many as possible without annoying the workers too much.


So far I have only taken two pictures here, and both are of my room (the other one is from a different angle because I was trying to be artsy like Steph). It is, as they would say here, buenasa (meaning awesome). My bed is fine, but not always blanketed enough during the night because it gets pretty chilly. Unfortunately it usually falls apart soon after I get into it, because the sheets and blankets are not attached very strongly. Also it tends to be a bit bouncy. Sometimes I wake up at 4 in the morning mid-double-backflip-split-scissor jump.

The other day we went to the centre (not sure why I wrote that with a British spelling...must be all the British accents I hear here) of Lima and went to some churches. By doing this I sacrificed a win over my sister, who held an all-time record of not going to church for over a year. It remains questionable whether she has gone yet since she's been back from Mexico. I think she's going for the Guinness book. I wish her luck! Anyway, the Cathedral was pretty and fortunately the tour we joined happened to be in English, but unfortunately I still didn't understand everything the guide said due to his accent. Next we went to another church and travelled through some Catacombs, underground tunnels (as opposed to overground ones) beneath (as opposed to above) the church. They consisted of organized piles and patterns of people's bones, and in total there were over 25,000 people. I almost just sniped a skull to give Timmy for Christmas, but unfortunately they noticed on my way out when I was a head taller than I had been when I entered. So I had to return it. I did manage to steal some of the air though, by taking in a huge gasp and afterwards breathing into a glass jar. Sorry Tim, I didn't mean to give away your Christmas present. I hope you forget about this post so you can still be surprised!

Random comment: slang word here is deli, which apparently is a short version of the word delicioso. I'm not sure if my mom peruana knows that every time she uses the word, she is calling her own food a Jewish eatery.

Well since I mainly wrote this entry to avoid my homework, I should probably go work on it now. I'll try to take more pictures soon!

Ring, Ring, Ring, Bananaphone!

BREAKING NEWS:
I’m still in Lima.

Other important news headlines:
1. Spain won the world cup. To this I feel completely indifferent, yet try to care only for the sake of being part of people’s conversations when they talk about it (85% of the time). I don’t think I do a very good job though.
2. My siblings hijacked my father’s computer to create a Skype account, and I was finally able to talk to my family (my blood-related one, not the Peruvian one).
3. Everybody here says Ciao to say goodbye, but I learned that I have been spelling it incorrectly, for people here indeed spell it Chau. I’m hoping Ciao is not a bad word because I have written it to a lot of people.
4. I have been to the gelatería three times this week. According to my mom peruana, it's the best in Lima (not sure if I trust her on that one yet). Flavors I’ve tasted: mint chocolate chip, coconut, caramel oreo, cappuccino con crema, and another that was really good but I don’t recall the name.
5. At the market, I bought a pretty bag with peacocks on it.
6. Here they always serve you bananas with jam for breakfast. If you’re lucky they serve it to you for dessert too. Mmmm, nice and slimy.
7. I still can’t really understand what people are saying to me.
8. When I order drinks here, people don’t card me (not that I’ve ever gotten carded in the US, because I’ve never tried to buy a drink there).***
9. I kind of miss being able to put toilet paper in the toilet.
10. Every time I walk into the bathroom I crash into the same shelf.
11. Yesterday we got lost trying to leave the supermarket (we somehow got stuck in the parking garage, and a worker stuck us in the maintenence elevator to find our way out).
12. I finally mastered the art of flushing the toilet properly (Luckily I haven;t had to get close to my family in the same way that Mommy did with Walter when we were living on his boat).

This past week, I finally got the chance to experience the mysterious “discoteca” which I had heard rumors of for so long. I thought it would be a magical place, but it turns out, a discoteca is basically just a club. However, they are extremely hoppin'! Here in Peru, people party from 11:00 at night until at least 4:00 in the morning (when it was 3:00 AM and we were ready to leave, our Peruvian friends were distressed at how early it was). On Thursday night we jammed out to a reggae concert, and the Friday night we went to a place called Tayta, and danced our butts off once again. Unfortunately I think mine must have grown back, because when I woke up it the next morning it remained intact.

Embarrassing miscommunication report:
I asked my mom peruana if churros were popular here (you know, the doughnut things), but apparently the word churro also means a hot guy.

***Note to my parents: Comment not in any way implying that I order many drinks here.

Buenath Nocheth

Unlike in Mexico where they shortened "buenas noches" to "buenathnocheth," here they just say "bueeeeeeeenas." Also they say "ciao" all the time, which pleasantly surprised me! My Italian heritage unexpectedly earned me some bonus points with my family, because they went on for a while about how awesome Italians are and how much they love music. I hope I live up to their expectations, because I have been known in the past for denouncing my heritage (the Lotus Club said it all. I can't name the Asian countries though), and this year I almost forgot it was the Fourth of July. But don't worry, I celebrated it by going to an Irish pub in Peru with my French brother (other exchange student who lives in our house). It was a very diverse day for me! The pub, however, was on the Calle de las Pizzas, so I did indeed retain a bit of my heritage. Not all was lost.

Anyway, onto more interesting topics....On Sunday we went out to lunch and were served an enormous buffet. First we had appetizers, then dinner, then another dinner, then dessert. Then I went up to get more dessert because the Peruvian sitting next to me informed me that the rice pudding I was eating was meant to be eaten with something else, which I had disregarded. Also we had drinks too. So I basically ate a 6 course meal. Let's round that up to 10. During that meal I tasted cow hearts, which are called anticuchos (I think that's how you spell it) de corazón. They were a bit chewy but afterwards I felt like the Grinch, whose heart swelled many sizes on the night he served the roast beast! I wonder what my real heart was thinking as it saw some other hearts pass it on their way to my stomach. I also had the option of eating some guinea pig, but I decided to save some of my eating adventures for another day!

On Monday our program director, Julio, took us to our future school and showed us around. I felt right at home because he, like my mother, knows everybody, and introduced us to about 500 people that he ran into. Then we ate a gourmet lunch in the faculty dining room, and upon Julio's recommendation we all ordered his favorite dish, Pollo Saltado, which consists of cooked onions, chicken, maybe some other random vegetables, french fries, and rice. It's very salty and the french fries are a bit soggy because they're mixed in with everything, but it was wry tasty! Fun fact about the school - many deer wander around the campus and they're so domesticated by this point that you can practically pet them (I did not take the risk. I also have absolutely no idea where the deer came from). Apparently there used to be two of them, and now there are 30. I will get back to you on how I feel about this incest.

After the school, we went to a museum and I did my best to understand everything Julio was saying about the 500,000 clay pots. Seriously there was actually a room with thousands and thousands of clay pots in tall shelves. Come to think of it, it sort of reminded me of the room in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix with all the Prophecies in it. Previous sentence not relevant to anything but the train of thought in my brain. My favorite part of the museum was the section on arte erótica, which had many interestingly shaped pots in it. I only wish my mother's friends could have been there, because it would have been a wonderful source of inspiration for their future cakes. If I had my camera I would have taken pictures.

The good news is, I am going to be able to fulfill one of my life goals here (besides learning Spanish), which is to learn to surf! There are surfing classes - or, as they call them, clases de soorf - here, and I am determined to take one once it gets warmer! Finally, I can become a surfer dude!

Anyway, this entry is getting long and I am getting tired - all this talking in English, it just poops me out! Sheesh. Bueeeeeeenas!!!

Yoe Noe Say

It was the strangest thing....I woke up this morning and I was in a different country. I think I'm in Peru, but one can't be sure. "How did I even get here?" I asked myself. Then, before long, I remembered to myself, ah, yes, I did indeed travel to get here. In fact, I travelled all day. And some of the night too. When I signed up for Peru I clearly did not check a map first to see how far away it was. It's pretty far. When you include a five hour layover in Miami, a one hour delay due to maintenence, a trip through customs, searching for my name at the airport amongst the crowds, the drive to the house, the 800 mile (sorry, I meant kilometer) long walk to the front door, and the hours it took for my mother to answer the doorbell, and the 300 trips I had to make on the airplane to use the bathroom (actually I think it was only 2), it totalled about 18 hours.

My first airplane pilot calmed us all down before take-off by saying "Well, folks, looks like we're about twenty minutes early - so the next time we're twenty minutes late, call it even." At first it made me laugh, but then my next flight was 60 minutes late so I felt cheated. They still owe me 40 minutes. At least the two other people in my row were invisible, so I got to lie down on them for most of the flight. But also instead of a window I had a nice lavatory, so I'll call that one even. I'll be waiting for my forty minutes.

Well, I should probably begin to unpack my suitcases. Most of them are full of candy and tea, but I think I brought a couple shirts and socks. Today I get to see Peru in daylight! So until later, alligators! (If anyone's actually reading this, that is).

Paping Papals

In less than 24 hours I shall be aboard a plane to Miami, Florida, where I will wait for five hours until I board another plane to Lima, Peru, where I will reside for six months (well, not quite. I just round it up to that. It's really only for 8 minutes that I'll be there, because that's how long things take in my family). People say to me, "So how do you feel about leaving?" Usually I flash my prizewinning smile (it actually did win two gold medals) and say, "I'm pretty excited, a little nervous though." And they respond with some helpful advice such as "Well, my friend who is a priest lives there, you should get in touch with him! But it'll probably be suspicious if a young woman walks up to the gate of the papal chancery." Actually I was only given that advice once, and I might actually take him up on it. I do tend to roll with the papal crowd.

So in sum, I would describe my anticipation as an inward turmoil. But don't worry, I packed plenty of Andes chocolates (courtesy of my sister), which may all disappear before I even arrive (oops in advance).

According to the history of my childhood (see textbook entitled "Val's Rough Life"), Steph and I were always jealous of each other as children. To keep up this pattern I will make every attempt to outdo her in every way possible, particularly by making my blog better than hers (which isn't hard to do). In order to accomplish this feat, I shall post an entry more than once every 8 months (just an estimation).

Now that that's settled, I should finish packing. Rather, I should tell Steph to force me to finish packing. I use that strategy to make her jealous of me that I'm the one packing and not she.

Hasta la vista bebes! (even though no one actually uses that expression). Until Peru, folks.

Stuffing

...things into suitcases, that is. Twenty nine hours before the big departure, and almost done packing, even though my list of Things To Do Before I Leave is about 17 pages long. Prescription medicines, shoes filled with the more delicate items, and mountains of copies of my passport aside, I'm really excited to be embarking on this 5.5 month journey to a foreign land that hopefully will cease to be foreign in the next few weeks!