Lalala. I don't know where to start this blog. I don't feel like I've done anything too exciting since Buenos Aires, but I'll try to make my life sound exciting ;-) hehe. The week following my trip to Buenos Aires I was mostly trying to catch up on both sleep and homework. Thursday (April 22) I went to Crepes & Waffles with Laura and later Amelia and Audrey met up with us since the ballet they were going to was canceled. Apparently the ballet company was from Iceland or was flying through Iceland and due to the volcano they couldn't fly to Peru, so it was postponed. In any case that was a fun night because I love the chocolate fondue crepe that I get there and we just goofed around and enjoyed each others' company. Then that weekend was really chill, which always sounds nice but I end up getting bored when i don't have anything to do. Makes for a long weekend. I did do some reading for fun though which is always relaxing! Monday (April 26) I tried to tutor a girl in my music class. I love this class even though it is very basic for me, but for the rest of the students in the class I think it is really hard because the teacher progresses really quickly through some complex musical theory that is difficult to grasp if you have to experience with music. I think playing the piano is particularly helpful for music theory. It was challenging trying to explain all these musical concepts in Spanish to someone who has no background in music! Personally I think you need to learn how to read music before you go into scales and intervals and transposition, but for my sake I'm glad it's not quite so basic. Did you know that in Spanish they do not use letter to name the notes but instead they use do, re, mi, etc? do=c, re=d, mi=e, fa=f, sol=g, la=a, si=b. It is interesting learning musical terms in Spanish.
Wednesday was a day of ups and downs due to a whole variety of things, but to summarize, here's what happened: I was trying to make buckeye cookies for a dessert contest at CBU that would take place on Thursday. I ended up having to buy another jar of peanut butter (which costs about $6 here! ridiculous!) because the dough was too dry and then later I was having the hardest time with the chocolate and I thought I overheated it and I was getting sooooo frustrated by that time because it was 11pm and I wanted to go to bed. And that's when my host dad came to the rescue, worked some magic in the kitchen and we finished the cookies together! It was some great bonding. I have never seen my host dad do anything in the kitchen and I was really touched that he was willing to postpone going to bed a bit longer to help me when he saw how frustrated I was. It was some good teamwork!
Thursday was the dessert contest which, as it turns out, only the coordinators of the group were the ones actually making desserts...everyone else was just supposed to come watch and taste. So after all the effort I put into my dessert on Wednesday I felt silly having to present it to the group but I just went up and said that I was the "international student group" and everyone laughed. Plus, everyone really liked the cookies and several people asked for the recipe! Overall success. Oh, and I won third place! Thursday evening I went to my friend Amelia's house to make mac&cheese with her and Abby. Amelia lives in Barranco and holy cow her how is soooo big and soooo beautiful. She lives across the street from a park overlooking the ocean. Her host parents are artists, so the whole house was decorated with paintings that her father made and various other art pieces. My favorite part was the table covered with baskets of fresh fruit that they apparently keep stocked all the time! I love fruit! Amelia's room was really cute too, but I could never live in it because the door was too small for me and just going in and out a couple times while I was there was enough for me. I should probably explain this door... the entrance to her room is in her host dad's art studio and she pulls aside a board that slides on the wall to reveal the entrance to her room but the opening in the wall is not very high, which works for Amelia who is short, but for me it is awkward to both step up and bend over at the same time. :-) In any case, we had some good conversation and I ate a lot of fruit! What could be better!
Friday I went to Marion's apartment for "Mochas with Marion" which is her creative name for little group meetings to check in on how everyone's semester is going. She has a cappuccino machine and she actually made us mochas, which were really tasty! It was interesting to hear everyone share how their semester has been going and to hear some of their impressions about things. Especially since I feel like my perspective is a lot different being on the second time around. One question that Marion posed was what is the most challenging thing we've face this semester. As I thought about it I realized that last semester the biggest challenge was by far the language barrier, and many of the students who are here for the first time this semester said that as their answer. For me, since the language barrier hasn't really been a problem this semester it is interesting to see the other "problems" that have arisen. Honestly the biggest challenge this semester has been related to food and living with a host family. As much as I really love my host family, I am longing for the independence that I have when I am at Hope. The food plays into that because I just really really want to be able to have my own food habits and not have to adjust to my host family's food habits. For instance, I have a vendetta against rice this semester. Peruvians grow up with rice as a staple. Every meal is served with rice and they love it because that is what they are accustomed to, but for me plain white rice is boring and I don't want it at EVERY MEAL! I mean, it's okay if there is sauce to put on it or beans to mix it with, but sometimes there isn't and even if there is I could do with less of it. Also, I just really like snacking. I would so much rather eat a small meal and then eat snacks throughout the day than sit down and eat an enormous lunch and then eat nothing for the rest of the day. And I sort of have a thing with potatoes too. I mean, they're okay but they're just not anything special. And it is not unusual that potatoes and rice are both served in the same meal here. And i feel like they consider potato a vegetable but it's not. It is just a starchy tuber that doesn't taste like anything! Okay, sorry about this little rampage. I just have to add too that my host family in particular is not very conscious about what they eat in terms of healthiness - an example being that they love all things fried and I really don't! And it doesn't help that when I don't eat as much as they want me too they tell me that I'm too skinny and occasionally accuse me of turning anorexic. There is a big difference between wanting to eat healthy and being anorexic! Alright, I'm done now! My apologies for venting, but it does feel good to get that out of my system. And really I know that my host family just cares about me and I am grateful that they are so concerned for my well-being.
Saturday was labor day here. Went out to lunch with my family at a cultural fair where I tried rocoto relleno. Rocoto is a type of pepper that looks like a bell pepper but has the spicyness of a jalapeño or hotter. Then it's stuffed with meat and cheese. And it is served with a potato to help with the spiciness. I thought it was rather tasty but it may have poisoned me because the following night I was throwing up and having diarrhea...sorry if that's tmi. Which brings me to my fun times Sunday into Monday. I had a final first thing Monday morning, so it was not particularly helpful to get sick Sunday night. But i made it through and slept and relaxed the rest of the day Monday. Yesterday I went to see Iron Man 2 with some friends and it was awesome!!! Love it! I would totally go see it again! You should all go see it when it comes out in the U.S., which I believe is Friday! :-D
Tomorrow I have my history exam and then I'm done for the week! Woohoo! I'll try to post some pics soon. I haven't transferred from my camera to my computer in awhile...sorry!
One last thing! Today is day 60 in Peru which means tomorrow I am exactly halfway through the semester!
No comments:
Post a Comment