Arequipa

I'm on a Rotary trip in Arequipa, Peru right now! We are doing so much in one day that I have to write everything down and take a ton of pictures just to remember anything. It's ridiculous. The views of the mountain driving are the best, but none of the pictures do them justice. I can't write much, but I'll have a ton when I get back to Lima on the 2nd. Chau y tenga un buen semana!
Lydia

¿Cuanto cuesta?

Prices here are ridiculous... ly awesome!! Depending on where you are, you can get an ice cream cone from like 34 cents! I take advantage of this opportunity quite a bit! You can also buy movies for 1 dollar (only mostly illegal) ;)! fun stuff! Vamos a Arequipa today for 10 days so chau for a while!
L

Great Blog

My friend Luke has a great blog about his experience in Peru! Here it is!
http://www.thepassangersseat.blogspot.com/

Peru

  I suck at writing! It's wednesday today and I haven't been to school since monday. I had some evil throat pain, phlemy thing! Tomorrow all the exchange students from my distrtict leave for Arequipa, the 3rd most tourist visited site in Peru. I'm sure it will be fill with white people! It's going to be a 16ish hour bus ride, but we'll have a boat load of fun! We'll be visiting churches, convents, and many other historical places. I'm super excited to hang out with the other exchange students! I do see them all the time though, our district is super close. I feel like I really know all the people! The kids in my club are super cool too, and we end up hanging out with them the majority of the time, which is great! I do hang out with school friends too. Mostly at the movies!
   School is hilarious for me. Since I still don't really understand everything, and I don't have any books, I just end up copying what I can from the board and just listening (or napping) for the rest of the hour. It's very difficult to work hard when nobody asks anything of you... And even though it's hard to talk to people, everyone is my friend! Which I love! I'm trying to pry some of the boys out of their shells because they really do avoid me like the plauge! Well, like 3/4 of them, the other 4th is all over me lol! I love that being different makes me super hot to them! lol
   I think my English is starting to get silly. Rs are getting a bit slurred and weird. And when I write I make stupid mistakes. I'm sure it'll be fine!
That's all I think I've got for tonight!
L

Volunteer

So we went to volunteer today in a free clinic. We played with the children waiting for parents and made balloons and did face painting! It was a lovely day! Then we went to a home for children without parents or without fit parents. It was a generally liked place by the kids! They loved us immediately because we are all white! Hilarious! I can't write much now because I do have school tomorrow and I should probably sleep a bit!
L

SORRY FAMILIA!

I know you hate it when I don't write for a while! Sorry! So I bought a new camera (for the second time in Peru) and it inspired me to stop being lazy and post my pictures! If you are a facebook friend, there are about 200 new photos of Olympics and Centro de Lima and all sorts of fun stuff! This weekend was the birthday of my Mama here so we had fun with that! On Saturday, Martine, Mama, Vale y yo fuimos al zoo. It was great! They mostly had animals native to Peru, a ton of birds! A bunch of hawks, photos for Mom! My favorite is the big cats, and there were these lovely baby jaguars (they moved too much for good pics, but mom was beautiful too.) Their spots were just coming in! Lindos... Then at midnight we gave Mama her cake and her gift, but she had a scavenger hunt to find it. It was a new camera!

Yesterday, for her birthday day, we went to Pachacamac. In a micro, like a little bus. It was a long ride, but super fun with Martine and Valeria and Mama! I got to give my seat up for an older man too! Huge ego boost! We went to the ruins first, it looked really pretty, but we couldn't get very close (lame!) I really wanted to stand where I know an Inca stood or something! After walking around the ruins for a while, we hopped back on a micro for the pueblo de Pachacamac for lunch. We ate pollo a la brasa (like charcoal roasted chicken) and salchipapas ( just fries with hotdog bits)! Then we discovered a Marinera presentation outside! Amazing! I love watching the little kids dance with the adults, it's so cute, like a Shirley Temple movie! We just took our micro home after that.
Martine y yo had to walk around the market of course for arroz con leche and picarrones! We also looked in the small stores for a wallet and a headband! Fun stuff! Only school today, and my tutor.
Chau to all and I can't wait to show off my mad Spanish skills!
L

Speed bump!

So I hit a bit of a speed bump yesterday, and it wasn't the crazy huge ones that are everywhere here, it was just a bad day! Yesterday was a bad day for me. Tired all day, not in the mood for ANYTHING, except maybe churros. I slept for like 3 hours of class and slept 4 hours after school! I just had a ba attitude. But today was pretty awesome, and I got to play Voley with my friends.
So my great story is that for my birthday, I received one gift from a friend at school! But it's not just a gift from a friend! I got a silver bracelet from a BOY!! I felt pretty awesome about that one!!
I think that's all I have today! Time for Rotary soon and buying a new camera!
L

Story time!

I know that I've been talking about my day to day life a lot, but I havn't gotten to tell many of my stories! I have a ton, so I need to do just like one a day or something! Centro de Lima is the subject today! Before I came to Lima, I imagined it as a bustling metropolis with chic shops and super multicultural people mixed in with antique buildings and street venders. When I arrived, it was nothing like that, but now I realize that the suburban areas are different because people actually live here. Centro de Lima was much more how I had imagined Lima, minus the diversity. There were some gringos, but not very many. There were so many antique buildings with armed guards in full military dress uniforms. This was in front of the President's home though. It was lovely! The cathedrals were amazing as well! We visited San Francisco cathedral and got to see ancient art and all sorts of lovely sculpture inside! I think I really realized the slendor of the Catholic church there! There was a gold plated altar. Like a huge freaking altar! And a full silver like person carrier thingy! It was crazy. Then we got to go down into the catacombs of the church! Super creepy! I thought maybe there were going to be like 100 skeletons or something, but it's like huge pits filled with mish mashed bones! like they were just killed and thrown in! I know that's not what happened, but it's pretty freaky! I kind of wish I could figure out how thousands of people were all put in that same church. I think you really have to see it to understand!
Afterward, we ate lunch at a famous cafe and I ate the biggest bowl of soup I have ever seen in my life! It was crazy huge! I should have taken a picture! Martine and Mama also had huge soups and sandwiches, I couldn't finish a whole sandwich too!! Of course I bought souvenirs, a Peru jacket and an Inca Kola shirt.
That's pretty much my day in Centro de Lima!
Thanks ya'll
L

Mi Cumpleaños!

Today is my birthday and I have never had so many people say Happy Birthday or post on my facebook wall! It's crazy and I love it!! My parents and sister here woke me up at midnight to give me my gifts and my cake! It was great! I have more rotary stuff today and maybe some things with my friends from Rotary. That's all I can do for now!
L

Más sobre colegio!

Colegio is crazy! I'm starting to enjoy it a bunch more now that I have friends though! I'm having trouble understanding all my classes still, but I think the teachers like my attitude! So I think the people are super awesome in my school, but the boys seem really timid to talk to me! Despite of this, I'm going to make a new guy friend each day! Two boys have asked me to prom (in December), but the first one was like an indirect ask through a girl... Idk! And the other is my guy friend who I want to wait to answer! It's a bit crazy! I discovered a sport I like here, Voley! Volleyball is definately not my talent, but I like to play with my friends during PE! I'm pretty bruised up on my arms though!
I got to visit Centro de Lima on Sunday with Martine (another exchange student) and Mama, great fun! Some people did stop us and ask to take a picture with us because we are white! Awesome! Many fun things going on, but it's midnight and I have school tomorrow! Oops lol!
Buenas noches!
L