Last night the entire group went out together for the first time in the entire trip without it being forced upon them. We heard rumors of a discoteca being located down the street, but when we went to check, we were told they are not open on Thursday. Oddly enough a nice lady who was working in a coffee shop (what?? coffee in Peru??) offered to turn down the lights and play music for us so it could be our own little party. I was surprised by the darkness of the decorations in the cafe- there was a large painting of what seemed to be an aborted fetus and blood spilling out of a coffee cup. Despite this unusual choice of decorations, we decided to stay. I think some people may have stayed a little too long. This morning a large portion of our group was in less than friendly moods. I kept hearing cries for pain killers and water. Fortunately I had thought ahead and therefore felt fine. After seeing some lovely dolphins and other marine life, we had a few minutes to kill before getting back on the bus. Browsing through the markets, Anna found a pair of pants she wanted to try on. While I was waiting for her, the shop attendant asked me if I had ever heard of Jehovah's Witness. Mishearing her and thinking she had said "Cuba's Witness" I was confused. I asked Anna, "What happened in Cuba exactly?" and she didn't know either. We asked the girl to explain the Cuban conflict to us. She instead launched into a spiel about Jehovah's Witnesses and how she has been raised to be one. She told us she is seventeen years old and she goes to a school for Jehovah's Witnesses. I asked when her birthday is, and her answered surprised me. She said "Jehovah's Witnesses don't celebrate birthdays because they are pagan holidays". That was my first time to hear that, and I needed clarification. She went on to explain that she believes holidays cause conflicts among families. She told a story from the Bible about a man who was beheaded because it was his birthday. That was interesting to me, although I think it would be kind of cool to have the same birth and death date so for that reason alone I will probably not convert. She told me about the Jehovah's Witness website, and started to show me a video. Unfortunately it was time for us to go, so I couldn't see much of it. However, before we left she gave me two Jehovah's Witness magazines. It's interesting for me to hear about different religions. I once went to a Catholic service and that was when I learned how little I know about the Catholic faith. After we got back the whole group had free lemonade which was really tasty. Then the cleaning men came into my hotel room and sat here typing this while they cleaned. Now that they are gone, it is time for my nap. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ to better visualize the group
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In the first few weeks of the semester I contracted pink eye, and its been tough for me to get rid of. Sometimes it seems like it has gone away, but then a day or two later my eyes will be more red than ever. I know its not my host family's dog's fault that he's so dirty, and that I petted him and then touched my eye, but I do feel resentful towards him sometimes. He greets me happily after school and I just walk past him, he begs for some pancakes in the morning but I eat them all, and he sits outside my room for hours and hours on end, hoping that maybe, just maybe, I'll find it in my heart to let him in. Usually as soon as I come home from school he follows me and sits outside my room. When I come downstairs to eat dinner, he is still sitting there in the same exact spot waiting for me to let him in. When I wake up at 2:30 in the morning and need to go to the bathroom, he is still sitting there, waiting for me to let him in. Sometimes I feel guilty about not paying more attention to him, but then I remember the pink eye which still, even yesterday, plagued me, and I don't feel so bad. I also am growing less and less kind to stray animals. When the group went to Matucana, I shared my lunch with a few stray dogs. However the food caused fights, which could easily have ended in death. By trying to help I just made things worse. From that point forward I have made it a point to completely avoid animals as one they could cause pink eye and two I'm likely to just make things worse. At Machu Picchu I was eating crackers near the wall when a llama came up and stole a cracker right out of my hand! Wasn't going to fight it too hard over a slobbery cracker, and I gave it another one. However I was slightly worried this would cause problems within the llama community. Feeding time at machu picchuEven without the language barrier, it is easy to have misunderstandings. For example, today Anna, Traysea, Grace, Jackie, and I went to the market. There is a collective taxi there that takes anyone who wants to go from the market to our neighborhood. Anyone who wants to ride in it can ride- and since there are more people sharing that is why it is cheaper than a regular taxi. The only places it goes are to our neighborhood and back. Since Anna and I are the only two out of the five who went to the market today who live in this area, we were the only two who knew about this collective system. After buying some eh-skittles we were ready to go home. Anna told the girls, "Okay, Rachel and I are going to leave now! We know of a taxi that will take us to our houses!!" Grace looked at Anna like she had two heads..she responded, "Isn't that what a taxi does? It takes you where you want to go?" I died laughing. The people in the taxi probably thought I was crazy because I was still laughing about it all the way home. That combined with the fact I kept spilling eh-skittles everywhere. My brother always says that I think things are funnier than they are, and then I just pick one joke to laugh at for a really long time. One time I ordered apple juice at a sushi bar on a date and the waiter's face was so funny that I still laugh about it, more than a year and a half later. That same date happened to be when I figured out I was allergic to eel- because I had a reaction to it. Its always funny when people ask me if I have any food allergies. Eel is such an oddly specific allergy that I feel funny mentioning it. The only time when I really need to make it known is when I eat sushi. I once mentioned to my host family I'm allergic to eel and they just looked at me so oddly. They just said "Okay well, guess we'll just have chicken for dinner instead!". Stuff I'm not allergic toI should start this off by saying I really like my host mom. She is very caring and she always makes food for me. I can't adequately describe how awesome it is to have pancakes and coffee waiting for me every single morning. However, I have realized that I am either her replacement daughter or just a pet. I'm in between the ages of her sons, as is her real daughter, but her real daughter lives in Florida. They haven't seen each other in more than six years. My host mom calls me her little daughter, and treats me as her own. Sometimes this is awesome, she cooks with me, talks to me, etc, but sometimes it gets annoying. For example, there was a mystery meat that kept showing up on my plate at least four times a week. I didn't like the taste so I never ate much of it. Then my host mom kept stressing how important it is for me to eat meat, but I still refused to eat it. From that point on she started sitting with me whenever that meat is served and making sure I eat the whole thing. By the way, I found out the mystery meat is liver. I just thought it was really bad steak. The reason why I sometimes think I'm just her pet is because she doesn't leave the house much at all, her older son is usually busy with work, school, or his daughter and girlfriend, and her younger son usually either goes out with his friends or locks himself in his room. She and my host dad are separated, so there's not much warmth there. Whether I like it or not, I'm typically just someone for her to talk to. I like talking to her, but its usually pretty tough to get a word in edgewise. On the bright side, my Spanish listening skills have really improved here. She typically tells the same few stories, so I've gotten into the bad habit of spacing out. Either I'm able to fake listening really well, or it just doesn't matter at all. She just wants someone to talk to. I'll be the first to admit, sometimes, scratch that, a lot of times, I realize halfway through the story that the listener is bored. However I usually press on because I'm not quite sure how to wrap it up quickly. I know I don't always tell particularly interesting stories, or stories with a point, but I do try to listen...except in this case when I know I'm going to hear the same story for the 15th time. I could probably tell the stories in exactly the same words my host mom uses at this point. The thing that frustrates me sometimes is how bad of a listener my host mom is. The very first day I was here, she asked me if I had traveled to any other countries. I mentioned Korea and Vietnam. Since then, I've mentioned them each probably in at least one story a week, if not more. Two days ago I was talking about the coffee in Korea and in the middle my host mom interrupted to say "OH! You've been to Korea?? I thought Peru was your first time to travel. " and I just wondered at that point if she ever listens to any of my stories. Its okay though, just interesting. Not sure if this is a cultural thing or just a personal thing, but food for thought. Family photosOne interesting thing about Peru is that sometimes I have to mispronounce things in order to be understood. For example, yesterday I was trying to buy skittles and the cashier didn't know what I said. Taking her best guess at things that start with the s/c sound and are often sold behind the counter, she said "Ah! Cigarros!" I couldn't say no fast enough. Fortunately the lady behind me knew exactly what I wanted. She told the cashier, "No, ella quiere eh-skittles!" "Oh!! Eh-skittles!!!" cried the cashier and quickly grabbed them for me. Anna also bought Eh-skittles, and afterwards I had images of angry Peruvians trying to buy Eh-skittles and find out they had all been taken by tall, pale, foreigners. I never feel especially tall at home, at five foot six I'm pretty average for the United States. Here I never feel tall when I go out with Jaime/Mallory/Anna/all of the above because they are all taller than me. I've only gone out without one of them around three times, and when I was with my family I felt like a giant. I'll admit I kind of liked the feeling of being oddly tall, but I'm not sure I would have liked it if I was five foot six and lived here permanently. One of the occasions when I went out without Anna was to visit my host uncle in the hospital. The hospital was different than those in the U.S. (imagine that..). It was more open than hospitals at home-there was a warmer atmosphere than the hospitals I've visited at home. There were also multiple patients to a room, with no curtain or other division between the patients. There was a nice courtyard where patients and visitors could sit together and enjoy lunch. Although I would still not choose to be treated at a Peruvian hospital rather than an American hospital, I liked the layout other than the lack of privacy. After visiting my host uncle, who, by the way, is the spitting image of Santa, my host mom and I went to the water park. We saw a wedding, which was nice although I'll admit I thought the choice of venue was rather odd. The strangest part was the bride looked miserable. If she was that unhappy on her wedding day then I hope at the very least she believes in divorce. Its interesting to me how many people in our group are either strongly pro-American or anti-American. So many people complain so frequently in our group that I wonder why they don't just go home early and complete their Spanish classes there. On the other hand, whenever we are mistaken for Germans, certain people in our group say they are glad we are not mistaken as stupid Americans. I know they are partially saying it as a joke, but I do think they also do mean it at least slightly. I know America has its weaknesses, but it also has it strengths. That goes for any country. Not a huge fan of sweeping generalizations. I won't say I never make them, but I try not to if I can think about it. For example, I met a man on the bus when I was with Anna and Mallory. he said, "Oh, you're American? But you're not morbidly obese?" This comment, combined with the fact he had insulted my Spanish earlier in the conversation, rubbed me the wrong way. Sure America is not known for having the thinnest of civilians, but at the same time to say a country of more than 320 million people are all morbidly obese, every single one of them, really rubbed me the wrong way. I not so politely told the man that Peruvians aren't exactly all skin and bones either. He looked rather taken aback, and tried to argue with me. He said Peruvians tend to be a little pudgy, but not overweight. Seeing as I was in an agitated mood, I spent around ten minutes arguing with him that just as not every single American is fat, not every single Peruvian is in good shape. Finally, looking perplexed and frustrated, he got off the bus. I thanked my lucky stars I would never have to see him again. Lunahuana |