Supertiernos

Today is Thursday so I have been in Peru for 3 full days. I got in late Monday night and have been a bit tired ever since. Culture shock can really take a toll on you.

My flight arrived at 9 pm on Monday. It took about 40 minutes to get through immigration and then baggage claim, and then customs. (Peruvian customs is awesome. You hand them your form and then press a button. Either a green or a red light flashes. Green means you can go, red means your bags get searched. I got green.) I met my program leaders outside customs and found out that I was the second to arrive and we were picking up a total of 19 students. So a couple more girls got there and then we went in search of the airport Starbucks to take advantage of the wifi. We didn't get the wifi to work, but we learned that the airport is just like, it's just like, a mini mall. (Sorry if you missed that obscure reference. I had to throw it in for Dana.) It's open 24 hours a day and there are great places to eat like Subway, Papa John's and McDonald's. There are also clothing stores and of course, your typical candy/perfume/souvenir airport shop. So we hung out for a bit, changed some US dollars to Peruvian soles and eventually got to our host homes at 1am.

Tuesday was full of fun as we had orientation. My host mom served me a delicious meal of scrambled eggs and juice from a peruvian fruit (I don't remember the name) and packed me a sandwich lunch with a mandarin orange. The ISA office is only a few blocks from my apartment so it's really convenient. The majority of the walk is around the Italian Embassy so there are guards and policemen everywhere. I live in a very safe neighborhood. We had a nice orientation from the university that was all in Spanish. On the first day in country I probably only understood 45% of what they told me. I was tired! Then the ISA part of orientation began which was in English, thank goodness. We eventually got kicked out of the room we were using so we went on a walking tour of the area. We saw one of the main streets of Lima that goes all the way to the coast one way, and historic downtown the other. We went to two grocery stores and bought cheap prepaid cell phones so we can keep in touch with each other and our host families while we are here. We eventually made our way back and had the internship orientation and finished the orientation from earlier. When we were finally done it was around 5, but it felt much later. I unpacked and took a small nap before dinner. We had arroz con pollo and salad. We watch a lot of Animal Planet which is great.

Wednesday we started classes. My first class is from 8:30 to 11:30. It is a Spanish Literature class and the professor is a young woman who is basically a genius. She is Peruvian and speaks English and French fluently. Anyways, she speaks very quickly but very clearly. The class seems like it will be fun. Then my second class was from 11:30 to 2:30. It is about the Social and Economic Reality of Peru. The professor speaks very quickly in that class too, but he is also kind of funny. Then I went home for lunch and did homework, etc. We had a Peruvian potato for dinner last night with a lot of vitamins and minerals in it. It was purple and we ate it with a yellow sauce. How colorful! We watched Supertiernos on Animal Planet which is Too Cute in espanol. It was fantastic.

Today I went to my lit class, had some cafe, hung out at the university and skyped my Dana. So far, my afternoons and evenings have been restful, which is what I need right now after a month of field school and no time to rest before going to a new country. I'm pretty pumped to be here right now, even though I'm also really homesick. It's strange to have friends all over the place because even when you feel at home, you miss someone who is not there. Living in Columbus, I miss my family and church family. I miss my friends who have moved away and my friends from high school. Living at home, I miss my school friends and my high school friends who have moved away. Even though I really want to be here and I'm sure I will have lots of friends who feel like family eventually, I really miss my family and friends in Ohio. And wherever else you are. It's just really hard sometimes to reconcile my love of family and close relationships and my love of travel and new and unique experiences. Gracias a Dios for Skype, Facetime, Facebook, email, and TextPlus. Oh and I guess blogs. Even though I still don't like this.

The view from my bedroom window.
The cars are very loud all day long.