This week has been relatively uneventful. I mean, in comparison to a week of classes in Columbus, it was exciting. In comparison to last month, uneventful. But I guess there were a few events.
Monday I got lost, as you may have read. It made me a little nervous the rest of the week, but it was actually a good thing because I studied a map and now I am the master of the buses. Kind of. Tuesday went a lot better. I also figured out a better way to get there than taking four buses. Now I only have to take 3!
On Tuesday we worked with a girl from Finland. She is super cool. She is an elementary school teacher and basically has been everywhere. She has visited 6 of the 7 continents! (You have to really try in order to get to Antarctica.) She works at Mi espacio para crecer every Tuesday and Thursday. Yay new friends! She helped me figure out the bus situation.
Also on Tuesday I had to make another phone call in Spanish. We didn't know exactly how to get there because the whole bus situation is very complicated, as I'm sure you are aware by now. So I had to call someone, but she ended up giving the phone to Adele, who speaks english, so things worked out.
Wednesday I went with Clayton and we took the newer route for the first time. The second bus we got on had a ticket collector who spent a lot of time in New York. So he was very excited to talk to us in English. And a very old woman asked me all about where I'm from, in English but with a very heavy accent. She had been to Miami, so she knew about the US. Basically, it was a fun bus ride (and I'm not being sarcastic, I know I do that sometimes). We got there really early (15 minutes) and had to wait for a while. While we were waiting, a drunk, older gentleman started talking to Clayton. He left and came back and when he came back I was sitting next to Clayton on the curb. The man took my hand and looked directly in my eyes and told me that I am very beautiful. Latin men. They are so direct. He said that he could see I have a big heart. He saw it! Lo veo! Lo veo! Haha. Maybe I should get that checked out? So that was strange, but I'm used to it after living at Jacob's Porch for a year. The homeless men were always complimenting me on my straight teeth.
Also on Wednesday, I got to help a 6th grader with his english homework. He had to write 10 "will not" sentences. "Claudia will not eat chicken." I also helped a girl with her english homework, but it was harder because she had to write out the time under pictures of clocks. Why do we say "o'clock"? It seems super old-timey and weird. That was a kind of surreal experience, though, because I sat down and easily started talking to her in Spanish about English words. Our brains are so cool.
Thursday I had to ride the bus there by myself for the first time. I had a hard time finding the right bus, but I figured it out eventually. When I got there, the library still wasn't open. So we waited for Anali to show up. She never came, but Kati came and opened it for us. The kids got some time to play outside before doing their homework which is good sometimes. I also got to talk to Leidy about music and food. She recommended some Peruvian singers for me to check out, so that's cool. I also got lots of little kid hugs. Always good.
On my way home, I was having a difficult time catching a bus that would take me to my last stop. I decided to just walk, because it was only like 6-10 blocks and I had been really cramped on the last bus and wanted to stretch my legs. So it was dark and I was walking fast. I noticed that there was someone behind me and they were walking really fast too. I thought, "Okay, this person is either in a huge hurry, or they are going to kill me." Neither of those assumptions were true. This person wanted to ask me on a date. Ugh.
So it turns out to be this younger guy and he says, "Excuse me. Where I am?" in English. Obviously, this guy doesn't know English well, so I answer in Spanish that we are on Canevaro and Arequipa is that way and Salaverry is that way. He says he needs to get to Canada (that's a street name here, he wasn't that crazy) and that he came from a play in Jesús María. I said, "No sé, lo siento." He responded, "You aren't from around here?" Obviously.
"No."
"Where are you from?"
"Los Estados Unidos"
"What part?" (Notice that I am speaking Spanish and he is speaking English)
"Ohio"
"Oh I would like to go there." *red flag*
"Yeah it's great."I start to walk away. He starts to follow. I stop.
"So, uh, do you want to go out with me?" Again, so direct.
"I don't know you."
"Come on. I'm playing Rafiki in a play. You know The Lion King? I can get you tickets!" Cool!
"Can my friends come?"
"Of course!" Free tickets to see The Lion King for me and my friends?! Wow, this is great.
Basically I ended up giving him my info so we could be facebook friends. At the very least, it would be cool to see The Lion King performed in Spanish, right? So I went home, and realized he seemed kind of young. Maybe I should wait to get my hopes up. But we talked about how I went to OSU. He wouldn't think...
Yeah, he's in high school. It was a high school production of The Lion King. Sorry, high school boys, but I don't want to go out with you. That goes for you, too, old drunk men. We had a super fun facebook messaging convo about how I would be his friend but that's it and he would not give up, so I defriended him. What an adventure.
This, my friends, is a good example of a brinchero. A brinchero or brinchera is a local who only wants to hang out with foreigners because they are foreigners. They usually get you to pay for things for them by being in some sort of relationship with you. The ultimate brinchero/brinchera move is to get pregnant so that you have to stick around. Yeah. Traveling is scary. The fact that he stopped me on the street tells me that he only talked to me because I look different. He said that he wants to go to the States, which makes me wary that he wants me to get him there. Maybe I'm wrong, but we have to be careful.
Today I was less adventurous as it was my day off, and I laid in bed and watched The Office with Spanish subtitles until 4. Then I went to Starbucks and read this great story by Daniel Alarcón about Lima called "The City of Clowns." It's kind of long, so I suggest you only read it if you have time. But you are reading this, so I assume you do. It was crazy weird to read this story that takes place on the same streets that I then walked home on. Whoa. It mentions places that I have seen and events that we learned about in class. And the part about people getting on buses to sell you stuff? Still true. Yesterday a woman just sang us a song and expected us to pay her. It's like a more straightforward street performance.
Starbucks here has a really great orange chocolate chip muffin. They heat it up in a microwave for you. It's great. Starbucks Peru: great job, keep it up. Starbucks USA: sorry guys, you're slacking.
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