472 years Arequipa

Arequipa Day finally arrived!! Happy 472nd birthday! Unfortunately we didn't get out to the parade until about 4 in the afternoon. But I guess it didn't really matter cause we still got to see a few hours of the parade and a bunch of groups dancing in the streets.

It was on Aveneda Independencia so you could see El Misti in in the background, but it was so crowded the whole length of the parade, about 3km. I especially liked the Peruvian guy dancers because they had these little bells on their legs and did a funny kind of dancing.

After the parade Giovanna and I passed the fountain in Plaza de Armas (Weapons Square) and took a few fun pictures.
I found out that all the cities and towns here in Peru have a Plaza de Armas in the center with a church or cathedral.

That weekend after Arequipa day Giovanna went with me out to Tiyabaya in the countryside just to wander around. She was probably wondering why I wanted to go to such a small little village when there isn't really anything to do there. But we found our way down to the Rio Chile and just walked along the fields along the river. And it was so beautiful and relaxing after being in the city since I got here.

Living with a Peruvian family

Ever since the day that I moved in this family has treated me as a part of the family. Right now they have cousins visiting from Ilo, a coastal city near Arequipa, for the couple weeks holiday right now. In the picture there's Gabi, Lourdes, Giovana, Lise, milner, Liliana, me and Avi with Fatima in the front. They'll stay until after Arequipa day, August 15, so the house is so busy right now with all of them and all the friends and other family that comes to visit daily. But I hear that this is only temporary because of the holidays... Every day they invite me to eat with them, and most days I do. Lunch, from around 1-2 in the afternoon, is the big production here in Peru. And everyone takes their turns doing dishes, setting the table, and cooking. So yesterday, I made chili for them. It was the biggest pot of chili I've ever made and I had to split it into two pots just to be able to stir it all. We ate it over rice and even though the beans weren't completely cooked everyone said they liked it and took seconds.

My favorite -I'm not playing favorites, promise- is the little girl, Fatima. She's only 7 years old and doesn't speak English, but she loves coming into my room and making noises and faces at me. She sits next to me whenever I'm using my computer in the living room, and so far my family and Micah got to hang out with her too on Skype. Even though sometimes it's a lot of attention, I really like her company. She's the happiest little 7 year-old I've ever met, she's always smiling and in the whole time they've been here I've never seen her get upset about not getting her way or having to do something her mom says. It's refreshing after Neko and Skyler's tantrums...

And every night the neighbors came over to hang out, play cards or have little dance parties...sometimes until 3am. Would have been fun if I didn't have class in the morning or if every little creek in the house couldn't be heard in my room.

Arequipa day is coming!

This weekend I moved into my new place. It´s just an upstairs room in a family´s house, but it´s nice and the family is soooo friendly. They even invited me to have Sunday lunch with their whole family that was in town. They had fish soup, fried fish, Civeche (a traditional Peruvian dish that is just raw fish cooked by mixing it with lemon juice and onions- really good!), corn and sweet potatoes. I think I´m going to learn a lot of Spanish in this house. Especially because Giovanna (in the middle in the picture with the kids) is actually one of my students and loves to hang out and use her English and teach me Spanish, and everyone else in the house only speaks Spanish with a few words of English for fun.

August is a big celebration month here in Arequipa because the 15th is the anniversary of the city, Arequipa day. So starting last weekend they have all kinds of different celebrations and parties leading up to Arequipa day.

When Giovanna went with me to the center of the city to buy a few things we were walking past the Plaza de Armas (the very center of the city) and they were having a parade where groups from all around Arequipa come and do their traditional dance. Giovanna is from Puno, the city next to the famous Lake Titicaca which is a glacial lake up in the Andies and on the Peruvian border with Bolivia, and so she pointed out the traditional costumes and dance from Puno.

And also can you believe that this is winter here in Arequipa? 75 and sunny, everyday!

Then we went to the market. You can see it´s really different than the Chinese markets, but still stacked full of different fruits. And Peru has so many kinds of potatoes, so there´s Giovanna showing me all the potatoes. 

Peru

Arequipa, Peru

I feel like I´m living in a dream world right now. Somehow, all along I´ve been planning this trip to Peru but it hasn´t sunk in that I would really be leaving China and teaching in South America, teaching in Peru, teaching in Arequipa- someplace I´d never heard of before. I applied to this school, and had an interview and accepted the job and bought my plane ticket and all the other things necessary to get here, and I even did it months ago, but still managed to not believe it. So here I am, already, walking around the city feeling like I´m looking at pictures online, meeting my students dreaming of what my students will be like, teaching my classes wondering how my classes will go and eating the food hoping I´ll like it.

I couldn´t wait for this change from China (not that I don´t love China, but I needed a break from it). I wanted a place with blue skies, small cities, friendly people and REAL hiking. Arequipa is the second largest city in Peru and feels tiny, compared to China, there aren´t any sky scrapers, the center of the city is filled with old stone churches, cobbled streets and thousands of miniature taxis inching along.

My flight got into Lima Tuesday night at 10 and my flight to Arequipa was at 5:30 Wednesday morning. I was supposed to sleep in the airport but couldn´t, so on my flight to Arequipa there wasn´t anyone sitting next to me, I passed out before the plane was even in the air and woke up with the seat belt buckle imprinted on my forehead when the plane landed an hour later. When I finally stumbled off the plane this is what I woke up to.

Amanda, a new assistant director at Extreme English, picked me up from the airport, took me to the TEFL house until I find my own place, showed me to the school, treated me to lunch and helped me get some essentials. I feel so fortunate to have her because I know what it´s like to show up in a new place and have to figure out everything for myself, and she´s new so I´m the first one who got this ´treatment´ because they´re trying to make things easier on the new teachers.
I´m living next to the Yanahuara plaza and so my walk to school everyday is through this promenade with a view of El Misti. Also in the plaza is this beautiful, although not unique here, stone church.

I didn´t have classes the first day, thank g-d, so I had some time to wander around the city. I was in search of some notebooks for class and casually looking for dinner around 5pm. I didn´t find the notebooks because I refused to pay $5 for a small 100 page spiral book, I just figured I´d go to the central market the next day. So by 7 I realized a lot of places were closing and wanted to get some food, but I felt too scared to go into these small restaurant/bars on the street because they were packed with sweaty men watching TV and I couldn´t see if there was a menu. So I passed those and then only found cake or bread shops. By 9 I was so hungry and willing to eat anywhere but now absolutely everything was closed and so I did find some man´s small corner shop open and I bought just this bread, avocado, tomato and bananas for less than a dollar. And this dinner was perfect for me, I should have started with that option. Tomorrow I know better :)