The rapper was definitely freestyling and it was so cool and he was talented. Oh and I understood a lot of what he said..yay go me!!! He was pretty much rapping about everything and he started with rapping about the micros; it was comical. They went on forever, too!! They rapped and beatboxed for the majority of the micro ride! I'm pretty sure that was the only time Tonisha and I were sad to get off the micro. I know I could've just kept riding forever and listening, but I guess I'm happy we got off too because that meant it was ice cream time! Tonisha and I got our delicious ice cream and sat down for a few minutes to eat it. We then went our seperate ways. I got home just in time for dinner (don't worry, I didn't spoil my dinner with the ice cream). And of course for the rest of the night I've been doing homework... Oh wait, who am I kidding...I bought 9 movies today, do you really think I did homework?! :) Well, I hope you all have a great weekend! I'm heading to the National Museum tomorrow for a CIEE cultural activity. Buenas noches!
Friday, September 16, 2011
La música urbana
So, this morning, I cleaned and organized my room because it definitely needed it. After the tidying up, I went out to lunch with Tonisha to a nice bakery called San Antonio, which is really close to my house. After lunch, we walked to some markets near Tonisha's house, but we decided they didn't compare to Polvos Azules. So despite the recent strike that was there, Tonisha talked me into going (she actually did have to talk me into it, I was a little hesitant). We went on a hunt for two particular movies that we need to watch for our Ethnography class. One was The Mission and the other El Dorado. We found The Mission easily, but El Dorado was a little difficult to find. I was supposed to find the Costa Rican version from 1988, but instead I found the 2010 U.S. television mini series vesion. I went ahead and got it to watch, but I'm not worried about finding the correct version, because I also have a movie on reserve at the library that I can watch instead of El Dorado. Interesting enough though, when you're in front of an unlimited amount of movies that cost less than a dollar it's hard not to look at your choices. Needless to say I walked out of Polvos Azules with nine movies!! I have a feeling by the end of the semester I will end up with more, too! As we left Polvos Azules, we passed by the park where Mistura is still going on. I wanted to go in sooo bad to get some of the delicious pineapple and strawberry ice cream, but it costs money just to get in so that was out of the question. Then, Tonisha said I could pay someone to get me some and bring it out to me and I was ALL for that idea!! But, then I realized that she was just kidding and she commented, "I don't think you would ever see your money or ice cream if you did that." :( So what else do you do when you want ice cream that you can't have...you go to a different ice cream place!!! We got on a micro to head to Larcomar (a strip mall near my house) to an ice cream place that Tonisha wanted to take me and the micro ride was a blast! Number one: It was rush hour, but we took a different road than usually so we really didn't get stuck in any traffic and Number two: These two guys got on and started beatboxing and rapping!! It was the coolest thing ever! Here's a video.. I was trying to be conspicuous about it so obviously I didn't just point my camera at them, but you can kind of hear it...
Thursday, September 15, 2011
El lápiz lindo
I headed to the university early this morning to meet up with Tonisha at the library. We went on a mission to find the rest of our books/articles for our Ethnography class. We succeeded! Go us!! Now we just have to get to reading them..that's the hard part! Oh and then also the whole writing a paper afterwards, too..that can be difficult as well, but I think I'm up for the challenge. Plus, so far, the readings aren't too boring. I had ballet today, so of course it was a good day. It's a pretty difficult work out though and the combinations are crazy, but I love it so much and I think it will be impossible not to improve.
Today was Deporte y Vida day, also. Started out my time there helping a girl search for the departamentos and capitals of Peru in a crossword, but then quickly got switch to helping a young lady with English. She was learning proper greetings, such as, "Hello, my name is Andrea" "Hi, Andrea, it's nice to meet you" "It's nice to meet you, too." I really do enjoy helping them with English and, honestly, it does help with my Spanish skills a lot because sometimes I have to translate words/sentences or explain it in Spanish, so it's perfect!! I also helped another boy with his English homework and he had to read and match sentences with pictures. While I was helping this boy, I had to use his mechanical pencil several times, but he must have had different thickness of lead because I kept breaking it. So rather than waste more of his lead, I decided to get out my own Papermate lime green mechanical pencil, well, by golly if I didn't just get out a pot of gold! So many of the kids were amazed by it. They wanted to know where I got it and how much it cost and if they could have it. If I could have, I would've left right then and there, ran to a Walmart (which they don't have here), bought a bunch of Papermate mechanical pencils, and handed them out. Of course, I do kind of need mine for classes right now, but I'll probably end up giving them (I have two) away when I leave. Anyway, once the focus was no longer on my pencil, I help that same boy look up biographical information on George Washington and Napolean Bonaparte. Then, I ended the day with some math. The time there goes by so quickly, but I really am always happy to be there. The kids make me smile, I haven't had to use "a teacher voice" on them yet so that's good. :)
Well, my plan for tonight was to get some reading done, but I don't know if that will happen, but hopefully this weekend!! I hope you all had wonderful days today and I wish you a stupendous day tomorrow as well. Also, always remember to appreciate the little things in life. Even a lime green Papermate mechanical pencil has some value!
Today was Deporte y Vida day, also. Started out my time there helping a girl search for the departamentos and capitals of Peru in a crossword, but then quickly got switch to helping a young lady with English. She was learning proper greetings, such as, "Hello, my name is Andrea" "Hi, Andrea, it's nice to meet you" "It's nice to meet you, too." I really do enjoy helping them with English and, honestly, it does help with my Spanish skills a lot because sometimes I have to translate words/sentences or explain it in Spanish, so it's perfect!! I also helped another boy with his English homework and he had to read and match sentences with pictures. While I was helping this boy, I had to use his mechanical pencil several times, but he must have had different thickness of lead because I kept breaking it. So rather than waste more of his lead, I decided to get out my own Papermate lime green mechanical pencil, well, by golly if I didn't just get out a pot of gold! So many of the kids were amazed by it. They wanted to know where I got it and how much it cost and if they could have it. If I could have, I would've left right then and there, ran to a Walmart (which they don't have here), bought a bunch of Papermate mechanical pencils, and handed them out. Of course, I do kind of need mine for classes right now, but I'll probably end up giving them (I have two) away when I leave. Anyway, once the focus was no longer on my pencil, I help that same boy look up biographical information on George Washington and Napolean Bonaparte. Then, I ended the day with some math. The time there goes by so quickly, but I really am always happy to be there. The kids make me smile, I haven't had to use "a teacher voice" on them yet so that's good. :)
Well, my plan for tonight was to get some reading done, but I don't know if that will happen, but hopefully this weekend!! I hope you all had wonderful days today and I wish you a stupendous day tomorrow as well. Also, always remember to appreciate the little things in life. Even a lime green Papermate mechanical pencil has some value!
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
PeruFail
So what did we do today in Peruvian Social Reality you ask? Did we learn more about race or about the people of the Andes? Did we learn about the people of the Amazon? No, our professor showed us a website called http://www.perufail.com/ at the beginning of class and then we saw his addictiveness to the site come out. The site is just full of pictures of signs that are wrong or have been translated wrong or just funny pictures of things you would only see in Peru. We spent the whole hour looking through the site and just laughing! I think we heard him say "just one more page" at least five times. :) It was enjoyable and technically we DID do some learning. We learned some new vocabulary and about some Peruvian humor. Here's a couple of the pictures that were on the site..
See, they're funny, aren't they?! :) Anyway, moving on to an actual class from today. In Living and Learning we talked about values that U.S. Americans had. We split up into two groups and, out of about 38 values, we had to each choose the top five values in the U.S. and the bottom five. It was kind of difficult and some of our values from each group didn't match up, however, both groups did put "Freedom" as number 1. It's the only one that matched up exactly with both groups. Also, in both of our top 5 lists were "Equality" and "Capitalism." As for the five things that are least valued, that was a hard list to come up with because you rarely talk about the least valued things and our groups didn't agree as much. Although, two values were in the bottom for both groups, and those were "Tradition" and "Formality." It was just an interesting class trying to discuss the values of the U.S.A. Try taking a list of 38 values (that ranges from freedom, equality, respect to creativity, group consensus, and clear gender roles) and picking out the most and least important ones...it's not as easy as it seems. Anyway, I do enjoy that class a lot and honestly I feel like it's a class that alomost every student should take. It really makes you think.
In Spanish today we learned and practiced Spanish idioms. Those were definitely fun and useful to learn. A couple of my favorites: 1. "Consultarlo con la almohada" meaning "to sleep on it" or literally translated "to consult with the pillow" 2. "Estar en la luna" meaning "to be oblivious, mentally lost" or literally translated "to be on the moon" 3. "La gota que rebalsó el vaso" meaning "the straw that broke the camel's back" literally translated "the drop that overflowed the glass" and 4. "Meter la cuchara" meaning "to butt in, to intervene" literally translated "to introduce the spoon." It was fun to learn expressions that are used in Spanish since these are used in English fairly often.
Finally, I had Ethnography and I actually enjoyed it today and wasn't completely bored! I was able to actually pay attention and understand everything that the professor said. It gave me hope for the rest of the semester. I don't know why today was interesting for me, considering we talked about the farming of rubber trees in the Amazon, but it was. :) We learned the correct and incorrect processes of harvest the latex from the trees and it is actually a pretty precise process. Anyway, I hope that this whole not being bored thing continues!! :)
Other than classes, nothing else really happened. The cobradora this morning did try and charge me S/.1.50, which is more than I've ever paid even without my Student ID so I definitely fought that battle and won. :) Anyway, I think I'm going to consult with my pillow now. :) Buenas noches!
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| "Maximum security" |
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| "Moto Family" |
In Spanish today we learned and practiced Spanish idioms. Those were definitely fun and useful to learn. A couple of my favorites: 1. "Consultarlo con la almohada" meaning "to sleep on it" or literally translated "to consult with the pillow" 2. "Estar en la luna" meaning "to be oblivious, mentally lost" or literally translated "to be on the moon" 3. "La gota que rebalsó el vaso" meaning "the straw that broke the camel's back" literally translated "the drop that overflowed the glass" and 4. "Meter la cuchara" meaning "to butt in, to intervene" literally translated "to introduce the spoon." It was fun to learn expressions that are used in Spanish since these are used in English fairly often.
Finally, I had Ethnography and I actually enjoyed it today and wasn't completely bored! I was able to actually pay attention and understand everything that the professor said. It gave me hope for the rest of the semester. I don't know why today was interesting for me, considering we talked about the farming of rubber trees in the Amazon, but it was. :) We learned the correct and incorrect processes of harvest the latex from the trees and it is actually a pretty precise process. Anyway, I hope that this whole not being bored thing continues!! :)
Other than classes, nothing else really happened. The cobradora this morning did try and charge me S/.1.50, which is more than I've ever paid even without my Student ID so I definitely fought that battle and won. :) Anyway, I think I'm going to consult with my pillow now. :) Buenas noches!
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Some micro business
I feel bad for you guys when nothing exciting happens in the day. So I always try to think of the most 'exciting' things to tell you, so here comes the 'excitement' for the day...
I had ballet today! I never know what to tell you about ballet..I feel like as long as I don't fall on my butt or something than there's nothing to ever say about it except for I really love it and my instructor is crazy good. I also started reading one of my books for my Ethnography class. Of course I decided to start reading the English one first. So far it's good, even though I'm still in the Introduction. It's about the people living in the Bajo Urubamba and how they refer to themselves as having 'mixed blood.' So far, I feel like several of my classes overlap with their material, which is a good thing, that's what classes are supposed to do, right? Moving on... In my Cine class, we watched Erin Brockovich! I absolutely love that movie so I was really excited to see it. Plus, since I've seen it so many times, I know what happens, so I was able to focus more on the subtitles and learn new words. To be honest, I was kind of scared at first to watch it, I was hoping that I didn't have another laughing attack because of the simple fact that noone else was laughing, but luckily the Peruvian students understood the sarcasm and jokes of Julia Roberts. If you haven't seen this movie it really is a GOOD movie and you should. Plus, it's based on a true story. :)
Okay, here's the semi-exciting part of the day.. After class, I bought a snickers from a street vendor right outside of the university. I stood waiting at the bus stop for one of two micro lines that I take everyday and finally the number 26 came. I sat down and, once we were down the street, the cobrador asked for the money. I kindly showed him my Student ID (because we only have to pay 1 sol when we have it) and I handed him the coin. He then proceeded to ask where I was going and again I politely answered "Larco." And then this is where I was no longer polite..(I mean I didn't yell, I guess I was still nice, but yea...) He told me I owed him 20 more centimos. Well I haven't paid S/.1.20 since I've gotten my Student ID, so I said, "No, with this (holding my card) it's only 1 sol. I take this micro everyday and it's always 1 sol." He then pointed at a sign that had all the different rates on it (one of which says University-1 sol) and wouldn't change his mind on the price. So what do I do? I say, "I'm getting off then" and he gives me my sol back and I get off. I'm really becoming frugal here..I mean come on...I got off the micro because of 7 U.S. cents. And mind you, I had just bought a Snickers for 3 soles ($1.10)!!! :) But, hey 7 cents adds up, I could eventually buy another Snickers with those saved centimos! But, anyway, I continued to walk to the next paradero and got on the next bus that came and guess how much I paid...yep, 1 sol! It was worth the switch, too, and I'll tell you why...
You know those times when you're sitting on a micro, just thinking about how much you want to be home, and you see a really fast micro pass you and you think to yourself, "Man, I wish I was on that micro"? Well, that was my micro tonight!! I'm not quite sure where my driver was heading, but he definitely was driving like he had somewhere to be. He was cruising and I'm positive that we passed the micro that I got off of and I laughed at it as we flew by it. :) Needless to say, I would probably choose to get off a micro again before paying the extra 20 centimos (7 cents). Buenas noches!
Oh wait, one last interesting thing...there's a strike going on at Polvos Azules (the black market). Although some of you won't understand the Spanish, check out the video: http://www.rpp.com.pe/2011-09-12-comerciantes-atrincherados-en-polvos-azules-lanzan-bombas-molotov-noticia_402937.html It's funny, Tonisha and I wanted to go there this Friday...guess not. Also, Mistura, last night, was literally right next to Polvos Azules..crazy!
I had ballet today! I never know what to tell you about ballet..I feel like as long as I don't fall on my butt or something than there's nothing to ever say about it except for I really love it and my instructor is crazy good. I also started reading one of my books for my Ethnography class. Of course I decided to start reading the English one first. So far it's good, even though I'm still in the Introduction. It's about the people living in the Bajo Urubamba and how they refer to themselves as having 'mixed blood.' So far, I feel like several of my classes overlap with their material, which is a good thing, that's what classes are supposed to do, right? Moving on... In my Cine class, we watched Erin Brockovich! I absolutely love that movie so I was really excited to see it. Plus, since I've seen it so many times, I know what happens, so I was able to focus more on the subtitles and learn new words. To be honest, I was kind of scared at first to watch it, I was hoping that I didn't have another laughing attack because of the simple fact that noone else was laughing, but luckily the Peruvian students understood the sarcasm and jokes of Julia Roberts. If you haven't seen this movie it really is a GOOD movie and you should. Plus, it's based on a true story. :)
Okay, here's the semi-exciting part of the day.. After class, I bought a snickers from a street vendor right outside of the university. I stood waiting at the bus stop for one of two micro lines that I take everyday and finally the number 26 came. I sat down and, once we were down the street, the cobrador asked for the money. I kindly showed him my Student ID (because we only have to pay 1 sol when we have it) and I handed him the coin. He then proceeded to ask where I was going and again I politely answered "Larco." And then this is where I was no longer polite..(I mean I didn't yell, I guess I was still nice, but yea...) He told me I owed him 20 more centimos. Well I haven't paid S/.1.20 since I've gotten my Student ID, so I said, "No, with this (holding my card) it's only 1 sol. I take this micro everyday and it's always 1 sol." He then pointed at a sign that had all the different rates on it (one of which says University-1 sol) and wouldn't change his mind on the price. So what do I do? I say, "I'm getting off then" and he gives me my sol back and I get off. I'm really becoming frugal here..I mean come on...I got off the micro because of 7 U.S. cents. And mind you, I had just bought a Snickers for 3 soles ($1.10)!!! :) But, hey 7 cents adds up, I could eventually buy another Snickers with those saved centimos! But, anyway, I continued to walk to the next paradero and got on the next bus that came and guess how much I paid...yep, 1 sol! It was worth the switch, too, and I'll tell you why...
You know those times when you're sitting on a micro, just thinking about how much you want to be home, and you see a really fast micro pass you and you think to yourself, "Man, I wish I was on that micro"? Well, that was my micro tonight!! I'm not quite sure where my driver was heading, but he definitely was driving like he had somewhere to be. He was cruising and I'm positive that we passed the micro that I got off of and I laughed at it as we flew by it. :) Needless to say, I would probably choose to get off a micro again before paying the extra 20 centimos (7 cents). Buenas noches!
Oh wait, one last interesting thing...there's a strike going on at Polvos Azules (the black market). Although some of you won't understand the Spanish, check out the video: http://www.rpp.com.pe/2011-09-12-comerciantes-atrincherados-en-polvos-azules-lanzan-bombas-molotov-noticia_402937.html It's funny, Tonisha and I wanted to go there this Friday...guess not. Also, Mistura, last night, was literally right next to Polvos Azules..crazy!
Monday, September 12, 2011
Mistura
So today was my first day without my 8 a.m. class and it was quite nice not getting up at 6 a.m. (Sorry I bailed on you Tonisha). I started my day with Peruvian Social Reality, we again discussed race and the names for ALL the different races for when the Spanish came to Perú. It was ridiculous, literally every different mix of races had it's own name. For example, Español and India = Mestizo, Mestizo and Española = Castizo, Español and Negra = Mulato, etc. All of the names for the races are crazy and ridiculous, there was actually one called "No te entiendo," which means "I don't understand you." We also looked at a bunch of paintings from the colonial time and there were many paintings that were representations of the different races. For example:
After class, I went to the library to renew my books that I have to read for Amazonian Ethnography and I asked how I could renew them online so I don't have to keep going back and the people there were sooo helpful. I mean I'm assuming it was because I'm foreign, but it still was so comforting to have a lady invite me behind her desk so she could explain everything to me. Following this, I had my Spanish Writing workshop and rather than going to my Ethnography class after that, I decided to skip it. I know what you're thinking, "Andrea is down in Peru and she's not even going to class!," but don't worry...I skipped for cultural learning purposes (or that's what I'm going to call it anyway). Four other people and I went to Mistura, a huge food festival here in Lima. I'm not sure if any of you have been to or heard of the Taste of Chicago, but it was very similar to that. There were food stands all over the place with food from Lima and all other parts of Peru! It was wonderful and I ate/tried so much!!
And of course what else would you start the night out with except for Lasagna de Lomo Saltado!! I didn't take a picture of this because obviously it just looked like lasagna, but it was delicious, however it didn't taste too much like Lomo Saltado, also we had Manjarblanco and Aguaymanto (a fruit from the jungle) crepes. Again, no picture because they appeared like crepes, but again delicious! I decided that I love Manjarblanco. Oh, and of course we got Lúcuma milkshakes again. Okay, here's a bunch of food pictures from the night:
Tonight was all in all a wonderful night! We tried going to the Chef Wong tent, but Chef Wong leaves at 3 p.m. so we missed him, but Chef Wong is the most known chef in Perú, especially for his ceviche. Once again, I feel like I could be forgetting to tell you something about tonight and Peruvian gastronomy, but right now I don't recall. However, if I do think of something I will re-post.
One last thing, I changed the settings to my 'Comments' section so now anybody should be able to comment, whether they have a Google account or not, so if you've been wanting to comment on my blogs and haven't been able to, then I say give it another chance. Buenas noches!
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| This picture depicts that from Español and India comes Mestizo |
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| Suspiro (a dessert that also has manjarblanco in it): Delicious, but a little too sweet |
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| A cookie with manjarblanco: Delicious |
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| Causa: Potato, chicken, and avacado: not my favorite, but not disgusting. |
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| Queso Helado (Cheese Ice Cream) from the town of Arequipa Doesn't actually taste like cheese, but it is different, but still good! |
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| Anticuchos: ignore the stuff underneath cow heart meat chunks right now and it's delicious |
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| Now looking at the stuff underneath: disgusting... I'm still not quite sure what everything is, but it consists of insides of a cow or chicken, chicken hearts, probably some kidneys, who knows? |
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| Ceviche: I personally still do not like it, but I know A LOT of people do! |
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| Picarones!: delicious |
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| Risotto: Pretty good |
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| Chilcano, Delfin sour, Pisco sour |
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| Perfect way to end the night: I indulged in chocolate covered strawberries, as well as pineapple/strawberry ice cream (best ice cream ever!!!) Also, taste tested some Chocolate Pisco. |
One last thing, I changed the settings to my 'Comments' section so now anybody should be able to comment, whether they have a Google account or not, so if you've been wanting to comment on my blogs and haven't been able to, then I say give it another chance. Buenas noches!
Remembering September 11, 2001
This day I woke up early and dressed in my "Sunday best" in order to head to the U.S. Embassy for a September 11th Commemoration. Also, to prepare myself for going, I decided to watch some of the news footage from that day. I remember where I was that day, as I'm sure all of you do, but I can honestly say that I didn't quite understand everything that occured. I also don't remember the last night that I sat down and watched the news footage. Now, I am ten years older and going back to watch the footage definitely has a greater effect on me. If you haven't seen videos from that day in a long time, I encourage you to go back and watch them. I was mesmerized for most of the day just watching video after video from that September 11, 2001. I definitely spent a good amount of time watching footage rather than doing some homework.
Anyway, before I got to the embassy, I walked to Parque Kennedy to meet up with some other students and I decided I need to get out more on Sundays. There were so many people in the park! There was a huge group of people doing aerobics, many people biking/rollerblading/skateboarding, families walking, and fathers/sons playing a game that appeared to be a mixture between soccer and volleyball.
As we pulled up to the U.S. Embassy right away we noticed the security that was protecting us. There were many people standing outside of the embassy as well as men on the tops of buildings across the streets.
I really enjoyed the commemoration as a whole and the remarks that our U.S. Ambassador said. One of the things I most enjoyed though was the group of girls from the Villa María Miraflores School choir. Some U.S. Marines presented the colors and the girls sang the United States National Anthem. You kind of forget how much you miss seeing the American flag and hearing the National Anthem until you haven't seen it or heard it in awhile. Plus, I really enjoyed the fact that a group of middle school Peruvian girls knew our National Anthem. It was so calming to hear it. They also followed it by the Peruvian National Anthem, which I hadn't heard yet before, so I really liked hearing them sing that as well. Throughout the commemoration, they also sang "Amazing Grace" and "You Raise Me Up." Both of these songs were also very relaxing to hear. I'm not going to tell you a lot about the remarks of Ambassdor Likins, but some food for thought...I had never really thought about this a lot, but I learned that 90 nationalities were represented in the victims that died on September 11, 2001, five of which were Peruvians. Two of the families were in attendance at the commemoration, which made me very happy/sad. I can't even try to imagine what it would have been like to lose someone that day and my heart really does go out to everyone affected by that day. Also, the tree (pictured above) was just planted on September 10, 2011 and the caption is what a plaque in front of the tree reads. The type of tree (if I remember right) is a Mora peruana tree and Ambassador Likins made an analogy between the strength and resilience of the tree in the Peruvian weather with the families and communities affected by 9/11. Okay, now on to the not so sad stuff...the former President of Perú, Alan García Pérez sat two rows in front of me. :) He was just President a little over a month ago, so I thought that was pretty cool. I mean obviously I didn't personally meet him, but he was there and I was closer to him than I have ever been to any U.S. president. One more funny story, one of the girls from my program, Jen, dropped her sunglasses at the embassy and a man picked them up and handed them back to her. She politely said, "Gracias" and the man replied, "You're welcome." We both then began to chuckle because clearly the majority of the people there were US American and spoke English and here she was saying, "Gracias." It was comical.
I really don't know what else to say about today except for the fact that it was nice to have some moments of American-ness. I hope all of you were also able to commemorate September 11, 2001 at some point during your day and, if not, do it now. Finally, I'll end with a happy note, for lunch I had a Lucuma (just so you remember Lucuma is a native fruit here) milkshake with my meal and it was delicious!
Anyway, before I got to the embassy, I walked to Parque Kennedy to meet up with some other students and I decided I need to get out more on Sundays. There were so many people in the park! There was a huge group of people doing aerobics, many people biking/rollerblading/skateboarding, families walking, and fathers/sons playing a game that appeared to be a mixture between soccer and volleyball.
As we pulled up to the U.S. Embassy right away we noticed the security that was protecting us. There were many people standing outside of the embassy as well as men on the tops of buildings across the streets.
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| U.S. Ambassador Rose M. Likins |
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| "This tree grows in living commemoration of those lives taken in the terrorist attacks ten years ago in New York, Washington D.C., and Shanksville, Pennsylvania. As we honor all victims of terrorism, in nations around the world, so too we honor the resilience of the survivors, families, and communities affected, on every continent." |
I really don't know what else to say about today except for the fact that it was nice to have some moments of American-ness. I hope all of you were also able to commemorate September 11, 2001 at some point during your day and, if not, do it now. Finally, I'll end with a happy note, for lunch I had a Lucuma (just so you remember Lucuma is a native fruit here) milkshake with my meal and it was delicious!
Sunday, September 11, 2011
BBQ
Okay, I'm a day behind on my blog again so I apologize for that, but I'm hoping to catch up tonight. Yesterday (Saturday) was a pretty relaxing day. I spent most of the day doing some homework I had, but I would have much rather been doing something outside because the Lima sun decided to come out. It was beautiful! It's definitely starting to be kind of Spring-y, which is wonderful because my favorite season is Spring!!
During the evening hours is when my day started to pick up. One of the girls from my program, Rachel, had her birthday yesterday so I started out the night celebrating with her, her host mom, and her host aunt at her house. We got to indulge in delicious chocolate cake that her host mom made and Inca Kola (pop that tastes like bubblegum/medicine). Inca Kola still is not my favorite; however, the cake was amazing!!! Also, we sang 'Happy Birthday' in English which apparently is pretty standard here and then it's followed by 'Happy Birthday' en español. We then headed to our usually meeting spot in Parque Kennedy in Miraflores to meet up with everyone in our program as well as our Peruvian friend, Indy.
During the evening hours is when my day started to pick up. One of the girls from my program, Rachel, had her birthday yesterday so I started out the night celebrating with her, her host mom, and her host aunt at her house. We got to indulge in delicious chocolate cake that her host mom made and Inca Kola (pop that tastes like bubblegum/medicine). Inca Kola still is not my favorite; however, the cake was amazing!!! Also, we sang 'Happy Birthday' in English which apparently is pretty standard here and then it's followed by 'Happy Birthday' en español. We then headed to our usually meeting spot in Parque Kennedy in Miraflores to meet up with everyone in our program as well as our Peruvian friend, Indy.
As Peruvians are, Indy was late, so while we were waiting for her to get there in the traffic, all 12ish of us gringos headed to the nearby Metro (grocery store) to pick up some food for the Peruvian barbeque we were heading to. We really weren't sure what the standard thing to bring to a barbeque in Perú was, but we went ahead and guessed. We decided on chips, alcohol, and hamburgers. I still don't think the hamburgers got cooked, but the other two are definitely good picks, so next time you go to a Peruvian barbeque you'll know what to bring. I brought Lay's chips and those were gone pretty fast, but fun fact about Lay's..apparently they taste different here. Personally, I couldn't tell but a lot of my friends said that. Anyway, more about this barbeque..there were anticuchos! That's all you need to know. Anticuchos are pieces of cow heart cooked on kabobs and, although that may sound gross, they were delicious (hence the reason that no hamburgers were cooked). I also tried Canchitas, which are delicious as well! They are literally just corn kernels with maybe some salt on them. They are such a great snack food, like peanuts in the states. Also, there was grilled zucchini, eggplant, peppers, etc. It was pretty much exactly what you would expect a barbeque to be like in the states, except add more Peruvians. Also, we ended the night with some cookie dough cheesecake for Rachel's birthday again and again we sang 'Happy Birthday' twice and again it was delicious!!!!! Two desserts in one night is perfect!! Again, Happy Birthday and Feliz Cumpleaños to Rachel! I'm glad we could help make your day special!
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