One Month

Well, I'm finally getting around to starting this blog.  I've been intending to do this the whole time I've been here, but as more time goes on, the harder and harder it gets because more and more keeps happening....

I've been here in Lima for almost exactly a month now, but it feels so much longer than that.  My amazing summer in Wisconsin feels like ages ago.  I've been going to classes for 3 weeks now and, mostly, so far so good.  Since all of my classes are in spanish, I really have to focus to know what's going on because I get really lost if I zone out.  Thankfully, I feel like I understand most of what my professors talk about, even if I don't feel comfortable enough to actually talk in class yet.  One thing I'm nervous about is that my classes are almost exclusively graded on the exams.  This means I don't have any papers or written homework (woot), but this also means that each exam is worth a lot and I've heard that most of the exams here are essay based.  I actually had a reading "quiz" this past week that turned out to be 3 essay type questions about the stack of reading we had to do and I felt completely lost.  I'm really hoping the profs take it easy on foreign students.

While everyone at home is enjoying the beautiful end of summer, I get to wait out the end of winter in Lima.  Winter here is nothing like Wisconsin, with subzero temperatures and mountains of snow, but it is always cloudy and feels really cold all the time.  It doesn't help that all of the buildings here are open to outside and so there are always drafts inside.  Thankfully, we have been getting more and more sunny days, like today, which feel amazing.  Spring is coming!

Lima is a GIGANTIC city. Think almost 9 million people.  It is definitely a little overwhelming to think of that many people living in one city. Especially when I am one of them.  When I first got here and realized how big Lima actually is, I had a bit of a "what am I doing here" feeling.  There is always too much traffic, noise, and pollution and it takes forever to go anywhere!  I'm slowly getting used to big city living though.  I don't get headaches everyday from the noise and pollution and I'm getting more and more comfortable going places by myself.  There are also a lot of really beautiful parts of the city, especially in the center, with really old buildings, and next to the ocean.  I LOVE the ocean. It is so beautiful. The first day I went to the ocean, I decided to roll up my pants and wade in to feel how cold it was and proceeded to get soaked up to my knees when a wave came.

All the surfers near the coast of Lima. I want to try it sometime!!

Gorgeous coastline of Lima. I can't wait to see it when it's sunny.

Lima is growing on me, but it really feels amazing to get out of the city for a weekend.  I've traveled during two weekends so far- both to cities 4-5 hours south of Lima where I got to relax and soak in some sun.  Paracas is a pretty little coastal town, really close to La Reserva Nacional de Paracas (it's like a national park).  There, you can take a boat to some islands and see penguins, sea lions, and other wildlife.  We didn't take the boats, but instead walked through the desert to this little village on a beautiful beach called Lagunillas.  It felt like paradise.

Walking through the desert.

Ocean in the middle of the desert...

Pelican house pets?

They were expecting me.

Then, this past weekend I went to Huacachina, a tiny little oasis in the middle of the desert.  It is a town of about 100 people built around a beautiful little lagoon and surrounded by enormous sand dunes.  We went up in the dunes in dune buggies, which was like a very sandy roller coaster, and made some stops to go sandboarding, which is basically snowboarding on sand. So much fun! Sadly, I didn't get any pictures of myself sandboarding because I didn't want sand in my camera.  I've never felt so sandy before. At some points, there wasn't enough room in my shoes for my feet anymore because they had so much sand in them.

Beautiful little oasis. Some people hiked to the top of that dune. Can you say tiring?

Woo middle of the desert!

Some sandboarders.

Huacachina at night

Yesterday, I went to this Peruvian food festival called Mistura. As Lima is apparently the gastronomic capital of the america's, this festival is huge!  There were a million different little stands for food and they served small portions so you could try everything (well maybe not everything-you'd be a balloon).  I had ceviche (the signature dish of peru), another seafood dish, and this DELICIOUS pecan pie with a dollop of ice cream on top. I'm making myself hungry just thinking about it. However, I think I've written enough for now so more on peruvian cuisine later.

Well, now that I've finally started this blogging thing, I'm going to try to write more often. I'm sorry this post was so all over the place- it was really hard to organize my thoughts and summarize an entire month into a few paragraphs. I guess the most important thing to take away from this is that, though there are brief moments of uncertainty, I really love it here and am having the time of my life. However, I miss and love you all and would love to see everyone's face on skype. laura.m.neilson- add me! Chao!

Interesting Facts of Lima:

1) Halls cough drops are really common here. However, they aren't eaten as cough drops. They're candy. No thanks.

2) A "tortilla" is not a wrapper for tacos or burritos. If you order a tortilla here, you will get an omelet.  Not totally disappointing, just surprising.
3) You cannot flush the toilet paper down the toilet.
4) Pizza is not finger food.  Everyone uses knife and fork.  I am generally trying to fit in to peruvian society, however, I refuse to conform regarding pizza consumption. 

5) Here's a shout out to my cousin's cat, Tico. Many of the taxis are these tiny cars called Ticos. We were advised not to take a Tico because you would not survive in an accident.