yay, my house is fully functional again. the water works, blackie is not vomiting. valerie is not vomiting. amanda is not vomiting. and i managed not to vomit through this whole endeavor. Although surviving this plague is just one small feat, as i have 5 more months of many plagues to survive. it is quite common here for people to get sick randomly and then be sick for weeks and weeks. i hope that i can survive for longer. or at least if i survive 2 more months without missing work i get two paid holidays. So i have to try and make it or else this last month will have been in vain.
lets see, what else. we didnt do much of anything this weekend. Friday night i went to karaoke with amanda and her coworkers at excel. the most exciting thing there was the tv fell off the wall and shattered. luckily it didnt fall on anyone. then we went to cross keys, where amandas boyfriendy type person is a bartender and we got cheap drinks and hung out there until 2 ish. At that point, i decided it was far beyond my bed time and hopped in a cab, while amanda and Jorge (the bartender) went to a disco. unfortunately, i got home, only to find that i was unable to open the door. so i hopped in cab, again, and went back to the disco. there i proceeded to steal amandas camera, sit there and take lots of pictures of myself making funny faces, and pictures of her and jorge canoodling (or groping) on the dance floor. I then decided at 4:30 to head back home by myself after I realized Amanda would not be accompanying me home. So i took her keys and headed back, flopped into bed, and woke up mid afternoon the next day.
the rest of the weekend was kind of a wash. except that my favorite student, Vianney, (who is sadly not going to be my student next month) came over and had a couple drinks with Amanda and I and then we went on a "postinar" adventure. Amanda had thought the existence of plan B in peru would be nill. but Vianney told her otherwise. so at 11:30 pm we headed to an open pharmacy in search. we found that not only does it definitely exist (and apparently it is embarassing to yell that we need postinar on the main streets in peru, well, embarassing for vianney at least) but it is also very inexpensive. it was 18 soles (about 6 dollars), plus it came with 3 FREE CONDOMS! what an offer! amazing that a drug company actually is trying to limit its sales by giving condoms with the drug!
so that was the weekend. now its raining and all i really want to do is curl up with a mug of hot chocolate but thats kind of hard to find around here. so ill settle for curling up with my kittens. tonight is the season finale of fringe. so that will have to do....
Monday, August 31, 2009
Thursday, August 27, 2009
dying household
not much has happened lately, except for the deterioration of my house. Amanda (one of my roommates) was sick and vomiting and pooping on tuesday and yesterday, and then Blackie (one of our kittens) has been vomiting all over the house all week. And then last night Valerie was vomiting and pooping all night (luckily she was at her bf´s house). As if vomiting and pooping all the time isnt bad enough, add onto that that our water has been out since tuesday, meaning that we cannot flush the toilets (hence the luck that Val was at her bf´s house). Anyways, I hope I dont catch this plague that has apparently fallen upon our house....
Thursday, August 20, 2009
The long overdue blog post
so a long time ago I promised you a post about apartment hunting. Here it is:
"I´m sorry it has been so long since I have updated. I have not been particularly inspired, especially because I have been so very engrossed in my schoolwork. But now that I am so very close to being done with all of my work for this TEFL class, I guess I can spare some time to write. Plus, a lot of exciting things have happened lately.
First of all, I got a job! If you are friends with me on facebook you probably already know this. I was one of the strongest students in my class at both the being a student part (which I´ve always been pretty good at) and, amazingly, the teaching part! I didn’t start out a very strong teacher but I quickly improved and got hired at Maximo Nivel. I am officially an employee here now as I have signed the contract and everything!
So, that’s one very exciting thing. However, I had been completely stressing out about where to live because I have to leave my apartment early tomorrow morning. I had booked a hostel for Sunday night and hoped for the best (figuring I can always extend my hostel stay). Anyways, today two other girls (Valerie and Amanda) and I made a date to go apartment hunting. It was an exciting adventure. We started out by buying one of the classifieds newspapers here. Luckily, Valerie speaks very Spanish very well, so we delegated her as our speaker. First we hopped in a taxi and went to H-2 Los Sauces. Unfortunately, H-2 did not want to be found. We asked countless people and could not figure out how the street worked. Finally, we found the apartment. We walked in and we fell in love. Each wall was painted a different vibrant color, the rooms were spacious and a ton of closet space. Unfortunately, after walking around, we noticed that it was completely unfurnished. This meant: no beds and no couches. Of course, we actually noticed this right away. But in walking into the kitchen we found that this also could hardly be called a kitchen. There was no refrigerator, no oven, no stove. Nothing. So, sadly, we told them that we needed those things and could not get the apartment. But, on the upside, there were some one month old puppies outside that belonged to the neighbors and so we got to play with them for a while and had a pleasant conversation (in Spanish) to the woman who owned them. They were very cute.
Anyways, the adventure continued. So, we had passed an apartment building in our wanderings to find H-2 in which a man had said hello to us and told us there were apartments in his building available. However, he turned out to be an interesting character, who really just wanted to flirt with some cute gringas. So after venturing into his apartment and getting a tour we decided it was time to continue our search (his apartment smelled quite rank and we wanted out!). So, we called another ad from the newspaper and headed on over.
This apartment was quite spectacular. Everything in it was brand new, it was furnished with nicely, it was all freshly painted, in a nice gated building on a street muy tranquilla. However, this apartment turned out to be WAY out of our price range at $680 a month (yes, in dollars—our max was around 500 at the MOST). So, we called yet another person from the classifieds and headed on our way. As we headed out to grab a taxi the nice ladies who had just showed us the expensive apartment asked us where we were headed. Then they very generously offered to drive us there! Although on the way they told us it was in a dangerous neighborhood, not nearly as nice as their neighborhood (of course they would say that!).
Anyways, we got there and were not too fond of the street, however the apartment was in a nice gated community with a cute little courtyard that cute little Peruvian kids played in. We toured the apartment and Amanda and I were sold. The bedrooms were a bit small, but it was well furnished and definitely affordable. However, Valerie had her doubts. So, we told the friendly man that we had one more apartment to see and would get back to him later tonight.
So we headed off yet again. Amanda and I were feeling pretty set on the apartment and couldn’t imagine a better one. However, when we walked into the next apartment we were taken aback. It was totally adorable, a little bit smaller than the other one but absolutely beautiful! The furniture was wonderful, and the neighborhood was quite nice. This apartment was a tid bit more expensive but we were in love. The final push was when we asked if we could have a cat and the couple said “yes, of course!”. We then spent another good while discussing how long to sign the lease for (it was cheaper to sign it for 6 months, but we didn’t know if one of the girls would be staying that long). So after much debating we put down a deposit, told them we wanted it for 6 months and signed a contract (well, a preliminary contract that consisted of the landlord writing some stuff on a piece of paper and Valerie signing it).
And that was that. We have an apartment. We move in on Monday. We get a cat next Saturday. I start teachings 6 classes a day a week from Monday. I have a life in Cusco!
Oh, and we are naming our cat Emoticon. “Moti” for short."
Haha, this post is so old. Now our cat is named Tito. Well, technically his name is still Emoticat, but we Pretty much only call him Tito. And we also have a second cat! Tito´s brother, Blackie. Blackie was the runt of the litter so he is much smaller than Tito, and possibly even more adorable. But together they are the masters at being cute.
"I´m sorry it has been so long since I have updated. I have not been particularly inspired, especially because I have been so very engrossed in my schoolwork. But now that I am so very close to being done with all of my work for this TEFL class, I guess I can spare some time to write. Plus, a lot of exciting things have happened lately.
First of all, I got a job! If you are friends with me on facebook you probably already know this. I was one of the strongest students in my class at both the being a student part (which I´ve always been pretty good at) and, amazingly, the teaching part! I didn’t start out a very strong teacher but I quickly improved and got hired at Maximo Nivel. I am officially an employee here now as I have signed the contract and everything!
So, that’s one very exciting thing. However, I had been completely stressing out about where to live because I have to leave my apartment early tomorrow morning. I had booked a hostel for Sunday night and hoped for the best (figuring I can always extend my hostel stay). Anyways, today two other girls (Valerie and Amanda) and I made a date to go apartment hunting. It was an exciting adventure. We started out by buying one of the classifieds newspapers here. Luckily, Valerie speaks very Spanish very well, so we delegated her as our speaker. First we hopped in a taxi and went to H-2 Los Sauces. Unfortunately, H-2 did not want to be found. We asked countless people and could not figure out how the street worked. Finally, we found the apartment. We walked in and we fell in love. Each wall was painted a different vibrant color, the rooms were spacious and a ton of closet space. Unfortunately, after walking around, we noticed that it was completely unfurnished. This meant: no beds and no couches. Of course, we actually noticed this right away. But in walking into the kitchen we found that this also could hardly be called a kitchen. There was no refrigerator, no oven, no stove. Nothing. So, sadly, we told them that we needed those things and could not get the apartment. But, on the upside, there were some one month old puppies outside that belonged to the neighbors and so we got to play with them for a while and had a pleasant conversation (in Spanish) to the woman who owned them. They were very cute.
Anyways, the adventure continued. So, we had passed an apartment building in our wanderings to find H-2 in which a man had said hello to us and told us there were apartments in his building available. However, he turned out to be an interesting character, who really just wanted to flirt with some cute gringas. So after venturing into his apartment and getting a tour we decided it was time to continue our search (his apartment smelled quite rank and we wanted out!). So, we called another ad from the newspaper and headed on over.
This apartment was quite spectacular. Everything in it was brand new, it was furnished with nicely, it was all freshly painted, in a nice gated building on a street muy tranquilla. However, this apartment turned out to be WAY out of our price range at $680 a month (yes, in dollars—our max was around 500 at the MOST). So, we called yet another person from the classifieds and headed on our way. As we headed out to grab a taxi the nice ladies who had just showed us the expensive apartment asked us where we were headed. Then they very generously offered to drive us there! Although on the way they told us it was in a dangerous neighborhood, not nearly as nice as their neighborhood (of course they would say that!).
Anyways, we got there and were not too fond of the street, however the apartment was in a nice gated community with a cute little courtyard that cute little Peruvian kids played in. We toured the apartment and Amanda and I were sold. The bedrooms were a bit small, but it was well furnished and definitely affordable. However, Valerie had her doubts. So, we told the friendly man that we had one more apartment to see and would get back to him later tonight.
So we headed off yet again. Amanda and I were feeling pretty set on the apartment and couldn’t imagine a better one. However, when we walked into the next apartment we were taken aback. It was totally adorable, a little bit smaller than the other one but absolutely beautiful! The furniture was wonderful, and the neighborhood was quite nice. This apartment was a tid bit more expensive but we were in love. The final push was when we asked if we could have a cat and the couple said “yes, of course!”. We then spent another good while discussing how long to sign the lease for (it was cheaper to sign it for 6 months, but we didn’t know if one of the girls would be staying that long). So after much debating we put down a deposit, told them we wanted it for 6 months and signed a contract (well, a preliminary contract that consisted of the landlord writing some stuff on a piece of paper and Valerie signing it).
And that was that. We have an apartment. We move in on Monday. We get a cat next Saturday. I start teachings 6 classes a day a week from Monday. I have a life in Cusco!
Oh, and we are naming our cat Emoticon. “Moti” for short."
Haha, this post is so old. Now our cat is named Tito. Well, technically his name is still Emoticat, but we Pretty much only call him Tito. And we also have a second cat! Tito´s brother, Blackie. Blackie was the runt of the litter so he is much smaller than Tito, and possibly even more adorable. But together they are the masters at being cute.
Monday, August 17, 2009
We went duck hunting....with no gun....and no ducks...
Today was quite an exciting day. We planned a duck hunting trip in Lucre, a small town in the sacred valley known for their duck restaurants and duck hunting. Originally we had been planning to have a picnic with Natalie, our TEFL trainer in the sacred valley. When we went to talk to her about these plans, we learned that they had changed, and now we were going duck hunting, camo gear and all (well Natalie had camo gear). We met and grabbed a taxi to Lucre, about an hour outside of Cusco. When we arrived in Lucre, I learned that we had no gun, and really had no intention of duck hunting at all, but rather were going to embark on an adventure in the latest, and MOST extreme of all of the extreme sports: EXTREME IRONING. Yes, you heard me. We arrived in Lucre with ironing board and iron in hand, preceded to walk down a deserted road towards the lake in which we were going to extreme iron.
Well, we didn’t make it to the lake, but we did find some rocky mountains to extreme iron. We also stumbled upon some amazing, apparently previously unknown to tourists, Inkan ruins. It was quite amazing. So we extreme ironed a bit and then began our walk back. We even had some donkey extreme ironing. It was quite a cool town, and by the time we were done extreme ironing, we were very hungry and tired. So, since we had come to hunt duck, we went duck hunting. In a restaurant. Where we ordered different duck dishes and relaxed. It was quite a relaxing afternoon. We had some dessert, played with a cute baby, and headed back to Cusco. All in all, a nice afternoon with some beautiful views, exciting adventures, and delicious duck.
I have to say, I am now pro duck hunting
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
the other side of the spectrum
Being in front of the classroom instead of sitting in a classroom is a very different experience. I always wondered if the teacher watched the clock as scrupulously as I did as a student. I was always counting down the minutes until class was over, pondering how it was possible that the second hand seemed to stop for minutes at a time. I would do work for what felt like 15 minutes only to find out it had been 3.
Well, now I know. Yes, teachers do watch the clock counting down the time until class is over. But instead of being bored and wondering how class isnt over yet, I glance at my watch every few minutes, trying to calculate how it is that i am supposed to teach my students why you put "Do" in front of questions that use "have" and why "do" conjugates and not "have" (the main verb). (probably most of you weren´t even aware that you need do in have questions, and not in to be questions). Classes fly by now. The hour I teach for is only about 15 minutes long (and even shorter if you take into account the fact that its on Latin American time, which means students dont arrive until 10 after at the earliest). And then I go to my Spanish class. And I sit, and sit, and sit. And the hour never ends. Even when the class is actually fun!
Well, now I know. Yes, teachers do watch the clock counting down the time until class is over. But instead of being bored and wondering how class isnt over yet, I glance at my watch every few minutes, trying to calculate how it is that i am supposed to teach my students why you put "Do" in front of questions that use "have" and why "do" conjugates and not "have" (the main verb). (probably most of you weren´t even aware that you need do in have questions, and not in to be questions). Classes fly by now. The hour I teach for is only about 15 minutes long (and even shorter if you take into account the fact that its on Latin American time, which means students dont arrive until 10 after at the earliest). And then I go to my Spanish class. And I sit, and sit, and sit. And the hour never ends. Even when the class is actually fun!
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