Adventures in Peru- Week UNO

Wow, what a whirlwind of South America!

Everything has just been so crazy, I haven't taken time to sit down and blog thus far- but oh are there stories to tell already... yes.

It all started when...

I got on the plane. I like my flights just how I like my milkshakes- cool and smooth, and I had good luck with all three of the flights. I met a nice guy from El Salvador on the ride from SLC to LAX, listened to music (Iron & Wine) the whole time from LAX to Mexico City, and met two really nice back-packer girls on the flight from Mexico City to Lima.

I spent my last night in the US in Los Angeles in a nice little hotel room that my parents put me up in because they didn't want me to spend the night in the LA airport :P It was super nice to be able to sleep in a nice comfy bed for the last time in three months though. Sooo nice.

The 5 hour layover in Mexico City wasn't too bad. I spent a lot of time wandering around the mostly-deserted airport and sleeping in the chair/benches. Oh, and they also had XXL seats for certain people....

The flight in to Lima was about 6 hours (I'm not sure if there was a time change involved with that length of time, but I'm too lazy to figure it out right now) on which I watched Marley and Me- not mi favorito- read the first half of the Notebook- also not mi favorito- and got to know Denise and Kristie (I know for sure that that's not her actual name and I can't remember it..) who were just going to backpack through Peru and Bolivia with a couple hundred dollars and even less Spanish than me.

(Now here is where I apologize, because I had this blog saved as a draft, and I spent two hours writing about my first week in Peru, then the internet randomly stopped working, and everything past this point was erased.)

(I also must apologize for my poor spelling and grammar from here on out, because I know for sure that my English is getting worse- ha but not so sure that my Spanish is getting better, so now I just can't communicate at all.- So please bear (bare??) with me.)

I live in ASCEND's apartment slash office in Mayorazco, Ate, Lima, Peru. Mayorazco is similar to a neighborhood, Ate is like a district. Lima, the city- also capitol of Peru, is the 27th most populous city in the WORLD, and the 5th most populous city in Latin America. According to Wikipedia, (a source which I may or may not put too much faith in) Lima and it's surrounding metropolitan area contain one third of all of the population of Peru. That's almost 8.5 million people.

Alright, so take Utah's ENTIRE population, multiply that by three- and you almost have as many people that live in Lima, yes, all squished into one 'lil city.

So you can imagine the traffic right? And the pollution? Well, to add to the dirty hustle and bustle of the usual South American City; Lima is also a "humid desert". What this means is: no rain, just a lot of dust- and it all sticks to condensed humidity on buildings, so everything gets even dirtier. Get it? Everything is grey here The sky, buildings, and streets. At least now, in the winter, because the fog from the ocean that comes over the city never burns off. (however, today was blue in a little corner of the sky, and it made me SO happy!)

However, and more importantly, the people here are absolutely amazing. You'd think people in a big city would be cold and uncaring, but the people of Lima are the exact opposite, and I've already come to love their spirit and charisma.

Awesome baby Jesus shrine in our neighborhood.

We ride mini-non-bus-van things all over town.

Freaky for boys (huh Gabi?).

My first time in Huaycan- a poor town in which we work.

Self-explanitory. Myself and Diana.

Behind the Hospital, we started clearing a space for a soccer field.

Diana found a surprise! Can you guess what it is??

There is this town called Chancay; in it, there is a "castle". A crazy lady built it for herself when her husband died....

This was in the back of a motorcycle taxi.

Very convinient.

My new friend. I am making lots of new friends here. Many of whom sell chikle in the streets.

You can find more pictures here :D

Okay guys, or whoever is reading this, even if it's just my mom (love ya mom)- I'm really sorry for not writing anything sooner. From now on out I promise to write at least twice a week! There is SO much going on! And although I am busy, I owe it to all the people who are rooting me on to let them know what's happ'nin'.

peace and love.