I LOVE FILM!!!!!

Yesterday was a great day in film history. We watched fewer films, but one of them was a largo metraje (feature length) Yesterday was a focus on Italian films. We watched Nero, or the Fall of Rome, L'Inferno and Cabiria. L'Inferno and Cabiria are feature length, but we only saw Cabiria all the way through. They were both black and white and silent, but I enjoyed Cabiria much more than I enjoyed Birth of a Nation. The Italians were the first to go feature length. Americans were the first to do moving pictures, French were the first to use moving pictures to tell narratives, and Italians were the first to tell feature length narratives. We also finished that boring lecture in Literature class.

Today I enjoyed my Quechua class. I need to practice more, though. What I think is so interesting about the language is that because of suffixes, you can tell an entire sentence in as few as one or two words. Obviously more as well, but I can technically have a one word sentence with a verb and noun (and even a possessive indicator). I like the way it sounds too. I had a very chill day. Mom sent me a book on my Kindle on Monday or something. It is the first of a trilogy, and I've basically been reading that book nonstop, and today I started the third one, lol. So I spent pretty much all day reading the second one. Then I went to class in the afternoon. In my film class, we watched an Italian film. I don't know what it's called. It's a series and we only watched one of them titled "El Trabajo" in Spanish. Then we talked about it. I was irritated because I spent the whole class period coming up with something to say. I finally did and I didn't get to say it. Now I'm irritated because I'm a shy participant in class, and I think the teacher is going to think it's because of the language not my nature, so I'm going to have to write a 1 page paper every week. It won't be that hard, but it's the principle of the thing. Plus, I want to be in a room with a bunch of film students, not people who just want easy credits. Basically, I want a room full of Joshes, lol. I was so excited to talk to him the other day, so I could have a proper conversation about film again. I guess some of the film students I could talk about film properly with here, but not the way I talk to Josh about film. I miss the film school at Long Beach. The department, the other students, the faculty. Being away from Long Beach definitely helps me realize that it's the right place for me to be.

Sorry About the Delay

Sorry I skipped a few days. You weren't missing much. Sunday I went to 8 am mass. Dude! It was so cool! They didn't sing until like the very end! I have never been to a church that wasn't St. Bonnies that didn't have music at the mass. After mass I had breakfast and went to La Catolica to meet my group. I forgot my group is on Peruvian time, so I showed up at ten after ten and didn't see anyone in my group until a quarter of eleven. Not making that mistake again, lol. So, instead of going to the cemetery, we decided to go to one of the guy's houses to work on other things. Something about filming at night, I wasn't entirely sure. I think they said they wanted to film at night, but I didn't know why that meant we couldn't go to the cemetery to check it out. Either way. No one wanted to direct, lol. I'm producing. We went out to eat then separated. I came home, took a nap, and did nothing the rest of the day.

Yesterday I met with my group again. We were supposed to meet at 12. I showed up at ten past 12 and didn't see anyone until about 12:40 or so, lol. It was chill. We worked on our homework. Then some of us went for lunch before my class started. We ended up at the art cafeteria where we had salchipapas. (cut up hot dogs sprinkled on top of french fries) How it works is, each of the different cafeterias have a different menu: the menu, economic plate, vegetarian plate, and extras. The main cafeteria only had the economic plate which was just pasta, so we went to the art cafeteria and had salchipapas. They were pretty good for what they were. Class was so boring. We had a guest give us a lecture on the type of literature we were reading. I like my teacher's lectures better. I liked the play we read, though. It was full of drama. Although, I notice that the women in the literature we're reading are all wishy-washy. They marry whomever people tell them to marry. It's so weird. I don't know. It's interesting, though. I liked it.

Today was even less eventful than the last two days. We had our first prueba in Quechua today, and I did awfully because I got everything mixed up. Thankfully we can make up a quiz, so I'll just make up this one. Then I came back, did homework, and I talked to one of my Cal State Long Beach friends for four hours. Seriously! We were on Skype for four hours just talking. It was great! (Even though I should have been doing homework. I always put people before my homework. I can just sacrifice a few hours of sleep.) That was pretty much it. I baked brownies last night, and now there are only two left, lol. These ones turned out better than the last ones. They were more dense than the last ones as well. I think they were sweeter too. I think I also put a little more vanilla in, and I think a little less salt, and the girls all agree they're better than the last ones. (I used the same recipe) Who knows. As long as people like them. I still have tons of ingredients left over, so I'll just hang onto them.

The picture is of Catalin (my French roommate) and I at the beach our first weekend in Lima. It was like, Playa Hermosa, I think. Outside of Lima.

Finally!

Ah, I had a good dinner. Like, a REALLY good dinner for once. Well, yesterday wasn't so exciting. Although video was interesting. Apparently I don't have to be in class until 5pm every Friday, only 1pm which is a helluva lot better. I still stay and meet with my group. We went out to lunch like we did last week and I learned of a new food. It's called huevo relleno con cuevas. It's a hard boiled egg with the yolk taken out. The yolk is mixed with papas y un tipo de chili or something, not entirely sure what, but I'm sure you can mix it with whatever you want. Then it's stuffed back into the egg white. So, apparently my group talked about the kind of show we want to make. I had no idea what they were talking about. I got that they were talking about ideas. I think at first they were talking about music from the 60's or something, I'm not sure. I really had no idea what was going on. Then suddenly they were talking about places I had heard about in Lima. I had no idea why, but I knew they were doing that. Suddenly they asked me if I had plans on Sunday, which I didn't. Then I was told we were meeting in front of the school between 10 and 10:30. I had no idea where we were going. I just knew we were location scouting. That'll be my job. I'll just do what they tell me. A Liman accent is so difficult to understand. They speak quickly like Mexicans, but less clearly. I feel like it's the Californian equivalent of Spanish. Anyways, I hung out with them for a few hours. Then, when I asked if Nick could come to the shooting, I think they said that he could come and just hang out, he didn't have to help. Like I said, that's what I think they said. I know they said he could come, but the details I'm not sure of because they were talking quickly all at once. But I'm pretty sure that's what they said.

Today wasn't too eventful. I worked on homework, watched Eat Pray Love with my roommate Natalie from Indiana. This morning, we talked about hamburgers. I seriously have been craving one basically since I got to this country. Don't ask, I don't know. Which is weird because the first meat I ate when I stopped being a vegetarian was a Burger King cheeseburger, and I remember it tasted terrible. I like In-N-Out, but that's it. I still have been craving a cheeseburger for like, 2 months tho, idk. Well, my roommate was telling me how much she wanted to go, and that there was a Chili's at the mall nearby. It was a date. :-) We went to Chili's and it was about the same price as in the States, but expensive by Peruvian standards. And our waiter spoke English to us. It was kinda awkward. The hostess didn't, but the waiter did. We were annoyed. I was appreciative though that he spoke English well (unlike most people in tourism here who "speak English") But OMG!!! We both got a Beacon Cheeseburger, and they were amazing. I was so happy. I ate the whole thing. It was so weird, I ate the entire burger and all my fries (which were the best ones I've had in Peru). So freakin good. I felt very satisfied after dinner, but not full. Which, like I said, is weird because I usually don't eat that much especially on a day like today. I ate a lot today I was hungry. Pero bueno. I am excited for tomorrow. Practice my Spanish, see Lima, spend time with my group. It'll be good.

Imaynalla

Omg! I was late to class this morning, lol. I for some reason thought I had to have breakfast at 8 when in actuality class started at 8. So I get to the house for breakfast, and it's 8! So I scarfed down my breakfast and took a combis to school. By the time I got to class, the teacher was still doing roll and hadn't even called my name yet. Yes! I have to figure my stupid alarm out. Because I was almost late for class the other day. I don't know what's wrong with me. This is the most interesting language class I've taken. It's not like the Spanish classes I took in school where you memorize grammar rules and vocab words. Today we talked about morphology. An entire class about how Quechua words are structured! Which is actually quite complicated because they have so many suffixes. (no prefixes tho but it doesn't make anything more simple) It really is a linguistics class. Like, not really a language class as you and I know it but a legit linguistics class.

I had plenty of time between classes that I took a powernap and DIDN'T fall asleep during my film class. Didn't come close. Today we watched another German film called The Baader Meinhof Complex by Uli Edel in 2008. I didn't know about the terrorism and stuff in German. I thought it was an interesting story about how that radicals went from being protesters to terrorists. It was really good, very well done. I don't have my 1001 Movies book here (I don't think this movie is in the book anyways) but I decided to just note all the movies I watch this semester and when I get back to the states compare the lists. This is such a weird class, though. I though we would watch the movies and talk about it, but the professor gave us a lecture on the context around which this film takes place, turned on the movie, and left. And he didn't come back... weird...

This evening was really chill. My evenings are always chill. I told Nick I needed a life because I don't have anything to do anymore. Like, I don't have Josh to do film stuff, I don't have Newman to do Newman stuff, I don't have Nick to do Nick stuff. My life is boring, lol. I might go on an excursion this weekend. We'll see. I do want to take a weekend trip down to Ica, though. I hope next month, but it would have to be the first or last weekend. Maybe not because I'll need money for when Nick visits cuz we're going to Ayacucho. Or something.

I don't know, this has been a great experience and still is, and I am so glad I came. But I'm glad I'm here for this semester, and this semester alone. Last semester was great, and I know next semester will be too. I think I don't like this country because of how men treat me and the poverty. Like, I was fine as far as men goes in Southern Peru, but they are so poor there. Everyone in this country is poor except for, like, a few people. I don't know. I'm glad I came, and I've had fun but I wouldn't change the university I study at nor would I change the length or time of my stay. I just love Long Beach so much. I miss my friends, the campus, my classes, Newman, everything. I guess I'm comfortable in Long Beach. I'm not out of my element in Lima, but Lima is definitely different than LB. I think my video class will help. Idk, you can say what you want about LA: traffic, pollution, noise; I'll take it, lol. At least you have the highway. Can you imagine navigating from one end of LA to the other with out the 101, 10 or 5? Oh! And I felt like Indiana Jones once last week when I was crossing the street on the way to school; two cars were stopped waiting for the cross traffic to pass and two more cars were approaching. I decided to go behind the two stopped cars because I thought the approaching cars would have to stop anyways. I step onto the street and the cars drive away while the approaching ones go over the speed bump and speed towards me. My heart was racing and everything as I hurried across the street, lol.

I guess, in short, I'm enjoying Peru while I'm here, but I will also be happy when I return to Long Beach. Over the past year and a half, I have grown a life there, and I wouldn't trade it for anything I can find anywhere else in the world. And trust me, I've looked. And to be honest, I don't want to find another life anywhere else in the world. God put me in Long Beach (and I guess Lima for a while) and that's where I belong.

P.S. - I will give Peru one thing, food is HELLA cheap. Not just pretty cheap, not just really cheap, but HELLA cheap. Hella cheap. Just throwing that out there.

I Love Film History!

Today wasn't too exciting. OMG!!! Except, Film History ROCKS!!! We watched one of my favorite films today, Voyage to the Moon by Georges Melies in 1902. I still cracked up when the bullet or whatever landed on the eye of the moon! If you haven't seen that movie, look it up on Youtube it's the greatest. We watched a ton of his films. He made a bunch. I freakin love this class we watch movies and the teacher explains its importance in film history or why the film is so unique and famous or whatever. There are a lot of films where men kiss women. Like, in a film called "The Gay Shoe Clerk" by Edwin S. Porter from 1903, the shoe clerk is fitting a woman's shoe for her. She lifts her skirt so it won't be in the way. When her shoe is tied, the clerk jumps up and kisses the woman. Thankfully her mother beats him off with her umbrella. There was another one called "A Sticky Woman" by Gaumont from 1906 where a woman is in the post office sending mail. Her helper or whatever just stands there with her tongue out licking stamps. A man in the office is so impressed. He watches her lick the stamps and when the first woman takes the envelopes to the counter the man kisses the sticky woman. They then stick together and need scissors to cut them apart and some of the dude's mustache still sticks to the woman. I believe that is called SEXUAL HARASSMENT. But hey, what do I know? I'm just a woman. There are lots of really good shorts and stuff. I love it :-)

I had enough time for a walk back, lunch, power nap, and a walk to school. I enjoyed my literature class. I talked again! Teacher asked for a description of one of the characters of the book we read, and I was smiling because he's an interesting character. So the teacher asked me to describe him and I did. Without any hesitation. :-) Woot! I think that was the only thing I said in class, but I consider one answer this early on in class to be an accomplishment. It was cold and cloudy when I walked back from school. I think the time for miniskirts and tank tops are over. :-( I have to wait until the end of July! Blarg! I need a sweater. I'll buy one next month. I've done enough shopping this month. I have a jacket and shirts to keep me warm, but soon I will need a sweater. And Nick's bringing my leather jacket! Thank God I left it with him.

Oh! And the picture above is my ID card. I got it on Monday, finally. I think I was supposed to put my middle name on the paper, but I'm not the only exchange student who omitted their middle name. My film history teacher had trouble with my name today, so I told him to just call me Violeta. My literature teacher could pronounce my name, so I told her she could call me either one. Sometimes, when I tell someone my name is Violeta, it ends up on paper. For some reason, it's not weird for me to hear someone call me "Violeta" but when I see it on paper it's weird. I'm not too sure why but I think it's because it's my name misspelled. Or something like that. I don't know. I've gotten used to introducing myself as Violeta because in Spanish it's the natural thing to say, and I've been doing it since I went to Spain. Seeing it written, though, I'm not used to. I don't know.

Anyways, didn't do anything in the evening, but hung out with my roommates which was fun. These girls are really great, and I'm glad I'm staying here. Overall, a good day.

Boring

I don't think I'm going to like Tuesdays. Today was really boring. I came back from class around 10:30am. I took a shower and started my laundry. I wanted to do some reading, but was curious if anything interesting was on television, so I turned the television on. I found The Shining! One of my favorite movies! So I decided to watch it, lol. I love the cinematography and the acting and the set design and basically everything! Had lunch. Took a nap. Although my homework was interesting. When I woke up from my nap I started my homework and it's taking me longer than I expected. I had a short novel to read this weekend, and I did. However, we didn't talk about it in class yesterday. So we have to read it for tomorrow. Apparently I didn't comprehend much of it when I first read it because I started talking about it with this girl in my class, and apparently there's a whole half of the story that I missed, lol. So today I started reading it again, and it's taking forever because I'm going paragraph by paragraph to make sure I know what's going on. So I read a paragraph five times, make sure I highlight or write something and then move on to the next one. Now I know how long my homework will take and will spread it out and start early instead of doing nothing all day and trying to do it the day before. Guess I'll have a late night or something. Finished my book. Watched Sex and the City. Skyped Nick. Yeah, nothing exciting. I need to figure out what to do with my Tuesdays. Maybe I'll do homework all day or something. idk. I am proud of how hard I'm working for my literature class and the reward I'm getting. Over the summer in my lit classes in Mexico, I felt like my efforts were fruitless. I read a paragraph and had no idea what was going on. Read the paragraph again and still had no idea. Today, I looked at each word carefully. Then I looked at each sentence (the words combined). Then I looked at the whole paragraph. Words I didn't know I looked up in my electronic translator which helps so freakin' much. It feels so good to actually be comprehending the reading which is something I've always struggled with in English and even more so in Spanish. I always found it weird when in classes or something, people who couldn't speak the language as well as I can would understand the readings better than I could. I suppose reading and conversing are two different skills, so a person could be good at one and not the other. I am proud of myself, my work, and my increased comprehension. I hope reading will be a breeze by the end of the semester. Until then, I see this as a challenge I've struggled with for years and finally have the opportunity and knowledge to tackle it head-on.

Registration!!!

Ok, so TODAY I actually registered for my classes instead of just reserving my seat. Registration for exchange students started at 9am. My roommates and I got there at 7am, and I was number 67. So I sat in the classroom and read and did homework. I finished at 11:30. Whew! Here's the final verdict:

Lunes: Peruvian Literature of the 19th Century 3p-5p

Martes: Quechua 8a-10a

Miercoles: Historia del Cine 1 9a-1p, Peruvian Literature 3p-5p

Jueves: Quechua 8a-10a, Cine 3p-6p

Viernes: Video 1 10a-5p

I dropped one class and had to change my section for Cine. I am super paranoid that I will fail the Contemporary Peruvian Narrative, so I decided it best not to take it. The Tuesday Cine class was full by the time I registered, so I just switched to Thursday. nbd because I have Friday class anyway. Lol, my brownies I made yesterday are almost gone, they're super popular. Class today was fine. I was so proud of myself!!! I spoke up in class today!!! Which I found interesting because at the beginning of class I was thinking that it will take about 3 weeks before I have the courage to talk during class because of the language, and my teacher runs the class like a seminar. But I spoke! Not very well. She asked what one of the articles meant, and no one claimed to know the answer, but I knew the answer. :-) Then I got embarrassed because I couldn't figure out how to express what I was trying to say halfway through my sentence, and I just sounded like an idiot. But I talked, and I was proud because I have made it through entire semesters without uttering a word during class. And this was in a second language. :-) This will be a good class. I also met with my video group this afternoon, and we did our research for the Biography Channel. I also helped by asking questions, interjecting some facts, and giving my opinion. I like my group. They're good friends, and they're very nice to me especially Atenas. All in all, I felt like a good student today. I think this will be a challenging yet fun semester. I know my video and literature classes will be my hardest, but I think they will work out fine.

Long Weekend

Sorry I missed yesterday guys. Can you believe I forgot? I don't know. Well, yesterday I went to the beach with Catalin. We went to Barranco which is south of Miraflores. The beach was really dirty and not very pretty. The cliffs were beautiful, and there were many tall, modern, pretty buildings, but the beach itself wasn't so good. One of my friends suggested I get a new pose, so I decided to try something new, lol. During the day I didn't really do anything. Just homework. We came back and had dinner. Oh! But at lunch yesterday Chela gave me a package. It was from Nick! It was a cute note and a set of DVD's with fifteen movies on them (3 of them were mst3k ^_^) There's a good mix, so I should be set for the rest of my trip, lol. I'll probably end up buying bootleg DVD's anyways because, well, I can.

Today was a full day. In the morning I went to mass in the park. It was really nice! I thought it was so cute at the end of mass when they announced ppl who had birthdays then the priest called them forward and blessed them. Lots of good things happened at mass. Although, one thing they do at all the churches here and at a lot in Mexico is before each reading (including the gospel) some random person will tell the congregation what the reading is about and then say "Listen atentatively." It's really starting to bug me. They never use the wine here either. That doesn't bother me I just find it odd. After mass I went to the grocery store with Natalie, one of my roommates. She showed me a way where I will get less comments when I walk down the street. Gracias a Dios. I feel like it was quicker too. We were able to find everything we needed. Then I had lunch and after lunch I went to el Centro with mi companero PUCP, Luis. He had a photography assignment so we just walked around and took pictures. He showed me different places. He came up with a weird meeting place, and I ended up getting lost, lol. He found me though. We watched the changing of the guards in front of the what's-it-called. Where the president lives. He didn't seem to like the president. I don't know much, so I guess I should learn some. We ended the day by going to a park. It was really nice. Was big and had lots of tress. We walked around in the weirdest area afterwards to go pick up a carro. I did and came back for a quiet evening. Had a quiet evening yesterday too. After dinner I baked brownies. Apparently I did buy self rising flour, so I didn't use baking powder or soda. They turned out really good I was worried about the quality of the chocolate powder but they weren't too bad. And for the first time in YEARS I baked with walnuts. None of the girls opposed. I don't usually bake with walnuts because my brothers don't like them. Mom's not too thrilled with them either. When I first started dating Nick, I hoped that he liked walnuts too so that I wouldn't have to sensor my goodies, but no. I felt so free! Yes, putting walnuts in my brownies made me feel free. They were good. Not great but that could have been the ingredients. Next week I'm going to bake chocolate cake and everyone is excited. I am a popular roommate; all of my roommates had 2 brownies tonight, lol. They'll be gone by Wednesday. ;-)

Just another Friday

Oh, the weekend! I had class today. I finally went to the copy center in the library and got the copies of the articles I need for my 19th century literature class. (gracias a Dios) I had trouble following the lecture in my video class, but it's not as bad as my other literature class. I was glad. Class was supposed to be seven hours total. The lecture was only two hours and then the practica was only one hour. I felt out of place. I was the only exchange student, and all the students knew each other already. We have to work in groups, so during the practica I just got up and talked to a group. The practica ended at 1, and my group invited me to eat with them. I went even though I didn't actually eat anything. Nor drink any of the beer they bought. We hung out for a little while before I left. They all had class in the evening, and I didn't, so I didn't have much of a reason to stay. I was glad they included me, though. Well, came back to the apartment and didn't really do anything until this evening. Catelin (one of my roommates), Maria Jose (our Spanish friend), and I went to a bar in Pueblo Libre with some of Maria Jose's friends. We came back kinda early, must have been around 1:30 or something, and our roommates were already back. Apparently they went to the bar right next to ours and got back 2 minutes before we did. Then the four of us watched a couple episodes of Sex and the City before turning in. Tonight was fun, and I'm ready for another day. I've started my countdown already. Not my "Get Me Out of this Country" countdown, but my "Yay! Nick's Almost Here :-)" countdown. (yes, the smiley face is necessary) Only four more weeks, and my love will be back in my arms again. :-) Not much planned for the weekend, so we'll see how it goes. :-)

Chill

Today was a pretty chill day. I thankfully only had class in the morning. I love my Quechua class. I feel challenged because I was getting confused and had to try really hard to pronounce some of the words. I enjoyed it. We also learned the body parts which I have explained in the following video.

Then I had Contemporary Peruvian Narrative. This class was easier that it was Tuesday but my teacher still didn't assign any reading so I'm just confused what we're doing. I had an easier time following the lecture, but still was not great. One minute he's talking about mestizos the next he's talking about Mario Vargas Llosa. Beats me. Well, came back and had lunch. Hung out with one of my roommates like half the day. I took a nap! Finally. I took a good nap for like 2 hours, and my roommate and I talked and we hung out. One of the Americans, not the French girl. The evening was pretty chill too. We were supposed to go out with a couple of the guys at Chela's. We were going to go to a bar in Miraflores, but we started watching Sex and the City, and my roommates got out the wine. All four of us girls could not be pulled away from the show, lol. Like, the guys we were going to go out with ended up just going down the street, so we could have walked but we were too comfortable and couldn't be bothered with the fuss. So tonight was all girls all night, and I loved it. (see Facebook status) The wine we drank was apparently the cheapest wine you could get. (like 3 bucks, apparently) It's a Chilean wine called Gato. I'm not a fan of wine, so I didn't like it so well. It was still nice, though. I had a good evening. And I have class in the morning at 10. My roommate has class at 8 so I stopped complaining when I found out, lol. And it's not like my freshman year when I had Friday class in the morning and had my afternoons off. No, I am in class from 10 in the morning until 5 at night. My whole daytime is gone. :-( That means I can't really take many weekend trips because depending on where I want to go, by the time I get back to the apartment and get to a bus station, it would be too late. So, we'll see. I don't have a lot of money anyways, but I do want to go to Ayacucho for Holy Week when Nick comes, and I want to go south towards like Ica for the sand dunes. It would be nice to go to the Northern Highlands too, but idk. Cuz I still have to go to Cuzco in July. We'll see. No matter what happens, though, I know this will be a good semester. If I can survive my classes.

Oh, so that's how it works!

Today was better than yesterday. I went to the library early before class to see if I could find the articles I needed. I found the collection of El Mercutio Peruano and went through each book and couldn't find the articles I needed. Fail. Then I went to film history at ten and realized class started at 9. Oops. I won't be late again, lol. But we went way back to the very beginning of film. Like, the very beginning. And we watched like a million shorts. One of my favorites was the documentation of a sneeze by Thomas Edison. Yes, it was exactly that. We watched a series of shorts/clips by two French guys named Auguste and Louise Lumiere. They have a famous clip from 1896 called Arrival of the Train, which was one of my favorites. All it is is a shot of a train pulling up to a station and people getting on and off, but the shot was well set up. It was really cool to see the train arriving and the people in different layers of the image. We watched tons of others that were really good. We got up to 1903. Then I came back, ate, and took a ten minute nap. Then I went to class. I had a lot more energy for my afternoon class than I did the last two days. I think a power nap is just what I need sometimes. It'll save money on coffee. I contemplated that option before my afternoon class yesterday. At class this afternoon, I learned the other American girls found the articles. I ran all over this school and no one told me there was a copy center on the basement level of the library with the articles I need. I didn't bring enough money to buy it, so tomorrow I'll go buy the stuffs I need. I worry about this class. I have a feeling I won't do well on the tests. I don't know. I'll try my best and hope it works out. I took a nap after class. I came home and laid down to read. I got really tired so I set my alarm to wake me up for dinner. I then fell asleep for like, must have been a half hour before my alarm went off. I felt so much better. Luckily I don't have afternoon class tomorrow, so I'll have lunch and go to sleep then get started on my reading. I think that's all I need. I've been tired this week, but I think I just need to sleep, so we'll see.

One reason I was glad I went on my pre-Lima adventure is that I learned that that's not the kind of travel I enjoy. It has it's advantages, but it was not as fulfilling as my trip to Mexico, and it will not be as fulfilling as my time in Lima. I don't think I will do the wanderlusting again. It's strange, though, as opposed to feeling pressure from co-workers to do better/work harder/make more money or whatever, I feel like there's some kind of pressure/competition within the travel community too. It's a strange kind of competition, though. It's how many cities and countries you can visit before your trip is over. For me, though, that isn't fulfilling. I prefer this. Living in another country instead of travelling another country. See, I like to live. You don't necessarily live when you wander around. You do learn problem solving and to be flexible and other valuable skills, but I don't feel like I give back to the world at all. Yes, I grew as a person, and I feel like I grew into a person that will benefit the world, but I need to move towards doing that: benefiting the world. My roommates told me about some volunteering they do on Sundays that I think I will do too. But see, I still feel pressure from other travelers. Like in the business world, I feel like I have to "keep up". Like, I only did Peru. People spent two weeks in Peru and moved on. I spent four weeks and I have another five months left. I just have to learn to detach myself from that and embrace what truly fulfills me. Volunteering on Sundays would be the first step toward that goal.

Day 2 of Class

Well, today wasn't so bad. It wasn't so great either. Well, this morning at 8 a.m. I had my Quechua class. It's really interesting because it's a linguistics class. So my teacher was showing us how he was going to break down the language. Apparently there are a bunch of different dialects and some of them can't even communicate with each other, so it's like another language. We're going to learn the Cuzco dialect. They have some sounds that they don't have in castellano (or English), but they're not too difficult to say. My teacher is from Puno, and I thought he was from the Southern Highlands when I saw him. I had an hour break where I tried figuring out how to obtain my school books. I think I checked out the wrong one, so I have to go to school early tomorrow to see if they have the right one and then read it before my first class. So, I went to class at 11. I think, for me, I shouldn't have any classes between the hours of 12 and 5. I can have class before 12 and 5 or later, but I seem to be more tired and less fresh between 12 and 5. My second class was Contemporary Peruvian Narrative. This class seems to disappoint me a little because it seems like it's going to be boring. I don't know. It just might be that today was the first day, but my teacher didn't seem to be going anywhere with his lecture, he seemed like he was just talking about literature. I am excited for later when we get to Mario Vargas Llosa. He's the most famous Peruvian author. Like, ever. The subjects look like they will be interesting, but we'll see how the lectures go. I kept zoning out but that also had to do with I was so tired. I seem to be really tired lately. I don't know if it's I'm not getting enough sleep or if it's my diet or both, but I have been just so incredibly tired the last week or so. I should have taken a ten minute powernap after lunch. I didn't think I'd have time because it usually takes me a while to eat, but I was done with 30 minutes before I needed to go to my last class, so tomorrow I'll do that. It's cool, on classes when I have classes in the afternoon, I have time in between to have lunch, so I never need to bring my lunch to school. I discovered today, that it takes me exactly 30 minutes to walk from the house to my class which means I get at least an hour of walking every day, which totally rocks. So, I had my last class at 3. I'm so not dropping this class, lol. All we do is watch movies and then take time to discuss them in class. Just like, what we thought of the movie. Today we watched The Lives of Others. Which was cool because I've been wanting to see that movie. We didn't discuss it because we didn't have time. In all 3 of my classes today, there were lots of exchange students. In my film class, my teacher told us that if we exchange students didn't want to talk in class, we could write a two page paper and turn it in the following week. F that noise, I'm going to participate in class. That's what I'm there for, right? Oh! It was so funny. I'm glad I'm as good I am at Spanish because the movie was in German, and the subtitles were in Spanish, lol. It worked. I had little problems. But I needed a powernap or coffee or something, lol.

Today was one of the boys' birthdays. So, we had a normal dinner. Me and 3 of the boys ate. (Natalie and Katie cook for themselves and Catalin and Sebastian were in class) After Daniel (the birthday boy) finished, we sang and he blew out his candle. Chela had a cake for him. Dude's 19! Yes! Someone younger than me, lol. I'm not the baby anymore. I've been the youngest person I've met on this trip so far. Daniel's one of the guys from Cuzco. We sang happy birthday in English and Spanish. They do that here. I love that so many people live with Carlos and Chela. There are 8 of us all together, and we're getting one more girl in mid-April. I usually always have someone who either is there when I get there or who comes while I'm eating. I love my roommates. They're all so nice and so fun.

And apparently my schedule seems so packed because it is. I'm taking more units than I'm permitted to take at Cal State without permission. I mean, I don't need permission here to take so many units, but that's why. It seems like I'm taking a lot because I am, lol. Because the units are the same here as they are at Cal State. I don't think I want to drop any of my classes. I don't know, I might drop Contemporary Peruvian Narrative, but I would need to find a back-up, and I don't know where I would do that, and I don't think any other literature class would be too different. I guess what's mostly throwing me off is the teachers don't have textbooks. I sent an e-mail to my companero today to ask him how it works because I've asked people, and I'm still confused. Arg! The only thing I don't like. The campus is so pretty though. Sad to say, but better than the Long Beach campus.

This is a video I took at the park last Thursday.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ohg5jz2NYk

First Day of School :-)

Today was my first day of classes at PUCP. I only had one class at 3pm. I definitely should stick to morning classes because I'm definitely fresher in the morning. 3pm is siesta time, and I was feeling it, lol. It was cool tho. It's not going to be as difficult as I thought it was. A lot of reading, but in class we get a lot of contextual information. I'm excited because we will do a lot of history of the first revolution of Peru and around that time. My teacher talks in a manner in which I can understand what she says. The class is really small. No more than a dozen of us, and four of us are exchange students. (all from the states) The textbook system is also really weird. I don't need to buy a textbook, but I think I have to buy like a packet from the department or something. My roommate tried explaining it to me, and I'm still not sure how it works. I'll try and buy the packet tomorrow, so we'll see how that goes. The walk to school isn't so bad. I'm going to walk again tomorrow morning. Haven't decided yet if I will walk in the afternoon for lunch. I think I have just enough time between classes to do that. And classes don't start on time. My teacher was like, almost ten minutes late. I got to the classroom ten minutes before class, and right when I did, the other 3 Americans showed up and we were the first ones. At Cal State, if I show up ten minutes before class on the first day, I don't get a seat or I get a seat in the back or something. It was weird. I guess that'll be good for tomorrow morning. Give me a little time to find where my classroom is. Oh, well. Chela is still cooking good food. She usually cooks the same thing for dinner that she made for lunch, though. I've met all the other boys that live in the house. So total, there are 8 of us. The other American girls in the apartment aren't getting their meals. It's kinda cool doing the meal thing because I have the opportunity to have company while I eat. (Even though the TV is always on every single meal) I get to get to know the other people and stuff. I don't know. I like it. Both the other guys at the house are Peruvian. I don't know why they don't just get an apartment or something, but I guess this is something common in Peru. Who knows. Apparently my cookies turned out good because my roommates loved them. One of them kept eating them all day, lol. I tried them this evening, and they for some reason taste better than they did yesterday. They're also a little flatter. I don't know. But all my roommates like them, and I think they're going to enjoy my baking. Next weekend I'm going to bake brownies, and I'm super excited. (mostly because brownies require less ingredients, lol)

Last Day Before Classes

Well, today wasn't as much of a party as you would think it would be. I went to El Centro to go to mass at the Cathedral. It was really interesting. Something must have been going on because (as you can hopefully see) the mass was being filmed and the bishop presided along with four other priests. The congregation was full, and I guess there were groups there. I think they were school groups but I'm not sure. They had like, signs and uniforms and things to identify themselves as a groups. I was so pleased. The whole congregation went up for communion. It's the most important part of mass, and not everyone goes up all the time, which is a shame. The churches don't decorate for Lent but the priests wore purple so that's a good sign. Then I walked around and had ice cream. Peruvians love their ice cream. You can get ice cream at every restaurant and all the stores have D'OnaFria ice cream you can buy. If not D'OnaFria then Lamborgini ice cream. I don't know. It's interesting. The ice cream's not the best I've had but it's really good. I took a while and ended up at the Santuario de Santa Rosa de Lima. I was disappointed that it was closed by the time I got there because I wanted to go inside, so I have to go a different day. I took the public transportation there and back. I had a little trouble getting there, but Carlos helped me out. Then on the way back, I was on the wrong side of the street but the bus driver corrected me, lol. So, when I got back, I decided I couldn't wait any longer to bake, so I walked to the grocery store. When I got there, I realized that I forgot to write down the translation for some of the ingredients, so I basically had to guess. I eventually figured out what the baking powder was. I bought what looked like baking soda, but when I got back, my roommate and I found out it was like, ground up freeze-dried potatoes or something. Speaking of roommates! My two American roommates came last night. They were here last year, and Natalie was giving me tips and stuff. They're both really sweet. They didn't have chocolate chips so I bought a bar of chocolate. (I ended up with extra which made me excited, lol) And I couldn't find brown sugar, so I decided to use Lucuma syrup. Lucuma is very popular in ice cream and other things. I wasn't sure how it would go, so I just decided to go for it. After dinner, I finally baked my cookies. I was not only looking forward to the cookies themselves, but to the baking. I haven't baked in so long, so I was super excited to go again. The cookies turned out alright, it looks like. I used some kind of Peruvian chocolate. Idk. It had a picture of Machu Picchu on it. The chocolate wasn't very good. The batter was good tho. Except, I was short of butter and I forgot to put less flour in but it seemed to me like I needed more flour anyways, but I think I put too much flour in because my cookies turned out really fluffy. The pan also burned the bottom of the cookies. Other than those two facts, yes, Lucuma syrup is an acceptable substitute for brown sugar when making chocolate chip cookies. In conclusion, today I invented Peruvian Chocolate Chip Cookies. But next time I'm using a different chocolate.

Just a Normal Day

Today felt like a regular day. My roommate and I went to the mall which is normal. I didn't even feel compelled to do anything touristy. We both needed shoes and clothes. We were going to go to the beach too, but we got back kinda late. We ended up going to the movies instead. The school was screening Winter's Bone, so we went and saw that. We thought it was at the university, but apparently it was at an off-campus location. The Centro Cultural is in San Isidro not at the university. So we went to the University and we got there like, right at 7:30 and found out that we had to go to another neighborhood, so we took a taxi only because it would have taken an hour by bus. We weren't too late. Movie started at 7:30 and we got there at 8:00. It must have been short tho because we got out a little after 9. We were supposed to meet our new friend Luis there, and we met him after. Then he gave us a little walking tour of el centro de Miraflores, which is the really touristy area. I was surprised because they had a TGIF. We saw Chili's too but I saw that in Mexico too. I didn't think there would be a TGIF all the way in Peru. And Pinkberry!!! I was so excited!!! The first (and probably only) sign of my favorite food ever in Peru. Frozen yogurt!!! There was a really long line, and I wasn't sure of the prices so I was worried they would be expensive, so we didn't eat there. We ate ice cream later tho. We went to Parque de Kennedy. (yes, named after JFK) There were lots of people and artisans. Lots of little stands that had Peruvian food and desserts and snacks. We also took a walk down a busy pedestrian street there called Las Pizzas. It's named so because there used to be lots of Pizzerias but now there are lots of bars and clubs there now. It wasn't too exciting, so we didn't stay. I don't know. Wasn't too exciting but it was kinda cool. Then Luis helped us onto our bus back. The people here are very kind and helpful. Today was fun and chill. I have more plans for tomorrow, so a good weekend before school starts Monday. Honestly, though, I'm getting a little nervous, but we'll see.

An Extra-Peru Adventure

Today was an...interesting day. Me, my roommate, the girl from Spain, and I wanted to go to the beach. We got on the bus to go, and we apparently were going to one outside of Lima that had dolphins. On our way, we decided with the Tsunami alerts it's not a good idea to go to the beach. However, we were able to stop at some ruins called Pachamac which was pretty fun. We didn't have a car so we had to walk through all the ruins which isn't so bad except it was very hot, lol. The ruins were pretty cool. I guess nothing real special. They were adobe so they weren't well preserved. Earthquake destroyed them a few years ago or something, so they're being restored. Pachamac is a whole city. And of course with a Huaca del Sol. So, we met a guy there who apparently teaches at La Catolica and he gave us some tips for what to do after. We went to a market for lunch where the girls ate fish. Afterwards, we took another bus to a beach called La Playa del Silencio. It wasn't too bad. The water was yellow because of the plankton, but the water was warm. I heard the water in Lima was cold, but I guess it wasn't technically in Lima. I don't know how much of a difference there would be. Eventually we left and took a very long bus ride home. It was quite an adventure. The man we met was very kind. We met him again at the beach, and he told us how to get back. I was so exhausted by the end of the day, though. I don't think I've gotten a full night's sleep since I got here. Today was a long day, and I'm definitely ready for a long night's sleep.

Registration/First Night Out in Lima

Today I registered for classes. It was quite a complicated process only because I'm taking so many different kinds. Well, I don't know how this will work because I'm taking more classes than I planned, so I have class everyday. Monday to Friday. And not just in the morning on Friday, ALL DAY. 10 to 5. Fiesta. Or is it 11 to 5? Either way, forget about weekend trips to Chiclayo, Ica, or Huarez. No way. :-( Well, I could do Ica. But not the others. Well, I don't have class on Monday until 3, but still. Well, here's my horario.

Historia del Cine (Film History) 1 Miercoles 10 hasta 3

Video 1 Viernes 10 hasta 5

Narrativa Peruana Contemporanea (Contemporary Peruvian Narrative) Martes 11-3/Jueves 10-12

Literatura Peruana del Siglo XIX (Peruvian Literature of the 19th century) Lunes/Jueves 3-5

Quechua (Native Peruvian Language) Martes/Jueves 8-10

Cine (Film) Martes 3-6

Quechua and Cine are elective courses that I don't really need. I'll take them if I need the credits but I don't think I will. I might drop them depending on the workload of my other classes. We'll see. I'll wait at least until I get the syllabus, but when will I get the chance to study Quechua? And Cine is just once a week, and all we do is watch movies, so I don't think I'll drop this one. Quechua I might though. I have to say, though, in total I'm taking 23 credits (which I think is the equivilant of 17 units pero no se. It certainly feels like 23. I took 18 units last semester but this feels worse. I think because I'm taking 2 literature classes in another language. Pero bueno. Vamos a ver.

We had a lecture about staying safe in Lima, and it made me all paranoid that I was going to get robbed or raped or something. I don't think I'll get raped if I just stay smart, but I might get robbed at some point in my five more months here. We'll see.

After that, a bunch of the other exchange students and I went to Lima for the evening. We started out en La Plaza de Armas and walked around. We wandered into a free art museum. Don't know what it's called but it had art from the 80's and a really cool exposition of a sculptor who had a really interesting style. His sculptures were very droopy and when he sculpted Jesus on the cross He was always screaming. We had dinner at a popular polleria se llama Norky's. It's a chain like Pollo Loco except you can be served here. They served chicken a la brasa. (braised) I knew that I would eat a lot of chicken here. If you buy a "hamburguesa" en la calle, usually it's a chicken patty. (?) And everywhere there are pollerias. En la casa tambien they serve chicken a lot. I'm not a huge fan of chicken, so I really won't be after this, lol. It was good. Apparently not many gringos like Inca Kola because it tastes like bubble gum. But that's why I like it, lol. Idk. I'm not a fan of soda, but for some reason I have a weakness for Inca Kola. Well, the chicken was very good, and we walked to Plaza San Martin. It seems every city has one of those too.

From there we went to the most wonderful place ever! You can say what you want about Lima, but you can't dis the Parque de las Aguas. Que hermoso!!! The fountains are so beautiful! I've decided to keep a list of the things in Lima Nick and I can do together, and this is definitely on the list. It cost S/4.00 para entrar but it's totally worth it. It's so big. If you've ever seen the show Fantasmic in Disneyland, it's kinda like that except spaced out. So incredible. I was hoping to try a Pisco Sour tonight, but alas, my plan was foiled. Oh, well. Overall today was a great day. Registered for classes, had fish for lunch (with aji! me encanta :-] es spicy), went out for the first time. It was funny, there were like 20 of us, and some guy, I have no idea his relation to us, but he acted sorta like our guide, I guess. idk. But he got us everywhere and told us where to go, and stuff. Idk. What I do know is, I'm going to enjoy a nice weekend before the craziness begins. I have no idea how this week will go, so we'll see. :-)

Orientation

Today was a really good day. Woke up, got ready for school, had breakfast. Met the Uruguayan boy, finally. I guess he came last night. So, the delio is I'm staying with a host family. However, four other girls and I live in a separate apartment two blocks away from our host family, and the Uruguayan boy lives in the home of our host family. My roommate is from France, the girls across the hall are from Indiana, and the girl in the room next door is Peruvian, and we're all students of PUCP. So, we went to orientation where they explained how things work, and I got to wander around campus. I also met my "Companero PUCP". His name is Luis and he also is in the department of Comunicaciones Audiovisuales (which is the closest to film) He is totally jealous that I get to study "film" not "communications". My roommate also will take communications courses entonces he told us about the different classes we can take which is awesome because tomorrow we register. OMG! The campus is HUGE!!! I have a feeling that land-wise, it's about the same as Cal State, but I feel like the buildings are bigger than those at Cal State. And I think there are about the same number of students. (And this is the biggest university in Peru) It's so beautiful too. And! It's so weird, there are deer that live on campus. Cal State has squirrels, La Catolica has deer. Talking with the exchange students, we mostly spoke with each other in Spanish even when we all could speak English. I don't know, you sorta just get into the habit of speaking Spanish, and we're all here to learn the language. I met a Korean today! I was so excited because before she even opened her mouth I knew she was Korean. And when she talked (even in Spanish I could recognize her accent) I definitely knew. After a year and a half in I-house I can spot a Korean two miles away, lol. I love PUCP so far, and I can't wait until Monday when classes officially start.

Primer Dia en Lima

Hey, Everybody, I took this video Sunday night when I moved into my apartment. I'll post pictures of the place and my roommates soon.

My host parents are named Chela y Carlos Castro. They're both very friendly. Carlos picked me up at the bus station yesterday, and Chela has cooked me all my meals. She's a very good cook, and I know I will enjoy my meals.

My last four weeks have been quite exciting. I have taken many pictures that I will upload onto Facebook. I also will once in a while sprinkle in a new picture here and there because I took 1,700 but only uploaded about 400, lol. I have to say my favorite thing that I did was spend a week in Mancora. Yes, it's true I have a weakness for the beach (even though I got sunburned almost every day this week even though I had sunscreen on), but it's also the only place I felt th most comfortable and got to know really well. I also tried the best food ever (which happens to be ceviche, and I can get more of it here in Lima, woot!) That's also the place where I made the closest friends that I know I will keep in contact with.

As much as I enjoyed my travels, the entire time I was so just looking forward to Lima. At home, when I'm on winter or summer break, I always wish I was in school. Except when I was in Mexico last summer. But, this whole time, I loved my adventures but at the same time I could not wait to start school in Lima. I wanted to know this city, I wanted to actually make real friends that I could go out with, I wanted to be doing film again, I wanted to be learning, and I wanted to meet my family.

I am so happy to be here that I cried. I prayed to God and cried.