Marcela fui a la escuela

My time in Lima has been fruitful. I have a good start with the language and lots of material to work on. I stayed with a family of 3 (mother, son and grandmother) in Miraflores, an affluent district in Lima. The house was a 15 minute walk from the school which I was grateful for because the traffic was horrible. My typical schedule was to wake up at 8 a.m., breakfast 8:30, out the door at 8:45, class 9 a.m. and break at 11 a.m. for 15 minutes. If there was more than just me in class, we would press on until 1 p.m. otherwise I would break for lunch at noon.

The school is nice. It is a refurbished house that has 3 class rooms on the 2nd floor and a kitchen that is stocked with coffee, tea and simple snacks such as canchita. Wed/Thursday around 1 pm you could participate in extra classes such as cooking or salsa dancing. I became better acquainted with recipes for well known Peruvian cuisine such as Cebiche, Jugo de Maracuya, Papa Huancaina, Chicha Morada and Pisco Sour. I also got to try my happy feet at salsa Cubano style which differs slightly from the salsa I have encountered in the States in that the couple dances around each other in a circular motion rather than linear.

Lunch could be anything, but in general Lima is expensive compared to the rest of Peru. I found comfort in American chains such as KFC, Pizza Hut, Chili’s, Tony Roma’s and Burger King. There was one restaurant www.crepesywaffles.com that you should check out. I think it is a crime that such a wonderful restaurant with an English name is not in the U.S.!!!! There were numerous Peruvian options too but I mostly availed myself of foods I could not get in Chimbote. Short of cooking for myself, I do need to say there were not too many healthy options. The Peruvian diet is severely lacking in fruits and vegetables and is overloaded with carbs. The average Peruvian eats 2 pieces of bread in the morning and about 2 cups of rice for lunch and dinner. Their drinks also have about an average of 3 tablespoons of sugar.

Perhaps you will understand the motivation of my next activity after lunch –the gym. The gym in Miraflores was one of the cleanest gyms I have ever been in. Things such as the conveyor belt on the treadmill and the 16 shower curtains in the female locker room got scrubbed down every day with bleach. I enjoyed the exercise and it helped wake me up for the second half of the day.

School resumed for me at 4 pm. I practiced an additional 2 hours of conversation with the professor from the school. All my teachers were excellent and extremely patient. The school attracted an interesting mix of missionaries, business people, scientists and travelers. I encountered people from Australia, Brazil, Ireland, France, Switzerland, Canada and the U.S.

Sometimes we would socialize outside of class. I got to take in a night club in Baranco, a few movies, football game (soccer) Lima vs. Chimbote :) , tourist shopping for my nieces and nephews and a night of music featuring Argentinean tango. All necessary diversions to help balance out the class room time.

The evening would usually finish out with me going to mass at Iglesia de la Virgin Milagrosa north of Kennedy Park. Dinner was with the family around 8 pm. (My contract with the family allowed for breakfast and dinner.) After dinner, I would work on a bit of homework and joined the family watching the telenovelas “Al Fondo Hay Sitio” (a comedy) and programa “Mar de Amor” (take a wild guess at that one).

It took me a few days to get use to the big city, digestion included. My first impression, the second time around for Lima: I had forgotten what buildings and highways had looked like; street signs that not only tell you the name of the street but the block numbers(!); liquid hand soap (!); comfortable furniture and TV – wow. The hot showers and baths were divine.

My room was designed for a young girl in grade school. The walls were purple and on the far wall was a mural of a tree with several colorful butterflies in flight. When I turned out the lights the ceiling would light up with glow-in-the-dark stars. Not my personal choice but kind of appropriate grade level for the Spanish I was studying. I hope to return and study more when my contract finishes in August 2011. A girl has to have dreams. Perhaps then I will have graduated to a grownups’ room.