me llaman Profesora Hannah

1. I TAUGHT TODAY!!!!!!!!!!! OH MAN!!!!!!!!!! Hahaha! It was great!!! Really, it was so much fun! I have missed teaching!! I was a bit nervous going into it, but God gave me peace and kept me calm. The language issue really wasn't an issue! I taught in Spanish!!! And I THINK that the students understood me! Or, so it seemed. I taught 75% in Spanish and 25% in English--I was planning on just teaching in Spanish, but right before the class started, Profesor Aguilar told me to throw some English in to see how the students do with that. IT WAS SO MUCH FUN!!!!!!!!!!!! I taught about finding the measure of angles created by sending a secant through parallel lines. I had a powerpoint with practice problems in it, and for each problem, the students wrote their answer on a little piece of paper and turned it in, and then I went over the problem. That is how Professor Aguilar has been teaching, and it worked out pretty well!! If it were my own classroom, I would have done some things differently, but as a guest in someone else's room, I wanted to make it as much like the usual routine as I could.

2. I have come to the conclusion that minerals taste nasty. Water tastes good. Mineral water tastes gross.

3. Guess what?? Tomorrow evening we are leaving for our adventure in Cusco! So, that means that I won't post anything until we get back on Monday. I don't know much about what we're going to do while we are there. What I do know is that we are leaving tomorrow evening and sleeping on a bus, and we're coming back on a plane on Monday morning. And sometime in between tomorrow evening and Monday morning, we are going to go to Machu Picchu and we are going to climb Huayna Picchu. Sounds like a good plan to me!!

Jesus, I pray that You would guide us as we travel to Cusco--may this journey glorify You! Be in our conversation and our thoughts and interactions with one another, God. And thank you so much for the great teaching experience I had!! And thank You for Colegio Claretiano!!

2 minute post

This is going to be a fast post (in fact, I'm going to time myself!!!) because I am going to PREPARE TO TEACH TOMORROW AT COLEGIO CLARETIANO!!!!!!!! (If you read this before 9:30 on Tuesday morning, PLEASE PRAY FOR ME!!! I'm quite excited. And nervous, too.) Oh man.

Today was a good day. I went to class, had a great conversation with David for our conversation group, went to Bible Study, and ate meals. Oh, exciting thing: today, Tita told me that she can tell that my Spanish is a lot better and that I'm completely bilingual!!! I'm not sure I agree with the 'completely bilingual' part, but I was pretty pumped to hear that!! Woo-hoo!!!!

Okay, I'm going now. This post took me 2 minutes.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BEN!!!

Today is Ben's birthday! So, Happy Birthday to the best brother ever!! You rock, and I miss you!! You should probably take a break from school and just hop down to Peru for a few days. I'd like that. I'll show you the awesome alpaca toilet seat cover that I saw yesterday.

In honor of my awesome brother's birthday, I went to the creperia today with some amigos. I got a really yummy chocolate and ice cream crepe. And my friends enjoyed their crepes, as well. So, Ben, thank you for having a birthday so that we could celebrate with you from Peru.

I did other things today, too. The creperia was not an all-day event.

I woke up this morning and went to church where Pastor Alonso preached about finding our identity in Christ. It was a great reminder that peace is found only in knowing Him and residing in Him. After church, I went to a little tent that was set up near the university where one of the dance classes from the university was teaching and performing some dances, because one of my friends, Jorge, is in the class and invited me to come. It was pretty cool! They were really good!

This afternoon, we played soccer!! And, guess what? I think I'm getting better! Or maybe I just had an exceptionally good day, I don't know. But it was really fun! We played for over two hours, and had a great time.

I declared war today. On my computer. It has been very rebellious lately. It likes to be very slow and sometimes not do anything. I don't know how, but I'm going to whip it into shape.

Also, today I had lunch by myself. Everyone in mi familia does separate things on Sundays because of schedules, so it was the perfect opportunity for me to practice eating like a Peruvian without having an audience. I (think) am getting better. But my left hand is a bit awkward with the knife sometimes (ok, all the time). I'll keep practicing. Another thing that I don't think I've mentioned about meals here in Arequipa is that the eaters do not wait until everyone has their food to start eating. That really threw me of for a while (and sometimes, it still does). It feels weird to start eating before someone else at the table has any food. But, that is acceptable (and normal) here.

I have to go now and write a song about the divisiblity rules. (No, this is NOT for my lesson at Colegio Claretiano. I have no problem with using songs to teach content.... but I'm DEFINITELY not going to do that for my first lesson here in Peru. Or ever, really.)

Father, I thank You so much for being here with me. Oh man, I am still in awe that I am here. I'm having such a great time, God, and I pray that You would bless my family here in Arequipa. Pour Your love all over them, God, and all over the people that you are putting in my path here in Arequipa, like Jorge. Bless him, Lord Jesus! I am so grateful for him and for the other people from the university who have reached out to me and made me feel welcome and cared for. And in the week ahead, teach me more about You--help me to see You working, to trust You more, and to shine Your light, Jesus. I lay this week at Your feet and pray that You would have Your way with it!!

Water from the SKY!

Hola todos!! I have much to tell you!

1. Oh man. Last night I went to the cooking class!! Mary and I took a taxi together... and we eventually arrived. There was a parade. That slowed us down a bit. But most of our group got stopped by the parade, so it's all good. This class was supposed to go from 7 until 10, but instead we finished up at 11:30. It was super fun! I took some pictures, but I'll have to post them another time because I haven't uploaded them to my computer quite yet. There were 9 of us, plus our chef, Javier. With his help, we made aji de gallina, ceviche, queso helado, and pisco sour. Aji de gallina is really yummy. It's chicken with this pepper sauce served over potatoes. And ceviche is raw fish in lime juice!!! (Okay, it's more than that. There were also lots of other sea food and some spices and onions. And, it was quite delicious. Though... the mussels... I just don't know about the mussels... they were really really really really chewy.) Pisco sour is a Peruvian alcoholic beverage that contains egg whites and lime juice. And queso helado is a desert that does NOT contain cheese, but it's still good. (Cheese, of course, would make it better because cheese makes EVERYTHING better). We had a great time making food, and I will attempt to reproduce some of these delicious things when I get back to the states.

2. This morning I went to the Club Internacional with Sydney. We went swimming. We did a couple laps, but swimming laps is HARD. So we just stopped, and created a synchronized swimming routine.

3. After lunch con mi familia, I went on a shopping expedition with Sydney and Amy. Some of you know that I don't like shopping very much, but this was a fun (and successful) afternoon.

4. IT RAINED!!!!! While I was walking home from our shopping trip, I started to feel drops of water! Indeed, it was water from the sky! Rain!!! It has not rained here the entire time that I have been here, and I am told that it is really weird that it rained in October.

5.This evening I went to younglife. Younglife is an international organization that's like a youth group. I know some people in the States who are a part of younglife. Anyway, there's a group here in Arequipa, and Alonso is a part of it and he told me about it this past week. I went with Emily, and it was fun! The people there were all really nice and it I quite enjoyed being in a less formal fellowship atmosphere again! There was between 20 and 30 people there, and we played UNO, sang some songs, and danced a bit before one of the leaders shared a message about having an intimate friendship with Jesus Christ. Jesus is the closest friend that we could ever have, and that is JUST SO COOL!!!

On that note, I think I'll end this post! Much love to you all from Peru!

OH I AM GOING TO TEACH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This morning, I joyfully leaped out of bed and got ready to go to Colegio Claretiano (okay, maybe I didn't leap--it was more like a groggy roll out of bed...). After observing his math class, I got to talk with Profesor Aguilar about teaching! I'm going to teach about parallel lines intersected by a transversal on TUESDAY!!!!! WOO-HOO!!!! I'm pretty pumped about this! And slightly terrified!! Profesor Aguilar showed me the problems that I will do in class, and I wanted to have a copy of them, but I didn't have my USB thingy with me, so I returned to the colegio after my class at the university. I brought my USB and loaded what I needed onto it. I also got to talk to the director a bit. He wanted to know all about how my semester here is going. It was great talking with him--he (and all of the rest of the teachers at the colegio, really) has made me feel so very welcome at the colegio. I am so thankful for them!! When I think about all of the awesome people that I have met and of all of the love that I have recieved from them here in Arequipa... oh man, I'm just in awe!! God is so amazingly awesome and good and faithful and graceful and--AH! I just don't have the right words right now!! Ah, I don't think the right words even exist!! Thank You, God!

Tonight I'm going to a cooking class!!! I'm going to make some yummy Peruvian food, and then I'm going to eat it! And maybe, when I get back to the States, I'll make it again and share it.

This morning, God reminded me that I can have complete confidence in Him all the time and that I am hidden in Christ and that I am complete in His presence!! Oh man! He reminded me to be continually dependant on Him alone, and that in Him (and in Him only) I am satified and sustained! He wants me to just dwell in Him and be satisfied in Him!!!

Plans for this weekend: prepare to TEACH MATH IN SPANISH!!!! This will probably include a good deal of just sitting and being in awe that I'm actually getting to do this. And at some point I will also actually prepare to do the teaching, as well.

Okay, God, I am just so in awe of You right now!! Thank You so much for all of the people You've put in my life and thank You for being so good and so mighty, Jesus! Thank You for loving me and for providing for me and for the opportunity that I have to teach at Colegio Claretiano next week!!

Happy Birthday to YOU!

Today at lunch, Tita taught me how to eat like a Peruvian! I had noticed here and there that there were a few differences between the way that I was eating and the way that everyone else was eating, but I didn't think about it too much and couldn't quite identify exactly what the difference was. But now I know!! First, I usually eat with my left hand in my lap. But Peruvians eat with both hands on the table at all times. The right hand is for the fork and the left hand is for the knife. And when I'm not using the knife, it is to be set on the side of the plate. And when I'm all done eating, it's proper to place the fork and knife together in the middle of the plate to signify that I'm finished.

Today, we all gathered at Professor Zandstra's home for a birthday party. This was a special birthday party, unlike any other one that I've ever been to for two reasons:

1. It wasn't anyone's birthday. The purpose of the party was to celebrate EVERYONE'S birthday, no matter when it is!

2. The main activity at this party was reciting poetry in Spanish. Most of my Calvin classmates are in Spanish 309 here in Arequipa (I took that class at Calvin) and they had to memorize a poem this week and they are reciting them tomorrow in class. Because of that, the birthday party was more like one large poetry practice session. We really know how to party.

Before the party of the century, I got to have conversation groups with Anthony and Alonso. Anthony is studying computer science, and he showed me one of the things that he's been working on, which naturally reminded me of a friend of mine, Andrew Webster. Hola, Andrew!

Alonso and I (accompanied by Lauren, a Calvin friend) moved our conversation group to a cafe near campus and ate some cake, which was a wonderful decision. I had a great time talking with Alonso! I'm so grateful for my friends from conversation groups! It's quite humbling to think that these cool people are want to take time every week just to sit and talk with me for a bit. Getting to know them has been such a blessing to me. Thank You, God! Through my time spent with them, God is teaching me about grace. We can't earn grace--we just have to recieve it.

It's easy to recieve when we feel like we have earned what we're recieving. However, I have done nothing to deserve the time and conversation and friendship that I am receiving from my conversation group friends. I can't even really try to earn it... I don't have very much to offer these friends other than someone to speak English with. All I can do is gratefully accept their friendship.

feeling at home

I had a nice slow morning today. I took my time getting ready, and when I got to the university I sat in the shade with Amy and Sydney for a bit, talking, praying, laughing, and eating.

After class, I took a taxi to Colegio Claretiano to go to the English Department meeting! But... when I got there, it was quite evident that there was no school today. One of the administrators was there and he told me that the students and teachers had the day off because there was going to be some kind of mass at the school in the afternoon. Unfortunately, there was no English Department meeting for me to go to. But, I made the most of this change of plans, and I went to a bakery and got a delicious pastry, which I ate while I worked on a math assignment. Sitting in a bakery in Arequipa, eating something that tastes awesome, doing mathematics... I don't think that there are many better ways to spend an afternoon.

Right now, my short term plans involve finishing the blog post, finishing my math assignment, and going to Didactica de las Matematicas tonight. My long term plans (as in... within the next week) involve returning to that bakery and performing an experiment to find out if all of their pastries are equally delicious.

It is really crazy to think that two months from now I will be in the States again. It will be nice to be back with my family and friends there. I miss you all!! But one thing that has really hit me this week is that Arequipa feels like home. Yes, I still have a lot to learn, but I no longer feel like I don't know what I'm doing every time I try to print something off at the university or cross the street or step into a grocery store. I feel at home with the Calvin group, with mi famlia, and with the new friends that I'm making at the university. I am so blessed and thankful!!

ADVENTURE!

Father, I thank You so much for all that You had done over the past few months here in Arequipa. I am breathless. You are so awesome!! Jesus, I thank and praise You for mi familia here in Arequipa, for the wonderful Calvin group, for the friends that I have made at the university. It is so humbling to me that You have put all of these people in my life. Father, I pray that You would bless these people. Soak Tita and Vicente and Andrea and Kike in Your love. Bless them, Lord.  And God, in the time that I have left here in Arequipa, I pray that You would be exalted! I give You every moment, Jesus. Do with these days whatever You want. God, I know that Your ways are higher than mine and that You are able to do immeasurably more than all that I can every think or imagine. So, I surrender these days to You and I invite You to do whatever You want with them, Jesus. Everyday with You is an adventure, Jesus. Help me to embrace this adventure and keep my eyes open to see what You are doing and how I can join You!

In the past two days, I have:

1. eaten imitation Hostess cupcakes.

2. gone running twice at the Club Internacional. (You see, there are these big volcanos here in Arequipa, and for the past two months, they have been screaming at us to climb them. We are hoping to try to climb a volcano in November. But we have also been told that it is very difficult and that it needs to be taken seriously, so I'm trying to condition myself a bit.)

This is for Ben: "See that mountain over there? One of these days... I'm gonna CLIMB that mountain..."

3. observed math classes at Colegio Claretiano.

4. taught a lesson to Amy's little brother and sister about conservation of quantity for my Didactica de las Matematicas class.

5. learned about slope and equations of lines in Algebra Lineal y Geometria Analitica. (This is something that I learned initially in eighth grade and then reviewed almost every year of high school. However, it seemed to me that these concepts were new to my Peruvian classmates. I'm learning that the math curriculum is not the same in different countries. There are different focuses. In the States, slope and equations of lines recieves a lot of attention, but it appears that this topic is not as important before college here in Peru.)

6. gone to Bible Study with some of my Calvin friends.

And now, I'm going to go to bed and continue this adventure tomorrow.

BIG BIRDS!!!

Hey hey! I've had a wonderful weekend!! On Saturday morning, the Calvin crew loaded onto a bus and rode out to Canyon Country!! Our destination was Colca Canyon, which is about four hours outside of Arequipa. The bus ride was breathtaking. Oh my my! Really, look at these pictures.

Look at my beautiful friends!!! I'm so thankful for these ladies!!

We drove past many vicuñas! They are related to llamas, and it was pretty cool to get to see them in the wild because I've learned about them in some of my classes at the university! They were highly valued animals during the Incan Empire.

Look at all these llamas! Or, they might be alpacas. I can't tell a difference.



We stopped along the way and Professor Zandstra bought us all tea! It's called mate de coca, and it's made out of coca leaves, which is what cocaine is made out of. The altitude is very high, and the coca leaves have stuff in them that help with altitude sickness. So, we all had quite a bit of mate de coca this weekend. I am used to tea being made out of a tea bag, so it took me by surprise that mate de coca was made stright from the coca leaves, but it was good!

  

Along the way, we stopped at the Mirador de los Andes, where we had an absolutely beautiful view of a very small (yet very impressive!) part of the Andes Mountains! LOOK AT THOSE!!!! OHHHHHHH!!

There really aren't words to express how majestically awesome this view was.

God made some really cool shaped stuff.

I assure you that this picture is real.

After this awesome bus ride, we arrived at our hotel near the Colca Canyon. Fuller and I shared a room, and we all checked in when we got there. After check-in, we ate lunch, which was a buffet provided by the hotel. We all enjoyed this a lot--it was really good food!! After our lunch, we took a short hike with our guide. From the hotel, we walked up to a high rocky place where we could see a good bit of the valley. It was so pretty!!!

This is along the way on our little walk.



This is the view that we had of the valley. We spent a while sitting on the rocks and taking pictures and exploring before returning to our hotel.

 





And here's our hotel.

After our little walk, we all piled into the bus again and drove a short ways to some hot springs!! This place was right next to the river, and there were five different pools that ranged from 97 to 105 degrees. We had a great time there, relaxing in the water!! And I decided that I think that hot springs are quite mind boggling. There's just all this hot water coming out of the ground! That's crazy!! The pools don't need heaters, because the water is just... really hot!

We got back from the hot springs and ate dinner at the hotel, and dinner was just as delicious as lunch! I must admit that we all ate... a whole lot this weekend. The food was very abundant and yummy, and everyone went up for seconds... and then thirds... and sometimes fourths and fifths.

After dinner, it was dark outside, so Amy, Scott, Sydney, and I went outside to look at the stars. The hotel had some hammocks set up, and Sydney and I thought we could share one. That worked out for a while, but after a few minutes, the hammock collapsed. I'm not sure what happened, but all of the sudden, we were on the ground. But no worries!--the hammock wasn't far off the ground. We both walked away with minimal injuries. I landed on my bottom, and that region is currently quite... tender. Sitting down is slightly tricky (which made today's bus ride slightly uncomfortable), but for all of the laught that came out of this incident, the slight discomfort is totally worth it!!

Scott, Sydney, and I ended up staying up until midnight last night. This was definitely the best part of the weekend. We saw some amazing things, but none of them compared with getting to know these friends better and spending time with them. We just stood in the field behind out hotel and stared at the stars for (literally) hours, talked about so many different things, laughed, tried to talk to the cows who were grazing nearby, prayed, and shared life together.

The stars were awesome!! There were SO MANY of them!! Oh man--they were all over! AND THEY WERE TWINKLING!! Yeah, some of them were actually changing colors. We looked this up to confirm that we're not crazy, and we're not! The stars really do change colors!! This happens as the light passes through the earth's atmosphere. And we saw many (six) shooting stars, too!

At midnight, we decided that we really should go to bed, mainly because we had been told that we would be woken up at 5 AM in order to go to breakfast at 5:30 and leave the hotel at 6 AM. So, we didn't get much sleep, but I have no regrets! The beds at the hotel were really really comfortable, though!

At 5:00 on the dot, an employee of the hotel knocked on our door to wake us up. We were a bit groggy, but breakfast was delicious, of course! We piled into the bus and drove two hours to the Cruz del Condor. Once again, the bus ride was beyond breathtaking! The road went along one side of the canyon for the whole time.

Colca Canyon is the home of Andean Condors, which are enormous birds! They have the largest wingspan of any land bird--10 feet!! The Cruz del Condor is a lookout where people go to see these amazing birds. We saw a bunch of them! They were just gliding back and forth in the canyon, and it was awesome to see!! I have never in my life seen anything like it! At one point, one flew right over our heads--oh man, it was crazy!!!

The view from Cruz del Condor was magnificent!!

And look! See that bird??? It's a condor! I know it looks little... but it's really really big!!

Here's another one!! It is so cool to watch them glide around!!

This isn't a bird picture. It's a mountain and sky picture.

The river was REALLY FAR down there!!



  After staring at birds and mountains for a while, we took another short walk to another lookout place where we looked at birds and moutains for a while longer.

 Eventually, we got back in the bus and headed back to Arequipa. We made stops on the way to eat lunch and take some pictures of the valley, and on the busride back, Sydney and I made up a story about a dragon before we fell asleep.

We saw lots of landscapes like this over the weekend. See all of these terraces that are built into the valley? They are really old!! They are pre-Incan, which means that they are over 1,500 years old! The people who lived here created them for agriculture so that they could plant and harves on the uneven land. First of all, that's brilliant. Second of all, those are really old!!

I cannot tell it all!

He's done so much for me! I cannot tell it all! That's part of the refrain of a song that we sing sometimes at First Lutheran Church, and it came to mind today as I walked to the university full of thankfulness and awe at God's goodness!! Let me tell you about my time at Colegio Claretiano this week!

On Tuesday morning, I arrived in the classroom where I have been observing. The professor came up to me and asked if I was ready to teach. I didn't think I heard him right, but I did. No, I was NOT ready to teach today! I think he might have realized that from my facial expression.

"I told you that you would teach when we get back from the week off," he told me. Yes, that's true. I remember him telling me that. But I didn't realizet that he meant that I'll teach the FIRST day that I get back!! Three weeks ago, he had shown me the content and mentioned that I could teach it. But other than that, we hadn't talked about anything. I have been expecting that I would sit down with him and plan things out. But apparently, that's not what he was thinking. Misunderstandings amaze me sometimes. I have understood the words that we have spoken to one another, but I have missed the meanings that he was conveying to me. That is to say, in the conversations that I have had with the professor, I believe that I have understood things well. But there is more to communication than just understanding words. I understood the words perfectly, but I didn't understand the unspoken implications that were probably pretty obvious to him.

The idea that he was ready and willing to allow me to teach his class without having spoken with me and talked about what to do took me by surprise--it's one more reminder that I am indeed in a different country where many things are done differently (and that doesn't make his way or my way bad... just different).

That was Tuesday. When I arrived at the school on Thursday, the secretary greeted me and told me that the English teachers had been waiting for me the day before. What? Apparently they had a meeting that I was supposed to be at...

And then I realized what had happened. Last week, I spoke with one of the English teachers, and he told me to come on Wednesday at 2:00 and Friday at 2:00 to observe some classes. But I did not go on Wednesday because a few weeks ago I came on Wednesday at 2:00 and there was no English classes at that time. I didn't realize that it was a meeting that he was inviting me to, not a class.

So, I was planning on observing an English class today at 2:00, but I was a bit unsure about that becasue I didn't actually know the professors name OR the room number. I was hoping to see the professor sometime this week so that I could ask him, but I hadn't seen him. So, this morning when I finished observing in math, I asked the secretary what room the English classes are in today. She was most helpful. I took a seat to wait, because there was an English class that would start in about 30 minutes. And then the teacher that I had spoken to walked in!!! I was able to talk to him, to clarify about Wednesdays and Fridays, and to get room numbers.

This wansn't a life or death situation. It was quite small, really. But the way things worked out, God reminded me that He is with me all the time, that He's never failed me yet and He never will, and that there's absolutely no reason to worry or be anxious about things when He is with us.

And now... I think I'm going to try to play soccer again. We'll see how this works out!!

today was fun!

Since my last post highlighted some wonderful food experiences that I've had, I thought I might as well continue with this trend of writing about food. Today, I went to Capriccio's with Sara and Amy and Sydney and Emily and Jessica. I got chocamocha cake. Wow, it was good!! It had chocolate and oreos and some kind of creamy filling stuffy that was delicious. And I drank some mango-maracuya-pina juice! Seriously, it was good. God could have made food very bland tasting, and we wouldn't know the difference. Or He could have just NOT given us taste buds. But He made some awesome tasting food AND gave us taste buds so that we could enjoy it! Thank You, God!!

One of my goals for the next two months is to convince Capriccio's to open a store in Lansing. I'm thinking that the strip mall on Torrance Avenue, right off the highway, would be a perfect place for them to settle.

And I should mention that we took a VERY FULL combi to Capriccio's. Some combis are tall. They are the size of busses, so if you have to stand up, you can stand up straight and, for the most part, still see out the windows. Other combis are much smaller. They are more like large vans. The one we were in was a small combi, and it was very very full. We were all "standing" (since the ceiling is so low, "standing" is more like un-natrually twisting your body into whatever empty space you can find) and couldn't really see out the windows of the combi. Combi rides can be quite an expereince. But I like them!!

And today I also got to talk to Alonso, one of my coversation group friends, for a while! He recently spent some time in the States, and brought back some Skittles that I snacked on while we talked. I know I keep saying this, but I really like the conversation groups. It has been such a blessing to me to get to know these awesome people!!

This evening, I also got to spend some time working on a group project with Dahil, a friend from Didactica de las Matematicas!! I really had fun working on the project with her. We talked about math in a wonderful mix of Spanish and English. She was super patient with me while I fumbled for words, and by the time we left the library, we were both a bit tired and perhaps slightly slap-happy.

I realize I haven't really mentioned much about Didactica de las Matematicas recently. I am still really liking that class a lot! The class focuses on teaching elementary school, and I will be a high school math teacher, but I'm still getting a lot out of the class. By the time that students get to my class, mathematical foundations have been built, but it's good for me (and very interesting) to learn about HOW those foundations are created. It gives me a better understanding of my students and insight on how I can help those who are struggling.

And this weekend, the Calvin Crew is off to Colca Canyon! We'll leave on Saturday morning and come back on Sunday evening. Colca Canyon is twice as deep as the Grand Canyon! Oh man! So, while I'm out experiencing more of the awesome world, I won't be posting anything on here. I'll tell you guys all about it when I get back, though.

Oh God, I thank You for all of the people whom You have put in my life here in Peru--my family, the Calvin students, my friends from San Pablo... Lord Jesus, I pray that You would bless them--may my family and conversation group friends experience Your joy and peace and the awesomeness of Your presence with them. God, I give You the days that are coming. I don't know what is ahead, but I pray that You would take each day and mold it according to Your plan. Guide me, Father. I know that You can do immeasureably more than anything that I could ever even begin to imagine, so I invite You to have Your way with every moment of my time here in Peru.

This post contains a lot of thoughts that include food

1. Today for lunch, I ate cauche de queso. Oh man - that was good! It was kind of like soup. My bowl contained two whole potatoes, and this delicous soupy stuff, and a chunk of yummy cheese!! Oh, it was good. I have been eating so many good things here! Ah, the FRUIT is so good! I love it! Sometimes, for dinner I eat fruit with honey, and it is absolutely delicious.

2. Speaking of fruit, there's this place called Pura Fruta that has lots of yummy fruit stuff. I went there this week with Megan, one of my classmates, because we had a presentation that we had to work on, and I got a really great smoothie.

3. Earlier this week, I went to have tea at the lovely home of las abuelitas. There other sister was there, as well as a friend of theirs and Tita and I. It was quite fun to spend time with them and hear all of their stories.

4. Everytime that I walk to Colegio Claretiano, I walk past a street called "Jhon F. Kennedy"... spelled exactly like that.

5. Last night, I had conversation group with Danery. We went to Cibum's which is a cute little coffee/food place that is really close to the university. I ate salchipapas, which are french fries and hot dogs. Apparently, salchipapas are a common fast food-type meal here. They were quite yummy. And I had a great time talking with Danery! I enjoy the conversation groups so much!! They are one of the things that I look forward to the most during the week.

6. This morning, I went to class. When I got back, Tita was heading out the door and asked if I wanted to go with her. So, I threw my stuff in my bedroom and followed her out. We ran some errands around the town for a little while. Some of the things that she needed to do involved going to el centro, but the traffic in the city was really crazy. The month of October is a month of the Senor de los Milagros in the Catholic Church in Peru, and there was a big procession today that re-routed many many vehicles. We took a taxi to el centro and saw a bit of the procession before heading off to el mercado and finishing up some errands. Even though we were just really running errands, I had a great time! I really like going places with Tita and seeing things and talking to her. These outings are never planned... they just happen, and I really really like them.

Out a bus window...

On Saturday morning, we got up and ate breakfast. We had some time to relax in the town before going to the bus station. We got on the bus at 11:30 in the morning, and 13 hours later, we arrived in Arequipa! By the time we got to Arequipa, I was quite ready to not be in a bus anymore. However, I am SO GLAD that we took the bus during the day instead of overnight, because the view out the window was absolutely amazing! I saw some amazingly beautiful things! I took some pictures... but they really don't portray the beauty of what was out there. I will just have to keep the images in my head.

The road wound through mountains...

... oh man, it was SO COOL!!!

And, of course, we drove through lots of desert.

And then we drove past the ocean!!!!

And the sun set!!!

The views were... breathtaking. It was totally worth a 13 hour bus ride!

It was such a fun trip!! I am also really proud of us for pulling it off -- we did it without going on a guided bustour thingy, we found our own places to sleep, we went with the flow when things weren't as we expected, and we had a really great time! I'm so grateful for the oportunity to do this!!

I am in a really really beautiful country!!!!!!!!!

Friday was a great great day! Oh man! We got up and got on a boat in the Pacific Ocean! It was wonderful! Here's the deal: not far from Paracas are the Islas Ballestas. These are sort of uninhabited islands. They are uninhabited by humans, but very much inhabited by birds and starfish and sea lions!! So we took a boat there and saw some awesome things! Look!

THIS IS THE PACIFIC OCEAN!!! I WAS ON IT!!!

Look at that!! This is a picture of the Reserva Nacional de Paracas from the Pacific Ocean.

Look closely at this picture. Just left of center, there's a candelabra! This candelabra was carved into the desert by people from the Paracas culture, a pre-Incan society.

And this here is part of the Islas Ballestas!!! Oh man, it was so beautiful! It is hard to tell in this picture, but the rocks in the background are COVERED in birds. I have never seen so many birds in my life! They were ALL OVER!!! And there were PENGUINS!!! Oh man oh man it was cool.





LOOK AT ALL THOSE BIRDS!!! And... sea lions? Yes!!

It was super pretty. These pictures really... don't do this place justice at all. Also, you can't really tell in this picture, but the islands are COVERED in bird poop. That shouldn't be surprising, because there are loads of birds. The surprising thing is that every few years, people come to the island to "harvest" the bird poop and sell it as fertilizer!

Eventually our boat returned to Paracas, and we had about an hour before we got on a bus for a tour of the Reserva Nacional de Paracas. It's a desert! And it's really big! It's actually the driest desert in the world. It was beautiful , but not the same way Lake Michigan is beautiful or the way flowers are beautiful. It was beautiful in a "wow-this-place-is-huge-and-I'm-really-tiny" kind of way.

There were some truly awesome look out places that we stopped at. Look at this!

Our guide crushed some of these rocks and showed us that they are all made of salt!! There was a huge salt deposit thingy streching across the desert!

This little path here? Yeah, it's all salt!!





We drove around this desert in a bus. I honestly am amazed that our bus didn't tip over. We cut across some very very steep slopes.

This here is the only red beach in Peru!!

And after the tour, we went to a restaurant in the tiny town (ok, it's not really a town--no one lives there--it's just a place that lots of fishermen go fishing and have about three restaurants where they sell their fishies).  After eating, we sat out on these rocks for a bit befor the bus returned to Paracas. I guess people used to live there, but the town was destroyed by a tsunami a few years ago, and now it's only a fishing location.

Here's one of the restaurants in the fishing place. Pelicans are cool.

After we got back to Paracas, we went to eat dinner. It was delicious -- arroz con mariscos! I'm not quite sure what all I ate... I know it was rice and lots of little things that lived in the ocean.

We spent the evening walking around Paracas a bit. We saw Alfredo about 67 times. (No, that's an exageration. But between walking around the town the previous day as well, we saw him at least 6 times. The town is quite little, so it's easy to run in to the same person over and over again. So, we did.)

For all of the breathtaking things that we saw on this trip, I think that Friday night might have been my favorite part. Sydney, Amy, and I sat on a bench by the beach for a while and talked and laughed and sang and prayed and relaxed and shared life together. And after that, a bit cold, tired, yet completely content and perhaps a bit slap-happy, we walked a short ways down the beach and stared up at the really cool stars!Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! (Psalm 133:1)