Well it's been a few days since I got in safe and sound. I made it into Arequipa around 8am after very little sleep, and after 2 days of lots of naps and recovering it's been wonderful here. I was overwhelmed at first by the reality of not being able to speak much with the kids, which was hard. But after getting to know them they've taught me a lot of Spanish, and I can help them with their English homework too!
I'm still figuring out exactly how I'll be helping here, but I hope to give some of the kids music lessons on flute, clarinet and guitar. I've also been helping the older girls make meals, and they'd like me to introduce some American dishes and more vegetables. Spaghetti with marinara sauce is the first thing I'll show them, then I thought about making pizzas with the girls. Apparently they love American food, so give me your suggestions! Also, everything here is made from "scratch", so some meals take a couple hours to prepare. Some yummy dishes I've had so far include:
-Steamed rice milk with sugar (every breakfast)
-Potato and chicken stew (minus the chicken for me). The sauce was made of fried onions, peppers, fried peanuts, and soaked bread - all combined in a blender
-Papas fritas! They often eat them with hot dogs, and no ketchup
I need to start consuming more fruits and vegetables, my body misses fiber if you know what I mean.
I'm sharing a room with a girl named Emily from London, and she'll be here a month. She's mostly helping with the little boys, whom I often visit because they are adorable and fun. Yesterday Emily and I toured the city of Arequipa with two of the older boys, and they showed us a lot of the older buildings with beautiful architecture. Arequipa is known as the White City because they're racist. JK. Actually, a lot of the traditional architecture is made of stone from volcanoes (I think) that's turned white. We saw a lot of beautiful stuff and tried frozen cheese. It's actually just ice cream made of milk and sugar.
Today Emily and I went to the beach! We took a 3 hour bus trip to Camana, where we saw some interesting characters, including a man who had a prosthetic leg. He was making announcements up and down the bus advertising his 'fake leg', which people could touch for 25 cents! When we got off the bus, we had to take a mototaxi to the beach, which is basically a motorcycle with two seats attached to the back. La Punta was the most desolate beach I've ever seen in my life. So after about an hour at the beach, we decided to head back to grab some food before our bus trip home. A dog followed us for a bit (there are tons of strays here), but I fended him off with a cardboard-tasting granola bar. Poor thing. We finally made it in one piece, which was good, because we were riding through the mountains the whole time so there were a lot of treacherous twists and turns.
Tomorrow is church!
If we had thought this through, you could've taken funfetti to them. Mmmm. Deliciousness. Actually, it's funny, because you said they like American food and the first thing I thought was "oh, you should make them tacos". Fail.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, I actually don't have suggestions for that, but I do suggest you get yourself some fiber/leafy vegetables. Produce down there is typically better than anything here anyway. Take advantage.
I love your face; I'm glad you're getting to see a lot of new things. Best of luck with the kiddies. :)