June 21 & 22

Tuesday we had Spanish class in downtown Chosica. It was another program designed to make us talk to strangers. It really is great that we practice our Spanish with so many people, but sometimes I feel so odd stopping random people to ask even more random questions. For instance, imagine that someone who barely speaks English stopped you in a park to ask about slang terms for modes of transportation. You’d be a little confused, right? Welcome to my Spanish class :-P We also had to ask questions about money, jobs kids have and the amount of fruit we could buy for 2 soles. The cops that patrol the park saw us running back and forth to the Spanish teachers with our worksheets. Luckily they were nice and started giving us answers. The whole thing was a race and Kim and I came in second. Fairly respectable. After we finished with class we all went to a restaurant to celebrate Faith’s birthday and discuss the answers we all found while talking with strangers. This happened to be the same restaurant where we stopped for coffee before class and where we bought cokes during class….the waitress couldn’t figure out why Jeff, Kelsey and I kept coming around. Simple- It’s the only restaurant we knew of at the time ha ha ha. After lunch we went back to the center for our afternoon classes. This was our first experience with a collectivo. It’s basically like a cab except that you might share it with strangers. The car only heads to the destination once it’s full. In our case we had enough to people to fill it up so the only real difference was that the driver didn’t mind fitting 6 people into his 4 seats - two in the front seat and four in the back. Traffic laws are more like suggestions around here. Back at the center Lucia, the Assistant Peace Corps Director in charge of Youth Development, came to talk with us. She’s the lady that’s in charge of our site placements. Needless to say we all felt a little nervous talking with her. On my way home I bought flowers to give to Sra. Isabel for her birthday. Later that night two of Sra. Isabel’s sisters came by and I sat with them for a while and answered tons of questions about the states and about why I’m not married. Don’t worry, this is super common around here :-P

Wednesday was much the same, lots of tech classes and more homework. Luckily Kelsey, my next door neighbor, and I are in a lot of groups together. We don’t have to go very far to do our homework.