today we had an exam. it was supposed be on thursday but 7 out of 15 students werent at school for the review. we think it was the ceviche that everyone ate in villa el salvardor. i didnt get sick and like 3 others also. i only ate a bite of the ceviche and then spit it out. but people felt like they were dying....im glad it wasnt me!!! the exam went well...i havent had an essay exam in sooooo long!!! man it was alot of writing!!! before we had our test we went to patamac to see their ancient ruins. it was very interesting. it was a lil scary because when we got to walk around one of the temples, there was a guard with a HUGE rifle on top of the highest poin...a lil ... read more

people are dropping like flies here....i woke up today at 6:45 because the beginners can go to school early to get help from our teacher, she calls at 7 to say that she doesnt feel well. so i get to school at 9 and 6 people are missing becasue they are eaither vomiting or have a cold. my teacher then cancels class and moves our test to friday which is good because i havent started studying, he gives us a study guide tomorrow so i should be ok. then we had an hour until lunch which was optional. so i ran home and brought my close to the lavanderia where they wash my clothes same day for 3soles per kilo (i paid 8 american dollars) ran back to school and i ate lunch...i ate raw chicken ... read more

today was an ok day i figured out what my cultural paper is going to be on. we visited a town called villa el salvador. it is a young town that was founded in 1971. it was founded by indegenious people ( about 150 families) that wanted a better place to live with more opportunities. they migrated to lima with material to build there homes. they had 4 sugarcane leaf walls and tarp to build their settlement. they were almost forced out of their area but they rioted against the police and the police ran away. today their are 70,000 in habititants with 40 schools and a town that 75% of jobs are from furniture making that is absoultely gorgeous. they sell their beautiful furniture to department stores and they put their label on it and ... read more

what a long boring boring day today i woke up at 6:45 and had to be at school at 8. i had spanish from 8 till 10:30and then we had history at 11. we had a guest speaker who was an expert on cesar vallejo a very famous peruvian poet. he spoke only spanish so half the time i was looking into space because he talked so darn fast! then we went to vallejos nephews home a couple of towns over...and he only spoke spanish...anyways....very boring we got into town at 5. i really wanted to get my photos developed so i went and dropped them off....5 rolls...1 hour....for 24.00!!!! and when they mean an hour...it was done precisely one hour later. of course they dont take credit cards so i have to go back tomorrow. ... read more

so im doing this journal entry alittle late again so here it goes: today we went on the airplane to see the nazca lines. let me tell u...i sat in front thank god...we think because i am a blonde and i was wearing pig tails. i heard it was really hot in the back of the plane and i sat in the front where there was a vent. out of the 5 students that were on the pane (it was only a 6 person plane) 2 of them puked! i gave my barf bag up so josemarie could puke some more. so i was just counting the number of lines we had left until we landed at the airport! the lines were cool but you really really really had to concentrate. and the pilot had broken ... read more

ok...so didnt get a chance to update yester day so here it goes... omg...yesterday was the best day ever!!!! we left lima at 5am and we started our adventure to paracas. we arrived at paracas at 9am. we took a 2hr boat ride around the sourouding islands. we saw kindof like a nazca line but it was used to direct pirates and to tell fishermen where to fish being that they had no maps. then we continued to another island. we saw real life boobies (penguins) and sea lions. it was absolutely amazing! when do u get a chance to see these things when u are not in a zoo! i couldnt believe that i was seeing these animals in their natural habitat. we rode around the island and saw thousands of thousands of birds. they ... read more

today was a little boring. i was absolutely exhausted in spanish class. the teacher would ask me a question and i would be like...please ask someone else i cant think this morning i just need a break! our history lecture was very interesting! we had a guest speaker that is an expert on the shining path. the shining path is a terrorist organization that got a group of people together to try and change peru through terrorism and violence. this event in history went from 1980 to 1992. abigael guzman is in jail till this day because peruvians do not believe in the death penalty. he killed over 40,000 innocent people. 75% were illiterate, indigenous people that mostly spoke quencua (not spanish: an inca language) and all of the supporters were mostly women and children and ... read more

sorry i didnt get a chance to update last night. we went salsa dancing. well we bought a lesson. it was fun...hard though. watch out, one more of those classes and ill be on dancing with the stars! jk. on the 4th, we had a long long long day....we walked and walked and walked. yesterday we took a bus to the city center and we ate lunch at the famous hotel bolivar. it is like the breakers of lima. we saw miss peru of 2005 or 2004 dont really remember. then we walked through the ghetto and we took a tour through the old san marcos college. it was very pretty. it was used for munks to study and it is the oldest university in both south and north america. then we went to the city ... read more

hola! today was my first day of school at san marcos in lima. i woke up at 7:30 and took a cold shower (which i didnt know that you have to turn the hot water on for an hour for it to heat up) had breakfast which my host mama made me because the professor called her and told her that she need to take better care of me. i walked to school around 8:20. it took about 25 minutes. we had spanish class at 9 and anthropology at 11:30. after class we had lunch...what a spread!!!! we had a 3 course meal at the university. appetizer a choice of tamalie or sopa de pollo, main dish: chicken or pork chop, dessert: an awesome cookie with dulce de leche and powdered sugar. i only took two ... read more

Today was out first free day. we just got in on friday so we actually got to explore by ourselves. i met up with tara, tara, jared and chris and we all went to 11 am mass at the cathedral at parque central. we were suppose to get up for the 10am mass but we were out late with our teachers last night. we went to this dance dinner show until 3am and then me, tara, and regina took a taxi home. well...no taxi driver knew where i lived and being that im pretty good with directions i kinda of knew but couldnt speak to them. i was so scared and the taxi driver was really mean. thank goodness the girls were with me. finally after getting a map, walking a mile, and 3 taxis later... ... read more