Triple birthdays and dancing.

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The month of July is THE month to have birthdays in the Berrospid family... Especially the beginning of the month. The last two days (the 2nd and 3rd) have been filled with nothing but birthday celebrations and huge lunches and dinners... and the occasional teaching of a class.

Monday was Beatriz's birthday (Daniel's sister), and Tuesday was Daniel's and Samira's birthday (Daniel's neice). There is a constant battle between her and Daniel about who looks younger. (Personally, I think Bea does, but most people think Daniel does.) Beatriz is a couple years older than Daniel, but I'm not sure exactly how much older. Jaja. Oh well.

The school day on Monday started off pretty normal. We didn't make it to our first class, but that's fine. It's become a routine now, so we're getting our schedules changed so we won't have class until at least 10:30. Janina said that she was going to put me in the secondary school on (I think) one of the first couple levels. That should be pretty fun. It would be the equivalent of sixth/seventh grade in the US. Perf. 😊 Classes were tough because there were SO many behavioral problems. There were so many times that I just found myself standing at the front of the room thinking, "This is out of control." Then it would take several minutes to get everything "quiet."

Then it was time for lunch and classes at the language center. Instead of teaching, we just spent time in the teacher's lounge working on blogging, journaling, or school stuff. We were so pumped for after classes because Gizeh, Daniel's cousin, was going to be giving us dancing lessons! Meredith had mentioned at one point a few weeks ago about how she would like to learn to dance, and Daniel asked his cousin to teach us. (In this family, they always know someone who can help you out or find you a good deal! It's so nice!) Gizeh taught us how to salsa... Kind of. She quickly found out that none of us can really move our hips or shimmy with our shoulders. Two very crucial pieces to doing the salsa. :/ We ended up just settling for shaking our hips back and forth and shrugging our shoulders. Jajaja. Arturo and Janina spied on us for a bit. Bahaha. They saw just how awful we were! After this, it was time for the fiesta at Daniel's house to celebrate his and Beatriz's birthday! WOO! We got there and had a huge dinner and delicious cake. The night ended with dancing with the whole family! :D (It's so nice to be in an environment with CLEAN dancing! They have traditional dances-- salsa, merengue, etc. They incorporate these steps into their dancing. 😊 It was actually pretty comfortable to dance instead of awkward... like I always do!)

Tuesday was a pretty lazy day when it came to arriving to school. (As it turns out, Daniel's family danced until after midnight, and then they stayed up talking until almost 3!) I went to my class and was teaching the lesson, when I happened upon a scissor incident. Yep. First one. Remember in grade school back in the 90s how everyone had to have safety scissors? Yeah. They don't use those here. Ohhh boy. Before I arrived in the classroom, the students had done an activity that needed scissors, so they were all still out on the desks. I was walking around while I was teaching to find a student playing with them... In a very unsafe way. She had both hands around her scissors, had them in her mouth, and was resting on the point of them. O_O I couldn't believe it! Immediately, I told her to take them out of her mouth and said that it wasn't safe at all. Then I took them away from her. Seriously? Scissors pointed at yourself, fine. Not a good idea, but not terribly dangerous. But scissors in your mouth... and resting on them? That's just silly! :/

Not much happened after this during the day. When it was time for the language center classes, I was with Janina in the grammar class. I taught about "will" and "going to." I wasn't really looking forward to it, but it didn't turn out to be too bad! The two girls participated quite a bit, which really helped. That, and we played two games to reinforce the information. After classes, we went out to dinner for pollo a la brasa to celebrate Samira's birthday. As she said at one point, she turned "seven anos." 😊 Silly girl. There was delicious food and great conversation. Not a bad way to spend a Tuesday night. One of the best parts of the night was when Beatriz asked Aimee if she wanted a second piece of cake. Now, the first thing you have to know about Aimee is that she loves to eat. She loves food to the max. She once won first place in a cream puff eating competition for the state of Wisconsin. Then there was another time where she ate 17 slices of pizza. Jaja. The best part is that she's SO skinny. Personally, I think all the food just helps her grow. (She's also very tall.) We all just about died laughing when she actually took a second piece of cake! There's even a little dance that goes along with her nickname "Tanque." Jaja.

Read on to find our about our fourth of July celebration... PERU style!

Monique

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Photos

Feliz cumple!
This is Berli (L) and Beatriz (R). We got to help Bea celebrate her birthday! :D

Another birthday!
This is Danielito (L) and Daniel (R). We celebrated Daniel's birthday on the same day as Bea's. :)

Dance dance
Parties here consist of eating. A LOT. And then you dance off all the calories!

Hungry?
The Berrospid family only goes grocery shopping once a month. They buy everything they need all at once to eliminate trips. The only things they buy on a daily basis are fresh rolls and meat. And if it means you have seven carts at the checkout, then so be it!

Still another birthday!
Samira turned seven on the same day as Daniel. She's such a goon ball. :))

Tanque
Here's Aimee. She likes to eat. Tanque.