La Quinta y La Sexta Semana

I didn't intend on doing these two weeks as one post, but then after seeing Machu Picchu, I had a no fun stomach infection or virus or something so I didn't get anything done for two days and then had a lot of last minute shopping and sightseeing to do. But while I'm finally uploading all my photos, let me tell you about my last two weeks in Peru!

Week 5 was more or less normal. Wednesday we had off from school, again, this time for San Pedro. My host mom was doing some traveling, so she gave me money for lunch. The nice, sit-down restaurant I went to gives you a soup, second (choice of beef or chicken) and drink for 4 soles. That's the dollar menu in Peru :) I also did a lot of shopping that day, more for myself since I hadn't bought much for me up till then.

That Saturday and Sunday, I woke up at lovely 5 in the morning for Machu Picchu. The weekend I picked was the one weekend during the whole trip that it was rainy and cloudy outside. The train was an hour late because we had to stop and wait for crews to clear off the tracks after a landslide.

When I got to my hotel in Aguas Calientes (they also have some famous hot springs, not just proximity to Machu Picchu) I took a nice long nap and lay in bed watching Scooby Doo and a Mary Kate and Ashley movie on my 3 TV channels. Sunday morning I went up, had my tour, and then did the shortest optional hike over to an Inca bridge. Even with the rain/fog/sickness, it was really awesome.

Week 6 was very strange. Monday, I lay in bed all day. Tuesday, I went to the school for the hour and a half after recess to try to teach a little, but they were having a volleyball tournament instead of classes. Wednesday was Teacher's Day so we had the day off, and I did more shopping. I left my scarf on the Machu Picchu train coming back, so I bought a new one and some gloves to go with it. Thursday was the 100th Anniversary of the rediscovery of Machu Picchu, so we had another day off and I went downtown to take a tour of the other church in the Plaza, La Compañía de Jesus. It has a beautiful altar covered in gold, which I really should have bought a postcard of.

Friday was the only day I worked and unfortunately, I didn't get to say goodbye to a lot of the kids because they thought Friday was another holiday and didn't show up. Then Saturday, I went to a mass at the Cathedral (so I could get in for free) and took one last shopping trip to get presents for my host family.

My first flight left for Lima at 3:30 in the afternoon and after lots of hours waiting in airports, I got back home yesterday morning! I'm still sleepy but I made myself get up this morning because I was sooo hungry. First cereal for breakfast in 6 weeks! Yes, the strangest things make me happy :)

In other news, tomorrow is my 20th birthday. I keep forgetting. Usually I have a countdown in my head from the beginning of July until my birthday, but this year it was a countdown to going home. As much as I love Cusco, I love being home even more. I don't think I'll be doing much since my dad and littlest sister are out of town (they left only a couple hours before I got back). My mom and sissy and I might get to go get massages though :) So my last day of being a teenager, as weird as that is, will be spent maybe unpacking, hanging out at home, getting a free slurpee, maybe going to the library...it's good to be home!

La Cuarta Semana

I have never had much luck with technology. Last week, my nice post about sightseeing at some ruins and a beautiful church got magically deleted by the computer. Today, I bought a USB drive to store my photos so I could take a couple hundred more (since I forgot to pack mine) and it doesn't seem to be the right thing.

But on a happier note, my school placement is working out, I'm going to get to try guinea pig soon, tomorrow and Friday are holidays, and I finished my major sightseeing, so I have time to read :)

I also have a couple more pictures to share! This is Ollantaytambo, which is about two and a half hours away from Cusco. It is a huge complex - there's a whole nother set of stairs to get down. It was a religious site, with a temple to the Sun at the top and another at the bottom next to where the girls who were going to be sacrificed lived.

After that, I stopped in the town of Chinchero on my way back. That was for sure my favorite site. There's a beautiful church built on the ruins of an Inka palace. All that's left of the palace are the Andenes, the amazing tiers with walls that are at least six feet high. The whole thing is absolutely breathtaking.

Six of the 13 places that I went to were museums, so I don't have any pictures from visiting those during the week last week. This past weekend, I went to one more set of ruins that were really gorgeous. I would show you a picture, but the computer's not cooperating.

I also have pictures from a parade on Saturday that will get posted eventually. This week is festival week in Cusco, with the anniversary of the city, Corpus Christi, and Inti Raymi, the Inka festival for the Sun god. Hopefully I can copy and delete my pictures so I have enough new ones to share from all the festivals. Wish me luck exchanging my not-working USB drive! I hope y'all are enjoying your wonderfully warm summer while my hands are freezing :)

La Tercera Semana - Pictures Again

So yesterday I didn't feel like dealing with technology and I went to a museum instead. I have until Sunday to finish visiting all the sites on my tourist ticket, although 2 of them I've been told aren't worth the time and money it takes to get there, so I really only have 4 things left. Hopefully here are some more pictures - the Internet at the Internet cafe by my house is just as slow so I'm thinking Facebook albums will have to wait. Luckily, it only costs 1 sol, basically 30 cents, for an hour. The keyboard is really bad too, which is really annoying. But anyways, more pictures! These are the four archealogical (or however it's really spelled) sites that I visited last Saturday.

First was Tambomachay, which was a vacation/bathhouse kind of place for all the Inca nobility. It was really cool to see the water running through the whole place.

Second, and basically right across the highway, was Puka Pukara. It was an important fort and I think also a granary.

After I walked a mile or two on the side of the highway (to take some pictures of things I had seen on the way up) I got to Q'enqo. I don't remember exactly what the complex was used for, but there is an underground bit that was probably used for sacrifies.

Lastly was Sacsayhuaman. I sure hope I'm not butchering the spelling...but this picture just shows a bit of the place - it was HUGE. My camera died before I got all the way through, but I'll be back next week for Inti Raymi, the Inca festival for the Sun, part of which takes place here. I went to two more sites on Sunday, but those pictures are going to have to wait until later :)

PICTURES!!!

Finally! :) I may be a complete technology idiot, because I think my problem before with the computer not recognizing my camera could possibly have been because the camera wasn´t on...just maybe. But now that it is on, I´ll be making some Facebook albums for all the pictures I have (gulp...590) so that I can delete them and take more. Well, if the computer would actually get stuff loaded, I would. Here are a couple, and now I´m off to try at an Internet cafe.

 This is part of the old Inca wall (I think). That single stone has 12 sides, and they all fit together perfectly. It´s crazy how well built these are.

Me in the Plaza de Armas, downtown Cusco. Behind me is one of the churches. But not the Cathedral, that one´s bigger.

La Segunda Semana

So the whole posting pictures thing still isn´t happening. Rats! Hopefully I can find somewhere that´ll let me download the camera software thing. Pictures make everything so much more exciting! For now, I´ll just post pictures from the Internet to show y´all what I´ve been doing :)

I´m living in Cusco, which is in the Southeast of the country. It´s in the mountains, at somewhere above 3000 meters, and has a population of 350,000. It´s the Inca capital and relatively close to Machu Picchu, where I´ll be going in a few weeks. I am super excited for that! It´s crazy that I´ve already been here for nearly 2 weeks and only have a month left!

I live in a neighborhood that´s a little ways from downtown, which is kind of a pain when I have to get to class or want to wander around in the afternoons since I have to take a 30 minute bus ride. But it is also closer to the school where I´ll be working next week, so I´m going to be glad of that. This bridge is pretty close to my house and spans the main street that goes by the neighborhood.

I haven´t done much touristy stuff yet, since I´ve been figuring things out, getting an international student ID card (discounts for me!) and hanging out with my family. But I did have a ¨field trip¨ with my Spanish teacher a week ago to San Blas, which is an artesan neighborhood by the main Plaza. There´s only two streets that you can drive through in the whole neighborhood, the rest is walkways - and the hills and steps here make San Marcos look flat.

In the next 10 days I´ll be doing lots of sightseeing with the Boleto Turistico, a tourist pass that gets me into 16 different sites and museums. That´ll be exciting. And then there´s a week full of festivals - Corpus Cristi, Inti Raymi, lots of dances in the Plaza with kids from the primary and secondary schools.

Well, that´s at least more colorful, even if I didn´t take any of those pictures. I guess I´ll just have a massive facebook album when I get back, not that that´s a bad thing. I hope everyone is enjoying their summer as much as I am mine! I´ll post another update in a week or so about all my sightseeing. Hasta luego, amigos!

La Primera Semana

I´ve been in Peru almost a week! Wow! I´ve mostly learned my way around, from my house to class to the main Plaza and downtown. The bus that I take every day gets so full, especially because it´s only a little van. The drivers here can be crazy, but I remember drivers in Italy who were just as bad. Today, on my ride home, there was a fight in the middle of a busy street! Usually, I try to sit down so I can look out the window. I can mostly recognize where I am now.

What else is interesting about Cusco? Well, the food is delicious! Lots of hot tea and soups, since it´s winter. Really, it´s only cold when there´s no sun (it´s so hard to get out of my cozy bed in the mornings!). I´ve done a little tourism but no shopping yet. I feel like I should pick a few things for myself or I´ll buy everything in sight! I´m also making a list of gifts when I see things I know someone would like.

I´ve watched a lot of Peruvian TV with my family, mostly a game show and telenovelas. They are so great! The family and the shows :) I love this game show, El Ultimo Pasajero (The Last Passenger). 3 high schools are competing, I think to win an awesome prom. They have ridiculous challenges, especially with cutting hair. There´s also trivia challenges, so I´ve even been learning from it! I also like a Korean soap opera, dubbed in Spanish, called Boys over Flowers. Crazy things happen, of course! [If you didn´t know, there is a relatively large Asian, especially Japanese, population in Peru (one candidate for president is Keiko Fujimori).]

Well, that´s all I can think of. Is there anything more you want to know about my trip? I´ll try to post pictures later. Chao for now!

Diario de Viaje!!

I'm going to Peru tomorrow!! And I got an early birthday present from mis padres so I can take pictures while I'm there!! If you can't tell from all the double exclamation points, I am super excited!!

I was going to take a super-excited-face picture of me holding my lovely camera, but my webcam is seeing red so it would look really strange. So after much messing around with software and cables and stuff, here is my first self-portrait from my new camera.

I promise I'll take a bunch of pictures (I'll be gone for 6 weeks and I get to go to Machu Picchu while I'm there!) and as long as I can find a nice Internet cafe, I should be able to post some of them. If I haven't already told you five million times, I'm going to be working/interning/volunteering at an elementary school in Cusco. And taking a bit of Spanish. And hopefully lots of sightseeing and shopping! I can't wait for all the alpaca wool :)