Another Change of Plans

Not sure if anyone still checks this, but we just wanted to let you all know that we've had another change of plans. Last Thursday Jeff was accepted at Stanford Law School. We took the weekend to think about it, decided to go there, and notified them on Monday. We left Monday night to drive up to Boston, arrived yesterday afternoon and have been packing ever since. Unfortunately we had already moved all our belongings out here, set them all up in our apartment, and threw away our moving boxes since we expected to be here for 4 more years. Let this be a lesson ... never throw away those moving boxes!

Change of Plans

For anyone who still reads this, we received some exciting news this morning. Jeff was accepted at Harvard! So now we are planning to be in Boston in the fall!

Also, I got all our Peru pictures posted in higher quality. If anyone wants any of the highest quality versions, let me know which ones and I can e-mail them.

Our Roommate

Well, it looks like I finally took a picture that was small enough to load. Let me introduce you all to our roommate Hormiga. He moved into our kitchen a few weeks ago. At first he was a nuisance. He would invite all his friends over late at night, throw parties in our utensil drawer and always eat our food without asking. One night (when he was throwing said party in our utensil drawer) I lost all control and in a violent rage killed him and all his friends.

It was then that we discovered Hormiga's amazing ability. Not a day later I entered the kitchen and who was crawling on our counter? Hormiga! It turns out that Hormiga never dies. No matter how many times I kill him, he always comes back ... as long as he thinks there's food involved. Now that I've discovered this talent, I use him as a kitchen cleanliness-o-meter. Everytime Hormiga comes back, I know that I missed a spot.

Law School

Just wanted to let everyone that Jeff and I have chosen University of Chicago for law school school in the fall! This week we found out he was put on the waitlist at Harvard and Stanford. He was accepted to several other great schools, but ultimately we felt University of Chicago was the best option. Thanks to everyone who has given their help and support during the long application/waiting process!

Machu Picchu/Sacred Valley

We just returned from our big trip to Machu Picchu, Cusco and the Sacred Valley. I've tried to post as many pictures as possible on our web album, but unfortunately I still can't load all of them. I'll try to make my post as short as possible because I know it can get boring reading someone else's travel log. The pictures are beautiful, however, and worth the time the time they take to look at!

On Thursday morning Jeff, Linda and I arrived at the Cusco airport and were picked up by taxi driver from our hotel in Ollantaytambo. We discovered that it doesn't cost very much to hire a taxi driver to take you around, and that way you are not limited to a specific schedule or structure like with a tour group. In order to get to Ollantaytambo, we took an hour and half drive through the sacred valley. Our taxi driver stopped anywhere we wanted so that we could take pictures. Along the way were several groups of women wearing traditional clothing and selling beautiful handicrafts. You can find pictures at:

http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/DrivingThroughTheSacredValley.

That afternoon we visited the ruins at Ollantaytambo. Ollantaytambo is supposedly named after an captain named Ollanta who fell in love with the Inca's daughter. The marriage was forbidden by her father because of their different social status, so Ollanta organized a rebellion. The Inca Pachacutec was killed during the rebellion, and his son became ruler. Ollanta was ultimately captured, but the new ruler recognized Ollanta's skill as a warrior and also his love for his sister and allowed the marriage. You can find pictures of the ruins of Ollantaytambo at:

http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/Ollantaytambo

On Friday we again hired the taxi for the day to take us to many of the ruins in the Sacred Valley. The first place we stopped is Pisac. This was an agricultural center for the Incas. They terraced the entire mountain and installed an irrigation system for growing crops. They also have storehouses halfway up that were used to store their crops after the harvest. The view over the valley was incredible!

http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/Pisac

After Pisac was Chinchero. I'm not sure the what the Incas did at Chinchero, but the Spaniards really went to town there. They destroyed all the buildings, and built a church on top of one of the Incan walls.

http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/Chinchero

Then we went to Moray. This was one of the prettiest places yet, and the ruins look straight out of an alien movie. At Moray the Incas experimented growing crops at different altitudes. There were 3 sets of circular test sites. To get from one level to the next they built these awesome stone stairs (as shown in the picture). I think the pictures from here are some of my favourites! The ones with the sheep are actually from the drive in between Moray and the salt mines.

http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/Moray

The last place we visited that day was the salt mines. We still can't figure out exactly how they work, but from what we can tell the salt water drains into all the pools, and somehow the salt is harvested from there. The pictures don't really do the colors justice, and we were told that the pools were a little muddy because it had just rained. Usually they are a lot more white. All around the pools are people hauling bags of salt on donkeys.

http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/SaltMines

On Saturday we got up early to catch our train to Machu Picchu, then received a call telling us our train had been canceled due to mechanical problems. Luckily they were able to schedule us on a later train, but it left us a with only 4 hours at Machu Picchu. Like everyone always says, the pictures really don't do it justice. Even the good ones. What an incredible city! It is so intact and has the most stunning backdrop! Jeff and I climbed to the temple on top of that big mountain that's always in the background of the pictures. It's a pretty brutal hike. It took about 45 minutes of pretty much walking straight up the mountain, but was worth every minute. You've got to check out these pictures!

http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/MachuPicchu

That evening we hopped on the train to go back to Cusco. I have never seen anything quite like our train ride. We all got relaxed and were starting to fall asleep when all of a sudden traditional Peruvian music started blasting and a guy dressed like some kind of Incan clown started dancing up and down the aisle of the train car. He was wearing a white ski mask and holding a stuffed llama. He came around to each seat and pushed the llama up close to each passenger's face before moving on. I never really figured out what the point of it was.

After the clown thing was over, we all started falling asleep again when disco music started blasting. They announced that we were going to see a fashion show of alpaca clothing. Our train attendants were the models and they had to walk up and down the aisle wearing various alpaca outfits from some company that must have a contract with the train company. Kind of crazy! We arrived safe and sound in Cusco that night and met up with our friend April. We ate dinner at a not-so-great restaurant then went to bed.

We spent the next day visiting some sites around Cusco. The first was Saqsayhuaman (the "h" is silent), the principal ruins of Cusco. At first when we heard the name we thought they were just playing a joke on foreigners, but that is really what it's called! These ruins were also pretty destroyed by the spaniards. Apparently Francisco Pizarro's son was killed here when trying to take it over. It has a beautiful view over the city.

http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/Saqsayhuaman

Cusco has a beautiful Plaza de Armas. We met up with April again, walked around there and checked out some of the spanish colonial architecture. Then we went the market and bought a bunch more stuff. We also ate at a restaurant there that night and took some snazzy pictures.

http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/Cusco

We flew home on Monday and slept a lot. Linda left last night. It was so nice to see a familiar face and have a good friend to share all of our experiences with. Now we're all alone again. :(

We have loved our time here, but we are getting excited to go back home in a week and a half and see all of our friends and family!

More Fun Stuff

We posted a few more pictures from our adventures last Saturday. Jeff has been helping out with the young men's group at church, so Saturday afternoon we headed over to the stake center to watch their soccer tournament. Unfortunately only 2 members of our team showed up, so they had to pull some guys from another team and Jeff had to play goalie. He was wearing his flip flops because he wasn't expecting to play, so it was a bit difficult for him, but he did a great job. Check out our cool action shots at http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/Soccer.

Then Saturday night we hung out with our friend April (previously mentioned, also an intern at the embassy). April has realized that here in Peru people have a difficult time pronouncing "April LaCroix," so now whenever she has to give her name or make reservations she calls herself "Abril de la Cruz." I get a kick out of it every time I think of it. We ended up eating at restaurant called Manos Morenas, an Afro-Peruvian restaurant in the district of Barranco (good thing I edited this sentence. Originally I had put that we ate the restaurant). Though Barranco neighbours Miraflores, we had never been before. We'll probably go back and can take more pictures. The restaurant had a music/dance show, and we got our 3 minutes of fame posing with the dancers for a picture. You can see those pictures at http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/DinnerInBarranco.

We're excited to have our friend Linda here. She arrived safely late last night. We have a lot planned over the next week, so stay tuned for more pics and stories.

Ceviche

Dear Pather (aka Dad),

Yesterday you would have been proud to call me your daughter. Why, you ask? Because yesterday I threw all caution to the wind and joined the throngs of raw fish eaters all over the world.

I attended a peruvian cooking class at my school. Three students, including myself, were supposed to attend. We had to select the two items that we wanted to learn a couple of days early so that the teacher could purchase the right ingredients. One of the students informed us that due to religious beliefs, she doesn't eat any meat except fish on Fridays. I, on the other hand, detest fish. However I decided her religious beliefs trump my food preferences, and agreed to learn to make ceviche. Come the day of the class, this student didn't show up and I was stuck with icky raw fish.

When I got to the school I saw the plate of fish, still with some scales and also big red streaks through it, which I assumed were blood. Unfortunately, I had already committed myself to trying a bite and couldn't back out now. I've been told by numerous people that it is a sin to come all the way to Peru and not eat the famous peruvian ceviche, and had decided that I would look back and be glad that I did it.

I was wrong. I believe I could have lived a very happy (though possibly shorter, given my lack of dietary omega-3s) life without ever having eaten ceviche. And though I must admit to you that I didn't acquire any severe bacterial infections as a result, the recurring memory made me feel as though I had and stole from me what could have been an enjoyable half-day in Lima.

Sincerely,

Carolyn

P.S. I took pictures to document my experience. Don't be fooled by the smiles. Inside I was crying. http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn/CookingClass. I also added a couple of pictures to our Miraflores album

The unveiling ...

We are pleased to unveil the Chris Walker section of our web album! So far it only has one picture, but it's the best we can do right now. The picture is from a little while ago. It's difficult to find recent pictures of Chris because no one has actually seen him in a year. Hopefully we'll be able to update it in the near future. :)

El amor esta aqui

Our brother/brother-in-law Chris received some wonderful news yesterday, and since he has been feeling a little down lately that we haven't put any pictures of him on our blog, we wanted to give him something that we have not given anyone else ... a whole blog entry dedicated to him! Yesterday we found out that he passed the Nevada bar exam, and also received a supreme court clerkship working with Justice Kennedy. We are so happy for him. And Chris, si me envias una foto, lo pondre en nuestra pagina web.

Picture Problems

Well, we thought we had figured out a way to get pictures to post, but it looks like it still isn't working. In the meantime, you can see most of our pictures on our web album. The link is in the top right corner of the blog. We've had trouble loading all of our pictures onto the web album as well, but I think most of them are there and we'll keep trying to add to it over the next few days. Sorry!

Huaraz

We just got back from a perfect weekend in Huaraz, a town located at the foot of the Cordillera Blanca, a major mountain range in the Andes.

Our perfect weekend didn't get off to a perfect start. Let's discuss the not-so-perfect things first. We got in the taxi to go to the train station and were halfway there when I realized that I forgot my ID. So we came back to the apartment so I could grab it. Then we got to the train station and realized that we forgot our bus tickets. Luckily they were able to re-print them for us for a small fee. Then we sat on an overnight bus for 8 hours. Jeff was too hot to sleep, and I was too cold to sleep. And our seats were right in front of the bathroom. The bathroom has signs all over saying the toilet is actually just a urinal, so if you have to do #2 you are supposed to ask the bus driver to stop somewhere for you to go. Of course no one wants to do that, so they just use the bathroom anyway. It stunk worse than anything I've ever smelled for the last 2 hours of the trip. And on top of it all we learned that altitude sickness is a very real problem! We spent the first day with terrible headaches, dizziness and painful lungs.

Luckily the rest of our trip more than compensated for all of the things that weren't so great. We spent the first day resting and walking around the town. Huaraz attracts a lot of tourists, but mostly backpackers, so it doesn't contribute much to the wealth of the town. It isn't much to look at on the outside, but the people were incredibly friendly and interesting. And we saw and llama and two sheep, one with the wool on its head died bright reddish pink for Semana Santa, wandering through the town. We also saw a woman walking her pig. I kept envisioning myself as a teenager saying, "Mom, can I hang out with my friends?" "Not until you walk the pig, dear." How cool would that be?

The second day, once our bodies were a little more adjusted to the altitude (the town sits at 3090 meters, or above 9,000 feet above sea level), we visited the two lagunas Llanganuco, or Chinacocha in Quechua. I've posted a few pictures, and there are more on our web album, but unfortunately it was cloudy, so the pictures don't really show off the colors. There are two main lagunas, a male and female, with a small one in the middle, which is considered their offspring. The female laguna is a beautiful green color. You can sort of see in the pictures the beautiful orange tinted trees around it. The contrast of colors was amazing!

After visiting the lagunas, we hiked through a lush, green valley to some nearby waterfalls. Everywhere we looked there were cows grazing ... which resulted in a lot of cow pies that we had to avoid. Our guide was wonderful and Jeff had a great time talking to her about the local culture. Carolyn had a great time trying to understand what they were talking about, then giving up and just enjoying the scenery instead.

To get to and from our hiking spot we had to drive for about 2 hours through the countryside. It was unbelievable to see the little pueblos with all of the women in their bright, traditional dress. They have terraced most of the surrounding mountains in order to grow crops. I felt like were standing in the middle of an intricate patchwork quilt of nature. Once again, the clouds muted the brilliant green in the pictures, but you can still get and idea of what it was like.

On Saturday we opted for a little more of a challenge. We didn't know that we were doing that at the time. We ended up on a 16 km (8 km each way) hike almost straight up a mountain to visit Laguna Churup. The lake sits at an altitude of about 4,500 meters (around 13,000 feet). The altitude combined with our less than ideal physical shape made for a gruelling adventure, but it was worth every minute. At the top of the mountain we could look down and see the entire valley with all of the terraced hills and the river running through it. There was a giant waterfall coming down from the lake that we followed for the whole hike. At the very top was the lake. The sun came out for about 2 minutes, and I was able to snap one picture that shows the colors of the lake pretty well. Then our camera battery died! This was the saddest moment of my life, and it became even more sad as the day went on. Our guide brought his 8 year old son, Jong. He was amazing! Jeff and I had to rest more times than we can count, but Jong hiked up the whole mountain pretty much without stopping. He would run up ahead, then while we were resting he would come back and meet us, then run up ahead again. Jeff nicknamed him "El Loco," and he thought that was pretty funny. At the end of the hike his dad showed him the map of where we had hiked and he responded, "So little?"

Side note on our guide: his name is Johnny and he was wonderful! He talked to us about how drugs are becoming very common in their town among young people and how bad it has been for them. Many of the travel agencies set their guides up with drugs because it is so common among U.S. and European backpackers. Infact, both our guides told us that many of the Peruvian guides get hooked on drugs because the U.S. and European travelers introduce them to it. Johnny said that the reason he decided to work for the agency that we used was because the owner is a really honest man who isn't involved with any of that. Johnny runs a bicycle club to help keep kids away from drugs. He said that kids always look up to really athletic people, so he started this club so that kids could be active and look up to someone like him who doesn't use drugs. Jeff asked if he had sponsors for his club. He doesn't and said that he was interested in finding out how he could get some. Jeff told him that if he made some materials about it, he could translate it into english so he could approach some companies. Does anyone have any other ideas? We'd be interested to hear any so that we can let him know.

After the hike we felt like we were going to die. We (by we I mean Jeff) had signed us up for a 15 km bike ride down the mountain. I have had an incredible fear of riding bikes since I broke my arm on one 16 years ago. Infact, I think I have only ridden a bike once since then, not including riding in circles in my driveway in Canada. We were tempted to forego the bike ride, but decided that we might as well try since we probably won't ever have the chance again. Am I ever glad that we did! The next two hours were two of the best, most beautiful hours I have ever had in my whole life. I kept thinking, "If only my friends from high school could see me now!" Except that I wouldn't really want them to see me because they are all very good at outdoorsey things and I didn't even know how to change gears on the bike so I rode in the same gear the whole time ... kind of embarrassing. Still, I would have given all the money in my bank account to have a working camera at that moment (which isn't a lot, but still more than most cameras are worth).

We followed a road down the mountain through several little pueblos, once again with people in their traditional clothing and kids working and playing in the gardens. Several times we had to ride through herds of cows, donkeys, sheep and pigs as people guided them down the road. There was a little stream that followed the road, running through the long green grass. Everywhere we looked was the most beautiful green I've ever seen. The beauty brought tears to my eyes. I can't describe in words how beautiful it was because I would need words a thousand times stronger than exquisite, magnificent and breathtaking.

We finally stopped at some pre-incan ruins and took a tour, but we were so exhausted that we didn't stay long. We had already checked out of the hostal before the hike, so we didn't have a room to go back to. Thankfully the owner of the agency that arranged our hikes invited us to come by in the evening for some pisco sours. Pisco sour is the national drink of Peru. It is made with lime juice, some sort of sugary syrup, egg white and pisco, an alcoholic drink native to Peru (though the Peruvians and Chileans have been fighting over who makes the best pisco for years). We thanked him kindly, but told him that we don't drink alcohol ... so he invited us for just sours. That evening we spent an hour or so hanging out at the agency, drinking sours (which were surprisingly delicious) and talking with a couple of other groups of hikers from Lima, France and Portugal.

We returned home on another hot, stinky overnight bus with great memories. In case anyone that reads this is planning a trip to Huaraz, we would highly recommend the hostal we stayed at as well as the travel agency. They are right around the corner from each other, which made things much easier!

Hostal: Churup Albergue, http://www2.blogger.com/www.churup.com

Travel agency: Huascaran, http://www.huascaran-peru.com/

Crisis!

I learned a new word today. Destapador. It means plunger. I learned this word through experience, which turns out to be a good thing because it isn't in the dictionary. It's not even in the online dictionary. That is why I was overjoyed when our toilet got clogged and water started backing up in our bathtub and sink. Had this not happened, I probably never would have learned the word destapador.

Of course it all happened right as Jeff was on his way out the door for work. I needed my sisters with me to fully understand my terror. You see, I have this secret (now not-so-secret) fear of talking on the phone and talking to people if I think they will be mad at me. I mention both because they both give me the same reaction in my gut. My sisters understand. I also have a habit of blowing things out of proportion. I was sure that if we told our landlady that our pipes were plugged, she would immediately evict us and it would cost us thousands of dollars to redo all of the plumbing in the whole house. So I fretted and paced, dumped drano down the pipes, fretted and paced some more. Finally after an embarrasingly long time, I went downstairs and confessed to the housekeeper (in broken spanish) that the water wasn't going down in our bathroom. She found me a destapador and I plunged the toilet. Kind of an anticlimactic end to a story, huh?

Update

We moved apartments and since the move we are not able to post pictures on our blog. So instead, we have created a web album that can be found at:

http://picasaweb.google.com/calowyn

This page will take you to our main page with all our different albums. We have a few new pictures, and you can see any of our other pictures in a larger size from these albums. From now on our blog will just link to these photos. It also has a few pictures of our nephew Max, who is not in Peru with us but is so cute that I had to show him off.

On another note, in the past week and a half:

• We moved apartments- our old one was not so nice, didn't have everything they told us it would, had a plastic yellow couch (very sweaty) and was a total rip-off. We now have a much larger, must nicer apartment for just over half the price of the last. You can see pictures on our web album.
• We attended a cooking class- there is a chef here who is also a pastor. He runs a cooking show as part of his ministry where he trains peruvian students and discusses family values as he cooks. Once a month he does a cooking class at the embassy to raise money for his parish. We learned how to make these amazing beef skewers in a peruvian peanut sauce. I will try to post the recipe so you can all try it out.
• We found out that my brother is engaged to his wonderful girlfriend Courtney. You can see a picture of them on our web album.
• A bird almost pooped on my head
• We had a formal dinner with all of the interns from the embassy. It was hosted by the Deputy Chief of Mission (2nd in command at the embassy). Her cooks were kind enough to make one of the most delicious meals I've ever had! There is also a picture of us with all the interns on our web album.
• We waited and waited and waited and waited to hear back from the final law schools ... Unfortunately Yale "failed to accept" Jeff, but we're still waiting on two more.

Tonight I am going to try my hand at making Lomo Saltado, the most famous Peruvian dish. If it turns out I will post a recipe for that as well. And this weekend is our first major excursion to Huaraz! Stay tuned for more pictures.

Score/Bust

So, my sister and I had these friends that always played the score/bust game. It is played like this: One person says something that is either good or bad. If it is good, everyone then shouts, "Score!" and if it is bad, everyone shouts, "Bust!" People from older generations (like my parents) usually shake their heads and don't think it's funny, but it is quite hilarious if you give it a chance. I was thinking about it the other day and decided to make a score/bust list of Peru. I'm sure I will add to it as time goes on, but here is what I've come up with so far:

Score:

• Mopping the sidewalks- Every morning on my way to class there is a man mopping the sidewalk in front of a particular apartment building. It even looks shiny! I've never seen a shiny sidewalk before.
• Cool drying rack- Our new apartment has a washing machine, but no dryer. We went shopping all over looking for a drying rack and couldn't find one. When we got home, we realized that we already had everything we needed! They have installed a drying rack that comes down from the ceiling on a pulley system. I'd like to see Derek engineer something like that!
• Breastfeeding women- Jeff laughs, but everytime I see a woman breastfeeding in the middle of the street I want to give her a high five. No one has problems with something as ordinary as a mom feeding her baby. I'm not quite sure why in the U.S. it's considered pornography by so many people.
• Tanta- For anyone travelling to Lima, you have got to try this restaurant. SO GOOD!!
• My school- For anyone travelling to Lima to learn spanish, El Sol is the place to be! It is awesome.
• Handwashing sink in the mercado- Not sure why they haven't thought of this in the U.S. There is a handwashing sink next to the meat section in the supermercado! Unfortunately there are almost no other food safety practices that I am aware of. You can wash your hands, but you still might be buying week old meat that has been sitting at room temperature.

Bust:

• Cucarachas- we are in cucaracha season. Apparently there are always cucarachas here, but during these months they are bigger. And there are a lot of them, dead and alive, on the sidewalks.
• Honking- Anyone who has travelled outside North America knows how imporant it is to have a working horn on your car. They honk EVERYTIME they cross an intersection to let people know they are coming, everytime they see a gringo, everytime they see an old lady crossing the street, etc. I haven't the heart to tell them that when everyone honks that much, it doesn't mean anything anymore.
• Giving change- People here HATE giving change. Everytime you give them a large bill, they either refuse to take it or give a long sigh as though giving change is the most difficult thing in the world to do. One day we needed change to take a taxi, so we went to a tienda to purchase something and break a larger bill. The lady wouldn't let us buy anything because she didn't want to give us change!
• Hot water- Every apartment has a little breaker switch that controls the hot water. Usually you don't have hot water 24 hours a day. You have to flip the switch and let it heat up each time you need hot water. This means that we wake up every morning at 5am to flip the switch so that we can take warm showers.

Yuck!

Today I got kissed on my face by an italiano. It was weird. Everyday as I walk through Miraflores I pass countless men who hope for some attention from an extranjera. Some have no teeth, some are 4 times my age, some look like they stepped out of a clothing catalogue from the 80s. I haven't mentioned it before because everyone already knows this about South America, and I didn't want to sound falsely modest by saying how much I can't stand it, though I truly can't. A typical day in my life involves walking down the street followed by a line of about 10 taxis with drivers either honking at me, whistling at me, asking if I need a taxi (incase I don't know how to wave in spanish), shouting, "guapa!" or any other number of words that I pretend to not understand. In addition, on every block I also pass an average of about 2 men who try to strike up conversations, or who stare at me until I am completely out of site. One taxi drove by me with a man inside who waved to me for 2 blocks and wouldn't stop until I waved back. I suppose this is some women's paradise, pero a mi, no me gusta!

So today as I was walking to my spanish class an Italian man joined me along the way. He spoke some combination of mumbled english, spanish and italian, and since I only speak english and a little spanish, we didn't have the tools to become great friends during the minute and a half that he walked with me. It didn't help that when he was walking fast, I tried to walk slow, and when he slowed down, I tried to walk faster. Maybe he thought I was playing hard to get? We finally passed the little magazine booth where I think he said he worked. Before I figured out what was going on, he leaned over and kissed my cheek! I understand that this is a very cultural thing, and in Peru it is common for people to kiss the air beside another person's cheek. However, it is not common to kiss someone who is just walking down the street that you have never met before in your life! And he didn't kiss the air, he actually kissed my cheek. And what's worse, I think he did it in front of all his friends in order to show off!

On another note, Jeff and I didn't make it on our pinguino excursion last weekend because Jeff picked up a nasty foodbourne illness and was sick for 4 days. He's feeling much better now, so hopefully we'll make it there a little later.

La Noche Americana

Sorry this is a late post. We have had trouble loading pictures onto our blog.

Jeff got pretty sick the Thursday before we were supposed to go to Paracas to see pinguinos and we weren't able to go. Instead, we spent a few interesting days doing absolutely nothing. Well, I did absolutely nothing while Jeff puked his guts out. As he started recovering, he couldn't stomach the thought of eating peruvian food, so we decided to have a noche americana. We ordered pizza

from Papa John's and watched a movie. We walked for miles to find a Blockbuster, but found out that they were put out of business by a little market that sells "cheap" DVDs. So a nice taxi driver took us to the market and we bought 5 movies. Despite being sick, Jeff still maintains that this was his best day in Lima.

Shower Curtain

I almost forgot! This is for Charlotte. I should have known that she would be the first to comment on our designer shower curtain. It is full of wonderful exercises that you can do to sculpt and tone your body. The best part is that you can do them in spanish, or in english!

La Primera Vez ...

I had a lot of "firsts" this week.

We had our first cucaracha in our apartment a couple of days ago. I was home alone, looking for something to eat, when I opened the freezer and saw a cockroack hanging out on the edge of the freezer. Luckily I was brave enough to wait until Jeff got home so he could spray it with anti-roach spray.

I also got to see the embassy for the first time. It's an odd looking building from the outside, but the grounds are beautiful! I finally got to meet all of the people that Jeff has told me about. I'm pretty sure the ambassador wanted desperately to meet me as well, but I was on a very tight schedule.

I took my first taxi ride sola in order to get to the embassy. That was a little scary because we are always hearing stories about awful things that happen to gringos who take taxis by themselves. But I lived through it and had another first along the way ...

My first real, long (about 20 minutes) spanish conversation with someone who is not one of my teachers. The taxi driver told me all about his brother who lives in the U.S. He is married to a woman who doesn't speak spanish, and he doesn't speak english. Apparently they understand each other, but when they speak to each other they only speak in their own language. Then he told me all about how everyone in Peru wants to come to the United States because in the U.S. almost everyone has a Ford Explorer.

And my last first came in class today. Today I had my first chance to use the word "amamantar," which means "to breastfeed." I never thought I would use my wealth of breastfeeding knowledge that I accumulated during my time working at WIC. However today in my conversation class we each had to tell about a strange story that we had read in the news recently. My fellow classmate told of an article about a mom in Chicago who was still breastfeeding her 12 year old boy. That launched a whole discussion on breastfeeding, and I was asked what I tell my clients at work when I teach them about it. There is hardly a topic that I have talked about more in spanish. Finally a conversation I was prepared for!

And on top of it all, I found the cure for obesity. Move to Lima and don't buy a car. I think I've lost about 5 pounds already from walking everywhere (although most of it is probably sweat).

Well, we have our big trip to Paracas this weekend with OUR AWESOME FRIENDS GABE AND APRIL from the embassy (that was for you, April!). We get to surf down sand dunes, then take a boat tour to check out some cool aquatic friends. I was informed that to see pinguinos I probably need binoculars, which I don't have, so you have to settle for pictures of sea lions.

Hasta luego!

Larcomar Mall

Our apartment is 4 or 5 blocks from a very Westernized shopping area called Larcomar. It has a few American restaurants such as Tony Romas and the fine eating establishment of Hooters (I've heard their wings are great). They also have such great Peruvian stores as the Alpaca store and Bugui (pronounced boogey). Today we went for a walk to Larcomar after church and decided to take a few pictures to put on our blog.

Be sure to stay tuned next week as we visit one of Peru's wildlife reserves. There will be sea lions and other creatures, but most importantly there will be Carolyn's favorite: penguinos.

Come with us on our bus tour!

Today we went on a bus tour to many of the most important sites in Lima. We thought it would be fun to vicariously take you all along with us.

This is outside the San Pedro cathedral. Our tour guide introduced it as the grandest cathedral in Peru, and in her opinion the world. She said that some people find it too gaudy, but to most it is an important place of worship.

This is the main chapel of the San Pedro cathedral. The people who built it were very skilled in working with gold, and much of the inside is made with 24k gold. We tried to get a better picture, there was a mass and we had to move quickly through.

Just one block from the San Pedro cathedral is Torre Tagle. It is the main office building of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The brown boxes on the outside are balconies. They were designed so that when you are standing in them you can see outside, but no one can see you from the street. We were lucky to be one of few groups to have a private tour of the inside.

Here is Jeff and I on the inside of Torre Tagle.

And here is Jeff taking his natural place at the conference room table as Ambassador to Peru.

This is the Plaza de San Martin, probably the most beautiful park we have seen so far in Lima. San Martin is one of the main people who helped liberate much of South America from Spain.

Here is Carolyn in the Hotel Bolivar, located in the Plaza de San Martin. Simon Bolivar the leader of the revolution and San Martin was his co-liberator. When the hotel was built, they wanted to name it a Quechua word for cemetery, but decided that no one would want to stay at a hotel called Cemetary. Instead, they decided to call it the Hotel Bolivar because it was commonly thought that "in front of every San Martin there should always be a Bolivar." As an interesting side note, John Wayne stayed here, as well as another famous actress from the '50s American actress who got wasted from Pisco Sour (the national beverage of choice) and danced on the tables.

This piece of fine art is located in the restaurant at the Hotel Bolivar. The man has a square head because one of the early tribes (pre-Incan) would place wood braces around their heads to form it into a square shape because they thought it was beautiful. We dedicate this picture to Jennifer, a true connoisseur of fine art.

Here is Jeff in front of Peru's National Cathedral.

The old part of Lima has large squares with these beautiful yellow buildings.

This is the Government Palace, Peru's equivalent of the White House, where President Alan Garcia lives. It was orginally built by order of Francisco Pizarro (the spanish conquistador of South America). It was then inhabited by the vice royalty of Spanish Columbia. Since independence it has been used as the presidential palace, though Fujimori was the first president to actually live in it. We got to see the changing of the guard, or at least the first 20 minutes of it. Apparently it is a pretty long process with a band and stuff. It was pretty cool, but there were so many people it was hard to see anything.

After the changing of the guard, we left for the catacombs. On our way we ran into a group of young Peruvians from the jungle. They had come to perform a dance at a show after the changing of the guard. We didn't get to see them dance, but we will be going to a show in a few weeks where we can see it. They also had snakes with them that don't show up in the picture.

This is Santa Domingo, a dominican church that houses the catacombs. What look like stripes on the outside of the church are actually birds that sit in rows on the walls.

Inside Santa Domingo Jeff snapped a picture of an old library that was used by the priests. It had books that were from the 16th century. The large books were used by the priests to read from at their meetings. Above the main chapel, there is a terrace where they would hold these meetings. The books had very large print, and they would place them on a revolving stand so that everyone could sing and recite together. Unfortunately we weren't allowed to take pictures of the room. All of the priests sat in folding seats. When they were allowed to sit, they would fold the chair down and use it as a chair. When they had to stand, they would fold the seat up. On the back of each seat was a little ledge to rest their behinds on while they were standing for very long periods of time. They called them "mercy seats."

Outside Santa Domingo there were tons of Rock Pigeons (aka Rock Doves, or just plain Pigeons by those not well-versed in the world of fowl). There were a bunch of little kids chasing them and it was so cute we had to take a few pictures.

After seeing all the grandeur of Lima, we hopped back on the bus and drove back to the embassy. Most residents of Lima live in extreme poverty and their are many make-shift homes on the hills or near the edges of the city. It was such a contrast from everything else that we saw. We returned much more grateful for the small apartment that we live in.

Viva el Peru!

The view from our living room window

The most important room in the apartment

Our bedroom

Our kitchen

Our living room

Hi everyone. We are finally settled in Lima, so as promised we are updating the blog and sending pictures of our apartment.

We arrived in Lima at about 1:30 a.m. on Friday. Well, I guess it was actually Saturday. Our flight was delayed leaving Atlanta, but other than that everything went pretty smoothly. We stayed at a hotel Friday night, then moved into our apartment on Saturday morning. It's very yellow and has mirrors on almost every wall, but it is nice and will suit our needs. We have no oven and the fridge only gets to 50 degrees farenheit - totally unacceptable for a food safety expert such as myself. Luckily I brought my kitchen thermometer so I could test it. So until we can get that fixed we'll have to put everything on ice to keep it at a nice, safe 38 degrees.

Yesterday we went out to eat with Lyra, the foreign service officer Jeff will be working with, and her fiancee Landry, who is also in the foreign service. They are both very nice and it sounds like Jeff will have a great experience over the next 10 weeks. Jeff will be working in the fraud prevention department. He will be investigating any suspicious claims or documents that people give along with applications for visas or immigration.

Today we went to church and made some new friends. There were a few other norteamericanos there. One man is from Canada and his wife is from Peru. They spend 6 months of the year in each place. There is another couple named the Walkers who have been here while the husband does research for the past 7 months. They are going away for the rest of the time that we will be here, but they got us in touch with a group of other americans that get together frequently. I was lucky to meet a wonderful woman named Laura who translated the Relief Society lesson for me. She also gave me my first church assignment. Actually my first two assignments. She was asked to sing in church next week and I am going to accompany her on the piano. Tonight is the stake choir and I will also be playing for that while I am here. She is a music teacher for 3rd grade students and is one of the only highly musical people around, so I guess she was excited to find another piano player.

I made a spanish sentence today as Jeff was finishing off the 2nd 1.5 L bottle of Diet Coke. Jefe toma demasiado Coca!

Over the next couple of months we will try to post updates from Peru. For those who haven't heard, Jeff was accepted as an intern at the U.S. embassy in Lima, Peru. We were so excited that Jeff was able to convince me to start a blog.

Our adventure begins with kissing. For the past two months we have been living with Uncle Darren and Aunt Shae's family. We were anxiously awaiting security clearance so that Jeff would be approved to intern at the embassy. If we didn't receive clearance by February 16th, the internship would be canceled and we would be living in Provo until August. Five days before the deadline we hadn't heard a thing and were getting very nervous. For those who know my cousin Zach, they know that he is never one to miss out on a risky venture and loves to turn someone else's vulnerability into his personal gain. He drew up a contract (which Jeff signed) stating that if the clearance came by 11:28 p.m. on 02/13/07, Jeff would have to kiss Zach's feet for a week. Well, Tuesday came and went and we still heard no word, so Jeff thought he was in the clear. However come Wednesday he received an e-mail stating that he received his security clearance ... 7 days earlier! We are pleased to present the first installment of Jeff kissing Zach's feet. Fortunately for Jeff, Zach has been out of town for the past 3 days.