Big doings

The excitement of city life apparently was evident today, but of course I missed it. A cop had his gun drawn (pointing it straight up, I was told) as he entered the residence across the street from us. Mind you, our street is just wide enough to get a car through, so this was right in our grills. My neighbors from across the hall watched as the cop entered 118 (we're 115), but my neighbors had a previous engagement and didn't stick around to see what happened. I was either napping or lesson planning, and didn't bother to look out my window.  Didn't hear any shots, so I guess all turned out well.
The usual action in our alley/street is high school kids making out. We're just off the beaten path enough, and close enough to the bus/combi/taxi stops on nearby San Lazaro, that kids wander up here to smooch.
My classes will be ending this weekend and next week with final exams. New classes start in September. Good news: My night class, which has some high school students, had some behavior issues early -- they wouldn't shut their pie holes. But they've turned into a great group. I made a deal with them that I would show more videos and have more games if they would be quiet when someone was talking (like me, for example), and quit playing with their cell phones. I called it fair and square and drew a square on the board to show them their two sides and my two sides. Corny, but it worked. Next month I'll be teaching a TEFL course, which means I'll be teaching the teachers grammar. It'll be a challenge but I'm looking forward to it.
I posted some pictures: the gimnasio where I'm the biggest but not strongest guy;  a photo of my dinner or new sweater; and a shot of one of the cool old cars you see around town. With the dry weather, cars are preserved pretty well here. Just like SoCal. There are some classics around town, and quite a few VW Beetles.
Still eating the street meat almost nightly, and I've also found a wonderful pastry shop/vegetarian restaurant combo. So far I've only sampled the pastries and they're awesome as well as affordable. I cut my finger pretty good (or bad, depending on your preference) slicing bread and cheese, so I've stopped doing my laundry in the tub upstairs. I could get used to (a modal with a phrasal verb!) someone else doing my wash.
Bought a bottle of Chilean wine from some street vendor -- Casillero del Diablo (Legend of the Devil, I think), a 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon. Paid $ 20 soles, about $6.50 U.S., and it's outstanding. But I don't know crap about wine, so take my endorsement for what it's worth.

The simple things

Who would ever think a walk to work each morning would be such a source of joy? But every Monday through Saturday I stroll down Calle Bolivar and Calle Sucre to the Institute del Sur, where I teach English to college students, and it's the most pleasant and relaxing 25 minutes of my day. Bolivar and Sucre are actually one street that has been turned into a pedestrian walkway that cuts through the center of central Arequipa. But since this is Peru, taxis and a few cars "somehow end up there." It doesn't happen that often though, so it's not really an issue. My walk starts in the oldest part of Arequipa where I live, and it's here the walkway is called Bolivar. In three blocks I'm next to the Santa Catalina Monastery, which was built in 1580, and was home to some wild and crazy nuns until 1871, when the Vatican cleaned house, so to speak. I go past another church that I haven't learned about yet, but it's quite impressive looking (it's on my list of things to do). There are hostels and shops along the way. There's also a Crustaceo Cascarudo, which is modeled after the Krusty Krab on Spongebob Squarepants. It serves Krabby Patties. My walk starts at 7 a.m. when the usually nasty air of the city is actually crisp and clear.  It's cool with the temperature in the high 50s. The skies are clear and the mountains and volcanoes are always visible. School children in uniforms, some street dogs, a couple of cops and a few folk on their way to work are on the path as well. Still, it's just so much more mellow than midday Arequipa, where everyone's in a crazy rush and trying to make a sol (or buck). I'm posting pictures of what I see on the walk and maybe you'll see why I like it so much. Sometimes I walk back home, but it's not the same at 11 a.m. (when my classes end Monday, Wednesday and Friday)  or 2 p.m. (when my classes end Tuesday and Thursday).
I feel fairly safe here, but my students are constantly warning me of the dangers of the city. They say the cabs are very risky. They say robbery at knifepoint is commonplace on the combis and buses. They say walking through the city is also extremely dangerous, especially for gringos. I say: How do you get around town if you don't walk, or take a combi, bus, or taxi? I don't aimlessly wander the streets at night looking to get assaulted, and I'm alert. But I don't care to live in fear, so I don't live in fear. I do what's necessary to get to where I need to be, and that's by walking, combi or bus.
Found an OK gimnasio to work out in. It's pretty old school, with lots of free weights and dumb bells. It cost 1 sol to get in, which is pretty cheap. Place is dark as hell, but does the job.

Arequipa Day

Straight up, I'm not a parade guy. That said, the folks in Arequipa put on the mother of all parades on Monday to celebrate Arequipa Day, the founding of the town...  I believe in 1540. I honestly found myself enjoying this parade like no other I've seen. We had a rooftop view thanks to Ale, the girlfriend of Jon, who's my neighbor. We watched that parade for at least four hours, and instead of getting bored, I got more fascinated as it went along. The parade had everything: dancing, skits, bands, rock music, pretty women, break dancing, clowns, more pretty women, more everything. The rooftop view certainly helped. The crush of people below isn't for the faint of heart. Ale's friend Luis lived along the parade route in a part of Arequipa called Mira Flores. I had never met Luis and he treated me like family with chicken, corn, cheese as we watched the parade on his roof. We left while the parade was in full swing. I was told it goes on for seven hours or so and the parade route is 6 kilometers. That's a long way to dance and skit. Great time. I know the pictures won't do it justice. I don't know how there were people watching the parade since everyone in town seemed to be IN the parade.
Before we went to the parade we stopped at a store that was frighteningly similar to You-know-what-Mart. Employees wore blue uniforms and the store was bright and polished. Prices weren't that cheap though, or at least not like the marketplace. Speaking of which, I got ripped off AGAIN on change buying bread at the marketplace. You'd think I'd learn.
Went out with some teachers Saturday night and had a Pisco Sour or two. Pisco is a white brandy made from muscat grapes. The pisco sour I had included raw egg whites (no yolk!). It's like a margarita -- but not really. Strong lime/lemon thing going on, and it's a strong drink. Not too shabby.
I'm surprised how many of the English teachers here smoke cigarettes. Just about all of them. Great bunch even if they do smoke. As a former smoker, it's a bit of a temptation, but I'm too old to start up again, and I can't imagine how I'd feel the next day after a night of pisco sours AND cigarettes.
Try this link for a parade video ... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHsVZKgW1QY

Very odd indeed

Two guys knocked on the door to our building yesterday afternoon trying to gain entrance. They seemed to be saying they wanted to come in to do work. That's somewhat believable, since there's been plumbing  issues in the building.There's a main entrance off the street to our building that is always locked, and our rooms inside also are usually locked. Or should be. Anyway, the lady who lives across the hall asked me to come to the front door to talk to these two guys. They knocked but I ignored them. She answered. When I asked them in my broken and battered Spanish if they were from the city to check our water problems, they acted like they didn't understand, and they didn't really respond. They both had on the same gray shirts you used to see auto mechanics wear in the U.S. I told my neighbor to shut the door as I motioned to the two guys to ring the buzzer to reach the landlord. I never heard the buzzer ring, and went to ask my landlord if he had two guys coming in to check the plumbing. It was 3 p.m., but when I knocked on his door, my landlord was sleeping. He finally answered and said, from what I could tell, never to wake him up in the afternoon. But he did send some other contractor down (he was inside scrapping paint) to talk to the two guys. Well, the two guys were long gone in the minute or so it took the contractor to get downstairs. Long story short -- no one knows who the two guys were and most likely they were up to no good. The gang of gringos -- all of us ESL teachers living in the place -- agreed that we don't answer the door. Period. We realize that folk know we're foreigners living here, and that makes us targets. From now on, people can use the buzzer and talk to landlord Juan, unless he's asleep, of course. The joys of city life in Arequipa.
One odd thing I've noticed is that adults do not speak to each other on the street or in the combis (mini-van buses). I ride the combi every day, and I can't recall hearing a single conversation inside one of them. Nothing, nada, nil. You might get eye contact, but even that is somewhat rare.
More oddness, sort of. It cost you 50 Peruvian centos to use a bathroom when you're on bus trips. You have to buy toilet paper, even if you don't need it, to gain entrance. The places are, well, what you'd expect (pretty raw).
I think I've traced my mild stomach issues to the bread here. Stopped eating it and got better right away. Too bad ... the fresh rolls here are cheap and pretty good. I still eat the pan de tres puntas because it's 98 percent crust. And it's still OK when it's stale.
Classes are cool. I have a feisty group at night, but not too over the top. Mainly chronic talkers and texters. Pretty typical stuff.
Found a gym near my place that charges a sol (27 U.S. cents or so) for a session.
Time for more lesson planning. Later.

The working man

I'm not teaching an incredible amount of hours -- about 30 a week -- but my schedule is a little scattered. I work 8 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday, 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. Monday through Friday, and 4 hours or so on Saturday (8-12 or 12-4). Also tutor on occasion. I'm teaching college students the finer points of past perfect continuous, phrasal verbs, and idioms. Lesson planning takes a little bit of time for me. Preparing a four-hour lesson on grammar and vocabulary requires quite a bit of thought, actually, because you want the students doing the talking and you want the activities to be interesting. It's a challenge. Luckily, I have the internet and thumb-drives. My students are pretty good. Nice to know that students in Peru are like students everywhere. The students here take an average 6 or 7 courses a semester in addition to the English class I teach. They're pretty stressed and the English class isn't always high on the priority list. But I've had good classes, and my bosses have been very supportive (how's that for sucking up?). Support from you supervisors makes all the difference. I usually start classes with vocabulary -- call my bluff, where I show the students the meaning of the word and they have the option to give the real answer or make one up to tell the class. Same thing with idioms. Then we'll discuss a topic, such as nature vs. nurture, and the students may pick a side and write an essay defending their point. We have workbooks that contain grammar points as well as various discussion topics. I'll show a video (such as Vacation by the Go-gos) and ask them explain what's going on. I walk to class and take a combi (small van packed with people) home from San Pablo University's Institute Del Sur. It's a little more than a mile one way. Walk to my night class at the Institute. That may be a mile round-trip. No more taxis unless it's an emergency.
Things I find myself missing: Fresh brewed coffee -- you can get it but you have to make a trip. Mostly, it's instant. I miss driving my car, but I wouldn't do it here. I miss milk. Fresh milk is very rare here. Got some new pictures of views from my roof, the central market, my 'hood and traffic.

Timing is everything

Ate some midweek ceviche yesterday at the central market. Was told afterward that it's better on the weekend because the fish is fresher. Well, today my gastrointestinal system feels like a mosh pit at a Korn concert. I had to go to school this morning to pick up materials, and I was exhausted when I got home. It's a five-minute walk, so the ceviche clearly had the upper hand. But after a power nap, a walk and some agua con gas I feel like my old street-eating self again. Think'll I'll nibble some bread and cheese tonight to be safe. Bought a camera today and will attempt posting photos again. The purchase is quite the ordeal. I wanted to look at a camera and this guy had to get this woman, who had to go somewhere to get the keys.  There were about 20 keys on the key ring and she tried 7 or 8 before she hit the jackpot. Of course there was no working battery to try out the camera. No problema. I buy it anyway, with cash, but they need to see a copy of my passport. After she logs my info into a book, I go to another part of the store to pay. I pay, and go to another part of the store where I think I'm picking up my camera. No so. I get a little tripod from the man behind the counter and a bill of sale. I take this to the lady with the keys, and she begins searching for my camera behind the counter. After a few minutes, she finds one, and records more info into another book. Then she takes everything out of the camera box and tries it out, which is clearly a good thing. Back in the box and I'm good to go .... 35-45 minutes. I could have probably gotten the same camera for the same price from a street vendor, but I feel like the store may be more helpful if there are problems. Electronics and hygiene products are no bargain here. Chapstick will run you 16 soles, close to $5 U.S. Same with a bar of soap and shampoo. I went deep into downtown yesterday and found some better deals, but it's a long walk. Could've taken a combi I guess, but after my long bus rides Sat. and Sun. I felt like I needed to stretch out. Along the way I saw lots of street dogs. They're all over the place. I'm told that they don't have rabies, but you're advised not to pet them. Good doggie.
School starts tomorrow so gotta lesson plan.