Nothing much has been going on in the past week, I’ve sent out a couple of resumes. We’ve narrowed down destinations to Montevideo Uruguay, or several cities on the northern coast of Chile: Antofagasta, La Serena or Concepion. Of course there are some cities in Bolivia: La Paz, Cochabamba, or maybe Sucre, but we are focusing more on beaches right now. It’s been slow moving since we don’t have a great internet connection no matter where we go with free wi-fi, and it’s getting the fact that our schedule is so different from regular business hours it’s complicated. I’m guessing that drinking coffee at 1 am isn’t really helping, so this week I’m going to try to start getting into a regular sleeping pattern that doesn’t include waking up half way through the day. The whole household is getting excited about Christmas, especially the candy and sweets aspect! I am definitely missing Kali’s ginger snap cookies right now… we’ve been planning parts to the menu, and Jason’s girlfriend is coming down so we are thinking up things to remember to ask her to bring. Kentucky Gentlemen is on the list because I am going to attempt to make bourbon balls, I’ll keep everyone posted on how terrible they turn out. We have also been making some additions to the tree. Terry’s mum sent a card with some Merry Christmas confetti, and we put most of it on the tree, it adds some really nice reflection and color, and then Terry drew a Santa drinking Pisco for our tree topper, it looks great. I’ve been busy this weekend doing lesson plans because…. Drum roll please… I GOT A JOB! It starts tonight, I’ll be teaching a doctor couple at this nice clinic in Cusco the English that they need to know to deal with tourist patients as well as basic English because they don’t speak at all. It’ll pay about 9 dollars an hour which isn’t bad, but it doesn’t matter, I’m just excited about having a job, getting some more practice, and boosting my resume un poco. It’s strange having to make my own curriculum for these clients, as well as learning more about doctors vocabulary than I’m comfortable with. I’m already kind of nervous about teaching in a manner I am completely not used to, and on top of that having to teach information I have no clue about! I haven’t the foggiest about what doctors have to say to patients, I can’t even remember the last time I went to the doctors! EEK. So, I’ve been looking at charts of organs to help illustrate the vocab because the husband is a surgeon; it’s just gross. Not to mention a pain in the ass to find the information that I want. Why is google search failing me now?! Maybe it will be more advantageous than I think, overall, in the long run. It’ll also be fun to dress up and walk around in business clothes like all the other Peruvians. However I did walk back from the interview in cute flats and got these two wicked blisters on my heels. And then proceeded to make them bleed by going out Saturday night in HighTops, so I am bound to my flip flops for now. I am forever grateful to Onja right now! They have been a lifesaver for me! Unfortunately the pharamacies here don’t have moleskin, so I’m stuck with these cheap looking bandaids. I’m just not going to wear them unless I’ve absolutely GOT to. I've gotta run and finish up my last minute lesson plans for tonight! Procrastination is my best attribute?
hugs, and LOVE!

Festivus for the Rest of us!

So in the spirit of the season, even though it’s about 70 degrees on a regular basis and always raining, we went on a hiking excursion to find a Christmas tree in the woods way up above our apartment in the area called Villa San Blas. It is to the right of Sacsayhuaman and Cristo Blanco if you are standing in the Plaza de Armas. It was a lot of fun and took a good long while. I still am having some trouble breathing, nothing serious I just get short of breathe fast (shocking considering how healthy I was while back home…) so climbing up the developed side of this mountain was not easy for me. Eventually we got to areas without inclines and found this awesome ruin site. First it was a wall that had been revealed, and we followed it around (it’s in a square shape) to the opposite side and climbed on top of the wall and found some really awesome chairs and various right degree angles carved into the rock debris. It was really cool. After hanging out for quite some time exploring and rock jumping we got down, climbed up some more and found ourselves at the back entrance to Q’enqo, which is another ruin site right outside of Sacsayhuaman. However this one you have to pay to enter, and there was some guy in a jacket who looked like he would stop us if we crossed the line any further into the site, so we turned back, found a cool group of small evergreen shrubs and Terry cut off a nice branch for our Christmas tree. On the walk back we went a different way and I started collecting the pretty dead blossoms off of various bushes. Of course Jason and Terry didn’t really understand what pretty dead was and started to crack jokes about the rotting dead cactus, and would I like that, or the fact that some of the stuff I was cutting off wasn’t quite dead yet… needless to say after some good natured harassment reciprocated with sweet smelling branch beatings there was enough of a collection of tree decorations we started home. It was a really nice relaxing Sunday. We had an early-ish dinner, played cards, experimented with coca tea and pisco then watched Life Aquatic. I decorated the tree today while it rained. Unfortunately it wasn’t the same as previous Christmases. The only Christmas music I currently have on my computer includes: Tom Waits song Christmas Card from a Hooker in Minneapolis, and the Neko Case cover of this song; The Kinks’ Father Christmas; Run-DMC’s Christmas in Hollis; the They Might Be Giants album HolidayLand; of Montreal’s Christmas isn’t Safe for Animals; John Prine’s Christmas in Prison; Richard Cheese lounge music Christmas covers (e.i. Christmas in Las Vegas) and then lastly the David Sedaris book on tape of Holiday’s on Ice. But no need to worry! I am currently downloading several different Christmas compilations, as well as the Charlie Brown Christmas album and that Disney Christmas album from the 80s that has been in the Conover household since the dawn of it’s creation (it being either the cd or the household, both work).

So, here is the rundown of what is currently decorating the Asnoqch'utun Alley gringo apartment Christmas tree of 2009: (3) beaded bracelets collected from various Cusco markets; (3) full pairs of earrings: large purple circles, ohm symbols, and cheap silver plated club danglies; (1) Saint Christopher keyring; (1) Buddha earring; (1) broken earring of the red and black seed for good luck from Peru persuasion (the name of which I’ve never been able to understand when told by merchants); (4) strands of blue-turquoise dyed wool; (1) bunch of dying orange flowers; (many) clusters of two different types of dead blooms. This tree is also being held up in and ingenious tree stand compromising of: (1) plant potter currently being occupied by some pretty plant with pink blooms and some grass and (2) several beer bottles with left over dead bloom branches to camouflage.

Unfortunately i can't upload to this website right now, but the pics are all on facebook, so look up that album! LOVE!

xoxo.

back in action.

Having spent a whole two months state-side I’m now back in Cusco! So far the weather has been sun, rain, wind, sun, rain, rain, night. It’s some great thunder storms, but otherwise a bit of a drag. Anyway, after a couple of days I’m back to the old habits of living in a third world country. It’s amazing how you can forget to flush TP, but you don’t forget to not flush it. All of the random food I brought has been much appreciated, Cheese toast is now a part of our daily diets in the apartment! I even rolled some sushi for dinner a few nights ago! It was very yummy (I thought). Then of course the junk food is also being devoured! Oatmeal pies are almost gone, the gallon jug of goldfish has been demolished and I think the slim jims disappeared the second I took them out of my suitcase… I swear this stuff is even better in a place it’s not readily available, and probably healthier for you too… Our days have been very relaxing, pretty much the same routine I had back in VA: staying up late watching movies, waking up in the afternoon, however I’ve been busting my behind to get my resume prefect and look up places to live/work. So far it’s narrowed down to anywhere except: Peru, Ecuador, Venezuela and Brazil. If there are any suggestions, please feel free to share! Otherwise there isn’t much to speak of. The flight here was pretty uneventful. Mom and I drove to D.C. in the middle of the night, I caught my lay over in Panama City, the two flights from D.C. to Lima had more little kids on them than I think I’ve seen on the total of other flights I’ve been on. The first flight had this really cute little kid and his mom sitting next to me, and I was in the window seat. Each time they were asleep the mom would fall into my seat, as would the kid, so I was up against the window trying to give them enough space, but they were really nice, and anything to keep that little 2 year old from screaming was fine by me! When I got to Lima I found my flight to Cusco was 6 am, not pm, so that was fun. But thanks to Grandma Linda I knew of a great little hostel to stay in, and they even gave me a ride the next morning at 3:30 AM to catch my flight. I made it safely to Cusco, and Terry was waiting for me at the airport. And the rest has been nothing but relaxing. Right now we're watching futbol in a pub of sorts, with free wi fi. I'm not sure why we haven't been doing this earlier. Anyway, I'm off! The food just showed up! LOVE!

xoxo.