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It’s been a good week since moving. I didn’t surf as much as I wanted to because I wanted to let an injury to my toe heal, but as it was close to being better I slipped and stubbed my injured toe. Ouch. Oh well. I got Kim to start going out with me and she’s rocking the surf scene. We’ve been taking a few lessons from Juan Carlos from Un Lugar Surf School. Kim got hit in the nose with her board the other day. Overall though we’re having tons of fun even if it’s a little cold. There’s been more sunny days lately.

I’ve had ups and downs teaching. Some days I really enjoy it. Those are the days when I feel like my small class of three students listens and learns. It’s rewarding to see students “getting it”. There’s some days though where I feel like I’m in front of a pack of crazy brats. I know an hour and a half is a long time to sit and learn stuff, so I try to make it as active and entertaining as possible. I’ve found with such a small class doing a question and answer format seems to work best for me. I ask them questions about the material until they start to seem comfortable, then I have them ask each other questions. Sometimes we do a jeopardy style game, sometimes spelling bees, sometimes bingo, and other games too.

I’ve got the page up for Espaanglisch, the school I’m working for, even if it needs some polishing. David Mercedes is the head of the organization and the best Peruvian friend I’ve made here. He’s passionate about languages and cultures, and I hope the organization can make good use of the new web presence.

We haven’t gone too far out of the city since we’ve been here, which has been really quite nice. We keep meaning to take a weekend trip to Chiclayo or someplace a few hours away, but the chill atmosphere keeps us nearby. We visited some more ruins called the Huacas del Sol y Luna. I think they were cooler than Chan Chan since they were better preserved. They’re temples that are pretty big since every hundred years they’d fill up the temple with bricks and build a new level on top of the old.

I’ve got some interesting observations about culture and people here:

• Wall clocks never work. They either don’t have a battery or have the wrong time
• People here have a higher tolerance for noise. Honking horns, blaring stereos, skipping movies, constant contruction, and barking dogs don’t seem to phase the locals
• There’s no such thing as too full when it comes to local transportation. Even if the aisles are stuffed, people are sitting in each others laps, and the ticket man is hanging out the door the combis will stop for more people.
• Business hours are flexible. Even more so than Spain where the siesta was at a consistent time. There’s one restaurant that was open only a couple times in our first two weeks. Now it’s open all the time. Sometimes the restaurant will appear open when there’s nobody there to actually cook. Sometimes the wait staff will tell you this, sometimes they won’t…

The end of the month is approaching quickly, and we’re not sure exactly what we’ll be doing. We’ve had trouble getting the Otra Cosa volunteer coordinators to nail down our next volunteer project, so we may just head north to Ecuador for a little while before we figure out what we’re doing next. We might end up doing a project near Iquitos, in the jungle, but it’s all up in the air right now. Whatever happens, I’m sure it will be fun and interesting.