This is from yesterday

Still no health problems! It seems to be a nice miracle because people who are getting sick look like they´re having a terrible time. Some people are expelling nasties from the mouth, others from the other end. My friend got pretty sick and then frustrated with everything because her host mom is super overprotective. Somehow she decided that the best way to confront her frustration was to dress in a short (for Peru) poofy jean skirt and tank top. I think the canon of whistles directed at us as we crossed a busy highway brought her back to reality, thank goodness. Another girl also decided to wear a poofy black skirt today, above knee-length. I think she liked the attention though. Not good.

I am learning a LOT of new words in Spanish each day but still feel like I am bumbling like an idiot when I speak. It´s worse because I´ve been soooo exhausted every day. We have a rough schedule and I´m ready to sleep before dinner although I last until about 10 at night and wake up without an alarm clock at 6:20 AMish!! If you know me, that is NOT my normal schedule. I´d feel fine except for the fact that they placed me too high in language. Now the staff think I´m near fluent in Spanish, which I´m not but I don´t want to disappoint them. I had the beginning of an interview today with the guy in charge of the environment program and he started off by expressing how happy he is at my level of Spanish...understandable because there are only 2 of us in the advanced levels and we have some trainees that only have high school Spanish ability. Boy, I need to work really hard...

Many people are feeling overwhelmed these days. They told us yesterday that we´re going to have 2 projects coming up, one is individual and the other is with a group. The individual project is basically to shadow a professional related to the environment and get to know them and what they do better. The point is to practice meeting new people and approach them with an idea as well as to practice Spanish. It might culminate in a one or two-hour project. The group project culminates with a project of some sort. I´m pretty excited to speak Spanish to different people. It might be pretty cool.

Yesterday we had a mission in which we had to work with a partner. I was paired with a girl who is at the ¨novice low¨ level of Spanish and we were an awesome team. We went to Chosica, which is a cute town nearby, and had to go to the biggest supermarket there and learn about their products. The supermarket is about the size of two convenience stores in the US combined. According to the manager, virtually all of their products are Peruvian, including all of their produce, water and detergent. Of course, there is Coke, cookies and other American products, but they are surprisingly few. They also sell store-made chocolate cakes. Score! Then we had to learn about the potable water system. First, we had to figure out where to go to find the answers and then find a person who could answer our questions. It was certainly rewarding to be able to accomplish that in a place that was foreign to us. I had a great conversation with a water engineer about how the town, Chosica, gathers their water from 6 wells (probably large water pumps) although 1 dried up because this is the desert. We talked about how there are no water conservation education inititatives even though it´s very needed. He doesn´t know when the wells will dry up, but it doesn´t seem to be an unlikely situation because 1 already dried up. Some other office has that information but it´s kept confidential! That was a great day of learning interesting things and my partner and I both left feeling more confident about our Spanish and resourcefulness.

It´s time for dinner so I better leave!

chao...