I have arrived!

Cusco, Peru. 3,400 meters in elevation. The navel of the earth. My home for the next four months. 

The past week has been absolute roller-coaster. Literally 8 days ago I was at Camp Chief Ouray finishing up my summer as a cabin counselor with some of the most inspirational, kind, and genuine people I've ever met. In the next 36 hours, I packed up everything I'd need for 4 months in Peru, spent some quality time with mom (thanks mom and dad so much for making that happen :), and drove to the airport. 

Every moment since then has been an ever-changing combination of excited beyond belief, lonely, adventurous, and scared shitless. So far I've hiked up a hill on the outskirts of Cusco to see a statue called Christo Blanco and some ruins called Sacsayhuaman (pronounced by all of the extranjeros as "sexy woman"), explored various streets and neighborhoods, witnessed one of my host sisters getting engaged, and gone to see an Argentinian rock band.

One of the many learning opportunities (AFGO's, for Melissa's reference) I've encountered along the way:

On the way up to Christo Blanco

I'll just start off by saying that the bus system here is very intricate. Basically these mini-van type vehicles pull up at predetermined street corners and someone in the bus will start screaming very quickly and shrilly in Spanish what their destinations are. So anyway, imagine you're on one of these buses for the very first time. You've heard that theft is pretty common, but you have your bag in front of you so that you can keep an eye on it and you're being pretty vigilant. As the bus gets closer and closer to your destination, it starts getting more and more crowded so that you end up getting pushed up against the wall of the bus with no room to spare. You're doing fine, soaking it all up, having an overall okay experience. You decide to look down at your bag once more to make sure that everything's still in order, and notice that some guy has his jacket over his hand and his hand is directly over your bag...... not cool. 

You quickly grab your bag to see if anything is missing and are not all too surprised to find that your iPhone has gone missing. Now you're pissed. You grab his jacket and search through it but can't find anything. In a moment of insecurity you think that maybe you're just being a crazy gringa and making a big fuss over nothing when you actually just left your phone back at the hostel, but then you decide to follow through with it and so with your infinite knowledge of Spanish, you look directly at him with a disgusted and angry fire burning behind your eyes and say "¡¿En serio?!" Very sassy. 

Then, you realize that you're the luckiest person in the entire world. Because in addition to a thief being on the bus with you, there also happens to be the most wonderful Peruvian policeman ever. He hears everyone chattering about your phone being stolen, lays down the law (literally) to all of the people on the bus, and suddenly some other random guy is all to eager to pull your phone out from his pocket and say that he found it on the floor. Mhmmmm. 

So the moral of the story is this: All you have to do to get a stolen iPhone back is be really angry and sassy to the theif, and some nice policeman will hear you and help you out. 

But in all seriousness, lesson learned. 

So yeah, that's my life at the moment. I miss a lot of people at home and the language barrier is very hard especially during meals with my family, but I'm doing okay. I have my moments when I can't believe that I've thrown myself into yet another unknown situation, but then I go and play soccer or monopoly with my host brother and laugh at his many attempts at cheating and everything's okay again. 

Based on all of the crazy stories that I have to tell after only 6 days, this is going to be an incredible 4 months. 

Hasta luego,
Hannah