Little breaks...

On a quick break at school...

Wednesday night after I wrote a blog in the peak of my frustrations I went out to dinner with a bunch of people from school. We found a little restaurant that had Thai food.... that was a huge treat. Some of the teachers from the school came, which I was kinda bummed at first but it ended up being a good thing for me hanging out with them outside of the institute. I struggle with the school I'm getting my TEFL from- (although there are some really good aspects)... but it was good to see the professors in a setting outside of the school. We had a great time- a group from the school mixed with a group outside the school, mostly peruvians & we had some interesting conversation over Thai food. It was what I needed in the moment... to stop everything and not think about anything.

There was a couple that won me over pretty quickly there- she is an American and he is Peruvian & they were the a wonderful couple... I got along great with them and she twisted my arm to go to a salsa club to dance for a little while. I haven't danced much since I've been here so I took her up on the offer. Good decision. Until I had to wake up the next morning that is. Ohwell, sometimes you have to seize the moment & take a break from the ¨musts¨and enjoy the ¨wants¨. It was good to dance for a bit. I don´t particularly like the dancing in Cuzco (the style of Salsa) as it is very rehearsed. The reason I feel in love with Salsa is for the spontanous freedom that it brings me. But I did manage to find a dancing partner from Lima & for a few hours I forgot about all my worries. Those Lima boys sure know how to dance (Ï´m talking to you ¨camisa negra¨). Nah- it was good though to relax.

Waking up to my cold shower at 5:30 am was a pretty big slap in the face-but I managed and the rest of the day was LONG- but I survived. I actually did much better on my reviews of my class (although I personally felt the class went worse)- but this school is SO focused on methodology. This class has been more like taking foreign language classes then my Spanish classes were.. EVERYTHING they talk about is ¨termonology¨. The CCQ of the EPA.... . What is Method two of the E? To me the model that they use is very dry and boring.. but when I do it that way I get great reviews. So- I figure I just need to do my work here, take what I can from it and get back on the plane to head North. I´m so excited to teach in the States. I love the teaching aspect! This past week I was in class from early in the morning until early evening and then in the evenings we teach and are observed by about 15 people. Talk about pressure. The first time teaching EVER & I have my students to build report with and an audience observing my technique. I´ll be glad when I´m done with the observations. I have one more on Monday.

Monday will start my practical teaching. I have a class here at the institute. I got an intermediate 2 class... they are pretty decent at conversational English. That is good and bad. Good that they understand a bit of English but bad in that the grammar that I´ll be teaching will be complicated. Monday I have to teach them the future perfect tense. That gets confusing because there has to be two events that happen at two different times, but simultaniously. Hmmm.. should be interesting. I have to get my lesson plans for the week done this weekend and then next week I´ll be in class all day again and teaching in the evenings. I went to observe the class that I´ll be taking over and there are about 11 students when the class is full. The teacher that is teaching it now is ironically from Littleton, CO. That was kinda cool to run across her. She signed a 6 month contract but is ready to be done teaching I think- so she was happy to have the week off next week.

Everything else (if there IS anything else) is going well. I get home late at night and last night saw my host mom & brothers for the first time in awhile... they were like ¨what a miracle!¨ I have no life right now. BUT I´m hoping to get all my lesson plans done today so I can enjoy the WEEKEND!!!! My last weekend I´ll have for awhile I´m sure. I´ll be teaching until Friday night next week and then Saturday morning at 8:00 am I´m off to Lima. I´ll get to spend the day with Willy´s family one more time and then (PRAY PRAY PRAY) that I get out on my flight Saturday night/Sunday morning at 1:00 am. I´m flying stand-by so I need everyone to send their prayers that I make it out. IF I make it that far I´ll be in Atlanta on Sunday late morning and try and catch another flight to Denver. IF all that goes well... I´ll be home next Sunday!!!... and back to work & the real world on Monday. Exhausting to think about BUT I´m just taking it one day at a time for now.

This weekend I´m not sure what I´ll get into- but something always comes up. I´m going to try and take a little day trip to a market that is about an hour and a half away on Sunday. One last day in the country.

I always think about things I want to write about as my day goes on to share the experience that I´m having and often forget by the time I sit down to write. This morning I was reminded of one thing though.... Living in Cuzco I don´t trust anyone. If someone is trying to help me- there is a pretty good chance they are trying to get something out of me. That didn´t amaze me at all as I´d experienced it many times in Costa Rica. The part that DID amaze me is what you have to be the MOST careful of. The kids. I guess I always had an image in my head of the innoncence of children... that they can´t be corrupted. Wrong. The number one thing that I have to be on guard of here is the kids. They come up in groups and one will try and distract you will the others work to steal.... I encountered this this morning when I was walking to the school and a little boy who is a shoe shiner started walking with me. I knew he wasn´t interested in selling me a shoe shine becuse I was wearing flip-flops. Red flag. I watched as they tried to do their magic but told them strongly- no and went the other direction. They knew I knew & gave up quickly. Pretty amazing that the kids are so well trained. Sad.

Enough for now. Just trying to capture the experience as a whole. Last weekend! Time has flown by. I´m excited to have a life for two days.....