So I’ve been told twice this week that my español is really good. Granted once was by a boy who was trying to be nice/impress me and he said my español was “super bien” (super good) to which I said he was lying – BUT to my credit, the other was by one of the nurses at work and although I think she was still just being nice and appreciated that I can understand everything they say, I count that one as a real indication that my Spanish really is improving.
This week was fairly uneventful, which I’m not complaining about. I spent Saturday at
Sunday we went to this really nice place called Casa Campestre that has an all you can eat lunch buffet and a pool for the equivalent of about 4 dollars. It was nice to lay around by the pool and get some sun because I’ve definitely lost 100% of the tan I had when I came down here.
Tuesday was three holidays in one: Dia del Estudiante, Dia del Amor, and Dia de Primavera (Day of the student, day of love – aka their Valentine’s day minus the insane amount of Hallmark cards and valentines, and day of spring). They had a party at Solomon Klein where Salas 4 and 5 did some adorable traditional Bolivian dances and they served the most delicious cake I’ve had since I’ve been in Bolivia (granted I’ve only had one other piece of cake and that was at a birthday party at Nazareth). All the festivities led the mama’s to ask me about holidays in the US and what kinds of festivals we have – when I made a comment about the fact that we only have a fifth of the number of holidays they have, Dona Sabina jokingly told me that the reason Bolivia is so broke is because they love any reason to have a holiday/party – I kind of believe it though…
Updates on Sala 1 include that we are now eating our meals in the cafeteria with the big kids instead of in our Sala. Apparently on Tuesday after I left and they were transitioning between dinner and bath time, Gonzolo (the same knight in shining armor that brought chivalry to Sala 1) managed to land a table on his foot and fracture two of his toes. So they’ve moved our tables out to the cafeteria and we eat out there now – which is nice because it gets the kids used to eating in the cafeteria (even though there aren’t any other kids in there when we eat) and it means less cleaning we have to do in the sala after meals. We’ve only been doing it for two days, but I’d say so far so good.
I also mentioned last week that three of our kids moved up to Sala 2 – but what I didn’t mention was that one of them, Juan Carlos, left his girlfriend, Liseth, behind in Sala 1. I used to wonder about the amount of PDA (public displays of affection) down here in the parks and generally walking around – but now I know where it all begins. When we would put Liseth and Juan Carlos next to each other on their basins (toilets) in the morning about every other time we looked over Juan Carlos would have his hands on the side of Liseth’s face and be giving her big kisses. Quite possibly one of the cutest things I’ve ever seen. But now that Juan Carlos is in Sala 2 apparently Liseth is missing her make-out sessions and on Tuesday when we were watching the older kids dance she kept trying to escape over to where Sala 2 was sitting (to find her boyfriend, of course) and on Wednesday morning when she was seated next to one of the other boys, attempted to place a big kiss on him to which he just started shrieking and crying. We’re all rooting for Liseth to move up to Sala 2 so she can be reunited with her pareja (pair/mate).
In other exciting news, I finally found and joined a gym! As some of you have already heard I’m probably a little overly excited about it – but it’s a really good deal. For the equivalent of 120 dollars I get 6 months of membership which includes: a cardio room (with treadmills, ellipticals, steppers, and bikes – all generally impossible to find in Bolivia), a weight room with more machines than the YMCA, instructors (aka personal trainers) in the weight room who will show/tell you what exercises to do every time you go in and what part of the body to focus on for the day if you want, free access to all their Body Pump/Body Sculpt/Cycling classes, AND free internet. I can hardly contain my excitement. I’ll probably never find a deal this good again, so I’m going to take full advantage of it while I’m down here. Granted the downside is that it’s a 30 minute walk from my house and a 45 minute walk from work, so I generally take a trufi/taxi from work to the gym and then use the walk home from the gym as my cool down. I have a pretty good record for making random friends at the gym, so I’m hoping maybe this new part of my life will also enhance my social life (and at the very least my stories for the blog).
And the most exciting news of the week – MY FAMILY IS COMING FOR CHRISTMAS!! My parents and my brother are arriving in Coche on Christmas morning and leaving on the 30th. So while it will be a short stay I’m SUPER excited to see them and I’ve already started a countdown calendar on my desktop (90 days to be exact).
As for the weekend, it’s been fairly uneventful so far. Last night Jordan and I stayed in and invented Jersualen bowling using the 2-liter bottles left over from soda as our pins and a plastic jar of honey as our ball. Our thin hallway is perfectly designed to act as a bowling alley and while the honey-ball isn’t ideal, it definitely adds to the challenge. I’m planning on spending my Saturday at Nazareth with the boys again, although it means I won’t be hanging around BK all day on gametracker, I might head to BK on Sunday to attempt some epic Skype catch up dates with people.
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