I have been in Peru for one day. I arrived at the aiport really late on the night of the 15th. My luggage didn't come.I stayed by the thingy that delivers luggage for a long time hoping it would come. Even if it was last. One of them came very last, but the other did not come. There was an old lady who was there with her husband. She spoke good English. She is the lady who traded me seats on the plain. I got the "comfort seat" in trade for my "economy seat". It was an upgrade. She was very cute. She reminded me of Grandma. She told me that she worked with missionaries but is originally from Peru. She made sure I had a ride. She told me to not get in any taxis. Her and her husband said something along the lines of "If your ride does not come then wait in the airport for it". Her husband told me where to go to get my bags delivered to me. He checked and repeated to me several times how exactly to do it. I could tell he was reluctant to leave me there especially because I didn't speak Spanish. By the time I got through customs and squared a way for my luggage to be delivered to my house I was sure my host family and counselor Maria, wouldn't be waiting for me anymore. I figured they would have thought that I did not come. I came out and there they were. They were holding a big sign that said "Welcome Rebekah" on it. They also had a balloon that said "Welcome Home". I quickly learned that I do not know Spanish. Maria was translating for us. I was dead tired and just wanted to sleep. The house we live in is 20 or 30 minutes away from the airport. So once Maria left I was left in a long car ride with a couple I did not know how to communicate with. I resolved to just taking everything in. I initially thought "Wow they are pretty good drivers here". Little did I know that is only because there was no one on the streets at that time of night.
The next day was my first day here. We learned to communicate with each other very well over google translate. I hope we don't always resolve to that. We use a lot of body language to communicate too. The food has all been good so far. Breakfast had canelope in it.. That is the only thing I just don't like. I ate it anyways. I've been miserable since I arrived because I'm so sick. My bags had not come so they took me to the store. We went to 2 huge malls. They bought me an outfit to wear and a bunch of neccessities like shampoo. The mall was crazy. I saw 1 white person. I can't tell if I am over reacting or if people saw me and thought "why is there a white person with blue eyes with 2 native Peruvian adults?" I was just miserable at the malls. I didn´t even want to stand up let alone walk. They were so excited to show me everything though, so I tried to act happy, as best I could. Eventually though they asked if I wanted to go home and sleep. That is all I wanted!! We went home. The ride to and from the store was something else!!! They are funny drivers!!! They don't listen to any street signs!! People constantly cut each other off. There is non stop honking. Whenever you turn a corner you honk incase someone is driving around the corner in the middle of the street. Their system of driving works though. Just honk, lay on the horn so people notice you and gooooo!!!! I didn´t witness a wreck so it must work. Hahaha. The only thing that they follow are stop lights, thank goodness!! We got home and I layed down for awhile. Then we had dinner. Chicken, rice, and soup. We eat a lot of chicken and rice. We also had fried potatos. Everything is good. We skped with their daughter, Yanela, yesterday. She told me to tell them if I don't like anything. Her mom told her to tell me she won't be offended, but really I liked everything. This cute little girl came down from upstairs last night. She is 8, almost 9. She is their niece. She is just the cutest thing in the world. She speaks English very well for an 8 year old. I just couldn't get over how cute she was. I felt so blessed that she got to be part of my life while I am here. Our maid is 25. She is from the Jungle. She left her family in the jungle when she was 12. She has been around Peru looking for work since then. She has worked for this family for 6 years. She really is like another daughter. She likes to be called "Luz". I don't remember her real name. We call her "mono" or monkey. I don't understand why. They named her that at lunch. But I like it. Dinner was fun last night. We were all gathered around the table and just laughing so much. They could not pronounce the word "napkin". It was so funny. Everything was funny. They are so accepting. I like it here a lot. My sleep last night was a hot one. Me, Mono, and Diana Mariel (the 8 year old) stayed up until 1:30 playing all sorts of games. Diana just has a cute personallity. Dang, I love her. Too Cute. Mono washed my feet for me before bed. The floors are white tile. They look so clean!!! I don´t understand how my feet get BLACK. Everyone else wears shoes, but I just hate shoes, so I don't. I can say I´ve never had my feet washed before. It was funny. After that I went to sleep. I woke up DRENCHED in sweat. They don´t have air here. The weather is nice so we just leave the windows open. I had already needed a shower the day before, but was to tired to take one. Now I really needed one. Now let me explain my house. I don´t want you to think it´s primitive. I have a cute little room. It´s small, but has a bathrrom connected to it. A man worked on fixing my shower all day yestersday. They said it would be fixed by tonight. My house has 3 rooms. Mono has a bed behind the washing room as well. Everything is decorated so cute. The structure of the house is really smart. Elvis, my host dad, is an architect and designed it himself. There is a courtyard that opens up to the top. There is no roof on the courtyards. You can stand in the courtyards and see the clouds haha.. you can also talk to family on te floors above. The garage is the same way. It doesn´t have a roof. I suppose they do this in order to have better circulation. Windows and doors are always left open. The doors on the outside and the front door are always left secured though. It really is brillliant architecture. Please excuse my spelling errors. This computer is set in Spanish so it says every word is spelled wrong. It doesn´t know how to correct my English misspellings. There is some sort of security system on our house. I am not sure how effective it realy is though. Everything here appears very poor from the outside. The houses are just run down and ugly. I wonder if they are all as nice on the inside as mine is though. I went to take a shower this morning and realized there is no hot water. I did not want to immerse myself in the cold water, so i washed my hair standing next to the shower then dipped my head in. I washed my body from the outside of the shower. Then I immersed myslef in the water for as short of a period of time as I could. I shaved from outside of the shower too. We discussed via Google translate the outline of my Sundays. I felt bad, because they had all sorts of fun plans for me on Sundays. My host mom assured me I didn´t need to worry about it and it was okay. Skype worked great this morning and I was able to hear everything at seminary. My luggage arrived at the house this morning. I think everything is in there and not stollen. I hope so. I forgot to tell you details about the city. It is strange. The Temple is gated. It is the nicest thing in its area. Everything looks ghetto and then there is the temple grounds. It kind of looks like the dallas temple. The city is composed of those ugly living quarters like I explained, but we entered a nice part of town yesterday. There are street venders everywhere. Tons of people are out walking at all hours of the day. They all dress nice. I have actually seen some really attractive guys. Not all the men are small and scrawny. Most are kind of like Brandon, but some are really muscular and you can tell they have to work out. And they dress really nice so it´s just icing on the cake!!! But I know, I know I won´t fall in love here. Both my host parents are running errands right now. They always give me those cheek kisses when they arrive, leave, and before bed. I love that. Diana did it too. I think it´s the best tradition in the world. I wish america did it!! I´m not affectionate, but you just automatically feel welcome. We have a flat screen TV and 2 laptops and a good sterio system in our living room. Yanela has the ipad in Germany. Elvis, my host dad, is going to enroll me in some sort of activities until school strarts so I don´t have to sit home for months. I'm excited. I have really enjoyed improving my Spanish. It is already 100 times better!! I can't wait to get enrolled in activities like dance lessons or something. I love to learn. I am going to go take a nap now. I think I've written everything in detail for you, Mother. haha. I am supposed to meet Yanela´s friends later today. I was supposed to go somewhere in the city with all the exchange students today, but they want me to stay home and rest, which is good. I feel way better today than yesterday. I can swallow without dying!! Alright. Later.
You are such a brave girl! I'm do happy you are enjoying yourself. Keep writing and Cindy keep letting is know when she does.
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