Going to buy pepperspray...

so that people can worry about me less. I am being very careful, believe it or not! Yesterday, Juan Escate, the WUSC rep in Lima came to see me as he had just dropped off another student in Chiclayo. He looked at my pictures and seemed to think things were going well, and said that I seem to have adapted to life here well and my understanding of Spanish is better so that´s good. Then I gave him an English lesson for about an hour which he recorded to listen to on the bus, because it´s about 16 hours to Lima and really not a lot of fun.
To pass a class at ICPNA you have to get 80%!!! So, actually I might have to flunk some students. How horrible is that! I have students with 82% all upset because it´s only a D. Good grief! I really don´t like the way one of my students looked at me when they got their exam back with only 67%. It´s not my fault they didn´t study. The average in that class was 85% so that´s okay I think. My other class with 28 students has an average of 89% which is actually awesome! Yesterday in my Pre 4 class I almost broke out into hyena giggling but I restrained myself because it´s not very professional. I was trying to explain this article about what children can do at different ages and they didn´t understand crawl and so they said, show us. But I showed them standing up because I didn´t think it would be professional to crawl on the floor.
Yesterday at lunch two of Rosa´s friends came around so that was nice. We had spaghetti which was surprisingly normal so a nice change. Not that I don´t love the food here, gorgeous home cooked meals every day beats Uni! But my Mum still cooks the best food :)
Yesterday I was invited out with all my collegues for lunch on Sunday. We are allowed to socialize with our collegues so this is okay. It will be nice to make some girl friends my own age.
Haha, yesterday one of my students wanted to know how old I was so I said 18 and other students heard and were like "Que!! Profesora, no! Miss you are young!" Hahaha.
Today I am taking some Jazz music to my Reg 1 class because last class we were talking about music and nobody knew what Jazz was! Dios mio! Don´t worry, I will educate them.
Well, it´s a short one today because I have to go and finish preparing my class.
Cheers, Gemma

Guinea Pig and Rice.

Me with Otoniel´s Dad and his Bible.

The random cave in the Andes.

Falling in love with Peru...

So wow! It´s Tuesday and I haven´t written since Thursday. I expect you were friggid with despair at not having to read another essay from me. Actually, I have been very very busy, which is a good thing, I think.

Thursday evening I met with one of my students, Otoniel, who is 23 and we went to the Polleria, which is not the name of the place but a kind of restaurant that serves chicken. We studied English. After this, we went to Santa Apalonia, which is gorgeous at night because you can see the whole city. I think I would have cried if I were a more sentimental person. He walked me home. It´s good to have people looking out for me.

So, Friday was exam day and naturally my students begged me to hold off the exam until never, but since they had two weeks warning and lots of time to study I was mean and said no. The exams went pretty well though. Saturday morning at 8:00 I went with Rosa to meet all the teachers in the the program (the schools of poverty in Cajamarca). These teachers have a high school education at the best, so we all went to a training at Davy College. I really wish I could have read the minds of the teachers when they walked around the College. It is 1000 worlds away from the schools they teach at. Some of them were in awe facially though. It was really interesting for me to take the training entirely in Spanish. It was about teaching children though, which would have been useful for me before when Delicia was away and I taught classes of children. You can see my Children CD class pictured above. I tried to take it when no-one was looking because the camera would have created a lot of excitement. The first part of the training was lecture form and I understood the general gist of it so that was exciting for me, of course it helped that we were given hand outs and it´s easier to read Spanish for me. The second part involved singing and group work though... I almost managed to learn all the words to the song before it was over. The group work was more difficult, in the end I did the artsy stuff and when we presented someone else did the talking, thank goodness! I did meet some awesome women though. When we got back here one of Rosa´s brothers and his daughter were here so we chatted for a bit and had fish for lunch. In the afternoon I had about 1 hour to plan my 4 and a half hour class (yes, I organised my time well) and then ran off to ICPNA. However, when I got to ICPNA, out of the five of us who had class that afternoon only one of us had a key and it didn´t work. So, that was good planning. We had students up and down the stairs (which, by the way, are going to kill me) waiting. In the end the keys were sent by taxi and we started class 45 minutes late. My class was okay I think, we give our students 20 minute breaks on Saturdays because the classes are so long and it´s just not fun without some time to relax. After class on Saturday it absolutely hammered it down. So much for Rosa telling me 2 weeks ago that there would be only one more rainfall in the season. I went to the Plaza to meet one of my students but being a man and useless he was 10 minutes late. So, I was pretty soaked but despite that actually pretty happy beacuse the Plaza is beautiful and Cajamarca is beautiful too, especially at night. We went to Quinde, the mall here and had pizza (my first time in Peru) while we studied. Then, we tried to go to Santa Apolonia (because I love it there but I can´t go by myself at night because it´s too dangerous) but Otoniel wouldn´t let me go up because he spotted two men lurking who I didn´t see. So, you see why it´s a good thing that I don´t go out alone. Anyway, we walked away pretty fast and he walked me home.

On Sunday morning at 8 I walked to La Recoleta Church, which is gorgeous, and met a different student, Antonio. We took a taxi to Banos Del Inca for a walk in the park so he could practice English. It was somewhat depressing as the night before his girlfriend of 3 years dumped him and he was a total wreck. I felt bad for him. He told me his entire life story, and it was pretty difficult. He is the mathematical genius I talked about before. He told me he finished first in the class at the most difficult math school in the world, located in Lima, and that´s why he has a grant to go to America and why he needs to improve his English. He then tried to explain to me this really complicated mathematical thing that he loves but I didn´t get it. It didn´t help that the whole thing was in Spanish. After, we went to a little restaurant place for a drink and took a Combi back. He, too, walked me home. I have decided that the Combi drivers are really rude. They are yelling at you "get on get on get on" and "get off get off get off" and practically push you out. Antonio is 25 and has had 92 girlfriends. He had pictures of them all. I told him he was a player. He said he was honest with the girls he was dating at the same time and they didn´t care. I told him he was still a player and that it was only necessary to have one girlfriend at a time.

Rosa, Luis, Ana and I went to Quinde for lunch to the Polleria there. The fries here are proper big chips. Yummy. Big Luis went to Celedin for the weekend. I couldn´t go because I had to work on Saturday and the others couldn´t go because Ana isn´t doing well at school and might have to repeat the year. When you´re paying 300 dollars a month for private school this is a big problem. In the afternoon I marked like 500 workbooks and exams. Arrhhh!! But, I think it´s important that students know what they are doing wrong so it was a good thing. (I had students come up to me and thank me yesterday for my feedback so that makes it worth it.) At 7:00 I met a different student (I´m starting to realise that none of the students who ask me for extra help are female...) and we went out for supper at a pretty nice place. He is 25 too, I thought maybe 20 from the way he looks. He is the biggest square I have ever met! It´s awesome, he´s even straighter than me! He doesn´t drink, smoke, or do drugs (which is good!), he´s never had a serious girlfriend (i.e. he´s a virgin) and he only goes to the club or the bar very very rarely is there is a group of 10 or more. He´s very religious. When I said I was agnostic he invited me to church with him on Sunday. He goes like 4 times a week. He says I shouldn´t go out in Cajamarca if there isn´t a large group of people and some men to look after me. When I told him I that I walk home from work alone he was totally shocked. He said that after class he would walk me home, which is a pretty good thing I think. Despite this, he is totally crazy and a fun person to be around. We also went to Santa Apolonia and just talked to practice English for 2 hours. I love Santa Apalonia, I think I should just live there in a cardboard box. I would be happy. Until it started to rain or creepy men came up to me. I´m having such a good time here now that I have friends close to my own age and a family who are a lot of fun. Don´t worry, all my male friends here know I have a boyfriend in Canada, some of them think I´m engaged, and people here have respect for things like that. When he walked me home he wouldn´t let me walk beside the road. Everytime we crossed the street and I tried to stand there he stood closer to the road than me. I was like, what are you doing!! He said that it was custom for the man to walk beside the traffic, so if a car verges over he´d die first. So, thats sweet in a disturbing kind of way.

Yesterday was awesome! In the morning I was supposed to teach one student to catch him up with his class, but he didn´t show. Delicia saw me and said she wanted a word in her office so I had to wait. I was so nervous!! She gave me my lesson plans and said I had to type them up. So, that will be fun. There´s like 50 of them. Then she said she was going to observe my class in the evening. I was like noooooo AHH!! Then, she said that the rule at ICPNA is that teachers are not allowed to socialize with their students. So, how many times have I broken that rule? A lot. I think it´s a silly rule. I understand not going to a party with them or drinking with them but I don´t see why I can´t help them with English outside of class. Most of my friends here are my students. So, I was in a pretty bad mood when I walked home and when creepy men said hola to me I gave them a glare that could kill. At 9:30 I met Otoniel because before we were talking and I said I wanted to see some waterfalls, he said he would take me to llacanora. So, we took a taxi with his friend the cab driver who was very funny and kept laughing at my Spanish, and stopped a few kms away from llacanora. We walked up the mountain to check out this cool cave thing and there was a dog who followed us. We walked though the mountains over rocks and through forests and stuff which was so fun! But, there were spiders. I freaked out! Most weren´t very big but I spotted this little hole which was a spider´s den and I pointed it out to Otoniel, who proceeded to poke it with a stick and then this huge spider came crawling out. Well! I have never run so fast in my life. I ran halfway up the mountain in 2 seconds, which Otoniel thought was hilarious. This spider is only poisonous to cows apparently. But still, I don´t like big creepy spiders! The dog followed us all the way to llacanora! The waterfalls were gorgeous. You can see the two main ones above. Again, I wanted to cry but I didn´t ahaha. I had fun running near the waterfall and getting wet like a 3 year old or something. For lunch we went to the actual town of llacanora and I had... wait for it... Guinea Pig. I told Otoniel that in Canada Guinea Pigs are pets and he thought that was very funny. He said he would prefer to eat it. Guinea Pig has a really odd flavour, I don´t think I´m a big fan of it to be honest. There isn´t much meat. It`s Ana´s favourite food though. You should see my legs. They are so mosquito bitten!! I look like I have a really bad case of chicken pox. I didn´t even feel the mosquitoes biting me and I didn´t see them either! It was sooo hot yesterday! We went to visit Otoniel´s parents which was 3 km away from Yacanora in the mountains, where they have a little house and land. Only his dad was home though, and he was a pretty cool guy. Otoniel told him I was agnostic so he proceeded to read me parts of the bible in Spanish and explain how there had to be a God etc. I wish Otoniel hadn´t told him I was Agnostic. It was a little awkward. But, he was a really nice man. Living in the beautiful landscape he lives in, every day looks like a miracle. Otoniel played music from different Spanish bands and then suddenly he played Here I Am by Bryan Adams!! I remembered Grad and everyone in Canada then, but I wasn´t really sad. I love my people back in Canada but Peru is awesome. I absolutely love it too! Haha, When I told my other student that in English speaking countries we don´t kiss each other on the cheek to say hi and bye, but instead shake hands, he thought I was joking. He was like, how stiff is that? It´s unnatural. I think he´s right. Now, when someone tries to shake my hand, it seems really stuck up. Like, do I have something on my face, why don´t you like me... Having said that, only one person has tried to shake my hand, and they were white.

Yesterday evening I was so nervous for my class!! Delicia left for 5 minutes to talk to someone else and I let out this big breath and started laughing and my class cheered. It was quite funny. After, Delicia said she liked my class. I was so relieved!! Apprently I asked 23 comprehension questions though, which is a lot. I hope she never comes to watch my class again. I don´t like tests!

Yeah, well I´ve been hogging the computer for about 2 hours now to write all this and answer questions from students so maybe I had better go!

Hoping you are well!!

Un abrazo,

Cheers, Gemma -x-

Infrastructure and a rude awakening...

So I am very annoyed because last night Delicia came and asked for all my lesson plans. When she talked about them before, she said they were just for me. So, all my lesson plans are all over the place on looseleaf in red pen with scratchings all over the place where I have changed things. Those of you who have seen my writing will know how terrible it is!! So, I guess I could re-write them all, which I really don´t want to spend a gorgeous Peruvian day doing, or I could hand them in as is with the excuse that I didn´t know I had to hand them in. I have no idea if it´s normal for your boss to want to see your lesson plans, but it feels like a lack of trust in my teaching to me. Those of you who know me well probably realise that I´m going to rewrite the worst of them. Yesterday I managed to follow directions given in Spanish to find a store that sells notebooks. The only kind they had were decorated with Cartoons, so I am now teaching classes with a Simpsons notebook. Classy. At least all my lesson plans are in the same place now though...

Yesterday I gave a private English lesson to a man who works in the mine here. We went up Santa Apalonia Hill, which is basically a death climb because there are a lot of steep steps and despite my gym trips it was hot and I almost died. Okay, I may have exaggerated a little. It was nice to spend time with someone closer to my own age. I love being with my family here and students but having friends close to my age is fun. I would like to stress the word friend here for those of you with suspicious minds. I might be a crap girlfriend but I´m not that horrible. He helped me with Spanish too, so that´s great for me. I had been thinking about looking for Spanish classes here to help me out but it´s much better this way. I don´t have to walk by myself or take a cab. Also, I get to walk around Cajamarca a bit. It´s much safer for me when I´m with someone else. He told me men would leave me alone if I were walking with him. Which actually seemed to be true. When I was giving him a lesson, a little boy came up and said he wanted to learn English. It was sweet but sad because you could tell from his speech that he wasn´t all there and very poor.

The only other white person working at ICPNA, from Texas, was robbed on the way home from work. They took her phone and her money, etc. So, now I´m even more nervous about walking at night and Rosa is worried about me walking too. However, I don´t know where this girl lives so maybe it´s in a worse area of the city. I have been given directions as to the exact route I´m to take home and to work, and there are a lot of people around so I´d like to think they´d help out if someone were to try and rob me. Rosa says I´m to give them my bag and run like the wind. Well, she didn´t say those exact words obviously but that´s the general idea. I walk pretty fast. I´m not sure about the girl who was robbed, she´s a little on the larger side of things.

This morning the student who I am supposed to be catching up didn´t show up for class. So, I could have slept longer. Oh well, it´s better to see the day right? Rather than waste time sleeping...

I am constantly frustrated with my Pre 4 class because half of them are late and loud and the other half are really trying to learn. The really frustrating part is that when I circulate the room to help they all want to learn, they just seem to want to look "cool" in front of their friends. Or, they try to flirt in English. Like, what girl wants to be told she is delicate, especially when she´s trying to maintain a position of control? Not me. It is really pathetic. They are mostly maybe 20-21. I think I even preferred the children to half of the students in that class. At least children can be expected to act like children... the worst part is that if they do crap on the exam it will be my fault.

The pics are of the really fancy restaurant and my sunburn, because I know that everyone is really interested in sunburns. Ahahahaha.

Please, the person who left a comment anonymously before, tell me who you are!! I really am curious.

Well, I guess I´d better get to rewriting my lesson plans... :(

Ciao for now!

From the Young Gringita

I laughed a lot when I heard that one of Rosa´s friend´s told her that her son had a new teacher, a young Gringita.

Good news! Delicia is back! No more little monsters. I´m sorry about losing my two morning classes though, I really enjoyed them. They were sad about losing me though so that made it a bit better! There is a student who just signed up for the class at 7 in the morning so I have to give him private lessons for a few days to catch him up. It´s nice that I get to see some of the students when I arrive at ICPNA for his lesson.

Yesterday at the gym I saw one of my students. She has huge muscles!! She yammered away at me in fast Spanish. Luckily all that was required of me was to nod my head in agreement. Good grief.

My Juniors all came and gave me a big hug goodbye and a kiss as usual yesterday. They are so sweet.

Haha, in my Pre-1V class one of my students came at the end of the class to ask a question and I thought he wanted a kiss, because that´s what students usually do at the end of the class, come and kiss you on the cheek. Hahahaha. It was okay though. I didn´t break out into mad hyena laughing.

I never wrote about the blankets. My blankets are alpaca wool. The wool gets absolutely everywhere. I look like an alpaca there is so much wool. Rosa gave me different blankets today. Yay for that!

The pics are of Otuzco.

Well, off to the gym again before I eat a meal fit for a King!

Ciao, Gemma

Raindrops keep falling on my head...

So, yesterday we had the mother of all rainfalls. It sounded like people were tap dancing on the roof. Irene and I went running like mad wild things up the stairs to rip the clothes off the line. It was intense, I think there should be a sport called mad clotheslining. Ahahaha. Okay, I am very sleep deprived. I didn´t get to bed until late and I woke up early.

Delicia is still not back. How unreliable is that? I have no idea when she will back, so I don´t know how many classes to plan. Obviously I don´t want to waste time preparing classes that I don´t have to teach.

Yesterday my two classes of kids were insane. It was awful. They were totally out of control. I don´t know why. I´m pretty happy none of them fell out of the window. It´s really hard to lay down the law when you don´t speak enough Spanish. I moved the bad kids as far away from the window as possible and they still tried to chuck things out of the window. I had to close it. At least half of them were acting like they had A.D.D. and spontaneously screaming etc. I really want Delicia to come back so I don´t have to teach 6-8 year olds anymore. At least I know that I never want to teach kids younger than 10. Valuable knowledge. When there are 10-15 of them and only one of me, they are all crazy, and my Spanish is rudimentary, it is very difficult.

The nicest part about yesterday? On Friday I told all my classes that Delicia would be back on Monday. When I walked into my class of Juniors (12 yr olds) yesterday they cheered me in. So that pretty much made my day. Espcially as I had just walked there in the mother of all rainfalls and was thus somewhat wet. The Doctor in my morning class said "if Delicia doesn´t come back tomorrow, it`s no problem for us" so that was nice too. Then today when I showed up to teach again Doctor said, "see you tomorrow" even though I told him Delicia would be back. I hope she is back, I would like some sleep. My Pre-1 class yesterday were all happy to see me but not so happy when I said it would my last class with them (they are only Mon, Wed, Fri). I think it´s pretty cool that I teach people who are intelligent enough to be doctors. The two above morning classes are lovely. I wish I kept them and gave Delicia my Pre-1V class, most of whom are my age or in their 20s and content to spend time laughing instead of concentrating on English, and the men try to flirt in English. I.e... the question in the workbook was describe people, and one of them decided to describe me. This was a little bizarre as he´s probably 30 ish and although he was very nice and not suggestive I don´t appreciate having students look at me in a way other than as an English teacher. They are very immature and tend to giggle at everything I say. It´s really annoying.

My last class yesterday was my favourite. My reg-1 class now has 28 students and I really enjoy teaching them. They are motivated and try hard. Yesterday the computer wouldn´t work and the pen ran out and I tripped over the garbage but no-one walked out. There is barely space for me to walk around the room to check work as it is so crowded, but they help each other out so that´s great. I wish I wasn´t so exhausted by the time their class starts. I made up a bunch of sentencs with mistakes I saw walking around the room and they had to correct them, and one woman said "Paris is a city" and some people said "no it´s not" and I said "it´s a country" and then I was like "oh my god. Paris is a city in France" so now it´s a joke that I think Paris is a country. At least we had a laugh. How embarrasing is that. I was so tired, which is a crap excuse I know. It´s hard though because the students who don´t understand don´t ask questions and don´t speak up in class. I had one student come after class to ask me if Wednesday would be easier. She never spoke up once when I was asking for questions, walking around the room etc. Oh well. Another girl came and told me I was a really good teacher. So that will probably keep me going for the next 3 months. So, in one evening of classes there a many highs and lows, but I am always exhausted at the end! I just hope that my all my students pass the midterm on Friday (to pass here you have to get 80%) and that my class isn´t observed. If Delicia observes my class I will be so nervous! I think it´s pretty bad that when I was observing she didn´t let me watch any of her classes, especially as those were the ones I´ve been teaching for a week. Maybe she doesn´t like to be criticised. I guess that all I can do is my best so I should stop worrying about everything.

Rosa and I go to the gym in the mornings now. That means we can go for 2 hours, yippee. I will die of exhaustion. After the gym they try to force all the food in the world down my throat. No, I am joking, but there is a lot of food. For me, the soup would be enough.

My Spanish is a constant frustration. Even though I am learning I just want to be fluent right now! I have no patience left, I want to understand what people say the first time in Spanish!

I was wrong, Mother´s Day here was Sunday, but they celebrate it from Saturday to Monday. Luis and Ana didn´t have school Monday. What a nice treat for all the mother´s, instead of a relaxing day with the kids at school and enjoying their company in the evening, they have to have the kids around all day.

Yesterday I met another teacher at ICPNA. So, I guess there is a male teacher. He only has one class though, hence why I have never seen him before. His English is pretty good (obviously as he teaches it), but not awesome. When the other teachers talk to me in English they make grammatical mistakes and use incorrect vocab sometimes. So, at least as English is my native language I have a slight advantage, maybe it makes up for my poor Spanish? Right, I´m supposed to stop worrying about things.

The pic is of Pisco Sour. It is officially my favourite alcoholic beverage, made in Peru. Rosa is going to teach my how to make it and I´m going to bring a bottle back and we will have it at my 19th. Yummmy. The other pic is a typical Peruvian soup. The name escapes me. I´m not too keen on the beans.

Today I feel a little sick. The first time since the bus here. I hope it goes away.

Did I write about Otuzco? I can´t remember. It was on Sunday. I don´t think I did. Okay on Sunday we went to the world´s most fanciest restaurant. My jaw dropped when we walked in. It was gorgeous. The chair´s were massive, and I couldn´t help but think that if you ate there everyday you would need a chair that size. I had this really good steak with peruvian sauce and some kind of Peruvian side dish thing with lots of mushrooms. Yummy. We also had starters which were excellent. I was confused though because they said it was with salsa which I thought meant spicy red stuff but here salsa is any kind of sauce. Anyway, after the meal for Mother´s Day we went to Otuzco to see the windows of the Incas, where they slept. It is so cool. I have photos but I will post them later. There were loads of people though cause it was Mother´s Day, so they said we would go back another time. I got this photo in this shop beside an Inca statue but they made me buy something so I got this cute little keyring for like 30 cents.

I will post more pics another time. The other pic is of my room here. Veryyyy nice :)

Cheers!

Pics

One of the hidden beauties of Peru. You blink and you miss it.

Sitting on the fountain in the Plaza of Celendin