A is for Amazon

Lima is on the coast of Peru, along the Pacific Ocean. Further into the country there are mountains, country and then ... the Amazon!

The Amazon River

We walked along this little river one morning to go bird watching. We saw hawks and herons and parakeets and who knows the names of the others!

This tree is called Palmarosa.. pink palm?

Tree Frog!

We stopped at this 'floating house' for lunch while we were going down the Amazon River. There was this baby playing with a piglet.. but then the baby started to cry.. nobody was really paying attention, so i went and pushed the pig away and it kept nuzzling me too, then it bit me! Not in a mean way, but in a 'hungry piglet' way, i guess.. so i tell someone that it was biting the baby and they're like.. noooo.. i said, "well it bit me!" and they're like, "nah" and still didn't worry about it :/

One night, pulling away the curtain to go into the bathroom, something flew across the room and dove into the toilet... i jumped back and said.. "Erin! there's a bird in the toilet! What do i do?!" So went to take a look and this is what we saw...

The toilet wasn't flushing.. now i just felt bad for the bat. I ran out and found a large branch and saved it's poor little pee-soaked body!

One day we went to this 'island' in the river (it's a REALLY wide river). this was the surface of it.. just dry-ish mud, not so hard that we didn't leave footprints or sink sometimes as we walked. We had a LOT of fun here!


3-Toed Sloth!!

They said it had a baby with it, but we couldn't see it.

Little crocodiles or 'caymans'. They were youngins being protected in a deep mud-walled well. A guy lowered himself down about 15 feet in there to get them for us.. we were a little afraid he'd be eaten and told him not to go.. i guess he just thought that was funny.
yeah.. we ended up holding them in our mouths.. maybe not the best idea ever, but a good photo opp., huh?!
We had little shadows for a little while. Dance party in the village one night! We just danced around a candle and had flashlights for strobe lights :)


Back in the city, we went through the market they call the 'floating market of Belen' because when the water is high (about half the year) the first floors of all the houses in this area are submerged. There is still a market, however, on the second floors and people go from shop to shop in boats. We were able to walk along the street though. I guess the water gets about 15 feet high when it's there, though!
THE END!
(obviously there's more.. but it'll have to be told in person)

The Amazon

So.. being in South America, it's only logical that Erin and I want to go to the Amazon. Last night, I went to her place so that we could try to figure out when, etc. Well, we talked with Carolin, from Germany, and we're booking the flight today to Iquitos!

From Iquitos, a large city, we'll then head into the Amazon. So, I wasn't really sure exactly how far into the Amazon we'd be.. just on the edge? Well, I found a map and here it is... I've circled where we'll be. .. you think that's deep enough into the jungle?!

I know it's kinda hard to see.. so here's a link to the map, just look for Iquitos... http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.amazondiscover.com/images/homepage/amazon_map01.gif&imgrefurl=http://www.amazondiscover.com/amazon_map.htm&h=800&w=489&sz=36&tbnid=sDSjBULb8euhAM:&tbnh=143&tbnw=87&prev=/images%3Fq%3Damazon%2Bmap%26um%3D1&start=3&sa=X&oi=images&ct=image&cd=3

Huacachina

Last weekend, Erin and I went to a place called Huacachina, an oasis in a desert!

Population: 200.

The first thing we did after setting up at the hostel was head out in dune buggies- climbing dunes and fishtailing across this vast sea of sand! It was exhilirating as well as terrifying. (my seatbelt was a little less than what I imagine the security standards to be) The guide took care of us, though, and it was AWESOME.

Then they let us out at the top of a tall dune and we played around for a while

until we hit the slopes.

So we were driven up to a peak, then we slid down on our bellies on boards like snowboards... but for sand, haha. Imagine rushing down a hill.. how long should it take to get to the bottom? 5 seconds? 10? It took us about 15 to 20 seconds to get to the bottom of these dunes!! They were really tall! At one point, I drug my feet into the sand behind me to slow me down.. it worked, but my jeans started filling up with sand! By the time i got to the bottom, I couldn't stand up and had to roll over to first massage, then dump the sand out of my jeans, haha. It was as if someone had just poured buckets of sand into them!

We got to play around some more as the sun was setting.

We went back to the hostel and had a BBQ, then that night we went to a club, danced and danced.. afterwards we went out to try to climb a dune along the side of the road to see if we could get an open view of the stars.. but 1) it is SOOO hard to climb a dune! Most decided to stop at 1/8ths of the way. I and two others FINALLY made it to the top to collapse on the other side of the peak at a plateau. It was BEAUTIFUL, but there was quite a bit of fog.. I couldn't see Erin at the spot where they'd stopped, and it covered a lot of the sky. It was still amazing. When I decided to head back down, I started jogging down the dune.. but it's hard to run downhill at a steady pace.. I kept picking up speed, I can't really see where anyone is.. I try to swerve side to side while screaming from excitement and a little afraid at the same time, I see their shadows and I try to do a baseball slide only to go tumbling, haha. I stopped in a heap of sand dust and had to lay there for a minute to take stock of myself.

I had sand in about every part imaginable, but

thankfully I was in one piece!

The next day we pretty much just lazied around by the lake. The weather was perfect, warm and sunny and not humid. We did eventually have to leave to catch the 4 hour bus back to Lima, though.

What a GREAT weekend!!

Classes

Whew! It's been a week since I last wrote and a LOT has happened already!

Wel, I've got my classes set. I'm only going to get one class to transfer to IU as something I need.. so I figured since i have 8 more credits to fill, I'll have some fun here. I'm taking General Theory of Language as the transfer class.... ANNNND i'm taking a Musical Creativity Workshop (right now we have to compose short little ditties- VERY simple and a bit boring), I'm also taking Women's sports and Modern Dance!! I was hoping the last two would give me a bit of a workout. So, on Wednesday I had my first Women's sports class. It went well.. we did a lot of running then a physical fitness test with doing these step up and down things for 5 minutes.. my legs were pretty tired after the class, but it wasn't bad. Afterwards, the teacher asked me what sports I've played in the past.. I told her soccer, basketball, volleyball and high jump. Sooo she led me to some coaches and said, there you go, want to be on the team? haha, i thought this was just a gym class! I didn't realize i'd be playing for some peruvian university's sports team!

So thursday I went into the school (i have no classes thursdays or fridays) and met and trained with the track coach. It was so much fun to do high jump again!! Although I was really really bad in comparison with what I used to do.. but it's been 5 years and i weigh more, so what should I expect? So we talked about how I should get back in shape, etc.. so I did a LOT of running, jump-roping and random other exercises, then he let me go and I went to play volleyball. I warmed up with them (UGHH more running!) and then in the middle of playing, the coach pulled me out and asked if i wanted to go try out soccer, because their practice was about to start. Sooo off i went for more running and warm-ups! Then I scrimmaged for about 30 minutes and started to head home... but i saw the volleyball people were still playing, so i joined them again :)

OOOOOoooooOOOOWwww. Walking home was tough.. moving after I got home was tough, waking up Friday morning OUCH. I stretch and i stretch.. but 5 minutes later, I feel like i have stones in my calves! I head off to the university again for more practice with the high jump coach, but he tells me that he saw me playing soccer and volleyball, so i should take the day off and rest this weekend or else i could pull a muscle or so. So back home I went.

It's Friday night. I just got back from this really cool water park.. it's huge and full of really creative water fountains and water shows. My legs have still been full of rocks all day, my calf muscles grinding within themselves whenever I move, but it's a good feeling, too.. knowing I'm back in sports after so long!!

I've been having a cough and just annoying cold.. but after the water park we went to "The street of the pizzas" where we sat and had a bit to eat and drink.. and there I lost my voice. :/ So here I am, sipping tea and hoping my body gets back to normal by Monday!

I should have known better

I thought things were going too well. On Sunday, I made up two different schedules of possible courses to take. I chose one option and started attending the classes and so far, so good. One class I don't really know anything about because the teacher didn't show up either of the two days we had it, but I made a friend while waiting for the class, and he is really nice and says it should be ok and will help me if it's tough. I also went to a history class that I REALLY enjoyed and another class that didn't really spark my interest too much the first day, but the syllabus looked cool, and I've stepped out of my comfort zone to take a dance class and had a great time the first day. Too easy, right? Right.

On Tuesday I got an email from IU saying that my application to enter the School of Education was declined because i didn't have enough courses in my concentration area (Spanish) .. WHHAAT? I didn't freak out because I figured I knew the reason for the problem, which I did.. that my classes from Spain weren't placed on my transcript yet. So I contacted IU and got 7 emails the next day from 3 different advisors (one from the school of Education, one from the overseas study office, and the other from the Spanish Department) .. the first one said the only thing I could do was write a letter asking for temporary/conditional acceptance into the school and show them later that i have enough credits.. to do this, I'd have to have the letter to them by 5pm on Wednesday the 20th.. uh, hello?? that was an hour before I checked my email and only ONE day after I received notification that my application was denied. How do they expect a person to do that?! But then, I read the following emails and my Spain classes were quickly put onto my transcript and that part is taken care of.

Erin's House

Now that the classes are on my transcript, I know now for sure what credits my courses transferred as. That changes everything. Now some of the classes that I've chosen for here are unnecessary. So I need to find other classes that will hopefully transfer as something else I need for my major. Not as easy as it might seem. I've been writing emails and calling IU all day today. There's a course that MIGHT be able to be counted as an Education course, but I was told that the school of Education RARELY transfers study-abroad classes because they and the state are super strict about the education of future teachers. There's a credit that MIGHT be covered by a class I took in Spain that was transferred as a different credit, an unnecessary one. If it's not covered, I need to find a class here that will. The class in which I made the friend but the teacher didn't show up to is "definitely" going to transfer as a different credit that I need.. awesome, now I just hope it's a good class that won't kill me (it's called Theory of Language).

IF I don't need to take an extra class for the spanish credit and IF the education course won't count.. I think i'm just going to take Gym and be done with it. Might as well get a little exercise while I'm here.

All this needs to be done and my classes turned in by tomorrow. Wish me luck!