Prefe Briana!

Top of Chulucanas! I'm a giant!

 Wow! Where do I begin with my last couple of weeks...?? Guess life finally got busy, maybe even too busy!! I'm finally in a full on day to day routine, causing time to just fly bye! My weekly schedule looks about like this:

Back half of our house, my room is on the left!

Monday: Wake up at 5:30 to work out and have 2 hours to myself before I have to be at school at 7:30. I have three 1.5 hour classes (2C, 2A, 4B) with an hour and half break between my 2nd and 3rd period classes. Most of my teaching time is spent pronouncing words over and over again, stating significance, writing examples on the board and attempting to make students actually listen to me. I get home to Lacie and Chantelle where we make lunch together. Most of which consists of a lot of vegetables, chicken, and rice all mixed up in a pan with really good unknown spices. Siesta time is often spent with random visitors (mainly friends, yes we have friends, TONS actually, most of which guys and non of which call ahead of time nor understand what overstaying their welcome means) or university students needing things translated for them including their physics or statistics books (why the teacher just doesn't use a book in SPANISH is beyond us!).

Looking out towards the street of our house!

Tuesday: 5:30 wake up, 2B class, then off to the University for my 45 minute English class to a group of Argrodustrial students. My university classes are spent speaking more English, but also spent repeating myself over and over again, working on pronunciation, and doing listening activities. Then I am off to the Seminarian to teach 10 Seminaristas an hour and a half of the most basic English you can imagine. I walked in the first class and asked how much English they knew, got a blank stare so asked in Spanish and was given the answer of "Hello," that was all they knew. So we started with the ABC's! The sad part is all of them took 5 years of English in Secondario school, similar to what I do everyday. The problem is with their school system, after all is said and done they get about 45 minutes of English class a week (after teachers are 15 minutes late, take 10 minutes to plan what they are going to teach that day, 15 minutes to lecture about who knows what, and the last 5 minutes to chill), often times by a teacher that himself doesn't speak English, no wonder they learn nothing! Tuesday afternoon is spent similar to Monday with dinner at the Bishops house!

View from the Obispado of the street, plaza, and Cathedral

Wednesday: Can't get up at 5:30, too tired, get up at 6:30. Have my 5A, 3A, 5B classes, back to back, home by 1:00. Normally go out to lunch Wednesdays, for 5 soles ($2) a person, why not occasionally splurge! Have I told you how amazing food is in this country?? Wednesday night, often times we find someone that wants to feed us, yes people here love to cook for us, it's amazing! Then before bed we have our weekly community meeting and prayer.

Thursday: 5:30 wake up, breakfast normally consists of a banana with peanut butter (we have a PB obsession here), yogurt that you drink, the 18 sole ($7) box of cereal we bought in Piura with milk you buy warm, or a hard boiled egg. Head to school for my 4A, 4B tutoria class, then 1B, done by 11:50 :). Thursday's we go to Chantelle's host families restaurant for free lunch, so good! Then I have 4 classes that afternoon in the University!

Sunset over Chulu!

Friday: Attempt to wake up at 5:30, my walk to school takes me about 12 minutes, consists of saying "buenos dias" to every person I pass and every moto driver asking if I would like a ride. I have my 4B PFRH (persona, familia, relationes humanas) class, 3B, free block, 1A. The afternoon is spent like Monday and Tuesday.

Weekends here for most don't begin till Saturday night, so that is the night to go out, and we've sure done a good job and making sure that happens every week. But, Friday we often spend drinking on streets with friends, having friends over, going to watch Peru play Chile in the most popular club in Chulucanas with the owner, who we've made friends with. or staying in to watch a movie with a bottle of wine! Saturday day lately has been spent exploring Puira (where there is a Starbucks, Chile's and Pizza Hut), other small pueblos, the country side, the rivers, or cooking with friends. Sunday is spent recovering from not getting home till 6 am, church, and drinking more. But, unlike most Peruvians we do have to work on Monday's and don't believe in just not going due to drinking too much all day Sunday.

Drinking green mango juice for St Patty's Day!

Other fun facts of the past couple of weeks...I got bit by a dog, we lost electricity for a few days so had to cook with headlamps, we still lose running water often, our roof leaks waterfalls, we have a river in our street 4 feet deep when it rains that we have to swim through to get to our house, I have an infected bug bite on my arm that required a trip to the hospital, our internet goes out, the list continues but so does life here! It's all just part of the adventure, right?

El Fin de Verano!

After 9 months of permanent "Summer Vacation" I have finally officially began my first real life job!  My day begins at 7:30 AM with an all school assumbly of presenting the Peruvian flag (duck walk style), the Peruvian national anthum, Santisimo Cruz Colegio anthum, and of course prayer! Following the 20 to 30 minute assumbly students and professors are dismissed to our aulas!

My first week as an official teacher was spent often confused due to the lack of information given to me, the constant schedule changes due to early dismissal at the end of the day due to the first day of school, la dia de la mujer, and the heat of the afternoon, and lack of lesson planning! Not to mention the amount of time I'm left alone in my class with not a clue what to do next, but I guess they trust me?

Teachers are often late to class, or they leave the room to talk to another professor, or they just want to go talk on the phone outside the room. All of which is very normal! However, they are very strict with the kids, the students all stand when you enter the room, ask permission for everything, are not allowed to be late, talk when others are talking, and are yelled at often for bad work or lack of studying.

My favorite part is when we have breaks in the day and I can just sit and talk with the students! They love asking me hundreds of questions! They ask me what my state is like, if I have siblings, if I have a boyfriend and how much I miss him, how long is of a journey was it to get to Peru, what the food is like in the US, etc! Highlight of my Friday was in my last class, a boy at the end of our convo told me I was cool and gave me a kiss on the check! Then all the other students wanted a kiss goodbye too!

ohh Este Pais!

Well, our life just went from the slow lane to the fast lane real quick! Last week, my week was full of "training" to become a profesora of  11 to 17 year old kids! In reality this training was more so a really unnecessary bad RA training for 4 hours everyday where:
      -Everything moves very slow
      -Everything is a discussion
      -Everything is a process
      -Everyone has an opinion
      -Everything gets repeated 10 times
      -No one respects the other person talking, even when talking about respect
      -Nothing gets resolved
      -Snack time = best time

Other fun observations of the week:
     -Calling every Asian person Chino or Chinita (little china) is normal
     -Bring toilet paper with me EVERYWHERE
     -Think I'll get toned arms from fanning myself all day?
     -The teachers switch classrooms not the students
     -Lots of students repeat grades due to failing
     -Obama is on the news everyday
     -The Harlem Shake Colorado College Plane Dance on Youtube made news here
     -Instead of all students paying the same amount for school activities they all pay random amounts
     -It's rude for a guy not to pour a women's drink
     -Always kiss on the check with hello's and goodbye's even if it's only a 30 second conversation
    -Flowers are only given at the cemetery
    -Santisimo Cruz Colegio (the school I teach at) is the only Catholic School in Chulu
    -The more their voice cracks, they change their tone or fluctuation in their voice the better
    -Many people are very lazy, working 6 days a week, but often take 3 hour siesta, close shops early especially if raining, and watch tons of TV. Teachers mad about some working 22 hours a week when others have to work 26 hours a week

How they dress:
    -Like they are in the 90's
    -Jean dresses
    -Wedges, heels, or platform flip flops all day everyday
    -Really tight clothes even when really isn't flattering
    -SKINNY jeans
    -Colored leggings
    -Clunky jewelry
    -English T-Shirts, often don't even make sense
    -Guys wear leather sandals, cargo pants, and Holister T-Shirts
    -Wear tomorrow's clothes today after shower in the afternoon

Other fun events of the week:

Traveling on motorcycles with new friends, good thing max you can go in this city is around 15 mph before you hit a speed bump, intersection without stop signs, or something/ someone in your way

Got a tour of the city from the famous Bishop, learned where is dangerous, where is okay, and how we're suppose to avoid all dirt roads, go no where alone after 5 and there's a 1/4 mile road strip that is safe to run.

Learned how much we are really looked at as rich with lots of money to give out. We are often asked for money by kids and elders.



Getting to know my new co-teacher has been awesome! Yenny is  31 years od and has been teaching for 8 years. She is pumped to be my friend and teach me everything she knows! She is full of life, dresses adorably, everyone loves her, and wants to be my "sister!"

They don't understand why I only have one last name, they all take on their father's and mother's last name! oh p.s. my first name is Briana here!


We have this new awesome friend named Richard, who just finished serving in the US Army but is originally from Chulucanas. Richard has been a great person to show us around, protect us, and just having a friend is really nice!

Diabetes and Heart Problems have become a lot more common in Chulu with the amount of rice and sugar people eat everyday. Richard said in the last 5 years everyone has gotten fatter, women still try to look nice, but men just look fat.

Got fitted for my flight attendant looking uniform like I was being fitted for a wedding dress.

My students have 11 different subjects a week including home ec, psychology, work trades, and the usual science, math, communication, and English.

We went to Lacie's host sister's Quinceanera where they killed and cooked 10 ducks, we had cake, and met tons of family and neighbors! Her parent's were happy to welcome everyone into their little home in hopes of making it the best party they could afford to have for their daughter.

This week we moved into our new house and I've started teaching and 26 students from Villanova are here for the week! Stories to come!