What To Do Tomorrow…

We are very slowly…muy lentatmente (I had to look that up, by the way)…settling into a routine. Which so far seems to be: school, supermarket, a long walk that involves ice cream, relaxing after the walk, back to the apartment. It doesn’t sound like much but some how, so far, it seems to fill the day. We are trying to save the touristy stuff for when my parents come visit next week. (We are also going to Machu Picchu with them, I cannot wait!)

Sean, of course is up before the sun rises to do work and watch the fog roll off the Pacific. The apartment has floor to ceiling windows in the living room and you feel as if you are suspended above the park and the ocean. The four of us walk to school together, notebooks and folders in hand, trying to carefully cross the busy streets which mostly have no crosswalks and drivers that think they are in a Mario Brothers game. We scatter to our different classes: Sean is in class for four hours and the kids and I are there for two hours. I know that I am ready to leave after two hours of only speaking (trying to speak is more accurate) Spanish. My teacher, Marco is so nice and patient but I worry that he must think that I am total idiot: How is it possible for someone to have studied Spanish for as long as I did and still not be able to be able to tell him what time I woke up? The kids are in the room right next to mine and spend half the time laughing. They are picking up Spanish so quickly; I am jealous. There is one student from Finland and I refuse to speak with him in Finnish for fear of completely losing whatever Spanish I have picked up during the last few days. He seems to understand.

While Sean is still in class or off at meetings, the kids and I at some point seem to end up at the enormous and curiously stocked Supermercado Wong to pick up one thing or another that we have forgotten, marveling at the different fruits and vegetables, wondering why they sell limes but not lemons. I have never seen so many different kinds of potatoes in one place. There are hundreds of different yogurts and the milk is mostly sold in bags. Like the city dwellers we are this summer, we walk home with bags weighing us down.

We have been cooking at least one meal at home as we test out the different ingredients. Thank goodness Sean insisted we bring a set of knives with us. The kitchen in the apartment is big but not very functional but we have been making do and have cooked a couple of good meals so far. (The beef from Uruaguay is amazing.) We have also been continuing to try out the restaurants. The food is so good here; it’s lucky that we are walking a lot. The kids have been such great sports about it. I love walking and looking around and it’s the only way I can get my bearings since I cannot read a map to save my life. I am still getting lost (I blame the Southern Hemisphere!) but we always manage to find our way home.

But despite the routine there are constant reminders that we are not at home: Today we stumbled upon Huaca Pucllana, an ancient clay pyramid in the middle of our neighborhood of Miraflores.