Homestay

I have a host family here in Lima, which right now is just my host mom, Enma.  She also has a granddaughter who lives with her, but she's in the U.S. right now with her mom so I haven't met her.  I'm not entirely sure when she's coming back...  Enma and I get along well.  A lot of the time when I'm home I hang out in my room and she in hers, but we always eat dinner together and watch a Peruvian telenovela (soap opera) called "Al fondo hay sitio" ("There's a place in the back" is how I think it translates.)  It's quite dramatic, as soap operas are wont to be, and I don't like a lot of the characters because they're overdramatic or crazy or some mixture of both.  But it's good listening comprehension practice and I can learn about culture and such as well.

This is the front of my building.  I live in the district of Miraflores on the sixth floor of an apartment building (two apartments per floor).  The apartment is nice with 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, two sitting areas, dining room, kitchen, and laundry area.  It's about 5 blocks from the clifftops overlooking the ocean.  I enjoy walking along the malecón, which is the parks and walkways along the cliffs, enjoying the outdoors and listening to the ocean below.  I tend to go walking just before sunset so I have a lot of pictures of the sun setting and the ocean and an island off the coast... it's just always so picturesque. 

So far Enma and I have watched a movie together, gone to visit her mother's grave on her birthday, and visited with several friends and family members.  My second Sunday here, we went to have lunch at the house of some of Enma's friends.  It was a good afternoon, but I also think I got told that I have the face of a 14- or 15-year-old and that I need to go to the beach to get a tan (coming from Wisconsin winter, I'm pretty pale... not that I can really tan either...).  Ha. 

Then this past Sunday we visited Enma's sister.  Her grandson came in and Enma told me to go with him so he could teach me something... I wasn't entirely sure what was going on.  So I went with this guy whose about my age that I just met, and ended up helping him make cachangas (fried rolled-out dough which we then put mashed avocado on).  It was a little awkward, but the cachangas were good.  I was so full though after a big lunch and then cachangas, and my host mom was like "Eat, eat!"  Thank you, but please no more!  :-)

Here's my room... a little bare, but suitcases have their weight limits and I have what I need.  I also have a lot of shelving and other storage space in my room.

Sunset out my window.