Painting my toes...
Drying my nails with a notebook.
I finished my Reiki 2 training and now feel energy surging through me every second of every day. Gabriela and I are connected in a way that I’ve never been connected to anyone. We were sitting in our little kitchen the other night and she put her hand out in front of her as if she were pushing me (I was sitting at least 3 feet away) and I could feel the push against my stomach. It was insane. And then she started making faces (I think she was trying to get me to levitate) and I could feel that, too. Crazy shit.
Our friend, Jesus, came over last night to cook us dinner. His specialty: Chinese soup. Basically, it was snow peas, bean sprouts, 2 chicken drumsticks and 3 packages of Ramen. It wasn’t bad, but because he didn’t boil the water first (just filled the pot with the veggies and added water and brought it to a boil) I think today’s stomach issues were the result of his cooking methods. Thank goodness for my oils. I put a few drops of Di-Gize under my tongue and rubbed some grapefruit oil on my stomach and felt much better after my afternoon nap. Whew.
Stomach issues are rampant here. You have to boil your water. We usually boil a pot before bed and let it cool overnight and then fill our water bottles in the morning. It’s a good system and I should’ve told Jesus to use the boiled water last night when cooking. Disculpame (my fault).
On Sunday I met up with Alfredo, my former Spanish teacher from February, for a few hours. He’s in town for the week and then goes back to work in the mountains. We walked around and talked, eventually ending up at a café near my house and then back to my place so he could meet Gab. We hung out for about 4 hours and it was great. Lots of reminiscing and a bunch of new stories. We’ll probably see each other once or twice before he leaves again, but I don’t bank on anything with a Peruvian until it happens. That’s part of living in Peru. You just fly by the seat of your pants.
For example, if I set up a time to meet with a Peruvian friend, there’s a 75% chance that they won’t show. And if they do, they’ll be at least ½ hour late. Usually, it’s an hour. This is a difficult concept for a punctual American like me. It’s one of my tests, I just know it. I’m getting used to it, but if we’re supposed to meet at 4 pm, you can bet I’m still gonna be there at 4 – even if I have to wait until 5 before they show. I’ve been getting better though. Now I arrive around 4:15.
Saturday night, my friend Humberto cooked us Lomo Saltado, a typical Peruvian dish, in our little kitchen. We shopped at my new favorite market (basically a street full of vendors with all of their produce for sale on tarps on the ground – ridiculously cheap but still good stuff), got some carne (meat) at Mega (the supermercado – I won’t buy my meat from the street vendors – at least, not yet), and walked back to my place to start cooking. On the way home, I ran into Karem, the director of the program I came here with back in February. I hadn’t told anyone from that program (other than Alfredo, who doesn’t work with them anymore) that I was back in Cusco (not sure why, just didn’t feel compelled), so she was pretty shocked to see me, let alone find out that I was living here now. We exchanged phone numbers and she told me she’d call me the next day, which means sometime next week in Peruvian time. No worries.
Back to the lomo. It was sooooo good. Humberto spent some time in culinary school and his precision with the knife was impressive. I’m not so precise, so the two of us working in a kitchen together is kind of comical. Let’s just say he was less than impressed with my skills. So I stepped back and let him take over, since he offered to cook, and I’m glad that I did. Letting go in the kitchen is a challenge for me – letting go of control in general is difficult (I’m working on it), but doing so in the kitchen is especially hard. I think I did OK. The dish was absolutely amazing. It’s composed of rice, strips of beef sautéed with onions, tomatoes, red pepper, a little garlic and ginger with papas fritas (fried potatoes) on the side. Gab and I stuffed ourselves stupid.
The food coming out of our little kitchen has been awesome. We make popcorn on a regular basis, cook oatmeal, French toast and grilled cheese sandwiches for breakfast; stir fries, soups and veggie burgers for dinner (and then reheated for lunch the next couple of days). Celia (another housemate) even made delicious chocolate chip oatmeal cookies in our frying pan the other day. Humberto thinks the way we cook is a little crazy, but he’s liked everything that’s come out of our kitchen so far though (and I’m the primary cook), but I have to admit that I was a little annoyed when he told me that he’s constantly surprised by how good our food is. Fucker.
My last day of Spanish class is tomorrow (Wednesday). I’ve been taking them for the past two weeks (you get them free when you do TEFL) and since there have been no other students except for the first day and today (today’s addition was a French girl and a much better speaker than the first one), it’s basically been one-on-one with Anna Maria, my beloved teacher. We’ve talked about EVERYTHING (and mostly in Spanish) and it’s been great. Since Susie is coming on Saturday and Anna Maria is going on vacation for 2 weeks after Susie leaves, I think I’m going to take a month off from these classes and return mid September for one more month, as the classes have been super helpful with my grammar. Humberto, Jesus and every other native Spanish speaker is still correcting every word that comes out of my mouth, but my goal by next month is to have them correct every other word.
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