La vida en Arequipa

Entonces, hace una semana he llegado aca en Arequipa.

The city, 'la ciudad blanca' is full of beautiful colonial buildings, churches, fine foods and lovely people, all overlooked by Misti the volcano, see below.

Cheery chums

It's really interesting to hop from one NGO to another and see how differently stuff is done.
Intiwawa has several different projects all over the place. They help in a local primary school with English classes (one of the actual English teachers couldn't speak english!), in a kindergarten in San Isidro, which is an hour out of Arequipa, and there are Interculturalidad projects in 2 villages way out of town, teaching a group of kids about other cultures, teaching them about their rights and also a bit of English.
And the main project, tareas, where I go every afternoon is in San Isidro, a tiny village an hour away on the bus.
Buses here are mental. They cram so many people in, like 20 people in a pretty small aisle and it is very rare to get a seat. There is just no limit to the amount of people you can fit on, there will be people hanging out of the doorway, and if you are at the back getting off is always a mission. Then we have to walk a mile or so to the house, or sometimes we get lifts in the back of pick-up trucks, living on the edge.
About 30-40 kids from age 3 to 14 come every day after school to la Casa Intiwawa, a big house where they can come and do their homework with our help and all of the books they have there and have fun and just be kids. Which they are really good at!

On not great photo of the house

I have seen some crazy homework. One kid in the 6th grade had maths homework which took 4 of us to work out. Maths is definitely different in different countries... Really often they have to copy pages and pages of text book, even if they don't understand it! Or like 20 times the letters 'ma' then 20 mu's mi's and mo's. I don't miss homework.  Then we do games, try and keep them under control and then they have dinner which is cooked by a local mama.
All the work is done by volunteers which is amazing but a wee bit precarious, as numbers must change so much throughout the year, so I am going to help with advertising also. The week before I came there were 4 volunteers, but now there are 14 of us! As well as a lot of Peruvians who help once a week or co-ordinate the projects.
Have a looksie;http://www.intiwawa.org
The house is surrounded by hills and it is so beautiful at sunset....

This week has been really lovely and chill. We have been enjoying the hostel and the beautiful patio with coca leaf tea, where I am sharing a rom with the lovely Beth my friend from home. We also spend a lot of time in the volunteer house, as well as a lot of time walking all the way there, cooking, and eating a lot of pasta with pre prepared veg you can buy in the market in little bolsitas, which I am already a bit sick of, and lots of eggs. Arequipa is full of tasty treats, such as queso helado 'cheese ice-cream' which sounds suspicious but is in fact delicious, ceviche; seafood and lemon juice, which I have mixed feelings about, granadilla my favourite fruit which looks like slimy frogspawn...

 The city is really nice just to walk around; I could happily wander all day long. There is a beautiful plaza with a cathedral and a fountain, a million pigeons who ain't scared of no-one and people who without fail ask me if I want to buy sunglasses despite the fact I am actually wearing a pair. By night:

We also found the most beautiful cafe ´cafe y vino´ which is on the balcony of this courtyard right in the center but is so quiet, you can sit on the sofa outside and see over all the rooftops. It's a french place and I could very happily go on my own and listen to the one lady who is there absolutely every night talking with the french owner and chuckle at the et euuuuuuhhh et bof et bref. Golden.

Beth y yo also joined a gym which is really out of character as I would never join a gym in England, but it is 11$ for the month so I am deeming it acceptable. Entonces we have both been aching for the last few days, my pain is in the abs so every time I laugh or cough or try and pick something up it means serious pain!

Last weekend we also went to see Amy Winehouse which was an interesting experience. Here she is in person;

And even got the karaoke face out...

Cracking. I am going to go bed and then to the biggest canyon in the world tomorrow! I will bring y'all some photos!