It's been a while.....

I've been working on this entry for about two weeks. It's time I finish it. This won't be as detailed as I would like...

I went on a trip with my director, Paco, two weeks ago on a Wednesday night. We took a bus to Trujillo, which is a beautiful city about 8 hours north of Lima. That next morning we arrived in Trujillo, found a hotel, and immediately went on two tours--to la huaca de la luna and the city of Chan Chan. Both of these are ruins of the Moche culture, which is a pre-Incan culture. We had a tour guide for both of these tours, and honestly he was pretty bad. But the ruins really are pretty amazing. You can see in my pictures how much of these ruins still remain. Also, Trujillo itself is very beautiful--the plaza de armas and iglesia are gorgeous, and you can feel how much more "tranquilo" it is than Lima.

After spending the night in Trujillo, we took a bus (3 hours) up to Chiclayo. Chiclayo itself is not much of a city, but there are two museums in nearby Ferranafe and Lambayeque. In Ferranafe, there is the museum of Sican, which was a culture after the Moche but before the Incas. In Lambayeque I went to perhaps the best museum I've ever been to in my life, that of the Lord of Sipan. The Lord of Sipan was a ruler of the Moche culture, and the contents of this tomb are spectacular and incredibly well-intact. For example, they had enormous necklaces made out of tiny little shell beads, and these sort of large earrings made of gold with intricate carvings and turqoise accents. Anyway, it was really neat, especially if you like museums.

From Chiclayo we took a 3 hour bus ride to Piura, the town where Paco is from. We had dinner with his sister and her husband, which was really delicious. Her house was beautiful, too. That night we went straight to Colan, which is a tiny fishing town on the coast. It used to be a pretty prosperous, popular resort town, but an El Nino hit hard and practically destroyed it. Paco told me that people set up temporary houses and other buildings but never made them permanent for fear that another El Nino would hit and destroy everything again. You can definitely see the destruction of the buildings from the tide, which reaches to almost the floor of the houses on the coast every morning. We stayed in a little run down hotel on the coast, and the water woke me up at about 5am because it was so close to the floor. The town is incredibly calm, and all you see are fishing boats and families relaxing or playing soccer on the beach. A stone's throw away from the beach it is desert...the one interesting attraction is the first church ever built in Peru is there in Colan (I have a picture of the sign in my picasa photos). There were a few tourists from around Peru staying on the beach, but you won't find Colan in any guidebook.

The reason we went to Colan was that Paco is writing a novel called "El Ultimo Verano en Colan," or The Last Summer in Colan. It's partly about Colan in the future, after it's been hit by another El Nino and global warming...I think it's got a sad ending! Paco has had a very interesting life to say the least, so I know his book will be worth reading! The two of us ate a lot of fresh fish. One night we also ate this HUGE meal of lomo saltado (chopped up beef), rice, fried potatoes, and two tamalitos verdes (a food from the north), and it cost us $2.50 a piece! I couldn't believe it. But the food was great, which makes sense because the north is known for having some of the best food in Peru. At least that's what Paco told me, and he's from Piura. :) After Colan we returned to Piura to eat lunch with Paco's sister again in nearby Catacaos. We had another fantastic meal...ceviche de mero, tamalitos verdes, and a yuca dish. It's funny because most dishes here come with rice and another starch...I haven't eaten so many carbohydrates as I have in the past five weeks here in Peru!

We left Piura at 6:30 pm on Sunday (we spent about a day and a half in Colan), and arrived after a 14 hour bus ride in Lima at 8:30 am. I had class at 9:00 am. It was interesting. But I made it to my first Spanish class, and it was pretty good. We mostly just conversed, which is definitely the most helpful for me at this point. My class has three girls--me, a girl Jin from China, and a girl Carla from Brasil. Our profesora is a very colorful person, but very nice. The class is incredibly informal, but I think I will learn something. The classes are at the Instituto de Idiomas (language institute) of la Catolica, and there are people from all around the world all taking Spanish at the same time and at different levels. It's kind of a neat environment, and it's cool to hear other people's accents. I have to take a micro every morning to school, about half an hour.

la Catolica is such a great environment, and our friends are fantastic. I seriously walked from one building to another on this tiny campus and came across four of my Peruvian friends (granted I was super late to my class as a result, but my professor didn't mind at all...). The university feels so small even though there are more students enrolled here than at UVa. Lunches at Catolica are fantastic--although they always take 2 hours because of the conversations we have. Last Friday our UVa group did a little presentation at the "Global Village" on Virginia. We made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, which I don't really like, and I think it was clear that Peruvians aren't quite as nuts for it as USers who grew up on the stuff. But it was really fun.

I also met a fantastic girl from Brazil in my Spanish class, who is actually half Peruvian and living with her family here. I'm going to go have a Brazilian lunch at her home in about 2 hours. Should be great!

Picture update: I've posted most but not all of my pictures of the north on picasaweb but I haven't added captions yet.

Chao, all!
S