Being a Pedestrian in Quito

First of all, let me just say that the keyboards are different here so forgive my spelling and typos. Other culture shocks so far: pedestrians have literally no rights here and traffic lights are optional so that is a little scary. Also people don´t believe in leashes for their dogs and there are a ton of strays. I am rethinking not getting that rabies shot...

So yesterday I had my first class. We really just talked about rules and safety and the documents we need for our censo and visa registration. It was really fun to meet everyone though. There are 15 of us: 11 girls and 3 boys besides me. Three girls, Caroline, Brittany, and Emily, live in my barrio which is called "Las Casas." Last night almost everyone on the program met up in the Mariscal (also known as Gringoland) to hang out. We went to a cafe where most people got beers but I hadn´t eaten and because of the altitude I stuck with hot chocolate. It was so good! It had whole almonds mixed in and thick whipped cream and it was very thick and rich. That is probably the only really good food I´ve had so far besides the fruit.

I took a cab back home with two girls from my barrio. So now I feel like a big kid. Today we went to El Capillo del Hombre which is a mueseum of art by the famous Ecuadoian artist Guayasamin. He is indigienous and his paintings depict the suffering of Latin America. The museum was on the opposite side of the city way up on a hillside and it had AMAZING views. Of course I didn´t bring my camera (!!!!) So now I know to bring it everywhere even if it ends up getting stolen because it sucks to be without it. It´s super sunny today and I think that I got burned really bad today. Ooops.

Me and six other girls from the program ate lunch together and bought cellphones. This afternoon I have more class and then a dinner with the program. My host mom wants to teach me to dance this evening (and maybe a friend or two as well.) We are going out to a salsa club tomorrow at 10:00 so I need to brush up. I like everyone on the program but I can definitely tell that we have some SERIOUS partyers on the trip. Maybe it will be good for me to get out and be a little crazy! I just want to be safe.

Unfortunately people on the program with the exception of one or two are really bad about speaking in Spanish which is kind of annoying. I don´t want to be the Hermione Granger of my trip but I also don´t want to talk in English all the time! Oh well, hopefully that will work itself out. After the first two weeks I´ll be spending most of my time with my family and my internship anyway.

Last but not least, this Saturday my host grandma´s exchange student is going to cook us a special Indian meal. I´m really excited! His name is Hardeep and he´s from Massachusetts. He´s here learning how to teach English as a second language. My host grandma lives in another seperate part of the same house so he basically lives with us and comes over a lot but he is moving to an apartment very soon. Hopefully he will still come around because I like him.