On the rooftop taking a break from studying....
On the rooftop studying Espanol with Alicia; a great tutor! (although she's French, speaks awesome English and Spanish as well)
Monday, July 23, 2012
Teresa taking us to the airport! Thanks for the stop at Dunkin Donuts as we didn't eat again until midnight!
With all of our luggage....thankfully it has all arrived here now
The front of the house
Backyard...great place for studying spanish
Dining room
Kitchen
Tree in the middle of the house :)
One of the views from the rooftop...couldn't get a good picture...
Upstairs t.v. room with Dave
Here are some pictures of the house...not really any of the town because I keep forgetting my camera but a couple of the house. When Alice gets home I will try to get some pics from her...its hard to describe the city in words so we'll get some pictures soon (or when we get back from Sucre)! The weather has been beautiful...in the 70's (which is great for now but somewhat worrisome since this is the middle of the winter!)
Manana a Sucre!
Well we have had an eventful (almost) week in Santa Cruz.
Quick recap: we had a fiesta for Johanna who turned 13 this week; we explored the city on foot; we completed most of the visa process; we practiced Spanish; we booked our flights for tomorrow for language school in Sucre.
Longer recap:
Wed July 18th:
We had our lunch with Dr. Douglas which ended up being a fiesta for Johanna who was turning 13! We had the most delicious meal with Johanna, her mom, Dr. Douglas and several of their family friends (with the best cooked pork ribs ever and an awesome cake). After the fiesta, Maricella took us on our first Micro ride (a small bus/large van that runs like a bus and will stop to pick you up if you wave at them) to el centro de la ciudad (the center of the city). There she took us to several small art/history museums and to the top of the tower in the cathedral downtown. There happened to be a large rally in the center of the city that day; apparently the government wants to build a "highway" through the country side which will interfere with a river that many people depend on for their day to day survival. Hundreds of indigenous people were in the city center protesting against this, waving flags, setting off firecrackers, and speaking on stage.... Unfortunately we have forgotten to bring our camera anywhere with us this week so we don't have pictures at this time; however, Alice (the 21 year old from France who is also staying at the house) might have a picture from the rally.... Later that evening we met up with Alice who took us to a local bar that some of her friends had shown her. (Mom and Dad maybe don't read this next part....I promise we are being safe). Anyways at first we were very skeptical because basically she took us to literally a big red door on the side of a building; there was no sign above the door or windows that we could see. After ringing to doorbell about 5 times someone eventually came to the door and asked us how we found this place because we sure didn't look like locals...however she let us in and it was awesome. It ended up being a huge courtyard with a firepit; it was run by some young people from France, Czechoslavakia, and maybe Bulgaria. We stayed there most of the evening and met some of Alice's work friends who are local Bolivians; it was awesome talking to them (or trying to talk to them...) And guess what, there is soooo much icecream in Bolivia! Great news.
Thurs and Fri July 19th-20th:
We met with a lawyer set up by Dr. Douglas in order to try to work on our year long visa (which is actually a temporary 1 year residency). It was awesome; she used to be the head of immigration so she knows everyone! What usually takes at least several weeks took us two days to do; we taxied around to several places to get paperwork done and got to skip all the lines :) It was awesome! We also found our new favorite store that sells delicious homemade juices. We went there twice in one day....but it was soo good!
Sat July 21st
Lots of studying...packing for our trip to Sucre...
Sun July 22nd
Well this was quite a day...we woke up early to walk to the bus station to buy an overnight bus ticket to Sucre (around a 14 hour bus ride with apparently no bathroom stops). The bus station was somewhat crazy; intially we didn't know what was going on because there were people everywhere asking about getting to Sucre, either trying to buy or illegally sell tickets. All of the bus companies were sold out of tickets to Sucre at 9:30am, something that never happens! Apparently the buses to Sucre had not been running for 3 days so they were all packed (we have no idea why they were not running so it may be a good thing that we didn't get on the bus as they were likely all going to be packed and possibly there were problems with the roads...) So....after not getting a bus ticket we walked to the airport near our house but they were also sold out of tickets for the next two days. So then our next big adventure...Dave drove the manual car to the other airport, all the way across town! We got there and back with the car in one piece (thanks to Dave) and without getting lost (thanks to me)...So although we had wanted to go to Sucre by Monday morning the only tickets anyone had left were for Tues morning! Needless to say, by the afternoon we were fairly tired after walking at least 5 miles. We ended up trying a restaurant for dinner recommended by the past coordinators, Picolo. The food was pretty good and it was very cheap, always a plus. Again I wish I would have brought a camera; this was an outdoor restaurant with orange and neon green balloons everywhere, a playplace like at McDonalds, a singer and guitar player, and people dressed up like Barney and Baby Bop! After dinner we shared a cerveza with Nico, listening to music and me attempting to speak Spanish....The temperature here has been awesome!
Quick recap: we had a fiesta for Johanna who turned 13 this week; we explored the city on foot; we completed most of the visa process; we practiced Spanish; we booked our flights for tomorrow for language school in Sucre.
Longer recap:
Wed July 18th:
We had our lunch with Dr. Douglas which ended up being a fiesta for Johanna who was turning 13! We had the most delicious meal with Johanna, her mom, Dr. Douglas and several of their family friends (with the best cooked pork ribs ever and an awesome cake). After the fiesta, Maricella took us on our first Micro ride (a small bus/large van that runs like a bus and will stop to pick you up if you wave at them) to el centro de la ciudad (the center of the city). There she took us to several small art/history museums and to the top of the tower in the cathedral downtown. There happened to be a large rally in the center of the city that day; apparently the government wants to build a "highway" through the country side which will interfere with a river that many people depend on for their day to day survival. Hundreds of indigenous people were in the city center protesting against this, waving flags, setting off firecrackers, and speaking on stage.... Unfortunately we have forgotten to bring our camera anywhere with us this week so we don't have pictures at this time; however, Alice (the 21 year old from France who is also staying at the house) might have a picture from the rally.... Later that evening we met up with Alice who took us to a local bar that some of her friends had shown her. (Mom and Dad maybe don't read this next part....I promise we are being safe). Anyways at first we were very skeptical because basically she took us to literally a big red door on the side of a building; there was no sign above the door or windows that we could see. After ringing to doorbell about 5 times someone eventually came to the door and asked us how we found this place because we sure didn't look like locals...however she let us in and it was awesome. It ended up being a huge courtyard with a firepit; it was run by some young people from France, Czechoslavakia, and maybe Bulgaria. We stayed there most of the evening and met some of Alice's work friends who are local Bolivians; it was awesome talking to them (or trying to talk to them...) And guess what, there is soooo much icecream in Bolivia! Great news.
Thurs and Fri July 19th-20th:
We met with a lawyer set up by Dr. Douglas in order to try to work on our year long visa (which is actually a temporary 1 year residency). It was awesome; she used to be the head of immigration so she knows everyone! What usually takes at least several weeks took us two days to do; we taxied around to several places to get paperwork done and got to skip all the lines :) It was awesome! We also found our new favorite store that sells delicious homemade juices. We went there twice in one day....but it was soo good!
Sat July 21st
Lots of studying...packing for our trip to Sucre...
Sun July 22nd
Well this was quite a day...we woke up early to walk to the bus station to buy an overnight bus ticket to Sucre (around a 14 hour bus ride with apparently no bathroom stops). The bus station was somewhat crazy; intially we didn't know what was going on because there were people everywhere asking about getting to Sucre, either trying to buy or illegally sell tickets. All of the bus companies were sold out of tickets to Sucre at 9:30am, something that never happens! Apparently the buses to Sucre had not been running for 3 days so they were all packed (we have no idea why they were not running so it may be a good thing that we didn't get on the bus as they were likely all going to be packed and possibly there were problems with the roads...) So....after not getting a bus ticket we walked to the airport near our house but they were also sold out of tickets for the next two days. So then our next big adventure...Dave drove the manual car to the other airport, all the way across town! We got there and back with the car in one piece (thanks to Dave) and without getting lost (thanks to me)...So although we had wanted to go to Sucre by Monday morning the only tickets anyone had left were for Tues morning! Needless to say, by the afternoon we were fairly tired after walking at least 5 miles. We ended up trying a restaurant for dinner recommended by the past coordinators, Picolo. The food was pretty good and it was very cheap, always a plus. Again I wish I would have brought a camera; this was an outdoor restaurant with orange and neon green balloons everywhere, a playplace like at McDonalds, a singer and guitar player, and people dressed up like Barney and Baby Bop! After dinner we shared a cerveza with Nico, listening to music and me attempting to speak Spanish....The temperature here has been awesome!
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Estamos Aqui!
Greetings from Bolivia!!! We arrived safe and sound yesterday morning after an exciting trip to Miama--Miami airport closed down due to heavy weather and we flew over it until we almost ran out of gas. So we landed in West Palm Beach where we sat for 2 hrs on the plane while it refueled. We touched down in Miami at 1030 with our connection at 1035. Fortunately we were only 5 gates away as we sprinted through the airport (Home Alone style...) and made it just in time for last call. Our seats had already been given away so we both were forced to settle for middle seats 12 rows apart. Thankfully, we landed safely in La Paz and then Santa Cruz. Unfortunately it was sin (without) luggage. We were picked up and brought back to the Santa Cruz house which is a beautiful 2 story, 6 bedroom, 3 bathroom house for all the volunteers and random others who are friends with those down here. We met Nico who lives full time in the house and does some of the cooking and cleaning and her 12 year old daughter Joanna (big fan of J Biebs and OneDirection). We also met ?Elisa? a young woman from France who is friends with Dr. Douglas and is living in the house while interning this summer. We spent the day exploring finding the local mall with the movie theater (CineCenter) as well as checking out the nearest grocery store where we will be doing most of our shopping (HiperMaxi). Finally we got some rest last night watching Adventureland in the upstairs TV room--we put on the spanish subtitles so we could say that we were studying... This morning we took the car out for a spin and I (Dave) mistakenly turned onto a main road. To put this in perspective, we are both learning to drive manual for the first times in our lives and although we had 1 great lesson in Chicago (shout out to Ginny McCarthy!!), you probably wouldn't want us to be your chauffeurs if the car has 3 pedals instead of 2... Well, the car stalled twice on me, but overall it was an overwhelming success in that we safely made it home and the car had no new dents! We are having lunch with Dr. Douglas today where we hope to find out more about our luggage, out paperwork for temporary residency, and our hopeful trip to Sucre for language school! Mas a venir!
D and K
D and K
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