I hope this finds you all well and happy. And no, I haven't been slack in doing updates but didn't save last week's news - and it was a great creation too!!!!!!!
Most important, yes, we did survive the 22+ hour bus trip from Lima to Cusco. No bandits either which was a huge bonus. I will admit that every time the bus slowed down for roadworks I grabbed Rob's hand. Thank goodness that is over - well for a couple of weeks anyway.
Cusco is a lovely spot and the people are very friendly. Even when you say "No, gracias" to the street vendors they leave you alone and say thank you in return. We have a wonderful hostel to stay at which overlooks some beautiful sights. The downside is that we have lots and lots and lots of stairs to climb to get to it - and our room as you can see from the photos. Altitude sickness was awful - Rob was the worst - and being out of breath is an everyday occurrence.
A couple of strange facts about Cusco (and Peru) in general:
No heating in buildings - considering how cold it gets is unbelievable. Rob got a radiant heater for us from downstairs before they disappeared.
Toilet paper is never put down the loo - there is always a small bin in the toilet for this. Apparently the pipes etc. can't cope with the paper.
The TEFL school that we are attending is awesome and we have a great teacher. We are in a class of 7 - 3 Peruvians, 1 Pom and 2 Yanks. Our first week (3 days) was very daunting as we had our very first MiniLesson to do in front of a proper class. It went for 20 minutes and we thought it would go for ever but it flew. We had to do an "How to lesson" and Rob did making and playing the didgideroo and I did the world famous chicken dance. I am now known as the chicken dance teacher on campus!!!!
This week we had a bit of excitement in Cusco - the transport people went on strike for 2 days (no taxis, buses etc). We even had the riot police out with their shields lining the streets. There were street marches and the businesses lining the main street were closed. We could only get into our school via a very small door and security let us in and out. Apparently it is set to escalate but one plus was that it was very easy to walk to school.
We haven't really been doing much as we have been busy studying and studying. Last Sunday we did venture out of Cusco and headed to the sacred Valley - absolutely beautiful scenery and the weather was lovely too which also helped. More about that next week. We have got a huge week coming up - a MiniLesson on vocabulary tomorrow and a paper on Grammar to be done too - as well as 3 observations of other qualified TEFL teachers at our school. The following week is really our last full week and we do prac teaching for the 5 days! I think that the most stressful thing is that we don't know the classes and what they have done and it will be easier with our own classes.
I think that we will be doing CV's this week too, which leads to another problem - where do we want to go. Our teacher has told us that we can get a job at our school in Guaetemala but I think we would rather step out of their protection and do our own thing. We can start applying for jobs now but please don't think that jobs are well paid - I think that we will be looking at $2-$3 USD/hour but as long as we can cover our accommodation and food we will be happy. We have decided that we want somewhere in South America, warm,somewhere that we can be together (not necessarily the same school) and somewhere that we can do weekend trips away to see the sights. All suggestions gratefully received.
Talking about food, we were going to cook while we are here but we have found an excellent veggie restaurant on the way home that we can get a delicious meal each and a freshly squeezed juice or Chai for /20 sol which is approx. $7 for both of us so no cooking!!!!!! There are a few restaurants that serve cuy, yes guinea pig, but we haven't gone in. Talking about this little delicacy though, on our trip to the Sacred Valley we did drive through a place that is fondly known as Cuy Land and they were cooking guineau pigs on individual skewers like rotisseries - the skewer went lengthways. Eeww!!!!!!!!!
stay safe and be happy. Talk to you later xxxxooooxxxxx
