adventures in the andes

so, yesterday i was standing in the line at the supermercado, buying myself some snacks and maybe a bit of chocolate for myself (because my host mom believes in rice and noodles and potatoes in one meal, but never in desserts), and i looked around. the view was strangely empty. then i looked down at the crowd of people, lined up, and realized that except for the 6.5 foot tall british man down in the last aisle (whom i had heard conversing with his girlfriend earlier), i was the tallest person in the store. and not just the tallest... the tallest by at least a foot and a half.

no wonder they always say hi to me, and never hola.

sooooo. updates, and interesting updates.

friday night, my class had this welcome dinner thing. my host mom has about 6 other "children" though, so she had to feed everyone, and we got there late, but just in time to see everyone applause and look around awkwardly for what to do next... dance, that is. but there is a problem when the class has only learned salsa and merengue, and the school has brought only one 4 liter bottle of water. because (A) salsa and merengue are both fast and aerobic dances, and (B) everyone only knows 2 moves. and not particularly well. but no fear, it was a great time. i miss dancing.

Saturday was an adventure indeed... we got on our bus at 7 in the morning, and headed up for Otavalo, so they told us. But Otavalo, a city famous for its bi-weekly market(the mask pictured was bought there), turned out to be only a brief (if expensive) portion of the adventure that was saturday. the poor bus climbed through the andes like the little train the could... dragging us all reluctantly up and down some of the tallest mountains in the world, through some random sightseeing and touristizing, chugging past (and occasionally stopping so we could get out and take pictures) at the most gorgeous vistas). We took 2 hours for lunch, half of which my table spent looking around at the other tables and pondering if it would be okay, or possible, if we got the blackberry ice cream that everyone else in the restaurant but us seemed to be getting... (we did not manage to get said ice cream)
and then we stopped at a lake in the middle of an ex-volcanic crater. it was gorgeous, and we were all so tired that Josh (the professional artist) among us was having no trouble taking some of the greatest candid pictures ever. no one cared...
and we were off...for quito and home, we thought, singing our hearts out, a cappella and off key to some of the greatest hits of all time (from bohemian rhapsody to a whole new world...). but the bus stopped, yet again, and we all stumbled out, upon the house of a man who makes indigineous instruments, and everyone watched him make a flute like it was a race (i swear it took like 25 seconds), then play all these instruments, then they danced, and played more, then everyone in my class had to try the big native trumpet horn thing... and finally we headed home.
anne and i finally found ourselves eating dinner at 10 pm.

whew. i'm out of breath typing that.
well that was saturday. sunday wasn't nearly as interesting.
although i did accidentally confuse llamas and camels at the dinner table last night.oops.


but i'll let you know if i come across any more fun stories. in the meantime... keep in touch!