So, here I am.
Bolivia, si?
*quick note: all the punctuation on their keyboards here are different, so please forgive any grammar mistakes I make. (especially you, Mrs. Walton. Please don´t let the commas stress you out.)

Let me sum up my experience so far in one phrase: I was wrong.

About just about everything. But before you get worried about me regretting my decision to come here, let me tell you that I have been so wonderfully surprised by just about everything here.

The people in my group are fantastic. I had a few preconcieved ideas about them as a result of email communication, however, all of my previous labels were wrong. There´s a group of 6 of us.
Zareen - from Penn., goes to Pitt. Very intelligent and curious, and speaks mucho Spanish. Down to earth and likes to laugh a lot.
J - from FL, goes to West Virginia University. Marine veteran (hurt in training). She likes to cave, a spelunker.
Matt - from Penn as well, and also goes to WVU. Did not, however, know J before we all met in Miami. I thought he was uptight from the emails, but in fact very amiable and funny. He no hablas Espanol.
Carolyn - she just got here yesterday from NC, goes to Tulane. She´s sweet and friendly, and really likes to talk.
Andreas - from Austria, goes to WVU. We met him today. Don´t know much about him except that he´s super friendly, speaks german and italian, and is currently married.

The land is beautiful. The thing that first caught me by surprise was the weather in Santa Cruz. I felt like I was at the beach. This was just after coming from La Paz (both in Bolivia) where it was 41 degrees. I completely forgot that it was summer down here. I mean, I knew the seasons flopped, but that didn´t translate to February being the end of summer break for the kids here.


The people are so friendly. I know everyone says this about different places they go, but you truly don´t realize the kindness of strangers until you approach them and strive to tell them your problem which has nothing to do with them in a language that isn´t their own. We met a guy named Mirko on the plane from Miami. He was on his way home to Cochabamba from a business trip in Japan. If not for him, my bags would not be together, we would have probably gotten sucked into a taxi in Santa Cruz, I would not have been able to order my ham and American cheese sandwich at the Subway in the airport, and the entire group would have missed the finally plane to Cochabamba. I hope the group gets to hang out with him again sometime soon. Plus, he has raquetball courts at his home.
My host family is amazing. My host mom has taken such good care of me and the daughter, Andrea, is so much fun. She´s 28 and took me out for a steak dinner last night. A huge freakin piece of steak, almost 2 inches thick, rice, yucca, and a coke, for, get this, less than $8.
Eat your hearts out. :)

Some firsts in Cochabamba:

• first lie: (during first trip to grocery market) 'oh yes, I eat vegetables all the time'
• first injury: lost a big toe nail in lugging my overly-large suitcase into my host home.
• first meal: tacos. (haha)
• first surprise: security guards being the sketchy cat-callers
• first teacher: the 4 year old Alexia. 'no no no. perro...... dog.' [sigh of frustration]
• and, my personal favorite: first mistake: 'excited' in Spanish is NOT 'excitado'. Instead, you would say 'emocionado'. 'Excitado', in fact, means horny.

That´s all for now. More to come. Keep the prayers and good wishes coming. :)