Well, so far I have had two birthday parties and it is only 6 pm on the 12th. Last night, as soon as I arrived I went for my usual walk to the main street near my hotel and the inevitable happened. I had dinner with two guys Josh’s age who worked for the Bank of Nova Scotia. At about midnight, they asked me whether I wanted to go to a fiesta where they were meeting their friends. As usual, I said yes and ended up about 1 am on a Friday night at a tremendously large restaurant called three Marias where there were hundreds of people eating, drinking and dancing. What I found amazing was most of them, including my hosts, were going to work the next day, but it seems they eat really late in Lima and stay up really late, no matter what time they have to be at work. I guess it is like New York, although I can’t imagine Americans staying up till about three in the morning if they have to work at 8.
Today I slept in ( what a surprise) and then went downtown (el Centro) to see the presidential palace, cathedral and so on.
A group of university girls approached me with a camera and asked me to pronounce a list of s words, z words and sh words and they taped me, presumably so the class can hear how these words are supposed to be pronounced. Can you imagine a group of 21 year olds killing the English language because of me? Then another bunch of university kids accosted
me and when I told them it was compleanos they insisted on singing for me! Two fiestas for one birthday. I had my ups and downs, as usual, with my Spanish. Last night, driving in from the airport I spoke the whole way with a cab driver without problem. Today, I asked my cab driver a question in Spanish as he was returning me to my hotel and he apologized for not understanding me by saying; “sorry, I don’t speak English”
To-night I am going to go and have supper and see what happens. Whatever transpires, it will be an adventure, guaranteed!
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