This was it! I was finally on my way to a trip I had been looking forward to for months. It wasn’t even 15 min into my journey when I sat down besides a Hispanic woman who looked to be in her upper 20’s. We began to engage in conversation, en Espano, claro! ;) As it turns out she was a professor at Syracuse University and she ended up being such a blessing for those 7 hours into the night and early morning. The sunrise was breathtaking by the way. I believe we were flying over Ecuador when it began to rise over the horizon.
After arriving in Lima, Peru and having Evalin direct me in the right direction with many newly learned tips from the previous flight, she gave me her email and said I was welcomed to call, e-mail, or stay with her in Lima at any timeJ Praise God for another connection! The second flight was only about an hour and goodness I wish I could put into words how unbelievable Peru is from 11,000 feet up in the air!!!
Finally I arrived in Cuzco’s small airport around 10am after traveling since 3pm the previous day. Although exaughsted from the trip, I paced myself so I wouldn’t get altitude sickness and proceeded onward in hopes of finding a small Hispanic family holding a piece of paper with my name colored on it. Sure enough, there they were in the front row amongst the crowds with excited smiles and lots of welcome hugs/kisses. (in peru, and most Spanish speaking cultures, you greet with a kiss on the cheek even if you have never met them before nor will again.
Now… as for my host family…. GOD IS SO FAITHFUL! :D
I love Cuzco so far! The way that a group of people decided to build on, in and threw these gigantic mountains and, with a touch of Spanish culture, being bright colors, brought the city the size of Boston to life. As we drove to place I would call home for the next three months I couldn’t help but observe all that was going on in the city. There were street vendors with wild things to sell, multi-colored buildings, children running everywhere, and of course, thousands of people who drove however they wanted: fast, slow, on their side or yours:P. To say the least, it was an adventure getting from the airport home!
As we arrived at the house I got to meet the rest of my host family! J Marta is my mother, josylynn aka.josi is my 21 year old sister; renhato is my 19 year old brother; Whittany is my temporary American sister who is finishing up a volunteer program until the end of june whos 20 as well( our family cant pronounce her name so they call her whinnie as in Winnie the pooh…. Haha it brings a smile to our faces.; and then there is lucho…. Who is my eldest brother but he is married with a child and doesn’t live in the house I am staying at, but he hang out all day anyways! Something I licked up on right away was how close this family is. That means so much to me seeing as how my family is the closest knit family I have ever seen. After they showed me my room we had a quick “hello and what do you like to do” convo. As soon as the word “futbol” was brought up, that was all we needed to change real quick and call a cab to head down to the park to play!
Since I had just arrived 30 min previous to this, I, unfortunately, didnt play( there you go mother;)) but I had a great time watching and getting to know their family friends. Everyone is so close here, I love it so much. We ended up spending the entirety of the day at the park in the winter weather of 73 ;). Yup, was totally in shorts :0).
I am so blessed because I have the best host family in the world! None of them speak ANY English so it forces me to speak and listen 24/7-which is exactly how I wanted itJ. Like I mentioned previously, we all range between 19-23 and it is so much fun because instantly I have a group of friends that also so happed to be my siblings. We had Christopher “Chistes” and a few other friends of the family hang out all day with us two as we enjoyed a few solid games of futbol, had chicken/potatoes for lunch, and headed back to relax at home.
It is weird writing this because after today I feel like I have been here for a month already! God has truly blessed the relationships I am forming so far even after a day! I know that may be hard for some of you to understand, but for others, you‘re not surprised in the least ;).
you tell it very nicely. like a story! i love it. and very funny "there you go, mother"
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