The hunt for peanut butter...and other misadventures

So once again it has been awhile since I last wrote, so it's hard to decide where to begin. I guess first of all, I have been searching for peanut butter in Ibague for a few weeks now, and it's not very easy to find. Most people don't even know what it is if you ask someone in a supermarket here. The first time I looked for it I ended up buying arequipe, which is like a caramel spread...I was very disappointed. This past weekend I was with some friends who were trying to help me find some peanut butter, and when Thomas asked an employee at the store where we could find it, she had no clue what he was talking about and kept saying that there was no restricted section in the store because she thought it was some kind of alcohol or something..hah, so frustrating. But we actually finally found it, and now my life here is complete. I actually don't know why I wanted peanut butter so much, I guess it's just nice to have a bit of a taste of home sometimes...plus it's good to have for a breakfast food here because I have to make my own breakfasts. So anyway, the past week and a half has definitely had its ups and its downs. I got really depressed for a while about the thought of staying at this place for another full 2 months, just because it's very small and there's hardly any personal space, and it's not like I can just go for a walk by myself or go downtown at night by myself whenever I want. It's a little bit like we're trapped here sometimes. Plus working 10 hour days has really been getting to me I think. By the time we're done, the sun is setting and there's not much to do, and there's always a fight for the internet, with only 2 computers, and 2 internet cables, and 5 or 6 volunteers at times. Plus the tv doesn't work...so options are very limited. But those were my thoughts in my darkest hours, heh. I am feeling much better about everything right now, which has to do with several factors. First of all, there's a lady named Joanna who comes to the house to cook the lunches for all the children everyday, and she actually has 4 kids who are here during the morning program. Sometimes she asks me to help her peel and cut potatoes and stuff like that to get ready for lunch. So this past Friday I was helping her, and she asked if I was sad or bored or something. I guess she could tell I wasn't feeling too great, and I told her that I was having a hard time being so far away from my boyfriend and family and friends and everything for such a long time, and that there's not always a lot to do here and the days are very long. So she told me that she gets sad too sometimes, and that I can come over to her house whenever I want to cheer me up, and if I want I can come stay there on some weekends, and that I can come dancing with her and her friends. It was so sweet of her to say that, and I found out that she's a single mom, and she's 29 and has 4 kids and life is very hard for her. That evening a few of us went to her house just to visit and see where she lives, and she and her 4 kids live in a 2 room space and have only 3 beds. When we arrived she sent her son out to buy some pop for us to drink. I was overwhelmed by her hospitality, and it made me realize just how blessed I really am. My life is like a walk in the park compared to her life everyday. She is such a sweet lady, and I really enjoyed visiting her, and she keeps asking when I can come back again. I will definitely go back to visit her, but I don't think I can stay overnight...I have no clue where I would sleep! Secondly, that same afternoon the guy who runs the centre where I am and the few others stopped by to check on things. His name is Carlos, and he called me upstairs during lunch to talk with me. He asked me how everything was going, and told me that often when people come here they love it for the first week, and then the second week gets a bit harder, and they often leave before they intended to. Especially girls who are away from their boyfriends and such he said, so it was the perfect timing for him to talk to me because I was feeling like I didn't know how I could stay for 2 more months. So he told me that I'm a volunteer and whatever I need I should just tell him or Berenice and they are always there to talk to. And he suggested a bunch of places that I should visit on weekends and if I ever want to I can take long weekends to travel, and that I can call him whenever I want. So that made me feel a lot better as well, just knowing that people here care about my well-being. And I also sat down and talked with Berenice yesterday about my hours, and she was very understand and told me if I want I can have Monday, Tuesday, and Friday afternoons off and if I'm tired I can just tell someone and go take a nap, or if I need to get out she can take me to a pool or just into town or whatever. So that is a huge relief! I don't know if I'll take that much time off because I definitely want to help out wherever I can, but at least I know that whenever I need I can relax and things will be much better now. A lot of great things happened this past weekend as well. On Friday night I went out with a couple of the volunteers and two of the teachers from the centre, and we met Thomas and his boyfriend Armando for dinner at a very nice Italian restaurant. The owner is Italian, so the food was actually very good. On Saturday, all the other volunteers were out at the time, so just Berenice and I went to a pool for the day. It was in a really nice recreational park, and there were several pools. One had a big waterslide, and the one we went in turned out to be a wavepool. It was awesome, I swam into the biggest waves by myself because Berenice doesn't know how to swim, so there I was, the lone white girl swimming over the big waves amongst a bunch of Colombians, mainly guys who were saying things to me that I didn't understand and I just ignored them, heh. So I finally got to swim and tan in my bathing suit...it only took a month of being in Colombia. But hopefully by the time I get back from the Caribbean coast I'll have a nice tan! Sunday was the best day of all because I met a Canadian girl from Toronto who is teaching at the same school as Thomas and she will be staying here for 4 months!!! Her name is Sylvia, she's 22, and she's originally from Korea. She moved to Canada with her family when she was 9 years old. We get along really well, and we are both so happy that each other is here...she's is definitely a Godsend for me! So Sylvia, Thomas, the other volunteers and I hiked a mountain on Sunday at the San Jorge botanical gardens, and it was beautiful but very humid that day. It took a few hours, so it was very good exercise. Then we all went out for lunch, and I went back with Sylvia to the apartment she's staying at right now. We went over to the house of this family she knows who is super nice. They offered us food, so of course we accepted. They had made some traditional Colombian soup with bread, and then they gave us some masamora...probably spelled much differently though. The soup had two different types of potatoes in it, with chicken, some green stuff, and some cream on top, it was suuper yummy. And masamora is like kernels of corn in milk sweetened with sugar cane sugar, and it can be served hot or cold, and it was delicious as well. When we left they told us to come back soon, and they are going to teach us how to make some traditional Colombian foods. I have experienced a lot of amazing hospitality lately, so that was a really great experience. Then Sylvia and I went to Juan Valdez, which is kind of like a Colombian version of Starbucks. We ordered lattes and shared a piece of carrot cake and just got to know each other some more...I'm making it sound like we're dating or something haha. Then we met Thomas and Lilian at the theatre and ordered popcorn and drinks and watched Alice in Wonderland, which was all in spanish. And in Colombia, they have assigned seats at the theatre which I found very odd, and we were a bit late, so when we got to our seats some people were sitting in them and they wouldn't move. Even when a theatre employee talked to them they wouldn't...such jerks. So for awhile we just sat on the stairs beside the seats, but my back wasn't enjoying that too much, so Sylvia and I just went and sat super close to the front. I didn't understand everything, but it was ok because it kind of spoke for itself just watching it. In a week and half I'll be heading up to the coast during semana santa, or holy week, for one week and travelling with Sylvia, Thomas, Armando, Leonardo, and another Canadian girl who lives on the coast. That is what I am looking forward to most right now. It's going to be amazing to see the beatiful beaches and architecture in Cartagena and Santa Marta. But right now, William, Berenice's son, is sick with Dengue Fever...which you get from mosquitoes. Leonardo has been really sick too and thinks that he has the same thing, but we don't know for sure. Hopefully they will get better soon, and no one else will get sick. I have hardly seen any mosquitoes here though, so it's kind of strange. I've also had a bit of tension with the volunteer from France who's here right now...I don't particularly enjoy him too much, so I'll be happy when he's gone. Caroline, the girl from Belgium just left very early this morning, so I'm the only gir here right now. It's kind of nice to have a room to myself for once though, while the boys are 3 in their room right now. Well, I have to get going as I'm going with Berenice and the others to the centre and we're meeting Sylvia for supper. Hopefully I will be able to buy an adaptor for my computer and a Colombian cell phone as well to keep in touch with Sylvia. So I hope everyone is doing well, and thanks for reading :)

catch-up time

It´s been over a week since I last wrote on here, so there´s probably too much to tell, and I probably don´t remember most of it because my memory is terrible, so I´ll do my best. I know I should write more often, but I´m just so lazy...well, ya kind of, but also by the time I´m done a 10 hour day I just have no motivation to sit and think and write about my experiences here in a somewhat intelligent manner. Even now, I wish I was doing something else, heh. But there are some people out there who read this and tell me to keep updating it, so here I go. Ok, so between last Thursday and now, what has happened? Last weekend was rather dull if I recall correctly. We went to see Valentine´s Day in the theatre for the second time because there is literally nothing else playing here that is worth seeing. And it´s a fairly small city so there aren´t that many things to do, and there is only one theatre here, so on a Friday or Saturday night half of Ibague is in the mall or at the movies. Last Saturday I don´t think we left the house at all. Oh wait, we actually went to the gym which is about a minute walk from the house, and it´s pretty ghetto looking, and it´s dark and the equipment is pretty old, and some of the machines don´t really work too well, but it´s good enough. I´ve decided to try to get in shape while I´m here...and by this I mean tone and try to build some muscle. I bought a month pass which came 20,000 Colombian pesos or about $10 Canadian which is a pretty good deal I think. My fellow volunteer Leonardo who will be here for 2 months is going to be my personal trainer, because he´s pretty in shape and knows what to do. I on the other hand have no clue, so it´s a good thing he´s here. Although on Tuesday he decided we´d work on our legs, so I did 3 sets of 30 doing squats with a bar with weights on my shoulders, and I literally could hardly walk up and down the stairs or sit down on the toilet without being in so much pain! My legs are still sore from it, and it´s been 5 days since then. But hey, at least I know I´m getting a good workout. We tried to go to the pool last Saturday as well, but it turned out to be closed, so we just had some ice cream instead. We ordered food in that evening and didn´t do much else. On Sunday we went into the centre of town and the boys really wanted to shop, and Juliette and I couldn´t have cared less. We´ve decided that they´re the girls in this house, and Juliette and I are more like guys for sure. While they ooed and aahed over shoes and preppy clothing Juliette and I were bored to tears and just wanted to go eat and go back home to watch the hockey game, haha. So finally we had lunch and bought a dozen donuts and went back to the house, and I celebrated as Canada beat the U.S. in the gold medal game. Juliette who is American was a really good sport though. That evening we watched The Fourth Kind which I never thought was real, and didn´t really enjoy too much either. This past week was long, boring, tiring, and frustrating at times, but also really good at times too. I guess I became a little disenchanted (that´s a word right?) with things this past week, and things started getting to me, but I think I´m better now. I realized that I have to change my attitude and try to be positive about everything and not complain so much. I´ve been selfish at times, and I have to remember that I´m not here to serve myself or make myself happy at all times, but I´m here to serve the children who come to the centre with a joyful heart no matter how I´m feeling on a particular day. I´m doing my best to be positive and thankful for everything I have, no matter what the situation is like. Because being here has made me realize again just how blessed and spoiled I really am with everything I have in Canada. I don´t have to worry about a place to live, or if I can afford to eat, and I have an amazing family, boyfriend, and friends. So that´s just a little window into my thoughts this week. I also started taking dance classes with the other volunteers here, althought Juliette couldn´t take them because her ankle was still pretty bad. So Anders, Leonardo, Liliana (one of the teachers), and I took a class on Monday. Our teacher is the same girl who teaches the kids at the centre to dance, so she just comes to the house to teach us which is really nice, and it´s also super cheap!! Like a buck per person or something ridiculous like that. So we started with salsa, and Leonardo and I are partners, and we´re actually picking it up pretty quickly. It´s a lot of fun, and very fast at times, so I hope by the time I get home I´ll know quite a bit. We´ve had 2 classes so far, and have another one tomorrow night. Sadly Juliette left here yesterday morning, so on Friday night we all went out for dinner together. We sat on a patio and it was pretty nice, and I had lasagna which was alright. On the walk back to the taxis Juliette had a little bowel emergency, and thankfully Berenice knew a lady who lived in an apartment on the street we were walking down. So we quickly buzzed up and she let us in and Juliette and I both used her bathroom. I didn´t have the same problems though, but it was pretty bad for Juliette apparently. She had to use it 3 times! This lady is actually the aunt of the guy who runs this organization and its partnering ones. Her apartment was really nice, and it kind of felt like I was back in Canada visiting a grandma´s house. She was such a sweet lady and she made us tea which is commonly made here to calm upset stomachs. It seemed to work and we visited with her for about an hour, and then took a taxi home, and Berenice made me some chocolate cake which was soo delicious. For some reason I´ve had quite a bit of chocolate here but it hasn´t given me a migraine yet...I have no clue why. Let´s just hope that I can keep this up! Last night we were supposed to go see Alice in Wonderland with Thomas the white guy and a few of his friends. But when we got there it was sold out, but he and his friend had a ticket, so they went, and me and the two boys and one of Thomas´s friends went and had a few drinks and some food while we waited for the movie to finish. After that they took us to a discoteca, or a club, and we danced for a while, and then the guys were hungry again so at 3am we sat outside on a sidewalk on wet seats because it had rained, and I watched the other guys eat. I just wanted to go home I was so tired. But it was a pretty fun night. Today we were supposed to go to another botanical garden and hike a mountain, but it just poured so I don´t think we´re going anymore. I´m tired anyway so that´s ok with me. There´s a new girl from Belgium coming today, so I only had to be the lone girl for one day. She´s only staying for 2 weeks though which sucks. I really want to have a girl stay longer, because it´s nice to have a girl who speaks english to talk to when I´m so far from home. Not so lonely then at times. Well, that´s all for now I guess. It turned out to be another long one...sorry to all of you who don´t like to read very much, but you don´t have to if you don´t want to. Alright, bye for now friends!