En Cuenca!

I tried writing this yesterday, but the internet here (at school) is somewhat touchy and weird and doesn't let me do what I want sometimes.

I arrived in Cuenca Sunday evening, after a 9 hour busride from Patate. Our hacienda at Patate was within view of the volcano that is supposed to erupt soon. Saturday night we actually saw some small eruptions! It was super cool. 

My host family is wonderful. They're so sweet and understanding and patient. The mom and two sisters all speak English very well. The father and son of one of the sisters both only speak Spanish, so basically most of the time, Spanish is what they speak. It's nice, though, that the mom and sisters speak English because if I really don't understand something, they can explain it in English. It's kinda rough understanding and replying to what they say. My Spanish definitely needs A LOT of work. I've got about 3 1/2 months to work on it, so hopefully I'll see some improvement. My home is a 20-minute walk from school. I go home for lunch each day, so I get in at least 1 hour and 20 minutes of walking a day! Add an extra 20 minutes if I get lost (which happened yesterday... well, it wasn't really LOST- more like I turned the wrong way down a street I knew and ended up going back to school instead of to my house.. oops!). Man, my sense of direction is terrible and no matter how hard I try, I just don't know that it will get better. Gotta work with what you've been given though, I guess. 

Classes started on Monday. They are 2-hour classes, so that's a bit of a change for me. I will have to work hard to stay awake. I feel like I'm exerting myself so much more trying to understand what is being said and am exhausted at the end of the day! 

There is a thing around here called Carnival. It's technically supposed to be in the beginning of February, but the kids start celebrating it now. And how do they celebrate it? By throwing water balloons and squirting their water guns at passersby. And it's an extra 10 points for Gringos (that'd be white people, in case you didn't know). On my way to school this  afternoon, a bus was passing me and all the sudden I saw this water splash in front of me. I don't know how I did it, because I was not really paying attention, but I managed to step back and dodge it subconsciously or something. Stick it to those little kids with their squirt guns ;)

Welllll.... I cannot really think of much more to talk about.