Dude 2

How to enjoy surfing in Lima:

1. Go on a 2 hour bike ride down the beach with two biking friends
   
2. Stop and relax sometime in the middle of the bike ride, sitting and watching the ocean
3. Watch your friend greet a surfing instructor she knows who happens to walk by
4. Get offered surfing discounts ($6 for renting everything you need for however long you want it!)
5. Surf the next day
6. After a long struggle of getting on a wetsuit for the first time, enjoy the fact that you look like a tough ninja
7. Learn what to do and stretch

8. Get your board and enjoy the fact that you look like a surfer even though you have not touched a wave yet. Throw around some stereotypical “Dude” and “Whoooaaa” phrases in each one of your sentences until your friends give you I-really-wish-I-could-hurt-you glances9. Move out to the waves
10. Catch some waves with the help of an instructor who appears to be one of Jar Jar Binks’ distant offspring (His long and flowing dreadlocks and reddish brown skin did the trick. However, he was different than Jar Jar as well, being helpful rather than stupid and annoying.)11. Die on the floor of a Jeremy and Rachel’s house afterward
12. Resurrect just in time to play with Jeremy and Rachel’s twin baby girls

Extra note: It really was an exciting, exhausting experience. By the end of it my arms were tired of rowing back to the waves, my eyes could barely open, my stomach didn’t feel too good after consuming a good deal of polluted salt water, and I felt seasick on top of it all. But I loved every minute of it and becoming a master of a wave was thrilling even if it only happened on occasion.

“So will I see you tomorrow?” asked Jar Jar, before I left the beach.

“Another day,” I replied with a smile.

Dude

When surfing the internet this last week, I found some fun answers.

Sleeper Bus

Wednesday, the junior and senior high students went their first ICSL service project this school year. After a day of shoveling rocks, laying out driveway stones, priming walls, scraping walls, and performing dramas and messages for two schools in the town, the students were exhausted. Here is a collection of photographs Lindsay and I took on the bus ride home:










And then Lindsay and I slept too. Photographing sleeping students is tiring work!

I Love Grading

In the movie "Groundhog Day" the Phil Conner (the main character) begins to take piano lessons from a music teacher who is continuously surprised at how proficient he is, since she always believes it is his first lesson. The music teacher smugly says "That's my student" to a group of people in awe of her Phil's musical talents.

Sometimes I feel like that teacher - taking credit for talent which cost me little effort. Here are some photos from sketchbooks I graded recently.

Que profesora creeposa!

When we were in Arequipa we saw a strange advertisement for an educational facility. On it was an innocent looking little girl being taught by a very creepy professor (shifty eyes and a sinister smile). Though we didn’t get a photo of the sign, Kathy and Lauren reenacted it in the photograph below and I can vouch that they reenacted it well.

Kathy played the part as the creepy teacher, Lauren as the innocent young student.


Well, I got my Peruvian ID a few weeks ago, which means I am a resident of Peru and no longer a tourist of Peru. When I was getting my ID photo taken, the camera caught me unawares. And when I was handed my ID, my photograph made me gasp.

My ID photo hints that in the depths of every teacher's heart there is a shifty-eyed teacher waiting for a chance to capture her character. And each one has the same smile.

I learned something new today

The most gentle way to be woken up from an afternoon nap is through a minor earthquake.

100th Post

My thoughts 5 minutes ago:


"Hmm. I think I will post on my blog. Click on internet icon... now click on blogger icon... OH NO! 99 posts? That means that this next post will be my...
...100TH POST EVER!
Dagnabit, now I have to post something extra special! I don't have time to post anything extra special!

"Wait. I have an idea. I'll just search on Google images and find type in '100th birthday' and just post the coolest image that pops up first.

"Uh oh. The coolest image is an old woman who almost looks like she is strangling a cat. Oh well. I don't care anymore. This has taken long enough already!"