Feliz Cumple Pe'

Last night at grupo, Josue's dad spoke to us on character in his very "Carlos Gerstein" way. He is a rough 45 year old señor who mumbles out dry jokes which are humorous when I can catch them.

He has the same looks and mannerisms as the Godfather (especially when he lets his moustache grow out) and there is actually a facebook album dedicated to this fact ("Carlos Gerstein es El Padrino").

He spoke to us on character, asked us a lot of tough questions, connected what he had to say with Jesus, and ended by saying, "Look, you are at the age where you are young and everyone thinks you are a rebel' he paused, thought for a second, then added, "tambien, pe' " which is a slangish way of saying "well, me too."

After this, the grupo surprised me by bringing out two cakes and singing happy birthday to me in English (sounded so absolutely awful I laughed all the way through), Spanish (also sounded awful), and a different version of Spanish (pretty bad).

Then they asked me to give a speech. So I did. Here it is:

"Thank you all so much for the cake and the songs you sang so pretty-ly.

I am so thankful to God for your friendship and that here I can have a familia poquito ... I mean familia pequeño ... pequeñA. That's how you say it. Familia pequena."

They laughed at all my mistakes and then we shared around the cake.

As soon as I got my piece, Claudia and Maria chased me around for a while so that they could throw cake in my face. Which, since Bethany left, has become a tradition. Below is a photo of Bethany starting the tradition on her birthday:

They finally caught me. Christian and Claudia finally shoved it on. But I got sweet revenge by using what was on my face to share with them.

Peru is a wonderful place to celebrate your birthday. Peruvian friends of all ages felt the need to come up to me and hug me, then give a little flourishy speeches about how great I am.

Others gave me chocolate.

My roomates took me to Barranco for my birthday where they bought me dinner - very sweet. Afterwards, we went to the Metro Supermarket – when my cashier rang up my metro bonus card, she got this really warm smile on her face and had someone bring me a present in the obvious shape of a wine bottle.

Maniaquins

I was delighted to find that the school play was all about mannequins (nice choice Amanda and Laura). I was even more delighted when one of the props (an actual mannequin arm) was offered to me to be used in my art classes.

But we found that it not only is a wonderful prop and object to draw. Here are other creative ways to use a mannequin arm:

• Creep out your students… and then the parents of your students by touching them with it when their backs are turned
• Slide it up your sleeve and have an extra long and goofy arm
• Get odd looks when you greet people on the street with your long and goofy arm
• Put it in your armpit and act like a t-rex
• Pretend like it is your actual arm and scream in pain when someone pulls it off when they shake your hand
• Make wonderful puns like, “Hey! Do you need a hand?
• Flag down taxis then reject them with the appropriate Peruvian arm gestures
• Accidentaly leave it on the floor under a pile of sheets and frighten your maid, Elida.

Eden and the Chipmunks

I love my junior high students

I hate fake high pitched voices

My love is torn.

Today, the junior high girls were singing songs in high pitched, super annoying “Alvin and the Chipmunks” voices.

Annoyed boy: That is SO ANNOYING. It would be ok if you sang it in a normal voice but you are singing the song too high!

Chipmunk singer: So what do you want me to do? Sing the song in a super low voice then?

Annoyed boy: Yes! (He then started demonstrating what a super low voice sounded like by singing the same song while making a grinding noise with his voice box. It sounded even more annoying than the high pitched squeals of the girls). Ok I’ll stop now, singing this way hurts me.

Teacher: It hurts me too Seung Jae, It hurts me too.

Cheesy Pick up Line of the Week

Our church meets in a large remodeled Peruvian house. Each Sunday, there are two greeters on each side of the door who kiss you and welcome you into church. Today I walked up to the church to see that thirty-something unibrow guy and sweet-old-lady-who-always-volunteers-for-everything were the greeters.

I was surprised that Unibrow Guy didn't say "good morning" but rather, just said my name...slowly.

Unibrow Guy: Eden...

Me: Good morning.

Unibrow Guy: Eden means paradise right?

Me: Yes it does.

Unibrow Guy: It makes sense because you look like a paradise today.