Ya Ya Ya

My favorite Spanish word of all is "ya" it is such a small word that means already. It cuts talking time down and it's really fun to say. Imagine- someone asks you if you need to go shopping... you went already... your response is "ya." I love it.

There is a thing called Ecuadorian Time here. It basically means that everyone will be 15 or more minutes late to everything. Even though I'm not the most punctual person [yes Lauren, I know I'm always late] it's starting to get on my nerves. It's a cultural thing so I have to accept it but it's weird to me that you can plan dinner at 6 and everyone shows up at 7:30 like it's normal. There is no apologizing for lateness here, it's just expected.

Time for some food talk... I had popcorn with my soup today. It's very common here for people to top their soup with popcorn. It gets soggy pretty quickly so I have to scoop up the pieces before they turn too mushy. It actually tastes just how you would expect it to. Next time any of you make some soup try throwing in some pop secret along with it :) The meals that I get served in my house are pretty good sized but I've heard many differences among the other students. Many kids get a couple pieces of fruit for breakfast, a big lunch and bread with coffee for dinner. I'm half glad and half sad that I get massive meals every day. I certainly don't go hungry BUT my beach bod is at risk of turning in to a beach blob. (I made myself smile with that one).

So while talking with a friend on campus today I ran in to an old Dogfish Head coworker. Yes that's right- I bumped in to him while in South America on my college campus. HOW WEIRD! He is just studying here for 2 weeks so we made plans to meet up before he leaves. It truly is such a small world!

I dropped my Language and Literature class today and enrolled in Ecuadorian Culture. My lit class was wayyy to hard and the culture class counts as the same transfer class for my Spanish minor. I was lucky enough to grab the last seat in the class and I'm so happy to be out of the lit class. I think I dozed off about 10 times during that class today. I also dropped Tae Kwon Do because I don't want to have to buy the uniform if I'll never actually use it again. To replace my sports class I signed up for Triathlon with dos amigos. I REALLY REALLY hope this class is just training for a triathlon and we wont actually have to participate in one. I guess I'll find out tomorrow!

Guess what I signed up for tonight??? My trip to the Tiputini Biodiversity Station IN THE A-MA-ZON (you have to say it just like Darla from Finding Nemo). I'll be going Feb 15-18 and it costs... drum-roll please... $450. That's doable but still a big hunk of change. By all means, if anyone wants my local address to send me some money I'll be more than happy to give it to you. Just kidding :) [okay, half way kidding]

My one picture of the night is from my lunch at the Italian restaurant on campus. I ordered old faithful- Chicken Parmigiana.