Another thing about peruvian guys. All this stuff, meanwhile, has always been the case but I´m just now getting sick of it. I have a German friend who married a peruvian and lives here now and she talks about the six-month honeymoon with a new country. I can´t remember if I already talked about that. But I´m approaching the end of my honeymoon with this country, I think. The stupid, not hot, low water-pressure showers, the ridiculously crowded buses, and not being able to wear a skirt without some idiot whistling at you or saying something to you or grabbing you. Ok, the last thing only happened once. Except, I forgot to write about last night. I was visiting my German friend Jessica (not the american one) and she lives in a kind of bad area. There´s a nice bus I can get two blocks from her house, but it was after ten pm and I ran to catch my bus but saw it pulling away. Buses here gradually stop running after 10:30 or 11, sometimes earlier maybe, I can´t really tell. But I feel insecure if I´m waiting too late. So I walked down to the main street but I wasn´t sure what bus I had to take. I have to take two buses to get to her house anyway. So I´m looking at buses and it´s kind of a dark area and I´m thinking I should just get on any bus and figure out later where it goes. Then this bus stops for me, and I go to ask the cobrador (the door guy and money collector) where they go, but the bus is in the second lane over from me so I have to walk into the street and in between my bus and another bus. I´m talking to the guy when this other guy comes up behind me. There´s really no room for him to get by, so I kind of move in closer to my bus and I´m just looking at the guy like what´s he doing. And he´s kind of touching me but I think he´s trying to get by. Then he starts touching my butt and I´m like what the heck! But it´s not really violent or sexy or anything and I realize he´s trying to rob me. Meanwhile the cobrador is just sitting there, totally blase. I can´t even remember what I did. I was kind of in shock because I didn´t realize what was happening until it was over, in like one minute. I think I yelled at him and pushed him away and he then he walked away. And the cobrador was like you want to get on? And I was just like you jackass. I went back to the side of the road to wait for another bus. The guy who tried to rob me walked around a little and then wandered away. I realized I should just get on a bus, so I got on some bus headed in the right direction. This guy on the bus hears me asking for directions and gets off with me at my stop, which I guess is where I said I wanted to get off. And I´m thinking why I am getting off the bus with this guy I must be a total moron. But it´s a busy, well-lit corner so it seems ok. Then he walks over with me to this other corner and I realized he doesn´t really know what bus to take either. So I just tell him I´m fine and he leaves. I wasn´t very nice, he probably thinks I´m an ungrateful tourist. Then I find a bus to take me to where I have to take my other bus. Ha ha. 3 buses, kind of stressful. But I like being at Jessica´s. My house is so empty and hers is so fuol. She has two kids and she´s younger than me! A 2 year old terror who whines nonstop and a one year old girl who is the best baby ever. She´s so smilely and sweet and comes over and hugs me and cuddles with me. I told Jessica it´s the physical contact I need since breaking up with my boyfriend, and she laughed. The first time we hung out we spoke spanish but now we just speak english. She´s one of my only english-speaking friends now. But she speaks german to her son, and spanish to everyone else in the house and then english with me so sometimes she goes crazy with switching languages.
I don´t know. Peru is so different. It´s frustrating. People are so different, they have such different expectations of you. When I first got here I thought why would you want to make an effort to be friends with other foreigners? Isn´t that why you´re here, to meet peruvians? There´s this american-canadian society which has events and stuff. And I thought it was so weird, looking for friends soley on the basis of shared nationality? But now I get it. You need connections with people from other countries so that you don´t feel insane. Everyone around you thinks something except for you. Well that makes you insane, or an idiot, right? But if you´re friends with outsiders, you realize that it´s not you. Almost without exception, everyone I´ve met here has been extremely good to me. Warmer than in most parts of the US, I think. But for all that, they can be extremely narrow-minded. Even the sweetest of them. It´s such a small country and it´s pretty insular. And traveling out of south america is too expensive for many people, and visas are prohibitively difficult to obtain. So it´s not that surprising I guess.
I just had to look up the spelling of "surprise". Even though my spanish leaves much to be desired, it´s still contributing to the demise of my english. I only have one friend who´s a native english speaker, which I realize makes a huge difference. I don´t hear language that expands my vocabulary, and using difficult vocabulary with non-native speakers doesn´t make sense. So use small words with me when I get back, por favor?