Mountain Hike

5-31-09
Mike´s host family asked Jill to wake him up. Then we tried to go to mass but there was no mass because of the festival(?). On the way back from ´´mass´´ we saw a structure on top of a mountain in the city and realized it was a church. Jill´s host dad took us up the mountain. The church was beautiful and the view even better. To get into the church we had to venture in a dungeon looking door and were told it would be very dark as we walked through this cave under the church - it is dark to honor the dead. As Jill nervously gripped on to Mike´s shirt we walked through the pitch black into an underground chapel. After the cave we went into the actual church which was had 3 glass sided walls and a 4th wall as the side of the mountain. The balcony overlooked the city and the bay as well as a larger than life rosary - each rosary bead was represented by a pillar as tall as us. After our hike and almuerzo (potatoes in spicy sauce, rice, vegetables, chicken, and a squid mush - whew!) we explored our town some more and found more celebrations going on. We´re looking forward to our volunteering tomorrow. We hope we can make all of our posts this detailed but we may end up having less time in the future. Pictures soon!

Arriving

5-29-09 and 5-30-09
¡Estamos aqui! We flew into Lima in one piece minus a jacket (presumed stolen). Mike´s bag was open and the security guards ´looked´for us but it was no where to be found so now we are on a new secret jacket hunt mission. We waited around at the airport until it was light outside and then bargained down a taxi price. About three miles into the ride our driver said his car was overheating so he would call for his friend to get us. Shaaaady. Mike insisted for him to take us back to the airport. His car was ´´acting up´´ so he kept turning his car off and coasting in neutral in the middle of a three lane highway until we got back. We then found a cheaper and more legitimate taxi driver who took us to the bus station. We took a first class bus that gave us a safety instruction video in the beginning. In this, we learned that the bathrooms on the bus were for ´´urinating only´´ and that if you had other bathroom needs to tell the driver to pull over. We then had a 6 hour bus ride up the coast with the ocean cliff to our left and giant sand dunes to our right.
Rudy was waiting for us in Chimbote and we took a little taxi to our host families homes. In our intial drive to our host families´ houses we drove into smelt like a whale that had been dying for fifty years. Luckily, the smell is only near the factories and not the main part of town. Turns out, we live on a simple dirt street but our homes our very nice. We live in the same apartment complex - Jill upstairs and Mike downstairs.
Our first night, we went to a festival where we dominated in one game of foosball (and lost the next). We were out pretty late and very tired so we were out when our heads hit the pillow.