JUMP! JUMP! JUMP!

Oh what a weekend I have had since my last post! I hardly slept Thursday night because I had a paper due and had to teach in the morning. So, I was up until 1am, slept until 4:30, finished my lesson, then slept again from 5:30-7. My lesson on Friday went well. Afterwards a few of us grabbed lunch at our favorite vegetarian place where you get soup, 2 veggie dishes, salad bar, and tea for 4.5 soles (which is about $2)...ridiculous. On the way home in the afternoon my housemate Maggie suggested grabbing a bottle of rum so we could have a little toast to our crazy week being over. Of course that turned into us and 2 other girls in the house sitting around at 4pm killing the bottle of rum. Yes, we got drunk, but we also had some really amazing conversations about some crazy stuff. It blows my mind how you can form such strong bonds with people you know for only a few weeks. By next week 2 of these girls will be back in the States but we´ve all already planned to visit once we´re all home. Anyway, we went over to the San Pedro house later that night and had some rooftop cocktails. We eventually went to the bar, and on our way to another bar we got caught in a downpour, so I hopped in a cab with 2 of my housemates and called it a night.

Saturday was a lazy day again on the couch watching Lost and stuff. We went and paid for our Machu Picchu trip (shout out to Mom & Terry for being the BEST parents and paying for my trip as my Christmas present---amazing!) Then we went to a bar called Paddy´s Pub to watch the Real Madrid/Barca soccer game. 6 of us crowded around one table and ordered so much food and so many beers that there was no room on the table. Nachos, wontons, curry, quesadillas. So.Much.Food. It was amazing to have some good old fashioned bar food though. Then it was home to shower & back out again. My housemate Caroline wanted to check out a live Cuban Salsa band so we did that for a while. They were great and the salsa dancers were phenomenal. We ended up calling it an early night and coming home to just sit around and chill while one housemate played the guitar. It was a solid night.

Sunday was the highlite of the weekend. We had been talking about bungee jumping for a while and we were planning on doing it this weekend. Waking up hungover though, I wasn´t so sure if I´d join. But, our friend called and was buying tickets so I told him to buy me one, and then I had no choice. We took 2 taxis about 20 minutes outside the city and pulled up to this little spot right between 2 mountains. There was a tiny little cage hanging in the sky on some cables that ran from one mountain to the other. Obviously now is when I started shitting myself. We signed our lives away on a release form and did some stretches and ran 2 laps to warm up. One of the guys went first and I was getting so nervous so I jumped up and went second. They strap you into 2 harnesses, some leg contraptions, put a thing around your neck. Then, they attach you to the bungee and you get into the tiny yellow cage, and up up up you go. I was holding on for dear life, forcing the Peruvian man operating the thing to talk to me so I didn´t panic. He told me what to do, I asked him a million questions, and finally we were at the top and he was telling me to step out onto the platform and lean forward. So I did. And then I stood there for AT LEAST 6 minutes telling him not to let go yet. HA! But finally I was ready, and he counted to 3, and off I went. The only thing I remember is screaming until I lost my voice, then getting jerked back up in the air and holding onto the harness for dear life. Got a little whiplash & was seeing stars, but absolutely nothing can describe the feeling of realizing "holy balls, I just jumped off a platform 122 meters in the air". When I finally got to the ground and stood up, my legs were shaking uncontrollably and all the guys were laughing at me, but whatever, I did it! Hugs and high fives all around! I couldn´t have asked for a better group of people to share that experience with. We all took a bunch of pictures and cheered each other on and hugged and laughed and it was just amazing. We obviously felt on top of the world after that, and in need of a beer. So we went to our former housemate´s hostel up the street, had some beers and played some pool. Then it was time to go home for dinner and to write my lesson for today.

The crew, Pre jump!

Suiting up/trying not to piss myself

Flyinggg!

We did it!! Rockin our free t-shirts

Post Jump

The lesson didn´t go as well as I hoped. I only had 1 student show up so all of the pair/group work I had planned went down the drain and I had to improvise a little. I don´t think I did the best job as I wasn´t on my A-game after waking up to no hot water (aka no shower) and no coffee. But it was just Day 1 and the week can only get better from here.

Love & miss everyone, especially around Christmas time! Will add pics later today :)