Colca and vacation

So I was sick for a while. I went back to school today, Thursday. But it's funny. I was talking to a friend online the other night, Tuesday I think, and she asked "You're just going to be in school for a couple days before vacation".... So she told me that I have vacation for the next week. I didn't go to school last Wednesday because of my sickness. So I didn't have school for a week, then I find out that I'm going back for two days and then having another week of vacation... what a pain, ya know?

This weekend is the Colca Canyon trip. I'm really excited to see some condors and finally be able to put my camera to the test. Hopefully we get to see at least a few birds. The trip is for two days, but I'm not exactly sure what we are doing besides visiting Colca Canyon. I would be excited to hang out with the other exchange students, but all they are going to do is speak English the whole time and probably go out to Domino's. I don't understand them. What are they in Peru for?

Anywho, I'm not sure what I am going to do after the weekend in Colca. I went into this gym to ask what the prices were day and month memberships, and found that it's relatively cheap to pay a monthly price. If I were to go between the hours of 11:00 and 5:00 it would only cost me 30 soles per month. Due to the ever plunging value of the American dollar, that translates to about 10 dollars. So, I figure, at least 3 days a week times approximately 5 weeks a month, not a bad deal. There is this place called the International Club here that pretty much everyone here has a membership to. It's awesome. There is tennis, bowling, swimming, soccer, basketball, tons of stuff to do. My brother goes there pretty much everyday. But for me, a monthly membership would cost a wopping 50 dollars a month. A price which I most definately cannot afford. This other gym, the one where I checked out the prices and all, is called Platinum. It would give me something active to do after school everyday, which right now I need badly. My schedule after school up to now has been filled with: sitting in on the computer, watching tv in my room, watching tv in the living room, or watching tv in the kitchen. It is aweful. But I wasn't comfortable enough with things yet to really see the opportunities that I had up till now. Now I'm pretty comfortable taking a taxi or bus to where I need to go, and I've gotten used to what prices are like, so the taxi drivers don't take advantage of my gringo status and charge extra.

Also at my last rotary meeting the officials said that there are volunteer opportunities that they would like us to get involved with, so hopefully before too long I'll have somewhere to be regularly everyday. And now that I have been here for a while I'm starting to have things to do on the weekends, so hopefully TV will have to be cut out of the picture soon. It's weird for me to be watching so much TV, because in the States I almost never did.

I've been looking into flights to Chili early today and yesterday. I would love it if I could go visit Giorgio. My good friend Mike Epchool and I were planning on trying to meet up at some point during the year. He's in the northern part of Argentina at the moment, and will be in South America for about the same amount of time that I will. So we were thinking that if was possible we could meet up in another country, to see each other and also visit another place at the same time. So if I could visit Giorgio and Mike at the same time it would be pretty amazing. I was looking into March, but I'm planning on looking into pretty much every month to find the best prices. Giorgio said that if I were to come in June or July I would be able to snowboard. That would be the icing on the cake. To visit Giorgio, see Mike, and to experience the Chilean ride with both of them.... that would just make the end of my experience here in South America that much harder to leave behind as I head to college in the States.

So we'll see what happens with all of these plans. Hopefully it all works out!