First Night Questions... Day 40

Yesterday, after class at the University with a friend, I spent some time with a couple of people that I just met a few days ago. One girl is named Lexi and the other is Jilese. Lexi is from Canada and Jilese is from Oregon. It was Jelise's last full day here, so I spent the day with her and Lexi. That night we had a little going away party for her. The thing was that I forgot to call my parents, so I basically got in trouble. It was clearly my fault, and I accepted that, but the thing is, I am so glad that I forgot. My parents told me that we were going to sit and talk about some things about the family and all that stuff. Now, as I have explained before my family was really busy when I first arrived in Peru. So these "first night questions" I never got to do. By the time that the family was normal again, I had already been there for weeks, so it just felt weird to ask them the questions.

But I saw this situation as the perfect opportunity to finally get all those questions out. I was actually excited to have this talk about how they were worried sick about me and that I ruined their days and that I should have let them know where I was. And its crazy how much happier it makes me that we had the talk. There were a lot of things that I wanted to ask, and sitting down with my parents and talking about things took a lot of pressure off of my chest and just made everything feel lighter and happier. Now I'm clear about so many more things.
There are many customs here that are different than the States. Here in Peru, it is custom to greet with a kiss on the cheek to females and a handshake and sometimes a kiss to men. For me I have been doing that, but things change in different situations. So sometimes it happens, and sometimes it doesn't. There were a lot of things like this that I had questions about but just never got around to asking. So after my mother told me last night that we were going to sit and talk, I got out my first night questions and started writing things down that I had questions about. Over the course of the afternoon I came up with probably ten more questions for the original list, but also crossed out many that I already knew for sure. There were many that I did know, but I still wanted an explanation of it, so I asked them anyway. It helped to clear things up that were a little sketchy and to solidify what I had picked up over the last month. Things like, "when do I greet with kiss or handshake instead of just saying hello, why my brother doesn't invite me to go out with him, and why they sometimes give me the cell phone and sometimes not", lots of things like that were made clear. It helps so much.

What I learned from this, and what my parents told me to do more, was to speak. At lunchtime I usually don't talk much, because my parents are always talking about stuff that doesn't concern me or my brother. But when we were having our talk, my mother told me that she doesn't like that habit. She said that when Roberto, my father, comes home for lunch the only thing that he can think about is work, and that is why they always have conversations amongst themselves. But they said that I should speak up about something that I liked that day, or something that I didn't like, somebody that I met, just something that could steer the conversation in another direction. There have been times that I wanted to talk, but my parents are so involved in a conversation that I feel rude to intrude with something that happened to me that day. There have been times that I have felt that my family is too busy and sort of ignored me, but now I realize that they want to be more involved, they just need me to start the conversation, or at times to interrupt theirs.

The clarification of why brother doesn't ask me to go out also made me feel much better. My mother told me that she has asked him why he doesn't invite me. When I thought about this question, my thoughts were that he wouldn't like to have me trailing him everywhere asking him to re-say whatever his friends were saying in to words that were easier to understand. But on the contrary, my mother said that when she asked him, he said that the only reason why he didn't ask me to go out with him was because of the age difference between him and I. We are only two years apart, but here in Peru the different between 16 and 18 is pretty incredible. For instance, in school, most of the time I want to pay attention, do my work, and get good grades. Kids in my class, that are just 1 and sometimes 2 years younger than me, talk and fool around all day. They usually do get there work done, but there is way more copying and rushing than thought-out work done in high school here than there is in the United States. When kids in high school go out here most of the time all they want to do is drink. My brother likes the drink, but he also wants to play soccer or actually do something. So his reason for not asking me to go out with him was that I would only be bored because all of his friends just want to get drunk. Don't get me wrong, drinking can be a fun part of exchange, but too much of it is just stupid. It is a waste of time, and it just gets old.

So the talk that I had because I got in trouble ended up making me feel much better about how my exchange is going. Right now I have to go to bed, because (as I learned today) the only reason that my mother doesn't like too much computer time is because it uses a lot of electricity.

Goodnight everyone,
Love
Jack

PS: There will probably be more to come on this subject later