ick...

Things have gotten better. I am still not sure on the housing situation. I am very attached to this family and my parents are willing to help me. However, do I want to give them another financial worry? Or should I take the leap into a maybe not as comfy pension? I am not sure...I have been praying about it and we shall see.

I am starting to feel sick. My friends were sick last week and I am thinking I picked something up from them. My throat is sore and I am just overall feeling kind of crappy. Not good. Especially since a friend and I plan on traveling to a city called Iquique (pronounced E-key-kay) tomorrow and staying the whole weekend. It's just about 4 hours south of here. We still don't have school and we aren't even sure if we will have it on Monday or not. I am loving this free time. Kind of. Arica really doesn't have that much to do/see. Well especially now since it's their winter. It's too cold to the go to the beach and there really aren't any 'sites' or anything like that. I could walk around the city...but even that's pretty ugly. However, as I reread this I feel like I am telling everyone the bad parts. Arica does have a beautiful side. The ocean of course is always breathtaking and the view from the Morro is priceless. The Morro is a gigantic headrock that juts out towards the sea and has weathered time. It was where the Chileans took the Peruvians in some war a long time ago. If you keep on going past the Morro you'll find gorgeous beaches and coastlines. So! It's not all bad!

One thing I can't get used to here in South America are all the stray dogs. They are everywhere....literally...everywhere. I don't know how there got to be such a large population of stray dogs....but the numbers seem to be booming down here. One I remember seeing look like it hadn't eaten in a week and it was dragging one hind leg and another was turned inward. I really hope there's a Dog Heaven and every dog gets to eat as much as he or she desires.

I have been teaching English to my family's friend's kindergarten class every Thursday. It is going well. Practically every child comes from some kind of broken home and has little to no discipline in their life. They are 5 years old, but some of them are completely terrible. I actually had one child run out of the classroom and into the playground and proceeded to run away from us whenever we got close. Reaching out for attention I am gathering. Today day I did a lesson on things in a classroom. Next week I am going to do the days of the week. Teaching this class has really been a challenge for me. I am used to working with kids but not this young. It's a challenge because they can't read yet, so you have to improvise. What's more is that they know little to no English. I am learning what works and what doesn't and trying and failing and trying again is what becoming a good teacher is all about.