it's about 1.30 am now. i just had a cup of port with a friend then cycled back and i was just about to go to sleep. but i haven't written here for sometime (though i've been keeping up with the reading :), so i thought i'd just write a little...
got back from peru three weeks ago. it was fun, a little tiring, stressful. did the touristy things, but above all, i like walking through the streets of south america, watching people working, talking to the old ladies that sell broad beans by the streets whose hands and feet are really black and grimy, talking to restaurant owners, hostel people, learning more about their everyday life. i really love this place; i hope to stay here someday.
this is jonny:
jonny is 15, he's from ollayatambo and spent 45 minutes talking to me about the history of the incas and the meaning behind all their symbols. his parents work in another town. and he singlehandedly mans the hotel that his uncle and aunty owns. he wants to be a tour guide when he grows up because he loves peru, loves its history. he has photos of different ruins plastered in his little "office" where spiders hang from the ceiling. he loves music and played his guitar for me. he was off key but he wants to study music in the music institute in another town. and he wants to combine both and be a musical tour guide. :) carry his guitar and play songs for the tourists that he will bring around. he speaks a little english, french, german - all from the tourists that stay at his hotel. :) classic machu picchu picture (note the mountains in shape of incan face in the bkground)
and lago titic/aca
the whole island is made of reeds - the houses, the island itself, the handicrafts. the ur/us moved off the mainland into lago titic/aca (meaning puma) when the spanish came and started to live off the reeds. the islands are basically held in place by ropes tied to patches of reeds - so when there was a storm 2 years ago, the ropes broke and the islands started crashing into each other haha. we stayed with a couple called victor and cristina. they were awesome. told us stories, sang traditional songs for us. they don't read or write but they sing wonderfully - "mi lago titicaca, me haces alegria".
now i'm back to school and er more stressed out. my econ classes this quarter are more difficult than my last two quarters. both my professors are quite bad. i was taking an english class about the tw/o eliz/abe/ths but i think i may have to drop it because i can't handle the econ and english at the same time since the latter has a syllabus of 20 books. doing bahasa indonesian because i'll be leading a project in indonesia this summer - hopefully to do with sanitation and water cleanup. and an alte/rnative sp/ring br/eak course on public leadership. we'll be going to boston and new york this spring. :) i had my first class last money for ASB and it was great. st/eve w/es/tly, who opposed arnold for governor last year came and spoke about how he had been a student leader in st/an/fo/rd during the apartheid - when sta/nf/ord was still investing large amounts of money in south africa. and the students basically protested - riot police were called in and everything, other colleges took the cue, and two years later all investment from s/ta/nfo/rd had been withdrawn.
i guess it was inspiring because of two things. the first was because he kept reinforcing the permanence of trial and error in life - reassuring. the second because he kept emphasizing that we learn precious little in s/ta/nfo/rd and we need to start thinking about how we can use this education to do things; the education doesn't speak for itself. i guess i often feel that way.
i don't see how i can apply activism to si/nga/pore at all (and sometimes i feel am/eri/cans are so naive because they are so reactionary). sometimes i feel completely paralysed by suffering (like when i am in latin america and people ask for so little you don't understand how they can live. or when i read yu/nus' "ba/nker f/or th/e po/or" where anecdotes brought me close to tears). sometimes i am convinced that i can't do anything (school is so paralysing, as is sin/ga/pore's sl/ash p/s/c's judgment) and therefore do not care. but maybe i can. and i like this quote from the ta/lmud:
"D/o not be da/unted b/y the enor/mity of t/he wor/ld's gri/ef. Wa/lk humbl/y now. Do j/ustly now. Lo/ve m/ercy now. You are not e/xpect/ed to comp/lete the wo/rk, but nei/ther are y/ou fre/e to a/band/on i/t."
also been stressed out because i'm organizing snow trip for the sin/gap/oreans at s/ta/nfo/rd. the logistics aren't too bad but i am playing with so many factions and have so many emails in my inbox. and i went snowboarding last weekend. it was awesome. i fell so much, but i wanna get better so badly. :) difficult since i no longer have properly working knees, but I WILL GET THERE!
oh yea, bernice was in s/t/a/nford like the day before new year's. :) it was good to see her again! heehee... so i guess that while you guys met up in sing/apore, we did meet up too. :)
be snowboarding next weekend too, for the snow trip. and after that, it'll be back to the grind. it's a three day weekend this weekend and i'm really looking forward to it. :) i'm so exhausted from not understanding my classes, dealing with so many logistics, worrying about so many things that i'm glad for the three days to get on top of things. :)
