Day 3 of Iquitos

5 am came around quite early this morning. We're heading out before six in order to go bird watching. I was excited about the birds... until i saw the sunrise. It was absolutely breathtaking.

The birdwatching was alot of fun, although i have to admit that the birds were sometimes harder to see than the spiders. We spent a good hour watching and listening. At one point Brasilio asked us how many different birds we could hear during a minute time span. We all sat and listened, although i have to admit i spent more time thinking that this is impossible, rather than counting bird sounds. So i randomly guessed at 6 and he said there were like 12. How in the world he could remember which ones he had already counted is beyond me. I shouldn't have been surprised, he can name any bird from it's call and can mimik just about all of them too. It's amazing!

We returned to the lodge for breakfast. Rita was really sick all day, so she stayed at the lodge all day. I conveniently became the fill-in spanish dictionary for everyone else and discovered that i really enjoyed helping the other ISA students with their Spanish. After Rita, i'm easily the most advanced here.

We visited Indiana today. :) They have the most awesome mode of transportation. Haha... i know my brothers are all jealous. This is it too, like i didn't see any car like in the states. Everyone has one of these... i mean, i think people actually own them. they sit at houses, so... They are also taxis though, which is how i rode in one. The best part of it is, they actually have speed bumps to make you slow down. How fast can you get one of these things going? Not fast enough to merit a speed bump. lol.

We ate some really fun stuff here, they have a market type thing and we just walked along and tried all this strange looking stuff. It was actually, incredibly yummy. I'll put up pictures of a few of the things we tried. The first is called juana. It's a regional thing and is basically rice with some sort of weird flavoring wrapped in a leaf. The second is yucca. Incredibly good! i ate that in the selva... Fruit wise, there was one that resembled a grape, but was much more acidy. It was called camu camu; I absolutly loved it, like we bought a bag for like less than 1 sole and if it wouldn't have eaten my stomach away, i probably could have downed the entire bag. I also tried cocona, (the juice that i loved the first day). It was yummy, but lots of seeds, the juice is much better.

Ok, to get off of the food topic, let's talk about people. I have officially lost my heart in Peru... to this little guy. I don't know his name, but i saw him walk by and i would have given anything to have a picture of him. I took one of him walking away and i have to admit, it's just as good. Except that in my hurry, i got my finger. haha. Let's just say that Peruvian children are about as cute as they come! I'd bring them all home if i could!

Before we left Indiana, we had like an hour conversation with a native lady with a 2 year old boy. Adorable child! She was incredibly nice... that seems to be the norm in teh selva. I haven't yet met someone who made me feel uncomfortable. selva, keep in mind, not Lima. there are some strange people in Lima.

So, after Indiana, we went to a really really small village... less than 100 people. San Luis was also unbelievable! I met this cute 15 year old kid named Javier. He reminds me of me actually. He never stopped smiling. We had a grand time talking and laughing for like an hour while we were touring the village. (it really wasn't so big that it took an hour, the problem was everyone wanted to talk to us). As we were going to leave, a lady from the village gave all of the girls a necklace that she had made. Absolutely incredible. I loved it!

We were back to the lodge well before dinner, so we had a few hours to do whatever. Since Rita was sick and sleeping, i didn't want to chill in teh room, so Patricia and Hannah and i grabbed journals and once again hung out in the bar. We were joined... again, by Harry. Hannah thinks he needs to write his stories down so she gave him a journal and told him to start. He started all right... by writing a love poem, which he later gave to me. yeah, long story. While he was writing though, he asked if we would mind if he kept in touch with us by email. We all consented, why not? Yeah, his aim was merely to get my info, but he found it easier to get everyones. He told me that he didn't want to scare me away. haha. Like i said, long story, but we're keeping in touch.

It rained!!!!! my last night in the Amazon and it was incredible! One minute it was hot and humid, the next everything was soaked and it was cool and breezy. I was basically exstatic all night, if rain sounds awesome in the states, it is chevere in the Amazon. :)