blog #2

Today is Saturday and there’s no class. Hurray! Instead, I woke up around 8am because I never can sleep here. I ate breakfast and then my ech showed me how they handwash laundry here. I have never worked so hard to get my clothes clean in my life. My hands are achy and dry. My laundry took about 3 or 4 hours. I went to go hang dry it on the line outside, but it looked like it was maybe going to rain. Sure enough right when I got everything hung, I hear the rolling thunder sound coming from the clouds and it starts to rain. I felt like I was in a movie. In a movie, this would be the part when it starts pouring down rain while I was taking my clothes down. Thankfully, I am not in a movie. It lightly rained while I took my clothes down and rushed into the house. My ech and I hung all our clothes throughout the house. Then we made lunch: fried potatoes, cabbage, carrots, and meat. I don’t ask what kind of meat it is, I just eat it. I think it is some kind of salami. I think after so many meals of not finishing my plate, my ech has realized that she does not need to feed me so much. Today, she asked me if I wanted the big bowl or the little. This is a big step up. It is a cultural thing that as a guest, they constantly give me like twice as much food as everyone else. I really don’t need that much food, and usually end up eating the same amount as everyone else. This made me feel wasteful, until today I saw that my ech saves the food and eats it later.

The clouds here are constantly amazing. I am at a much higher elevation here than in California, and it feels like the clouds are so close. They are crystal clear and seem like you could reach them if you climbed the right mountain. The other day, it was rainy and towards the end of the day, the sky started to clear up. The sky does not clear here the same way as at home. I couldn’t get my eyes off of the sky. The huge rain cloud was moving to uncover the beautiful clear sky. Behind this oversized rain cloud was the beautiful crystal clear blue sky. Don’t worry, I took pictures.