It's Peru, Baby.

Often, people say to me "Ooo, you're sooo brave, I could never live abroad." To which I never know quite what to reply... erm, living abroad is not a special super power, and of course they could do it if they wanted to. Life is basically the same everywhere. You wake up, have breakfast, go to work, come home, eat supper, go to bed. I suppose the things that are the hardest to deal with about living in a foreign country are simply the details... if you move away from your home country you'd better be flexible about the details. I think I'm extremely flexible, but the details still do my head in sometimes... for example, here, I wake up in the morning and need a pee. I find that the loo is occupied by one of the many family members, and so I am forced to fall back in to a restless, full-bladdered doze. I hear the occupant exit, and hasten to open my door, only to find the next in the queue has entered... It's a tricky process. After I eventually gain access to the toilet, I'll have breakfast - that won't be the rice and seaweed I was accustomed to in Japan, but maybe some bread, black olives and avocado. I go to work here, just like anyone else. But I've never before had to travel by the 'collectivos' that function as Peru's public tranportation system (old chugging Dodges with 6 passengers plus driver, or small Japanese made Ticos with 5 passengers!). You get the picture...