It's Peru, Baby.

1. My doggy Wanpi (she's had the op, by the way... this is one Peruvian mammal that WON'T be reproducing!)
2. Sun every single day without fail
3. Buying fresh crabs, 4 for 50 pence, from the men who go out fishing on caballitos (reed crafts used since Inca times) and making chankarito - crush the crabs... add limon and chilli pepper... oye, que rico!
4. Tito's beloved Celica
5. Drinking outside Cecelia's corner shop on any random weeknight until 7am (not sure if I do actually miss this one...)
6. Glavis's cooking, especially the massive vegetable soups and coconut jam
7. Salsa music everywhere
8. The beaches, Pimentel (Las Rocas) and Puerto Eten especially
9. A rather filling cebichito with a tortita de choclo (a fried corn fritter) for one sol - about 14 pence!
10. Modelo market for wonderful fresh fruit and cheap silver jewellery

Thanks for your advice... it was much appreciated, as comments always are. (More, please!). I think though, for the time being, I am just going to carry on writing here, as if I were normal. I sure don't feel normal, having gotten married, gone on honeymoon, left my bizarre life and much loved in-laws in Peru, abandoned my dog, killed my monkey, moved to London, gotten a flat, received many smashing consumer durables from Katie and Al, started a job, and all sort of fabulous Japanese cooking ingredients (from the Japan Centre, Piccadilly, on Saturday!), all in the past two months. I feel very strange indeed, even though I am essentially loving it here, I feel like I'm just not 'with it'. Y'getme? I hate all my unfashionable clothes and just can't quite figure out the trains, I am sooo broke, and sometimes I basically feel like I'm on another planet right here in London. I can, however, make time for my blog this week... it's exam time at the college, and so no classes. Argh! That means no money... but I've just been approved for an 'eggcard' and thus feel flush. Lots of distracting Katie, seriously sorting out my filofax, cooking tasty Japanese meals for hardworking hubby, and most importantly, lots of BLOG in store for next week! Until tomorrow...

You might have noticed my postings have been a bit sparse of late. It's been a bit manic. Tito started work today, he's on a building site (probably getting soaked in the rain! bless'im!) which is a start... he's such a hard worker, I know he'll do really well. He's chuffed to get working again. I started teaching yesterday, it was truly lovely... and a far cry from disciplining 25 restive 13 year olds in the heat of a Chiclayo summer! The students at David Game College seem mature and focussed, the classes are small, and the classrooms well-equipped. I'll be teaching 'IELTS' courses, which prepare the students for the 'IELTS' English Proficiency exam which they have to take in order to qualify to apply to a British university. So, the teaching could be a little dry - but I will be more than pleased not to be playing riotous race-to-the-board games, ballistic Bingo, pandemonium pictionary, etc. at least for some time... and at a wage eight times higher than I was receiving at ICPNA. I still have to get a summer job though; there are multitudinous summer courses running - although this kind of teaching will indeed babysitting spotty teens - argh. Only two months of it, thank goodness.

Right, here's where we get interactive. Not only have I been too awfully busy and stressed and cultured-shocked to make regular blog entries, I've been a bit, well... directionless. My whole blog 'It's Peru, Baby' has been based on my strange, amazing, heart-breaking, heart-warming, etc. experiences of a country. Now I am living in Anerley, London, with the husband of my dreams, in a very pleasant flat, doing a very civilised job - not living with 10 of Tito's family members and a veritable zoo besides, being shocked by toilet facilties, poverty and machoism. I'm not getting drunk on the beach or outside Cecelia's corner shop, I'm getting drunk in Brixton or Soho. I don't have anything explosively wrong with my stomach, haven't seen a traditional peasant in ages, and I don't even have a dog to talk about, let alone a monkey (Wanpi, I miss you like crazy). So, where should I go with this? Should I start a new blog? Should I carry on as if I were normal? Should I stop? (ha - just kidding!).

This blog was my major means of communication and life-saving English expression whilst in Peru. It means a lot to me. But I'm just not quite sure what to do with it. Sometimes I think about writing a book about 'My South American Family'. I'm sure I could find enough to say, and it would certainly be gripping reading if I could bring myself to be more grittily honest than I have been on this site. That's all just pie in the sky for now though, I need some security and this nice little teaching job will offer that. Writing and journalistic endeavors will likely be limited to blogging for some time to come... so what should I DO with this, guys? I need comments, suggestions, ideas... please throw me a bone.

There's many extrordinarily good reasons why I haven't made an entry in far, far too long... honestly. In the past 6 days we have found, and now moved into, a really bright, lovely one-bed Victorian conversion flat in Anerley (next to Crystal Palace and just down the road from Katie and Al's) AND I have gotten a fabtastic job teaching English to pre-university foreign students at David Gate College in Notting Hill (many thanks to Em for landing me a real corker of a job!)... it's been all go, basically. We've been trying to figure the trains/tubes/buses, where to find South American types who might like to give Tito a job, what the heck I should do for a summer job (the college is closed for July and August), how to read the meters, how to get along with Katie and Al's Devon Rex curly cat Milo, and which precise types of curry/pizza/cheese we best enjoy. It's all new and exciting, and the emotional rollercoaster we've experienced for so long seems destined to continue even over here. It's spring, the leaves are well sprouted and the birds are chirping, the air smells fresh and green and we have lots of wonderful mates to meet up with. Yet, we don't know quite how we'll pay the second month's rent of our nice little flat, nor where the post office is, or how to join the library. Slowly but surely, we'll get sorted. We are loving London, and so chuffed with all we can see, do and acheive here. It's just super to be back!