A Love Affair with Cars

I think I can proclaim Eli officially car obsessed.  Thanks to a suitcase of cars that his grandma brought from the US recently, he has enough cars to set up shop in every room in the house.  He has been known to spend 1/2 an hour moving his cars through his tracks in his room solo as he "talks" them through their traffic jams.  The cars come with us everywhere...to the park, the grocery store, and to the club we've started to go to on the weekends.  When he's not playing with cars, he's talking about Bob the Builder's construction vehicles or pointing at the "big tow cars" on the roads of lima.  When we go visit Alan's sister, he immediately runs into our nephew's room and pulls out all of his cars into the hallway and starts wheeling them around.

Meanwhile, Alan and I have had our own discussions around cars lately but they have been more about our lack of a love affair with cars in Lima. Driving here is really nerve wracking and we've been analyzing what it is about Lima drivers that makes it so horrible.  First, Lima drivers are all in a major rush to go somewhere, even if it is to reach the red stop light first.  On Sunday mornings at 8am, you will still find Lima drivers in a rush, making every possible move to try to get around us, so they can go faster.  Speed bumps are no deterrent and drivers simply race their cars over them unconcerned about the damage done to their cars.  Clearly the idea of driving with gas efficiency in mind has not occurred to people here, as drivers race down the street to only "stop" suddenly at an intersection, and then quickly accelerate to the next intersection.  I write "stop" in quotations because despite the big signs that say "Pare" and the big "Pare" spraypainted on the road, no one stops at intersections.  It is a more slow glide through the intersection praying and hoping the other direction of traffic is also doing a slow glide through.  The other thing about Lima drivers is that they are extremely aggressive on the roads.  There is sense of fierce competition on the streets.  No one lets you in and in contrary, just makes it really difficult for you to get over where you need to.  Buses and taxes drive on the line between two lanes so that they can make quick decisions about where they want to be.  All of this is in total opposition to the way Lima citizens are off the roads.  They are not aggressive but very calm, orderly, and in general more passive.  Perhaps everyone is getting out their frustrations in life on the road.  But for the reasons I've mentioned and more, I've decided that driving here is not something I'm ready to attempt any time soon.

The problem is that the bus system is not to be attempted by foreigners...not sure where I'd end up.  Taxis are supposedly not safe to just hail from the streets as we did in NYC because they are not registered and there is no accountability system for the thousands of taxis driving around.  So you must call a reputable taxi company to hire a car.  Well, I tried that with my rough Spanish and after 15 minutes of trying to explain my address, the woman told me there were no cars in the area! So luckily, I've found a really nice taxi driver through my sister-in-law, who is available for hire whenever I need and he knows I'm learning Spanish and is patient with me.  And to top off how great he is, his name is Frank, the name of our beloved driver in Ghana.  So for now, that is my mode of transport when I'm not on foot! 

Small World

Alan and I were reminded last night of how small the world is when we joined our neighbors for a little  get together at their apartment which was meant to introduce us to some new people in Lima.  Within the first week of living in our new apartment, I met my neighbor Catalina, who is from Chile.  She and her husband, a Peruvian, lived in NYC for years but settled in Lima in the last 2 years. They have a beautiful 6-month old baby. Catalina has been great...helping me understand our sudden water shutoff in our building since I could not understand the building employee's explanation in Spanish, taking me around to some shops for beautiful pima cotton baby clothing, and offering tons of contacts and advice about living in Lima.  She and her husband kindly invited us for an impromptu wine and snacks get together at their place the other night to which they invited some of their other close friends.  We didn't have any time to arrange child care for Eli but since we were just across the hall, we used our monitor and frequent checks, and were able to join them.  Alan had not yet met Catalina or her husband.  When her husband walked in the room, Alan did a double take and said "I know you!"  They realized that they had gotten acquainted in NYC years ago through a mutual Colombian friend and had attended many parties together over the years they lived in New York.  We couldn't get over what a coincidence that we would have chosen an apartment literally across the hall from someone Alan knows!  We had a wonderful time getting to know them and their friends.  I got lots of great advice and suggestions from the group and we really enjoyed the company...even though we were out way past our bedtime (2am!). The night made us hopeful that we will continue to build our social network and friend circle here. 

Peruvian Sunsets

Since we arrived and settled into our temporary apartment on the 21st floor, we've been documenting the breathtaking sunsets here on the Pacific coast. One is more spectacular than the next and each one made us stop and pinch ourselves to realize this beautiful scenery is our backyard. Now that we've moved into our new closer-to-the-ground apartment on the 3rd floor and no longer have the same spectacular view, I wanted to share some of what we've been enjoying in our first weeks here in Lima.

And just for comparison, this is what our view looked like when we were literally in a cloud.

And just some other views. You can see in the one below how the mountains just rise directly out of the ocean.

A Month of New Things and Visitors

We finally got our real Internet and cable yesterday so I am back to blogging and skyping for as long as I want! No more modem with limited capacity!

And as I realize that it is almost been a month since my last post, I am reflecting on all the newness in our lives that has occurred in the past few weeks. The most fabulous piece of new news is that we have finally moved into our apartment here in Lima. We are still in the same district as our temporary one, San Isidro, but is much closer to Eli's new school.  We really love the new place and are finally feeling more or less settled. Our container arrived from the States a few weeks ago but after spending several weeks in the port, we got it delivered 1 1/2 weeks ago.  Thankfully we had my mom here and Alan's mom here to help us with the move, unpacking, and arranging our things. Here are some pictures of our new place!

The neighborhood is quiet and in fact we are across the street from the Russian embassy so we are well-protected! We have 2 wonderful parks within walking distance and a grocery store, pharmacies, banks, cafes/restaurants all within a few blocks. We've started to meet some of our neighbors as well so slowly, it is starting to feel like home.  That is...after a full week of either no water, no hot water, or no electricity! It was a rough first week to say the least but after resolving issues with our water heater, and after the building paid their water bill, and after the city finished their maintenance on the electricity in the area, we now have all three!

For Eli, his big new adventure is his new school.  He had his first day last week and so far is adjusting well. He is going to the Jewish school here in Lima and it is pre-k-12 but he is in a nicely protected wing of the school with all the other pre-k children so if feels like a small nursery school. His class is small, only 7 children, and he has a warm and sweet teacher named Silvia and a teacher's assistant, Alejandra.

 Here's Eli in his new school uniform. That will take a little getting used to by me, at least!

Luckily, for me Silvia speaks perfect English so when we need to discuss something important, I can at least understand fully. Although Eli still cries every time I drop him off, she says he's fine within seconds of me leaving.

The last few weeks, we've had the pleasure of having family visitors. Alan's mom was visiting for a few weeks and my mom came for about a week and a half.  It was great having family nearby and we tried to soak up as much as we could with them.  We had several excursions and activities with Alan's mom to the Lima Zoo, to a district called Barranco which is an artsy area catering to young people in Lima, to a nearby town for an amazing feast of unlimited rotisserie chicken and french fries, a day at the club for swimming and playtime, and a few quiet Shabbat dinners both at my sister-in-law's and most recently at our new house.

And with my mom, we managed some fun but mostly were busy dealing with the no water and no electricity situation and running around to get the loads of things necessary when you move into a new place. But we enjoyed a little market tour with my Spanish tutor, Mariana, on Friday and learned and tasted new fruits and then we went for a nice brunch last Sunday with some new friends from the American and Canadian embassy.  We got a few visits in to the park and Eli loved playing with all the new cars and trucks she brought him.

So things have finally quieted down, with the visitors back home and Eli in school, and the house mostly unpacked.  I will continue to work on my Spanish with my tutor, which is steadily getting better but still as frustrating as ever sometimes, and we will slowly start to put together the baby's room as we are counting down at 27 weeks now! I hope to spend more time taking pictures and writing about our experiences here too, now that we have our Internet up and running.