September 26, 2006
Que tal mis amigos?
Started taking 2 hours of spanish class in the evenings at the Simon Bolivar spanish school (http://www.bolivar2.com/). My first class was this evening and my spanish teacher is Jose and he is very good at teaching spanish. He basically asked me if I had anything special in mind that I would like to learn in spanish and I basically said to put sentences together so working with pronouns, verbs, adjectives and all those other things that form sentences since I can memorize all the nouns myself on my own time. In spanish "V" is pronounced like a "B". I always thought it was just certain words but he says all words with a "V" are pronounced "ba". Studying spanish on my own has helped a lot and these lessons are just reconfirming my pronounciations etc... I do 2 hours per day in the evening and it is doing the trick. They have free salsa dancing lessons right after my spanish classes so I may check them out.
Talking to a New Zealander in my hotel today and he said everyone he has talked to traveling in Ecuador has had something bad happen to them with mostly robberies and theft. He said he talked to a woman the previous night and she was held at knife point by 2 guys and they wanted everything as they jabbed the knife into her body. I can't wait until it is my turn!!! PICK ME! PICK ME!! We are told to always watch our bags on the buses since people slash them open quietly with a knife and take the contents without the owners suspecting anything. When it comes to traveling all this stuff is par for course in every 3rd world country has those people that specialize in robbing tourists. AWARENESS is the name of the game when traveling and using common sense. I have caught a couple pick pocketers in my travels.
So I am either going to spend another week or two here in Cuenca before moving on. After Cuenca I will probably go to Loja which is about a 5 hour bus ride south and then to Vilcabamba which is an hour south of Loja. From Vilcabamba I will go to Zumba and then cross into Peru. In Peru I will go to Chachapoyas, then Cajamarca, then Trujillo, then head down the Pacific coast to Lima and then make my way out to Cuzco and check out Machu Picchu and the Incan Vilcabamba and then Lake Titacaca before heading into Bolivia. From there I may head down into Argentina and over to Chile. I am just going on feel right now and move on after I start to get a little restless.
Chao!
Que tal mis amigos?
Started taking 2 hours of spanish class in the evenings at the Simon Bolivar spanish school (http://www.bolivar2.com/). My first class was this evening and my spanish teacher is Jose and he is very good at teaching spanish. He basically asked me if I had anything special in mind that I would like to learn in spanish and I basically said to put sentences together so working with pronouns, verbs, adjectives and all those other things that form sentences since I can memorize all the nouns myself on my own time. In spanish "V" is pronounced like a "B". I always thought it was just certain words but he says all words with a "V" are pronounced "ba". Studying spanish on my own has helped a lot and these lessons are just reconfirming my pronounciations etc... I do 2 hours per day in the evening and it is doing the trick. They have free salsa dancing lessons right after my spanish classes so I may check them out.
Talking to a New Zealander in my hotel today and he said everyone he has talked to traveling in Ecuador has had something bad happen to them with mostly robberies and theft. He said he talked to a woman the previous night and she was held at knife point by 2 guys and they wanted everything as they jabbed the knife into her body. I can't wait until it is my turn!!! PICK ME! PICK ME!! We are told to always watch our bags on the buses since people slash them open quietly with a knife and take the contents without the owners suspecting anything. When it comes to traveling all this stuff is par for course in every 3rd world country has those people that specialize in robbing tourists. AWARENESS is the name of the game when traveling and using common sense. I have caught a couple pick pocketers in my travels.
So I am either going to spend another week or two here in Cuenca before moving on. After Cuenca I will probably go to Loja which is about a 5 hour bus ride south and then to Vilcabamba which is an hour south of Loja. From Vilcabamba I will go to Zumba and then cross into Peru. In Peru I will go to Chachapoyas, then Cajamarca, then Trujillo, then head down the Pacific coast to Lima and then make my way out to Cuzco and check out Machu Picchu and the Incan Vilcabamba and then Lake Titacaca before heading into Bolivia. From there I may head down into Argentina and over to Chile. I am just going on feel right now and move on after I start to get a little restless.
Chao!
