Untitled No. 2

Hello! Still here. In La Paz. And what a crazy place it appears to be. I´ve been pounding the streets (and hauling myself up the steep ones) and, you know, just soaking it up mainly. No problems with altitude mercifully and no stomach related unpleasantness. Mind you, I have not yet attempted street food. Think I´ll get some recommendations first, eh? It´s early days. You can be sure that when it comes I will fill you in on ALL the juicy details. Um...there are a lot of policewomen, I have noticed, in my journalistic way. Bolivians seem to be a friendly and helpful lot and it´s much easier going with the lingo. Wandered around the witches market (lots of dead dried animals and herbs and so forth) and the other central bits of town. Food is decidedly mediocre which is just as well as I could do with eating a bit less (although I had some rumbustuous Bolivian wine - very nice. And the beer isn´t bad). Combined with the exercise (i.e. walking up hills) I imagine the next time you see me I will be lean and rangy. Unless, as is likely, I go mental in Argentina with all the meat. Anyway, that´s a long way off. What else? Oh, there are load of markets flogging everything imaginable on the ultra cheap. Might bolster my wardrobe before I leave. Saw some nice cheap tweed jackets, might pick one up. If only I had my pipe! I could be the tweedy, pipe smoking, bearded teacher that I´m told is my destiny.

I´m staying with a lovely lady and her 2 sons in a nice bit of town. She talks a lot and we have hilarious non-conversations in Spanish (although she does speak some English). Don´t know how long I´ll stay there, might start looking for a room in a flat after a month.....we shall see. I start teaching on Monday and the extent of my training is just watching other teachers this week. Hmmm. I´m sure I´ll be fine. I think I´m doing 3 classes a day for the first 8 weeks. They are all starter classes, which is just as well as my grammar needs some serious polishing before I start going on about, you know, conditional tenses and subjunctives and what have you. Quite keen to get stuck in, actually. It looks like the plan is to be here until Christmas at least.

So there you have it. Hope everyone is well.

P.S. You shouldn´t have to register to see the photos on flickr.