First days

One of my longtime goals has been to dance like a Latino. Now, genetically speaking, I have some built-in limitations that I have been furiously working to overcome the last 3 nights. Miraflores is a upscale district in Lima that has an alley called La Calle de los Pizzas (Pizza Street) where the Pizza isn't so great according to Mario. The dancing, on the other hand, is superb. It is the young Peruano (Peruvian) crowd and music ranging from salsa to electronic to meringue, reggaton, cumbia, musica negra and 80s ballads. They even mixed in a little "Greased Lightning" last night.

It is typical to hago horas (hang out) in Pisco bars before hitting the clubs. Pisco is a grape-based liquor that is popular in Peru and is pretty similar to vodka. Mario has lots of friends and it's been great to pick up some Spanish and then proceed to work on my dances moves until late into the night. We also went to a district called Barranca which Mario and company frequent. We spent part of a night in a classy pub there listening to a live singer and his guitar.

Yesterday, I met up with Helanie, a friend from Alaska that I had met in Portland. She is here working with orphans that she supports year-round but only can visit occasionally. Her main mission this trip was to find her "Lost Girl," who had run away from the orphanage to check on her family and had been sexually abused on the road. She found her at a detention center and said the meeting was incredibly emotional, a more tragic version of the story of the prodigal son is what I pictured. The reunion was nothing if not filled with mutual love.

Today (Saturday), Mario and I are going to help Helanie's group feed orphans and then get ready to go to San Andres for a party on Sunday. Mario's attending/boss, a preeminent neurologist and former Minister of Health in Peru has invited him and the other residents to her house there as kind of a retreat. I finagled an invitation and it should be a good time.

She also took us on a tour of his hospital a couple days ago. It is 310 years old officially and began with a miracle known as the "Pobre Cristo." The story goes that a priest stopped to help a beggar at this location, a former trash heap, and the beggar turned out to be Christ, who admonished the priest to care for others like he had cared for him. So they started a combination convent/hospital in the 1600s. Pretty cool stuff. Also, it was a great honor to learn this from such an important woman. The hospital has an entire room full of human brains with different disease processes visible which was pretty creepy but impressive all the same. Apparently it wasn't illegal to return a body to the family missing a few important, but non-visible pieces back in the day. (my apologies to the feint-of-stomach)

All that is not to mention walking on the beach, seeing cathedrals, palaces and other important buildings, hanging out with Mario's dad, eating good food, going for long walks through the city in search of electronics and taking taxis and buses all over the place. It has been a very full 3 days.

I also started my residency match list today. If you're the praying type, I could definitely use a little help there. Love you all!