Pachamama: I saw my first fly this week!

yes, as the title of this entry suggests i saw my first bolivian fly this week. because the altitude is so high, the little buggers have a hard time standing their own here, but this week as i was breakfasting on some bolivian baguettes ( maraquettas) and quince jam (O.M.G) i saw a fruit fly! it was quite magical and surreal. some other exciting things that happened this week, that again will involve food are: i bought these 100 calorie bars ( i guess they are into the 100 calorie packs here too) at Irupana, a health food store, that are puffed quinoa, amarynth or canawa covered in chocolate. they are pretty f-ing delicious.

i also drank a rather strange drink that i was skeptical about, but which turned out to be very delish: you take dried peaches, put them in a pot with a few cups of water and boil it for a while with some cinnamon. then you drink the water. and then you eat the peaches. its called mocochinchi.

i also had some coca and cinnamon tea this week because i was sick and had to miss school. i for some reason thought that dried fruit= safe, but as it turns out prunes late at night here that have not been washed it not a good idea. i woke up the next morning and couldnt walk because it felt like 10 ninjas were stabbing my small intestines with shark teeth. i slept for 3 hours, ate some crackers and then got examined by a family doctor. i had just had some soup right before she came and my estomago was digesting it, when she heard this with her stethascope she immediately diagnosed me with a bacterial infection and prescribed me anti-biotics. i said thank you very much and threw the prescription out. some other VERY exciting news in the life of adrienne in bolivia is that today, sunday september 20, i had some mexican food!!!!!!! such a relief and i will definitely sleep well tonight. i only have two more food items to tell you all about and then i will move onto the more boring things in my life. i found this AMAZING little health food store called " arco iris" and they literally sell everything delishous in this world. croissants, chocolate, jam, whole wheat breads, smoked trout, hummus, fruit juices, dried fruit, cookies, nuts, nuts covered in chocolate, cake, coffee, tea, cheese, babagonush, sundried tomatoes, you name it and they have it. i bought my family some goodies as a thank you for being so sweet to me and buying me basically everything i need and also things i dont need. i also tried to make brussel sprouts, and failed miserably. i used regular oil instead of olive and it just wasnt the same. also, the brussels here are about the size of olives ( precious size).

i will finish my food items with a segway into my jewish items. i went to yom kippur services and breakfast this fine saturday afternoon. yes, i attended services at THE highest synagogue in the WORLD. exciting, right? the temple was conservative, i had to show my passport to enter, then walked through 2 high security, vault-like doors to a room filled with maybe 60 bolivian jews. women on one side, men on the other. i sat there for 2 hours not being able to follow anything waiting to eat. i also didnt really take into account that not eating for 24 hours at 13,000 ft above sea level might not be the best idea. basically i almost fainted a few times, wanted to vomit, and couldnt really stand up. but hey, i was united with jews all around the world for a day so who cares, at least i am still alive and blogging! i broke my fast with potato empanadas, chocolate covered dried pineapple, challah, peanut stuff covered in chocolate, orange juice and some tea. it was all very delicious, but nothing compared to break fast at the beitcher residence. i havent really felt homesick yet, but last night i definitely did.

this week i also went to the museo de metales and the folkloric art museum. they were both very interesting and both very small. i got to see gold and silver from a very ling time ago.

my blogging this week is a little out of order and a little sans pictures because a lot of the things i did i couldnt take picutres of, like my volunteering on saturday. jenny ( a friend from my program) and i went to volunteer at this restaurant that helps children shoe shiners. the shoeshiners are anywhere from ages 8-28 and shine shoes on the street. some of them live on the street and some of them live in houses. every saturday they come to this restaurant to eat breakfast ( maraquettas with cheese and some tea) and discuss different things. every 2 weeks they publish a mini newspapers with articles that they write themselves about whatever topic they choose. this week it was mainly little kids who came so we ate breakfast, colored, wrote our names and then one of the little girls read her article to me. her name is karen, she is probably 11, and wrote a little article about when she was in the hospital having surgery. jenny and i are going to try to go every saturday that we are here in la paz.

the amount of bread they eat here is out of control and if i dont start saying no to my bolivian dad when he offers me delicious bread, i am going to turn into pan integral.

my mom also arraganged for a woman to come to our apt to sell me and my sister bras, so instead of a tupperware party, we had a bra party. my family also bought be new blouses, as seen in the picture above. there is a lot more that i have to write and tell but i have to pack my suitcase for tomorrow because we leave at 5:15 am for Santa Cruz, another city in Bolivia. I will get back next wednesday night and will have lots of blogging to do!

my new shirt, also proof that i am alive and not actually as preppy as the foto suggests