Friday, April 22, 2011

Cochabamba (4-22-11)

We ate breakfast a little later than usual.  The others packed up their stuff and said their goodbyes to Doña Celia.  We spent the morning at La Villa, before they said goodbye to the kids.  I kept having to explain that I was not leaving and would be back in the evening.

I went with the others to the airport.  It was useful to see how things will go for my flight home on Monday.  I was truly sad to see them go.  We exchanged email addresses and hugs.  Folks said that we should do a reunion next year and bring Susie, but I'm skeptical it will happen.  On the other hand, Amy and Walker are the kind of people who make things happen.

I returned to La Morada for lunch and my final lesson with Reginaldo.  We worked more on reflexive verbs like gustar and doler.  They are really useful words and I think I understand them pretty well now.  I paid him $160 for the eight days of lessons.  I still speak very slowly and don't understand as much as I would like, but I feel like I've learned a lot.  The key will be to try and practice with Rosetta Stone or something.

I ended the lesson early and Susanna picked up me with her husband, Roberto, and her little daughter, Anabela.  We got to La Villa just as the third station of the cross started.  Amistad did the first half of the stations of the cross and La Ciudad de Niños, the second half.  Many of our houses have no older boys, so our stations often had girls with beards painted on their faces acting the male roles.  Many of them seemed to be girls I knew, so I kidded them that they now had beards like me.  The whole experience was an odd combination of cute and sacred, Catholic and street fair, and chaos and solemnity.  I took lots of pictures with my good camera.

When I returned for a late dinner, La Morada really felt empty.  I fear that these last few days will be lonely.

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