Woke up yesterday to another lovely bright sunny day! I decided to go to the supermarket and buy some stuff as we have a kitchen in the hostel... Mind you the stuff I mean is bread, cheese and crisps! We really felt like we've been living in Sucre for a while, it all seems so familiar. We lazed around all day until it was finally time for our Spanish classes.
At 2:15 pm, we assembled in the patio, 5 of us dejectedly dragging our feet as we walked to Me Gusta, no idea what to expect. Long story short, I really really enjoyed the class! It's 4 hours long with a 15 minute break, but our teacher can sense when the energy is waning and changes it up with games etc. Yesterday we had an excercise at the end of the class where he took us to the main market to practise some of what we learnt and it was really fun and useful. He also took us to a 'chorisquena' (I've probably spelt that wrong), a local chorizo and pork snack stall, and it is seriously the best sandwich I have eaten yet!
The market itself is amazing - huge with different sections from meats to fruits and flowers and fast food stalls. The flower section was so breathtaking, if I ever saw flowers that pretty and fresh in London or Goa, I would be very happy.
After class, we went back to the hostel and immediately brought out the beers, the four hour class really took it out of the boys. We played cards (super competitive side of me came out!) and chatted and basically chilled. The hostel has an interesting mix of people, a few Brits who've been here a while, 2 South Africans who I thought were Australians (no matter how much I travel, I still cannot distinguish accents), some Argentinians, an Iranian, a big group of Brazillians (who aren't unfriendly, they just hang out with each other) and a couple of others I haven't spoken to yet.
It's really nice hearing about their experiences, and Bernie and I already feel qualified to offer our views since most of the people here haven't been to Machu Picchu/Cusco yet. Interesting fact, 'Machu Picchu' means old mountain... 'Machu Pichu' means old dick, so gotta make sure you pronounce and spell that right! Lots of stories on how they have been pick pocketed or straight out robbed, drunken losing bags, forgetful leaving cards in the ATM... quite scary but again just reinforcing what we already know - don't be stupid when you are traveling with all your stuff ie passport, money etc. But there's only so much you can do without going insane, so you can only be careful.
The other funny thing I've noticed is the search for weed aka drogas. Some of the people at the hostel smoke marijuana, but cannot seem to find any in Sucre. This is especially funny since most of them are here for 2-3 weeks, so daily we hear stories about how they went foraging and lots of exciting build up, only to come back to the hostel empty handed. Ah I love South America, full of surprises.
The 5 of us finally decided to check out the nightlife, since it was a Friday night after all, but couldn't find any! It was about 11 pm, which also meant the restaurant kitchens were all closed. We'd already been to beloved 'Pollos Locos" and were shocked to find it shut at 10 pm on a Friday night, absurd considering how much business they could be raking in. So we ended up at a kebab cart next to a woman selling pizza that she was cooking in a oven contraption, again in a tiny wheely cart - all of them mooching electricity from an electricity pole at the side of the road.
We stopped by a pub where there was live music, once again fairly empty. The duo playing Bolivian music was oh so bad - it was like each band member was playing a different song, but the crowd was loving it, singing and waving their hands in the air. We couldn't understand it!! But then, as our Brit friend rightly pointed out, even if he was playing a really bad version of Careless Whisper, we'd all probably break out in song as well! So true.
Fun times in the little town of Sucre.
We later found out that people here only go out after 2 am, so everything was dead because the party started a couple of hours after we'd gotten home already!
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