¡vamos a la peña!

let's go to the dance! a bunch of med students are putting on a dance here and invited me and some of the other volunteers along... i have no idea what to expect other than they're trying to set me up with one of the girls. i hope they know mikey's not trying to marry a quiteña he just met a few days ago... Anyway, it's a good thing i've been taking salsa lessons since i've been here so i'll have something to do to at least try to keep up! Over a few drinks they were interrogating me with a veritable barrage of preteen quesitons, "what kind of girls do you like?" "which one of us do you like?" "what do you think of latin girls?" It was everything i could do to squeak out some words in spanish, my face was so tight from smiling streched cheeks and my tattletale of a flushed face giving away my embarrassment. They asked me to say some nice things about them in french and the first thing that popped to mind was "ma petite chou," my little cabbage, a nice pet name which doesn't translate very well. "Lechugita!?" they exclaimed, and a nick name was born. They tell me that gringos aren't the best dancers because even when they know the steps they're a bit rigid. This is almost too much pressure, i feel like an ambassador for my people, i'll report back with details.

it's going to be two guys and five girls from quito that i've known for a week now, four chicas from germany and a great guy from australia that's living at our house for a week or two working on picking up spanish.

wish me and mi lechugita luck i'll need everything i can get!