Crossroads

I started this earlier, but my computer decided it was tired and I lost everything. So that’s one of my excuses for not writing on here very often.

I’m at a crossroads… It looks as though the president of the school I work at is going to shut down our branch. He’s not making enough money off of it. So this puts me in an awkward position.

I have a few options; I’m just not sure which is the best or which one I really want. Any input and advice will be gratefully considered.

A) stay in Tacna and try and get work at another school.
B) go to Arequipa and work at Brittany there.
C) find another job somewhere not too far away
D) go back to Canada for the summer and make some real money
E) cruise ship

Option A: I’ve been working on this. I had an interview last night with the director of CEID and they’re interested in having me work there, which is nice BUT there’s a couple of glitches. The first one is that because they work in 3 month contracts, you only get paid once every 3 months. I’m pretty sure I can’t live for the next 3 months on the 300 bucks that I made at Brittany this month. Glitch number 2 – because they’re a government institution, they require me to get a work visa. I went to immigration today and checked out what it takes to get one. 1st I have to leave the country again and re-enter with the contract from the school so that I receive a business visa instead of the tourist one that I have. This isn’t a big deal. I’ve been wanting to visit Arica again anyways before the summer is over. They have a nice beach. But it’ll cost about 100 soles. 2nd I need to do the paperwork. If I do it in Tacna, it will take 2 months because all of the paperwork has to go to the consulado in Lima. OR I can take the trip to Lima myself and have it done in 2 days which would cost 300+ soles just to go to Lima and the paperwork costs about another 300 soles. Anyways, I’m going to go talk to the director again tonight and see if there’s any way to work around the visa thing.

Option B: I don’t really want to go to Arequipa. For 1, I’d be working for the same guy and I’m not a really big fan of this guy. I don’t think he really knows how to run a business. Or maybe it’s a Peruvian thing, but I doubt it. I could live with Mapi, I know that. It’s the whole “it’s still Brittany” thing that bums me out.

Option C: I could look in Arica for a job. Or there was this posting in Juilica, a couple of hours from here. But when I inquired a friend about what it’s like, he didn’t have anything good to say about it. I don’t really have the funds to go any further. There was this other place in Chile that a friend of mine was telling me about. She said she’d get some info for me.

Option D: Honestly, this is the most appealing at the moment. I could go back to Van for the summer and make some real money and then before I go back to work here or in some other SA country, I can gather up a bit of savings as well. See my friends, do some camping, save some money. The only issue with this idea is I can’t get home. I’m kind of stuck here. This whole $3/hr thing is crazy. I thought about asking the president to sponsor me a ticket home since I spent so much money to get here to work for him, but he’ll probably just want me to work in Arequipa. I’m 99% sure he’ll say no. Like I said, businessmen here (or just him) are really different than in Canada.

Option D: The cruise ship. This I was more thinking about doing in November of next year after April and Edgar’s wedding… That I’m still HOPING to get to. Again, I’ll be able to save up some money doing that.

Anyways, like I said… crossroads. And I’m open to any advice or other ideas that I may have missed.

Thoughts anyone?

On the more positive side...

Well, things are much better now than they were at the last post. I've got a couple more friends (yay me!) and well, yes, the power is back on. They called me and asked me to pay it for them. It was about the same amount as my rent, so no big deal.
I've been hanging out with one of my students. She's just moved out on her own (which is VERY odd for anyone in Peru) and is used to being around people all the time too. But... the other night when we were talking, she told me that her mom is only 5 years older than me!!!! What the hell?! Ok, ya, she's only 20, and her mom had her when she was 17, but still... kinda weird.
I went to the beach a couple of weekends ago. Actually, the weekend my power was cut. We went on friday and were only planning on staying till saturday afternoon, but another friend of mine came out and we stayed until sunday. There's a lot of beach houses there and people usually know at least 1 person who has one. So that was cool. There was lots of food too. People are really friendly that way out here. They like to feed you.
So, if you didn't know before, I live in the middle of the desert. Tacna is actually situated between to big sand dunes. One to the North and one to the South. And it never rains here. Well, almost never. Yesterday afternoon when I was leaving for the school, I felt a drop. My first thought was that someone was dumping water from a second floor, but then I noticed... OMG, its actually raining! Not rain, like Vancouver rain where it pours for weeks on end, but just a very miniscule amount of drops. Almost like it wasn't raining at all. But that's the way it goes down here. I was thinking as I walked to work, "what is this strange wet stuff falling from the sky?"
Its quiz day, which is why i have time to write this. Its hard to believe we're halfway through the cycle already. One more week of lessons then the exams. The months are just flying by. I can't believe I've been here almost as long as I was in Mexico for. Seems strange to me.
Anyways, on a final note... good thing i'm not superstitious.