Well hello there! It's been a while since I've written to this blog.. about 2 years!! Wow. Who would have thought after that last one there would be another RackersInBolivia entry in 2010.?!

I just thought a blog is the best way to keep everyone up to date with what I'm up to and how I'm getting on, I know ya all worry :o) haha

If you're coming onto this blog then obviously you'll know that I decided to come back to Cochabamba, Bolivia again for 2 months this summer. I'm not with a church or charity, it's just me, Hannah Woods and Lois Browne. We've all been in cocha before and fallen in love with the place and so decided to spend summer 2010 hanging out, seeing all the friends we left behind, brushing up our Spanish and offering help to various charity and church projects in the city.

Our collective journeys to Bolivia were pretty awkward..
I did successfully avoid the ash cloud over UK airspace by flying to london a few days early and stay with my brother who then brought me to heathrow airport on thurs morning ( 27th may).
Here I met up with Lois. Due to the BA strikes, we had been transferred onto a different flight to miami pretty last minute. Lois had already checked in so I went to the desk where they told me I didn't actually have a ticket.. but it turned out the Expedia lady who transferred our tickets over the phone had messed up, and it was all ok. The BA woman disappeared with my passport for about 15mins and then came back with my ticket.
Arriving in Miami, we learned that Hannah's flight in from Texas was delayed and so she missed our flight down to La Paz. Poor Hannah took it well and set up camp in Miami airport until the next available flight to La Paz the same time next day!

Meanwhile, Lois and I checked us into a hostel in La Paz for the next few days. Little did we know that the annual street festival El Gran Poder, was happening that weekend and our hostel was pretty much right in the middle of it. So the streets were closed for 2 days and we couldn't really go anywhere. We had to grab Hannah from the airport and come straight to the hotel before the roads closed and we'd be blocked out. The festival itself wasn't even enjoyable.

Lois and I had a few things we wanted to do in La Paz, hence the reason for staying there rather than go straight down to cochabamba. However these things didn't take as long as we'd anticipated, and after spending 2 days pretty much in our hotel room we were a bit disheartened. However, we all get along great together and enjoyed hanging out, getting to know each other better (as we all live in different countries, weird!) and it's amazing the fun you can have with a deck of cards!
Monday and Tues were good days in La Paz. We went to see San Pedro prison, without going into all the details of how much this meant to me, and to Lois, i can just advise you to read 'Marching Powder', by Rusty Young. Real life story of a Brit drug smuggler's time in this prison. As we sat and watched the hustle and bustle at prison gates, a young man approached us and offered us a tour of the prison - 2 and half hours inside, seeing all 7 sections, and a bodyguard would be provided. Unfortunately his tours weren't operating that particular day and we were leaving the next..

Wednesday we had an 8 and half hour bus journey from La Paz to Cochabamba. It was long, uncomfortable and hot. But we were heading to our cocha so we didn't care, it was great!
Arriving in Cocha we met the lady who would take us to our apartment. It's lovely! We got the keys, threw down our luggage, sprayed a bit of deodourant, and went for a big feed in the poshest restaurant in town hahaha and had a two-fold toast.. to us in cochabamba, and to me getting into queens for nursing in sept!

From Thursday until today (Sun) we have taken a few days to relax, buy in some essentials, adjust to being back in Cocha, and settle-in really.
Thursday morning some of Lois's friends from her church here which was nice. They're lovely and it was a nice first experience of spanish!
In the evening, something very special happened... I finally met someone who I've been facebook friends with for more or less one year! hahaha
This guy, called Ever, and I have been really good friends chatting all the time online, but we never met each other the last time I was in Cocha, it's kinda weird. Anyway after so long we can finally be proper friends in real life -yay! He dances in a Bolivian folklore group and he invited us to a show. It was amazing! We loved it. The dances, the costumes, the atmosphere.
Hannah and I also bumped into our brazilian friends William and Renato at this show - completely by coincidence, so that was cool!

We met with our old Spanish teachers at the language centre and Hannah and I have signed up to Spanish classes next week from 8-10.30am Mon-Fri. I'm only planning to do the one week as I'm hoping this will be enough just to kick-start my Spanish into gear.
We also met with Marcos who is a Bolivian guy married to a Scottish lady called Gwen. Just over a year ago they opened a community centre in a very needy area on the outskirts of Cochabamba. They have also started their own communtiy church within the centre which Marcos himself pastors. At the minute Gwen is back home in the UK so we are planning to help out at the centre. We've agreed to start English lessons one night a week and to help run a holiday bible club for 2 weeks in july.

I'm sorry this update was rather long. It was a quick decision to start writing this blog and I felt there was a lot I needed to get you caught up on!
To sum up.. I'm in Cochabamba, I'm safe and well and really really enjoying myself, and looking forward to '' stop messing around and do something useful'', to paraphrase the words of my brother, Peter. :o) hahaha