ProPeru second week

So I´m coming to the close of my second week here in Urubamba, Peru. Things have been going really well so far. My project is working with children in Frida´s Place which is a kind of afterschool program for the kids to come to. A lot of the children have to travel pretty far to get to school, so Frida provides them with a place to stay. My assignment is to teach them as much as I can about the environment.

I was pretty intimidated by my assignment since my spanish isn´t great. The ProPeru office has a binder filled with really good environmental lessons by previous volunteers that were taught in schools. However I was nervous to try and go into too much depth with them since I wasn´t confident in my ability to explain the concepts, or in answering any questions the children might´ve had. So another volunteer and I came up with some other basic lesson plans to do with the children.

The first couple of days we learned that the children really liked coloring, maps and books. We tried to structure our lessons around this knowledge. For one of our first lessons, we had flash cards of different land forms, like mountains, forests and beaches and asked the children to identify them. We then asked them where on the map these places could be found. The children really seemed to enjoy pointing out locations on the map. We then had them draw some of their favorite animals and indicate in which land type they thought they lived. They chose the correct places and seemed to enjoy the activity.

In other lessons we continued to focus on animals and taught the children the different classifications of animals. We went over mammals, reptiles and birds and cut out pictures of these animals and had the children tape the animals to the correct classifications. We also liked to start the lessons with a book to put the children in the right mindset to listen and end each lesson with a game.

Earlier in the week more volunteers came who will be working with me at Frida´s Place. Their spanish is much better than mine so I´m excited to be able to focus more on the environment with the children. The children are really receptive to the activities and have a lot of energy and are a ton of fun to be around.

Urubamba is gorgeous. Everywhere you look there are beautiful green mountains. My commute to Frida´s Place takes about 30 minutes on the bus and is a 15 minute walk up a hill to the house. It´s my favorite part of the day. The view is gorgeous and is a great way to get exercise.

Every Tuesday all the volunteers cook dinner together in the ProPeru office which is a great way to get to know the other volunteers. We´ve gone out a couple of times and I´ve been lucky to be placed with a great group of people. Last weekend a couple of us went on a hike which was one of the most beautiful I´ve ever been on. I´ve hiked in the jungle and it´s basically all green but here there were flowers, ancient trees with moss growing on them and a ton of birds flying over head. When we got to the top there was a huge lake surrounded by ancient jagged mountains that looked like something out of Lord of the Rings.

This weekend we´re visiting some ruins and hitting up the Pisaq market which is supposed to be Peruvian famous I believe. I´m definitely going to put a big dent in my wallet there. That´s all I have for now, hopefully I will have time to update more next week about the new project I´ll be taking on starting tomorrow!

why I fall more in love with Jon Stewart everyday

Here is a wonderous clip of Jon Stewart talking about yet another Republican Presidential Candidate debate last night. 24 is a good show, it shouldn't be political idealogy. And I think it would be terrifying if Jack Bauer ACTUALLY worked for the government.

3:00 a.m. - 4:00 a.m.

So I skipped recapping the last two episodes because I’m lazy. But this one is worth a recap.

The episode begins back at CTU where Morris respectfully puts his jacket over what’s left of Milo’s head. Josh is being taken away by the Chinese and Marilyn is FLIPPING OUT. If I was head Chinese terrorist guy I totally would’ve shot her in the head. But Jack saves her life by telling the Chinese guy that he can calm her down. He then thanks the Chinese guy for giving him this opportunity. I love it when Jack snarls “thank you.” He comforts her by putting her in a chokehold. It’s really hard to type with fake nails. Josh is whisked away down the sewer.

The Chinese are about to roll out so they break up the CTU minions into two groups to lock them away. Jack is in group two and he falls in line next to Nadia. He reiterates, in case Nadia hasn’t been paying attention, that if they get locked up they will lose their chance of recovering the circuit board. He then tells her they have to try and escape but that they probably won’t make it out alive. Nadia’s down with that. I originally thought that Jack said, “I might not even go through with it,” because he’s snarling again and I had to rewind it. That would’ve been a very un-Jack Bauer thing to say. Chloe comes up and asks what they’re talking about which I thought was hilarious. She said it as if Jack and Nadia were just gossiping on their lunch hour. Anyway. Jack gives Nadia the signal and they both attack the closest Chinese person. Morris gets in on the action too and I think Nadia snaps some guy’s neck. Jack chokes the head terrorist with the guys own gun strap! It’s sick. Meanwhile, Nadia has a gun aimed at her head while Jack and Morris look on helplessly. Nadia has taken down two Chinese guys by herself, Jack’s taken down maybe three and Morris is still struggling with his first one. Come on Morris. A bullet takes down the guy who has Nadia and we see that Doyle and his CTU buddies have returned in the nick of time.

Jack and Doyle decide to go after Josh, knowing that the Chinese taking him must have something to do with the circuit board. Nadia allows Jack to be released from custody and off they go. But not before Jack gives Nadia a “great job.” Getting a “great job” from Jack is worth Jack’s weight in gold.

In the Chinese tunnel, Josh is returned to Cheng. Cheng is more than a little confusing to me. Isn’t he a high-ranking diplomat? Didn’t he have to take International Relations in college? He should know that stealing circuit board chips, taking hostages at a government facility and kidnapping isn’t good for Chinese relations. He’s such a renegade. So he gets Josh and calls Poppa Bauer. Phillip would like to talk to Josh. He explains to him that he wants to take Josh to live with him in the land of China because no one will ever forgive him for his father’s crimes. Phillip has apparently never been to the United States because that happens all the time. Phillip says in ten years the Chinese will surpass the U.S. in everything to which my thinking is Phillip will probably be dead in ten years time because he’s really old. Josh’s response to this is “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about,” which cracked me up. Phillip sighs at his grandson’s stupidity and tells him he’s going anyway. Last week’s episode, while it was entertaining, didn’t make any sense to me. I didn’t understand while Phillip couldn’t just wait until Josh and Marilyn leave CTU in the morning and then go see him himself. But the fact that he wants to take him to China kind of made more sense. Marilyn would’ve never been down with that.

After Josh hangs up with grandpa, Cheng throws him in the car to meet Phillip to exchange the boy for the circuit board. Josh whines to Cheng about being afraid of his grandpa and not wanting to go to stupid China and he never wanted to go on this stupid trip anyway. As they’re starting to leave, Jack creeps up from the hole in the sewer and starts shooting. Jack, Doyle and random agents start taking down the Chinese in an awesome shoot-out. Jack doesn’t even bother using both hands when firing his weapon. He also SLIDES ON THE FLOOR and shoots and kills a scary man. One of the best kills of the season.

Josh and Cheng get out of the car and start running. Josh turns around and kicks Cheng in the chests, which is more evidence that he’s Jack’s son. Or maybe Doyle’s, they all look so similar. I love the Ivy League outfit Josh is wearing. Josh falls and is dangling by a chain when Jack catches up with Cheng, and obviously starts yelling at him. But Josh is about to fall, because he’s a wuss, so Jack chooses to save him. Unfortunately, this gives Cheng ample time to escape. Josh tells Jack what his grandfather is planning, and Jack tells Doyle that his father is in fact still involved.

Your father’s involved with the Chinese? Why? – Doyle
I don’t know. I’ll ask him when I find him. - Jack Bauer

I can’t wait until Jack kills his dad. Speaking of dad, during his escape, Cheng calls Phillip to tell him Jack has Josh again. Phillip tells him, no son no chip and Cheng throws a hissy fit.

Back in Washington, Daniels is explaining to Karen about Lisa and how Lennox is watching the undercover operation. We then go back to Lennox who is still in the van watching Lisa and the spy get it on for upwards of half an hour now, even though last time the bumped uglies, it only took a commercial break.

And finally, we’re done. – Lennox

Lennox is officially my favorite character. Lisa excuses herself into the bathroom and spy guy goes to her PDA as planned. He looks like he’s about to download the planted information, but then changes his mind and doesn’t. When Lisa comes back spy guy is very suspicious towards her and Lisa breaks a wine bottle over his head. This is my dream. At some point in my life I really want to do that, it looks like so much fun. But spy guy doesn’t think its fun and he starts to choke her. The guards finally come in, but I really think they should’ve been closer so they could come in if things went badly, which they very much did. Lisa has a “faint pulse” and is loaded into an ambulance.

Lennox goes in to talk to spy guy and explains to him that he has to pass on the falsified information to his contact if he doesn’t want to receive the death penalty. Spy guy decides that’s a good deal.

Lennox gets back to the White House in four and a half minutes and Daniels and Karen are meeting with President Subarov. Daniels tells Subarov that the circuit board chip was destroyed in a raid by CTU. Subarov isn’t buying it though and does some mad trash talking to Daniels. If Daniels doesn’t give him proof in two hours time (how convenient, that’s how many episodes are left in the season!) that the chip is destroyed he’s blowin shit up. Holy shit Buffalo just scored 9 seconds into the game. I hope they get swept. Sorry.

Back on track. Lennox tells the rest of the people in Daniels’ office need to bounce so him, Daniels and Karen can be alone. It’s weird that they’re BFFs now. Lennox explains that Phillip Bauer is on the line. Phillip says that he has the circuit board chip and he’ll exchange it if he can leave the country with his grandson. Daniels is skeptical that it’s the real chip, so Phillip tells him the serial number. Luckily Lennox has a blueprint of the chip on his PDA and the serial number is blinking without any human input. The three musketeers consider it, Karen is not down. She says that Phillip can’t be trusted and that he’s a sociopath. Daniels asks Lennox what he thinks and he goes “well he IS a sociopath” which is hilarious. Lennox has been on point with the one-liners tonight. But Lennox is down with the plan; he thinks innocent children are good bargaining chips when dealing with national security. Daniels gets CTU on the phone.

Jack is with Josh and he is preparing to bring him back to CTU. An agent tells him that Marilyn wants to talk to him and he goes to take the call. As he’s walking away, Doyle takes Josh away in a helicopter. Someone ALWAYS gets Jack with the “there’s a call for you that you have to take far away from everyone you know.” Jack flips out and it takes like 9 agents to hold him back, which is completely unrealistic, no amount of CTU agents can hold Jack down. And after that one episode where Doyle was cool because he let Jack go chat with Audrey, he is again a tool. Congrats.

hotness

Ok so even though the Rangers season is over, I can't stop myself from sharing this gorgeous picture. I'm hoping to get myself back into blogging mode, starting tomorrow with a recap of 24. I've been too busy sitting on my ass and watching I Love New York 2 (I personally hope "New York" never finds love b/c I can't get enough of that show) and hockey to bring myself to be witty and write anything. But I should get myself back into it to keep myself practicing writing.

LET'S GO RANGERS

My throat hurts, there’s beer in my hair and my ears are ringing and I couldn’t be happier. Nothing compares to 20,000 people cheering and yelling as loud as they can all wanting the same thing. When they sang the National Anthem, the crowd was so loud you could only hear about the first 5 words. Then red, white and blue balloons were released and it was like a big celebration of New Yorkers. It looks so cool when a sell-out crowd is waving those white towels in glee. It’s incredible to hear 20,000 people hold their breathe right before King Henrik makes a save and then explode when he comes up with it 5 seconds later. I’ve been to the Garden when it’s loud, but that was usually for a special occasion, like the night they retired Richter’s number or Messier’s last game. They’ve been so dismal the last couple of years that the actual games haven’t been anything to get excited about. Now that it’s the playoffs, the crowd reacts to every single play. At the end of the second period when the Rangers were killing off a power play and they cleared it to end the period, the crowd went so nuts you would’ve thought they won the Cup. It was incredible. They’ve been playing really smart hockey. Avery, Tyutin and Ortmeyer have been playing really well defensively with their back-checking. Before I was just worried about them not getting swept, now I think they might actually have a chance at beating these guys. For some reason the Sabres can’t seem to get anything going offensively, and God knows the Rangers have given them plenty of chances to. Ryan Miller, the Sabres’ goalie, has been incredible, but Lundqvist has been just a little bit better, which is all the Rangers have needed.

On Thursday I’m going to Florida with the fam until Tuesday night. Which means they better be playing the games down there or I’m going to flip a shit. If the series goes to 7 games, we might be taking a later flight home, because we’ll be flying right when the game is starting. That is the definition of a true fan.

And now I can fall asleep to the soothing sounds of the thunderstorm!

Rangers vs Sabres Playoffs Game 3 highlights

I am currently not watching 24, too much hockey to watch. I will watch it tomorrow morning with my coffee, and it will be lovely. Ok here are the highlights from the Ranger game yesterday where they went on to win in double overtime. I sat on my couch yesterday for literally 4 hours watching the game through my fingers in agony. This clip doesn't include the second goal, which was disallowed because the people in Toronto are slow and stupid. As head coach Tom Renney said beautifully "It has to be a distinct kicking motion. If that's distinct then we're all in trouble."

I am happy to say that I will be attending the game tomorrow night and I'm confident that I will be witnessing a victory. The Rangers outplayed Buffalo Friday night and probably would've won if it wasn't for f***ing Malik. Tomorrow I will be posting my recap of tonight's episode and my experience at my first playoff game at the Garden!!!

some editorials

Two articles.

This first one is about how the NHL would love to have the Rangers fighting for the Stanley Cup. One thing that I've noticed over the years is that no matter how bad the Rangers are every season, everyone plays them well and hopes to beat them. And in a sport that doesn't get much respect or attention, they're probably the most high-profile team in the league. This guy makes a lot of good points, and it's very much worth reading.

This other article, comes from msnbc.com as well. Every week they have some sort of top 5 article about television shows. This weeks was the top 5 shows that should be cancelled and 24 was included. It's my belief that 24 will not be cancelled, the writers will be the ones who decide when to end it, but the guy has some good points.

Coming off its best season ever, “24” has had its worst season ever. The show has recycled plot lines, and has most recently shifted 180 degrees, dropping one plot and picking up another, which is almost as implausible as all that’s come before it. Worse, Jack Bauer has been more absent than usual this year — and there’s not much left to do to him. Unless the writers can give the series a major reboot, focusing on something other than an impending terrorist attack in Los Angeles, it’s time to pull the batteries out of “24’s” clock.

I think this season or the next should probably be the last anyway. There really is only so much that can happen on the show, and there have been a lot of recycled plots, this season especially. Some shows are too good to stay on TV a long time because they can't sustain their past success. The only reason I wouldn't want this season to be the last is the hopes that the 7th season would be better and they can go out on top. I think there's definately going to be a 7th season anyway, but I'm nervous it'll be worse than this one. So I guess I'm a little torn.

12:00 a.m. - 1:00 a.m.

I can’t decide if nothing specific about last night’s episode is standing out in my mind because it was boring and nothing happened, or if it’s because my roommates and I are trying to finish all of the alcohol in our apartment before we have to move out on Thursday. It might be a little bit of both.

The episode opens with Doyle running like a girl through traffic where Jack has abandoned him. Actually, it’s more like Mugatu in Zoolander. This scene was hilarious and I kept praying that Doyle would get hit by a car and die. But he doesn’t, he just throws some guy out of his car and attempts to find Jack. Bill announces to his CTU minions that “Jack Bauer has gone rogue” and that they have to find him before he gives the chip over to the Chinese. Of course no one at CTU is surprised by this news at all because hearing Jack Bauer has gone rogue is as common as hearing “there’s a mole in CTU” or “the suspect got through the perimeter.”

Now that Vice President Daniels is President Daniels, he wants to make sure Lennox isn’t going to call him out about the tape. I am convinced that Daniels could kill a man using only his voice. Lennox tells Daniels that they’re cool and that the only thing he was going to use the tape for was making Daniels stop bogarting the presidency. Lennox leaves and Daniels’ creepy assistant comes in and we witness one of the grossest scenes to ever grace television. Daniels keeps caressing her and talking dirty and then I threw up. It was horrible.

Back at CTU, Chloe and Morris get in a fight. Morris sarcastically asks her to make a list of all the things she would like him to do differently and the fight is boring and tedious until Chloe comes out with this line.

Don’t arm nuclear weapons for terrorists. — Chloe

Ouch. Chloe that’s cold, even for you. But Morris deserved it because he’s annoying and now he’ll go get shitfaced. Chloe immediately starts apologizing and tries to tell him that that isn’t how she feels, but Morris knows it is. He walks away. Later, he hands in papers to Bill asking for a transfer so he won’t have to work directly with Chloe anymore.

Karen Hayes gets a call that the department of justice guy wants to talk to her. He explains that Reed Pollack has been giving up any information he can so as to avoid the death penalty in the roll he played in the assassination attempt on the president. Karen is showed the video and calls him a weasel, which is pretty awesome. He again brings up the fact again Bill had Fayed in custody and let him go and that Karen might have covered it up. Karen explains that Bill didn’t have enough evidence to keep Fayed in custody and that she followed protocol with the information and that she wasn’t covering up anything. However, DOJ guy explains to her that someone is going to go down for it, and he would prefer it be Bill. Bill is farther away from the president and would therefore cause less damage on the American people’s psyche.

Meanwhile, Jack has gotten in contact with Cheng and comes up with a meeting place, which is an abandoned hotel off the highway. He assembles a bomb in a wall panel. When he’s done, he calls Bill and gets his answering machine, even though Bill’s voicemail message says that if the call is urgent you should dial 0. Jack doesn’t do this and leaves a message. When has Jack ever not made an urgent call? And why wouldn’t Bill pick up? His only job at this point is to locate Jack, wouldn’t he keep all lines open? Whatever. Jack leaves a message telling Jack that the chip will be destroyed and asks him to take good care of Audrey and that Bill’s been a good friend. Run Bill, as soon as Jack considers you a friend he will either kill you or you will be killed.

Karen goes to Lennox for advice, because they’re BFFs now. He tells her that there’s no point in the both of them going down and that her job is a lot more important than Bill’s. He also emphasizes that keeping the scandal as far from the president as possible would be good. At first Karen says that if they try to fire Bill she’ll resign, and Lennox goes “haven’t you already tried that today?” Karen doesn’t know what to do but eventually decides. She calls Bill and explains the situation to him.

I can’t let this touch me. I have to distance myself from you. — Karen
How are you going to do that? Are you asking me to resign? –Bill
I am firing you. –Karen

For a minute I though Karen was going to distance herself from Bill by divorcing him, but I guess that was a stupid thought on my part. Fired by your own wife, that’s gotta hurt. And it does, Bill is really upset and hangs up on her and doesn’t pick up when she calls him right back. I feel really bad for Bill, he loves CTU. I think the thing he loves the most is how the lights of the situation room always make his hair look purple. He puts Nadia in charge and is escorted out of the building by security.

Nadia’s chattin it up with Doyle about where Jack might be. They narrow down the possibilities of where Jack could be going and Doyle notices Jack’s car at the motel. Doyle hides in the bushes and waits for the tactical teams to arrive. But the Chinese roll up way before the tactical teams do.

Jack makes Cheng bring Audrey to him before he gives him the chip. Audrey looks like shit. Jack takes the gag out of her mouth and tries to comfort her. He tells her to walk up to a bridge and go to a gas station where a cab is waiting to take her back to CTU. She doesn’t say anything but starts to walk up there. Jack waits as long as he can for her to get away and then hands over the chip to Cheng. It’s at this moment that Doyle decides that he has to do something and he starts shooting everyone. The Chinese start to shoot back and Jack gets hit and stays down for a while. The tactical teams arrive, complete with chopper and start to take everyone out, except for Cheng who still has the chip. He hops into his limo and one of his henchmen takes out this gigantic bazooka and shoots the chopper down with it, which was pretty sweet. Jack gets a couple of kills, but Cheng gets away. Doyle comes in and tells Jack that Cheng got away with the chip. Jack yells at Doyle, telling him that he had the situation under control. Jack just can’t seem to get himself killed today, no matter how hard he tries. Nadia tells Doyle to place Jack under arrest.

They bring Audrey back to Jack, and make her run for some reason. Jack tells her that it’ll be ok, but she’s speaking gibberish. Jack asks her if she even recognizes him and it’s clear that she has no idea where she is or who Jack is. They sit her in a chair and she starts shaking uncontrollably and talking to herself. Jack is seething when he sees what they’ve done to Audrey.

The last four episodes will apparently be CTU trying to get the chip back from Cheng after Doyle’s royal eff up and trying to get through to Audrey. I hope Doyle dies, and I hope it’s Jack who kills him. At this point I find myself continuing to watch to see how the season ends, kind of like when I watched season 4. It’s disappointing, because the season opened strong and with a lot of potential. Get outside! It’s gorgeous!