Okay, so one of the harder things to wrap my head around is the schooling here. School just like back in the United States is not for everyone and it challenging. But some of the things that they do here are extremely different. All of my life I have grown up on the 100 point system with letter grades of A, B, C, D, and F. But here they do things on a 20 point scale. Equivocally it is the same thing. 20 is a 100 and 0 is well, a 0. Everything is the same for the most part, but the failing grade at most universities is an 11 or 55% in the United States that is a very low failing grade. But that’s how they do things here and I am not going to complain. The second thing here that surprised me was that they do not have general study courses at their university. Meaning that every class that they take will help them advance further along in their major and in their career. I personally see that as a very nice thing because time is not “necessarily wasted” taking courses that will not advance you mentally or morally for your life. I personally have not taken a course in college that I view as that but I have had friends who have and they would have preferred not to waste their time. But to me I view not having general study course as something that could only benefit me more in my career. Instead of learning about how tsunamis are formed and how they are tracked does not help me in my career to become a Spanish Teacher and a football coach. But I however did enjoy learning those things so personally I believe that they did not hinder me in my personal life or take away from my college experience, but I am open to the idea of not taking those courses for sake of helping me in my future career. It is enjoyable to see another form of system of education than what I am used to. So no matter what I will remember my teachers here and the way they taught differently than what I have experienced. |
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Culture Shock. The words that I have to use for my first couple days in Lima. I have quickly noticed that there are several things right off the bat that are barriers. For me I don’t seem to have so much of a language barrier issue, but it’s still largely there, but there have been a lot of cultural barriers. For me I grew up in two very different environments and in most any new situation I have been able to adapt very quickly. For me one of the strangest things is the kissing. Its customary here to kiss women on the cheek when you meet a women and shake the men’s hands. So on the first day here I have never kissed so many women on the cheek. Another thing that is harder to realize is that where I am they don’t see a lot of white American people. Normally in the U.S., I am not the type of person that gets a lot of stares, so coming here I, well the whole group is really a spectacle. The girls in our group get cat called a lot so I feel bad when I don’t get too confrontational.
Another thing that is different here is the poverty and the traffic. The traffic here is so hectic, I pride myself on being an excellent driver and here the rules of the road are not important. Like stop signs are suggestions, blinkers are never used, lines are blurred, and finally people always have this insatiable need to blare their horn. The other thing that struck me a little hard was the poverty of the city. We as a group went to the center of Lima and to be honest it was beautiful but so very dirty. There were slums that reminded me on of the Favelas in Rio de Janeiro. There was also trash piled so high that it would engulf me. But as for now I love Lima. |
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