¡Hola!

Here I am in sunny Cuenca...well, actually it's raining today. No real loss though, as I succeeded in getting quite badly sunburnt on my second real day here when I took a trip with the college to Ingapirca about 100km from here. km! That's the shit. Seriously, none of this miles crap, S.I. units only here! That's what I'm talking about.

The flight over here was wicked, I can seriously recommend Continental Airlines as a longhaul flight provider. The food was pretty awesome - they just kept bringing me free stuff and even APOLOGISED when there were no sandwiches left. I still had one, though, because I am fiendish. Plus the television was great, but that's another matter.

Naturally I got totally interrogated at border control. I mean, come on...do I really look all that suspicious? They didn't seem to accept that I wanted to learn Spanish at somewhere other than South Notts College...weirdoes.

But it's just peachy here. I had my first day at college yesterday, and although naturally they put me in the bottom group I wasn't alone down at the sea bed. There are loads and loads of Swiss-Germans here, which is kinda weird. A good thing I speak a bit of Deutsch, eh? I'm picking up Spanish reasonably quickly, which is good as in my apartment I have to fend for myself - if I want food, I have to go hunting for it! I've not yet found the local supermarket, although I'm assured there is one by my nice landlord Edgar, who speaks wonderful English.

It's 11:23am here and college doesn't start for another three and a half hours. I might go and have almuerzo, apparently there's a place around here that does a great meal for $1, which is pretty cheap even by Ecuadorian standards...I only have 3 hours of college every day this week ' from 1500hrs to 1820hrs. Probably next week I'll be doing lessons in the morning, which I believe to be 0730hrs to 1050hrs, but I don't know off the top of my head. The morning session looks to be pretty brutal, though, since it's 20 minutes to college from my apartment. Crikey!

Ecuador seems to have an unnatural obsession with football, bananas and panpipes, but it's all good. The only downside is that nobody speaks English...and that these f***ing keyboards are all weird.

Check back soon for another update, folks!