A View from Peru

Since my time in Peru, there have been many different things that I have experienced. I thought that the best way to try to describe them all would be by dividing them up into the five senses: sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and feelings. The first one that I will try to describe is the sights. This is going to be quite difficult, because you just have to be here to understand it all.
From my waking up in the morning, people are all around. I live with a pastor with his wife and four girls above a church, so there are always people around. Just as prevalent as the people are the buses. It is hard to find a street that does not have a bus on it. Not only are their buses to transport the many people, but there are also a large amount of ticotaxis (a small, compact car) and mototaxis (a sort of three-wheeled covered motorcycle). The buses, ticotaxis and mototaxis each have their place on the road (and dogs at times), or so they think. They quickly zip in and out of crowded areas, avoiding the speed bumps as much as possible, meanwhile, the people in the vehicles are jostled around in their seats. Many times the buses are so full of people that many people end up standing in the aisles while haning on to the bars connected to the ceiling of the bus.
Besides the number of people and vehicles, there are geographical sights to see as well in Peru, and especially Lima, where I am now. Lima is amongst the Andes Mountains, so on a clear day, the tops can be seen. Now that I have made the comment of having a clear day, mostly, the tops of the mountains cannot be seen due to the amount of smog and low clouds hovering over the tops. The mountains that I see daily are very different from the mountains that I saw in West Virginia each day. The Andes, in this part of Peru, are monstrous mounds of loose rock and dirt. Later on in my travels, we will be seeing more of the Andes Mountains in a more up-close view.
Traveling around Lima, houses are lined up very near to each other with walls surrounding the owner´s property. Rarely are you able to see the entire house due to the high walls and foliage creeping up the entry gates. The doors to the property are very different. In a poorer part of the city, metal doors with no design take up a large part of the walls. In the more wealthy part of the city, beautiful wood doors can be seen with intricately carved designs on the front. What I have been fascinated by is the openness in houses. There are opening in the roofs of the houses with no covering, because Lima averages about 1 in. of rain a year. Windows rarely have screens and staircases are normally uncovered. There is dust everywhere, so people are constantly sweeping their houses. Those are just a few things that I have noticed in Peru so far. I hope that you have been able to visualize these few things to get a sense of what Peru is like.