Monday May 30th 1pm

We are finally here! We landed safely and got through customs in a breeze with only one slip up...Liv forgot her carry on (aka her shoes and batteries) on the plane. Apparently it was a huge safety hazard...opps! After we got through customs we met up with the CIS people at Jamaica Cafe, they were awesome! Then we got into two taxis and headed off to our apartment...

We got to our apartment and it looked exactly the same as google maps...what are the odds?! We were met by two men from CIS and they let us into the apartment. Olivia, Kelly, and I (paige) were the first to arrive. We carried our bags up and it was a longgggg wayyyy up! Let's just say we are going to have a great daily work out! We walked into the apartment and were pleasantly surprised! Other than the one small room (sorry chels and kacie) the rooms are great! We have a kitchen (with pots and pans), we have an amazing living room, and we have two beautiful porches! We also are lucky enough to have a washing machine and we are all very excited to hang up all of our clothes outside!

Chels, Kacie, and Gaby arrived shortly after. The two men from CIS went over the ground rules. Pretty much we have to try to be silent after 10pm because the lady up stairs gets very angry (or that's the expression we think the man was trying to describe with his limited English and hilarious hand gestures). He then informed us that clothing is optional...on a daily basis. Lol we were quite surprised by that and then he told us a story of how there was a man yesterday who was riding a bike down the street completely naked (again with the hand gestures) I think our faces must have shown pure horror because he then reassured us that yesterday was crazy because of the football (soccer) win!

We then got a brief tour of the area of town we are living in. It is absolutely adorable. The metro station is so close and we are surrounded by little markets. We walked around and ate lunch at a little hole in the wall. As true Americans we got two full pizzas and completely devoured them! We then stopped at the super market and got all of our groceries. We fully regret getting the huge bottles of water as we had a few blocks to walk back to our apartment and the three flights of stairs. Let's just say that's our workout for the day...Tash would be so proud!

We are all unpacking right now!!! Then it is off to orientation! Hopefully we make some new friends!!!

ADIOS!

paige