22nd birthday. It wasn't till about 20 minutes after I woke up that I remembered it was my birthday. Meredith and Elsa left at 7 a.m. for a three-day trip to Tarma in the mountains, but Meredith left me some jewelry as a birthday gift - so sweet. It was kind of a weird day. I went to class after an especially crowded bus ride, and then I walked over to the Panaggio home, only about 6 or 7 blocks from school. Maria Panaggio, Claudia, Gabriel and I went to the beach in Miraflores for about an hour and a half (I thought the water was too cold to swim in, so I just read my book). We had some lunch at Maria's house and hung out for a bit before I took a combi home. I had time to call my family, Steve and Andrew (to wish him a happy birthday -- only the second year that we haven't been together for our birthday) and we had a good chat. I also got some mail -- my first since I've been here! Then I walked over to Eden's house, and we walked to San Antonio to meet Kyle and Kali for dinner (that's the photo). I had some tasty jugo surtido, a salad and a capuccino, and I thought it fitting to go to a restaurant called San Antonio since I'm so far from home. Afterward Eden and I walked to a bus stop to catch a bus to Jockey Plaza, a mall about 45 minutes away but close to Claudia's school, where she was in class till 10 p.m. There was some miscommunication about which Burger King to meet at, but we ended up just hanging out in the food court for about an hour just chatting -- Eden, Gabriel, Claudia and I. It was a very different birthday. I was kind of on the verge of tears all day -- partly because I'm sad that I'm not around anyone I've known longer than 6 weeks, but I was also very blessed by all these people here who tried to make my birthday as special as possible -- by text messages, phone calls, birthday cards, little gifts -- knowing that it's hard to spend a birthday so far away from everything familiar.
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