We have arrived

Hello all, Merry Christmas!
I hope you all had a wonderful white Christmas. I had the hottest and strangest Christmas of my life. We arrived in Santa Cruz on Tuesday morning at 9 from La Paz. We looked around a bit and then found our Bolivians waiting for us. We weren´t too sure of the plan but it was all cleared up for us. We got bus tickets and all of us but Allan headed to Camiri for Christmas. The bus ride here was beautiful. We are really in the jungle here and the view from the bus was really green and lush. The earth is also very red just like PEI so the contrast is very striking. We saw the lights of Camiri from a ways away and it reminded me a bit of coming into Cochrane from Calgary. Gustavo met us at the bus with his mini bus and we loaded all our stuff in. We drove around for a bit and then went for Pollo Sucre, the best chicken in Bolivia. It was pretty delicious and it was so good to see the Bolivians again. Lauren and I are staying at Brendas house so we got all settled in there and then went out to the bar for a bit. The next day was Christmas Eve which is the big celebration day here. We went to the pool because it was boiling hot. Then we had Christmas dinner with Brenda´s family. We had a whole pig and chicken and corn and a bunch of other things. The strange part was that they have dinner at midnight on Christmas Eve and then set off a whole bunch of fireworks. It was like the whole town was exploding. After that we went out to the bar again! We got there at around 2 (arrived in the torrential tropical downpour) and stayed until... 7 in the morning when they ran out of beer! The next day was pretty short because of the not going to bed until 7inthemorning. And then came yesterday. We decided to make ice cream cake because it is ridiculously hot here (like 30 to 40 degrees every day and humid) but the freezer is not very powerful so it took forever. We went to Sergio´s house to watch Little Miss Sunshine and then to the square. To explain what we did in the square you have to understand a little bit about the Camireños I know. They drink every day, and when there are holidays they drink even more. Also you need to understand the Plaza. Everyone goes to the plaza. There are no laws against drinking in the streets here so people go every night to the plaza to drink and dance and fight. There are different sections of the plaza for different groups of people. We were at the corner for all the kids who went to private school and Enna (one of the girls from the program) her brother was having a party to announce his New Years party. He had a cooler full of ice and lemon juice and liquor and sugar. This drink is from Brazil and is very sneaky. This is because it has a lot of alcohol but tastes really good and is really refreshing. They have a few cups and just keep filling them up. One of Dennis´friends Diana would keep taking our glasses, filling them up and saying "fifty fifty, I´ll drink half if you drink half" Even if you don´t want to drink, it is really hard not to. Anyways, we stayed for a while and then went home to sleep. Today the plan is to go up to a waterfall and hopefully go swimming. There is another party tonight but I am not going to drink until New Years. I have also been having some problems with my malaria meds cause they are making me feel really sick. I´m trying to figure out what to do about it and I think I´m going to go find a doctor. If anybody has any advice on Doxycyclin let me know cause it is knocking me out! I think the plan is to stay here until the 2nd and then to go to Santa Cruz for a couple of days. Then I´m heading to Uruguay to see my loverly friends there. I love and miss you all and I´ll see some of you pretty soon!
Anna