A gringa playing street ball in Peru?

(That's me in the pink shorts dribbling horribly.)

So joining the local women's basketball league in October (see earlier post) didn't work out exactly how I thought it would. It turned out even better!

I was looking to get some exercise and make some friends. As I learned, the league plays only one game a week. And while my team was in a severe "rebuilding year," only two girls bothered to come to practices. It was hard to get to know anyone. Plus, having not played for six years (and never being that great anyway) I sat out during most of the games. 

The whole thing started to remind me of my high school basketball experience (ouch). I was feeling dissatisfied, but hadn't given up yet. 

One day after practice, the cab driver started up a conversation about basketball and then invited me to play in the morning at 6:30 am with a more informal group. Even though I was the only girl that came that morning, I knew I had found my niche. 

For two and a half months now, I've been playing street basquet for two hours every morning. I even managed to make my first Peruvian friends and get a job teaching English! Some other girls have started to come as well.

When I was gone to Huaraz the past few weeks, we left so quickly that I didn't even tell anyone where I was going. I got back this week and my basquet buddies all asked where I had been. Had I fallen off the earth? Had I gone back to the U.S.? Why didn't I tell anyone?

It hadn't occurred to me that they might miss me! I'm sure they hadn't missed my awful dribbling, but maybe my funny accent?