diet and exercise

For anyone confused about the picture with feet and a red line - the red line is supposed to be the equator. So I had feet in both hemispheres for the picture! I am one of only a few members left of our group not to get sick yet and I attribute that to eating everything put in front of me. Generally speaking there are a few rules to live by here: 1) do not eat the lettuce; 2) street meat is probably not the best choice; and 3) the hot yellow drink (canelazo) gives wicked hangovers - probably because it is made from fermented sugarcane. Other than that everything is fair game. My diet consists strongly of a few basic food groups including meat (lomos, carne asada, pollo, etc.), rice, potatoes, bread, and fruit. A full meal of most of the above that will even fill me up is usually only $4. I also look forward to getting the opportunity of trying chicha whenever I get the chance. How to counteract this barage of good food and drink? Plenty of exercise. I have been enjoying the mile walk to and after school as well as the steady climb of working in the steep paramo ecosystem. Most of the walk includes climbing up steep ridges, wading through chest high schrubs, slopping through mud, following rivers found in previous landslides downhill to the road for fun, and battling through alleys of foliage that can be up to 15 feet high. But once you hit the ridges and the wind battles the foliage down to knee height (similar to krummholz in the alpine USA) there are great views of the surrounding valleys and mountain ranges. So I guess the steady regimin of calf exercises balances out the high carb and protein diet I have come to love. Attached are a few new picks. One is from my first study site at night prior to running down the mountain because nobody had lights, and the second shows some of the typical plants found within this area.