3:30 AM

As the title indicates, I am writing this at 3:30 A.M. Not out of choice am I writing instead of sleeping, rather it's out of fear. Fear that while I sleep a giant cockroach is going to crawl in my bed and snuggle up, or possibly eat my ear drum for a late night snack (that happened to a woman I know)! I tried for a while to kill Juan (I named him so he would seem less intimidating) but to no avail. He is fast and knows all the crevices in my room to escape. Needless to say, living conditions in the richest district of a large city in a less developed country are not up to my American standards.
In fact most things are not up to any kind of standard or code here. For instance there is literally thousands of old taxi's and buses (like circa 1950) that run off of natural gas (gets almost twice as many kmt to the litre). Obviously this causes tremendous amounts of smog which I'm told is going to get expedentially worse when the clouds roll in for winter creating a layer of smog that constantly hovers over the city for 6 months.
I have only been here 6 days and everyday I wake with a sore throat, headache and a cough. But in keeping with my standard of living, I run in the morning taking in the beautiful Pacific ocean and choking every step of the way. I cannot imagine what it's going to feel like when I step back on American soil and can breath again! It literally feels like I smoke a carton of cigarettes every day! Lima makes New York City seem like the of backwoods of Montana.
The taxis and buses are like weapons of mass destruction, but not only for their toxins. No, crossing the street is like playing Russian roulette - which seems to be quite popular based on the number of pedestrians I saw crossing the Panamerican highway during the middle of rushour! People are literally inches away from being hit by cars/buses that seem to increase their speed when pedestrians dash for the other side. I've been told by natives that hitting a pedestrian only matters if you kill them; apparently anything less isn't a big deal. I wish I would have know this game before I got here; I could have been practicing my 40yard dash instead of my 10mile time.
The other dangers of the superior quality public transportation here in Lima, are the high probabilities of being robbed, kidnapped, and/or raped. This is something that was explained by my taxi driver with great emphasis the night I arrived and was reiterated today at my University orientation. I have heard countless stories in just 5 days of these accounts. For instance, a fellow student from UWM was robbed of everything he had the first day he got here. Luckily for him, he was crazy enough to follow the theives and all important things (passport and wallet) he got back; but only after a 5 hour wild goose chase through Lima.
Public transportation is just one of many things I have found not so accomadating here in Lima. More to come, I'm sure of it.