My love hate relationship with public transport:

The journey to and from work every day is always an adventure. I take a 45-minute round trip to get to the school on a bus called 'Los Blancos'. Yes, the irony of the name is not lost on me (Los Blancos translates in English to 'the whites' ). It costs me 2 Soles, or $1 NZD, for the full trip and every day brings a new delight or a shock to my delicate and privileged eyes.

Every bus has two people on it, a driver and a person whose job it is to manage the door, call out the route at every stop and collect money from passengers as they depart. It's quite the head rush standing on the side of the road waiting for Los Blancos. Bus after bus screams past me with a man or woman literally hanging out the doors screaming in Spanish their route for the day (see video for a taste of what it's like - although it was a quiet day the time I filmed it).

Some journeys are delightful with the occasional, and generally good looking, Peruvian playing the guitar and singing sweetly in Spanish (see video). Or the days when there are little kids on the bus who can't take their eyes off the strange looking lady. Smiling at, or talking to, these kids usually results in one of two reactions:

1) sheer terror with bouts of screaming and crying, or

2) excitement mixed with shyness, desperately wanting to reach out and touch the white lady to see if she's real.

It's a gamble, but most of the time I get the latter reaction. Thank goodness because trust me, reaction number 1 doesn't make anyone feel good!

Other days the journey is INSANE!

The traffic and the driving habits are appalling. I know I've mentioned this before, but I've come to learn it's not just in Lima - it's everywhere. How on earth there are not more accidents or road rage I'll never understand. No one follows give way rules, nor restrictions on crossing the centre line. The mentality among all drivers appears to be DON'T slow down if you see an impending danger; like a car slowing in front, pulling out or crossing your path. The answer to this driving riddle here is just to keep your foot on the gas. Someone will move, it'll sort itself out. Except that it doesn't!! The impending danger doesn't miraculously go away …. it just gets more impending!! Meanwhile everyone now ends up with whiplash because we must stop so suddenly.

The roads are full of pot-craters (that's a new word I made up to take pot-holes to a whole new level) and the buses appear to have no suspension. I've been on old style roller coaster rides that were smoother than driving on these main roads. I swear to God that when I get home I'm going to get my doctor to take x-rays and an ultrasound of my torso, because I'm pretty sure all my organs have been jolted into different locations! Other fellow teachers and I must laugh and make light of it all, otherwise I think we'd be too scared to get on the bus. We joke that we have accepted our fate …. If we are going to die in Peru it will be on the crazy morning or evening commute for sure!

The sights on the streets can be confronting some days. People passed out, taking siestas, on the grass verges in the middle of highways and main roads. We drive past scenic inner-city parks with random people lying face down having a nap …. which as you go past looks more like a massacre scene from a Hollywood blockbuster. You know the ones, where they pan out and you see the carnage of dead bodies sprawled in random places and positions. Its such a weird sight.

One day I saw a guy bathing from the water tap at the petrol station - I think that trumps our complaining about cold showers at our flat. On more than one occasion, in the middle of a busy market area, I've watched the same homeless man lying face down on the footpath. I assume he is either drunk or hungover, as people walking by just seem to ignore him completely. They appear to be used to his presence. Meanwhile I wonder, as we hurtle past, what his story might be?

From my lofty perch in the Los Blancos bus, I've seen the fresh aftermath of a motorbike collision. A man in his leathers, lying in the gutter as a pool of bright red blood builds up fast around his head. People are gathering; some to provide assistance, some to just be nosy, and some are there to film it on their phones. I will never know what happened to that man, but I choose to believe he made a full recovery.

I don't think I will ever get used to people staring at me on the bus, fascinated by the foreigner. Most of the time I feel a lot like the blond pigeon in this blog's cover photo. Always obvious. Always different. If its not the blond hair and pale skin, then it's my height. And when I say 'staring at me' I don't just mean the occasional sideways glance …. I mean full on eye contact, don't look away when I look at you, staring!

Twice now I've had a guy get off at my bus stop and follow me down the road as I head to work. The first time it happened, because my Spanish is minimal, when he tapped me on the shoulder and said 'disculpe' (excuse me) I thought I'd dropped something and he was politely letting me know. After a rather awkward google translate conversation and him handing me his phone number scribbled down on a piece of paper, the penny dropped. The second guy I was a little more prepared for.

But today's journey home just made me a feel sad. I watched as the 'doorman' needed to deal with an empty can of coke rattling around under a nearby seat. His solution …. kick it in front of the closed doors so that the next time he opened them to start yelling out the route, it would fall onto the road and become someone else's problem.

The ignorance about rubbish here still astounds me. When I first arrived in Arequipa I was in the heart of the historical area, walking in one direction and an older woman was walking towards me about to start eating an ice cream. She had pulled all the wrapping off and as we got closer I watched in horror as she poked it through the beautiful wrought iron bars and onto the big stone windowsill of a historic Spanish building. Like it was nothing out of the ordinary. And I guess to her it isn't. She's no doubt been doing it all her life. I'm sure she's taught her kids and grandkids, that's just what you do.

Standing out at San Camillo markets:

A trip to the markets is always an adventure. The first couple of times it took forever, wandering around trying not to miss anything. Now it's more get in, get the stuff on the list and get out! The markets are a feast for the senses. Sometimes that's great. Other times it's a bit too much and I wonder why I'm not just paying extra and keeping my blood pressure within the 'normal' range, by shopping at the supermarket. While I mostly enjoy the environment, my ability to purchase something is always a nightmare. This is how it plays out the majority of the time;

· I awkwardly point at something in the stall and ask in English 'How much are they' because I can never remember 'cuanto cuesta' when I need it.

· She answers me in seconds - in fact it might even be an actual millisecond. Spanish is so fast it hurts my brain. Meanwhile I'm still desperately trying to remember my numbers ….. did she say 'dos cincuenta' a kilo?? What's cincuenta again?? 40 or 50? I always get those two numbers mixed up.

· I'm not really sure but I'm buying them anyway so why, why, why do I put myself through the stress of asking the price when it clearly doesn't matter! I'm an idiot. So, I just hold up 2 fingers and say 'dos'.

· She asks 'dos'? I say 'si' (yes) and things are moving forward.

· I take a deep breath, think to myself I have a few minutes while she bags up my items, and go back to working out the numbers in my head.

· Within seconds she's weighed it, bagged it and is handing it to me repeating over and over 'cinco soles' with her hand out, palm up and already onto her next conversation with her next customer. Damn it.

· I'm still processing the original 'cincuenta' …. I give up. Screw trying to find the right change. I hand her a 20 soles note.

· She mentally rolls her eyes at me and hands me 15 change, still conversing with the next customer at the speed of a bullet train on high level steroids.

· I can't look her in the eye anymore, so I lower my head, take the change, mutter 'gracias' and wander off to my next poor victim. Vowing never to go back to that stall.

This experience, in general, happens at most stalls. You'd think I'd be better at this stuff by now, but no I'm not. The speed and craziness of the market place and the feeling that I constantly need to be on alert, makes me freeze and I'm out of my comfort zone for sure. But at the same time, I love visiting there and taking in all the colours and smells. There is always a new fruit or vegetable that I haven't seen before. There is always a cute kid to make faces at or a puppy dog to pat ....

…. that's good for your blood pressure, right???