words words words...

on sunday i got a quechua lesson.
this is easy to do in sucre, you just hang out in the central plaza and wait for the shoe shine kids.

i find a chico, named sasa, who's about six or seven, and start reviewing the basics with him. he's happy to help. he takes my pen and notebook, and after questioning whether i really want to use a pink pen ("porque no?", i say) he writes the quechua for "how are you", "i'm good", "i'm bad", "my name is...".
i've asked other kids the same things but the answers vary a little so i´m asking again.
his hands are covered in black polish. black all over the pink pen and black all over the paper.
you can smell it, and i feel bad for these kids, who are kids, and breathe this all day.

soon there's four or five kids hanging around. they cram themselves onto the seat beside me and lean on my arm and talk to each other and talk to me.

after a few minutes hugo shows up, he's probably fifteen or sixteen. he corrects sasa´s errors and offers me a little spanish/quechua book, and then launches into a detailed explanation of the indigenous cultures of bolivia.
he teaches me a few other things. while he's talking, sasa takes the idle pen from my hand and puts the lid back on so it won't dry out.

i learn that the word for feliz, happy, is "kusi", and the word for araña, spider, is "kusi kusi"
i laugh and reflect on this.
i reflect a little on the fact that i´m being taught quechua through spanish, which i was taught in french.
porque no.

after fifteen or twenty minutes i give hugo the equivalent of 3$ CDN for the book and lesson, which he seems to be really happy with, and some change to sasa.
hugo wants to know if i have a boyfriend in montreal.
i tell him i do.
he says next time i see him we should take a picture of us together and i say that sounds good to me.