The movies they play in the buses in Peru are the worst movies ever. Movies like Bethoven's 5th. Usually they are some horror movie or a thriller about a meteor that is going to hit the Earth in 2 days. TV movie of the weeks that never really made it. If there isn't a bad movie on sometimes they show music videos in English of some unknown star with a bad 80's hair cut. After a while I start to enjoy the music videos. Even when I have a great book to read I still stare at the music videos or watch the bad movies for hours.

Sometimes I just stare out the window the entire time. I know that I should read while there is still light because once night comes we will all be sitting in the dark with no movie and no music. But I continue to just stare and stare out the window and the most random memories come to my head.

Sometimes the person next to me is interested enough to ask me questions. I take this as a good opportunity to practice the language but the conversations are so often the same that it is no longer good practice. In Chinese I am an expert at answering the following questions:

Where are you from?
What do you do?
How long have you been here?
Can you use chopsticks?
Do you know Yao Ming?

Sometimes the person next to me just likes to talk. I often don't understand what they are saying, I just let them talk and talk and talk and I nod my head. Every now and then they ask me a question and when I hear the tone of their voice raising, I have to ask them to repeat the question please.

People come by the aisles selling things the entire trip usually. They sell the most random things--safety pins or hair combs. Sometimes children come in and sing a song or someone comes in and tells their sad story and then asks for money. Or sometimes someone will come in and try to sell a special product--like message oil--for a half hour. Their voice is so loud that you have no choice but to listen to their sales pitch and at the end shake your head no.

At every stop people come in and try to sell things through the window. One time I spent a good hour trying to calculate how much one could make selling individual sticks of gum to passengers coming by in a day.

About every 15 minutes I make sure I still have my ticket, just in case someone comes by and asks to see it. I want it to be in a place I can easily reach, but I also don't want anyone to take my ticket. I become paranoid and obsessive compulsive about my ticket.

I constantly touch my bag. Or i constantly look up to see if my bag is still there. I try not to drink any water so I won't have to go the bathroom. Once I had to make a whole bus of Chinese farmers wait for me while I went outside to go to the bathroom. I don't want that situation again. I just won't drink anything at all.

No matter how long the trip is--3 hours, 15 hours, 24 hours--the last hour is always the worst! I start to get really anxious about arriving. I re-read the part in the lonely Planet over and over again about getting in and out of the bus station. What should I do first? Where should I go? Who should I talk to? Should I call a hostel? I don't want to get ripped off.

I also have these exciting fluttery feelings inside of my stomach. I am going to a new place! What will it be like? i don't know why--but there is something really powerful about going to an unknown place and finding my way around. And then leaving that place and always having memories about it in my head when before that place didn't even exist for me.