This last week definitely flew by, we had our language classes up until Wednesday and then headed to a community near Lima, San Juan de Lurigancho on Thursday to work in Wawawasi’s (Quechua word, very close to a daycare for very poor kids from 1-4). It was nice to see a new part of Lima, though every new part I see gets a bit more poor and a bit more chaotic, and San Juan was no exception. We drove about a mile up this huge hill in a combi over unpaved roads ( I suppose I should get used to this if I’m going to the mountains but don’t know yet) and got to our little Wawawasi greeted by lots of toothy and toothless 1-4 year olds. It was honestly a pleasant surprise to see how organized it was, the ladies that work there get a small wage per month but are charged with keeping a lot of structure for the kids and making sure they get all their nutritional needs met. The parents in turn have to contribute 1 sol (33 cents) a day to ensure that their children get the meals. The children did little dances for us and we watched them color, then they all got in line to wash their hands and it was fruit time. Afterwards we went around to the kitchen where the cooks had prepared little bocadillos (snacks) for us, a pincharrone (fried donut with honey) and something that looked like chocolate peanut butter (nutella-ish) and a tiny bit of rice with some form of meat. Half way through snacking on the ‘mousse’ like peanut butter I asked what was in it to meet the nutritional needs of the kids…the ladies said it was made only of the blood of chickens and milk with some cinnamon…..YUM! Once the people eating their third serving of fried donuts overheard that (and saw my face) they got curious as to why everything was the same color and asked what was in the donuts-chicken blood, The mystery meat? Coagulated chicken blood. Since anemia is a huge issue in kids and mothers here, they use the chicken blood as essentially an iron supplement and put it into everything…once I put the image out of my mind I was able to be impressed by the variety of things they had mixed it into and I suppose I got more iron that day than I have during my entire time in Peru!
Friday we had a little health fair at one of the health posts closer to where I live around Chaclacayo, my table was all about washing hands and we used glitter to demonstrate the transfer of germs and parasites-one of my favorite topics-, the other tables covered breast feeding and making baby food for different ages, and one group did a puppet show on self esteem which was a big success. The nurse at the health post made us all rice with milk, it was really tasty and a welcome change from my latest dinner craze rice with ketchup!! Friday afternoon we had a health group session on working with peer educators and I think things got a bit intense as so many of us are really clamoring to stop talking about these issues and actually go and start seeing what we will have to work with…not too much longer though…things are going to pick up a bit next week.
Saturday as per usual went to La Agraria (only one more time left at the ‘farm’ ) and had a lecture on raising Cuyes (guinea pigs) to eat….they are one of the lowest animals in terms of fat, and high in protein…seems though they are always served fried here which sort of defeats the purpose, but regardless they are a big deal in the Peruvian diet especially in the Sierra and I need to get used to this idea, I also need to start seeing looking beyond everything being fried as the Satan of all foods but I can’t help it! After the loooong lecture we went to where they were keeping the guinea pigs and there were literally hundreds of them in little habitats inside this huge room….they all leap on top of one another making their noise (literally sounds like CUY!!! Which is how they got their names) and try crawl under one another and push the others on top to be taken away for dinner!!! We also got to see guinea pig purses, gloves, and mugs….how versatile :)After that we headed over and brought some amazing fresh yogurt from the dairy farm they have there…this yogurt doesn’t have the usual preservatives etc and so it only is good a few days, but unlike all the other yogurt I’ve tried here in Peru, this one had a thick US kind of consistency, so I got the Lucuma flavor and ate it with some baby bananas when I got home, fabulous!
Saturday night I made smores with my host brothers, it turned out really well and was lots of fun!! There were lots of parties in our community so I listened to the festivities all night trying to fall asleep!! In a way it was kind of cozy..
So a bit of whats coming up::
Week 7 (this week): Language classes, mock Peruvian presidential debates, intensive first aid, Wednesday bus travel to Huarez, Ancash (7 hours north) to stay with various health volunteers living there and shadow them…come back on an overnight bus on Halloween oooo…
Week 8: Continued language/technical training/ Find out my site!!! Hoping for: smaller, sierra (highlands), strong community partner (this seems to be tough to find)…. Maybe provinces of Tumbes, Alta Piura, Cajamarca, or Ancash. Really have no control over this so we will see.
Week 9: Gone all week to the provincial capital near my site, then visit my new host family and previous volunteer if there is one.
Week 10: Last week of training, swearing in and leave for site on November 21.
So, with some reflection on the last few weeks, here are some things I really love about Peru:
How happy my 7 year old host brother is when I come home early.
Watching my families favorite Telenovela with them.
How warm people are, kisses on the cheek all the time.
Dancing at every social occasion.
Seeing older women with their little outfits from the sierra, no teeth, and super smiles.
That people are really patient with my language issues.
That I now can gauge how much longer I have to sleep based on when the chickens start their morning screams ( 3 hours).
Have lots of pics to put up but this computer is SUPER slow so it will have to wait til next time!!
Con Carino!
An attempt to share my experiences as a Health Volunteer in Campamento Tunel Conchano, Peru.
Monday, October 26, 2009
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
My Future in My First Centimeters
This is just a video some of you might find interesting...chronic malnutrition is a huge issue with kids here, and honestly you could probably just look at how tall I am compared with my family to see how that pans out over time...in a lot of cases its not necessarily the absolute lack of resources but more a need to share knowledge on how to feed kids properly during their first few years...
Little Earthquakes...
I was realizing that on this blog so far I’ve mostly just talked about festivities on the weekend and not bored you all to tears with the every day details of training which does in fact constitute most of what I spend my time here taking part in….but last week training got a little more interesting because we had a our first ‘dia de practica’ where we got to go out to health post and shadow the providers working there. The first day my group was supposed to do visits to people in the community of Tarazona who are undergoing TB treatment, and after an hour and half of trying to find this one patients house (we had 5 people in the community following us around trying to help!) we had to give up so that was disappointing, but that’s how things kind of work around here…if the community doesn’t know where the guy lives, there’s a good chance the address or something was just taken down wrong…but the next day was much more productive, I got to watch what would probably be the equivalent of a pediatric nurse do her job and held a two month old while she gave him his vaccinations by mouth, then helped her weigh babies up to two years so that was a nice start to the day until she asked me to give the baby an injection, of course I explained to her that I‘m only here to watch during training (I think there is the assumption we must have some background in hands on health care, and even if I did PC doesn’t allow us to give injections)…after that I sat in on an obstetrz which is similar to a nurse/midwife and saw how she worked with patients, afterwards we had a good talk about the nature of how these health posts work and I felt like I came away from it knowing a good deal more about the nature of what can be treated at the posts and what needs to be done at the regional capitals.
Friday night I stayed in and just read my book and slept early, Saturday I went to La Agraria and got to try some crazy different fruits I’d never heard of before, some of which were horrendous and others were soo good, I’ll make sure visitors get to try them! After La Agraria my friend Anne and I decided to head into one of the big plazas because she had some shopping to do, it took us ages but we had a great cup of coffee (yay!) and it was worth it, seeing the prices of Starbucks in Soles (Peru’s currency)definitely puts things in a bit more perspective here, especially because I’m living most days on 8 soles, less than 3 US dollars…so seeing the star bucks prices shook me a bit more then it usually would, but who knows when the next time will be (awhile!)…it was also a bit of a shock seeing the prices on everything at the department stores too….I just kept thinking of my family in Chacrasana and how prohibitive any of the prices would be…there’s a very stark contrast in the crowd you would see in these places in Lima and the places closer to Chaclacayo but I sort of wonder if where I am now (as poor as they seem) is more like the middle class here compared to where I‘m going…the other day we were told to expect ‘caves‘…maybe some with windows?!
Sunday I rested as well, and in the afternoon Jason, the previous volunteer who lived in my house came to visit….he’s been in Lima trying to get a root canal for 12 days and the dentist keeps dragging things out, only doing one step at a time and making him come back in every day so he was not a very happy camper. However, he and my little brothers and I all went to Chosica to play some air hockey and as we were getting ready to head out Jason spotted some Choclo (oversized sweet corn) and wanted some so we headed over to a street vendor…..one thing led to another and my host mom ended up ordering me anticucho (cows heart) with potatoes (of course)…..I normally would probably not have protested (it takes more effort than its worth I’m learning!) but given that I’m definitely still in feeble shape after being sick this week I opted just for a tiny piece, enough to be polite. When I was happy with myself for getting out of that we went for a walk over to the big white Jesus statue, and my host brother decided he wanted a burger, so in we went….everyone had burgers and I ended up getting a little icecream (better than hot pink burgers) and pushing my 6 year old brother to finish it off….Its always an adventure trying to avoid eating here :)
In other news, one of the other volunteers gave me his hard drive to share his music, so my itunes collection went from like 400 songs to 7 days worth, I’m very happy with that as its really my only little entertainment solace!!! Tonight I was listening to some songs and I heard a loud bang outside and next thing it felt like I was really dizzy or something….my room was moving and my bed was shaking and it seems that usually only means one thing around here…so I threw on some shoes and headed outside where my family were and they had a good laugh at me…I asked them if they had felt that, they said yup, it’s a pequeno terremoto (small earthquake) and when I asked if that happens often the explanation I got was that it happens when the ‘climate changes!’ So there you go, it may have only lasted 10 seconds but I felt my first earth tremor…of course I’m sure it was laughable here, many still talk about the Ica earthquake in 2007 and how they felt it all the way up here in Chacrasana and that one was ridiculously high on the radar. Today I found out though that I definitely wasn't imagining things, lots of others felt it too..
Only one more week until I get to go to Huarez in Ancash, very excited for that! After that only one more week and I will know my permanent site…I had my chat with Amelia, our supervisor for health again today but honestly, I think she already has in mind where we are going based on need over our individual preferences, so we will see how it all pans out in terms of where I get put...
Enjoy some pics below of the carbfest that was my dinner the other night, and when Jason came to visit the picture of the two of us that looks horribly awkward is because as it was being taken my host family was rambling on about the two of us as a cute couple in the sierra...hahahha no. The Scranton one is especially for you Joe...
Con Carino,
K.
Friday night I stayed in and just read my book and slept early, Saturday I went to La Agraria and got to try some crazy different fruits I’d never heard of before, some of which were horrendous and others were soo good, I’ll make sure visitors get to try them! After La Agraria my friend Anne and I decided to head into one of the big plazas because she had some shopping to do, it took us ages but we had a great cup of coffee (yay!) and it was worth it, seeing the prices of Starbucks in Soles (Peru’s currency)definitely puts things in a bit more perspective here, especially because I’m living most days on 8 soles, less than 3 US dollars…so seeing the star bucks prices shook me a bit more then it usually would, but who knows when the next time will be (awhile!)…it was also a bit of a shock seeing the prices on everything at the department stores too….I just kept thinking of my family in Chacrasana and how prohibitive any of the prices would be…there’s a very stark contrast in the crowd you would see in these places in Lima and the places closer to Chaclacayo but I sort of wonder if where I am now (as poor as they seem) is more like the middle class here compared to where I‘m going…the other day we were told to expect ‘caves‘…maybe some with windows?!
Sunday I rested as well, and in the afternoon Jason, the previous volunteer who lived in my house came to visit….he’s been in Lima trying to get a root canal for 12 days and the dentist keeps dragging things out, only doing one step at a time and making him come back in every day so he was not a very happy camper. However, he and my little brothers and I all went to Chosica to play some air hockey and as we were getting ready to head out Jason spotted some Choclo (oversized sweet corn) and wanted some so we headed over to a street vendor…..one thing led to another and my host mom ended up ordering me anticucho (cows heart) with potatoes (of course)…..I normally would probably not have protested (it takes more effort than its worth I’m learning!) but given that I’m definitely still in feeble shape after being sick this week I opted just for a tiny piece, enough to be polite. When I was happy with myself for getting out of that we went for a walk over to the big white Jesus statue, and my host brother decided he wanted a burger, so in we went….everyone had burgers and I ended up getting a little icecream (better than hot pink burgers) and pushing my 6 year old brother to finish it off….Its always an adventure trying to avoid eating here :)
In other news, one of the other volunteers gave me his hard drive to share his music, so my itunes collection went from like 400 songs to 7 days worth, I’m very happy with that as its really my only little entertainment solace!!! Tonight I was listening to some songs and I heard a loud bang outside and next thing it felt like I was really dizzy or something….my room was moving and my bed was shaking and it seems that usually only means one thing around here…so I threw on some shoes and headed outside where my family were and they had a good laugh at me…I asked them if they had felt that, they said yup, it’s a pequeno terremoto (small earthquake) and when I asked if that happens often the explanation I got was that it happens when the ‘climate changes!’ So there you go, it may have only lasted 10 seconds but I felt my first earth tremor…of course I’m sure it was laughable here, many still talk about the Ica earthquake in 2007 and how they felt it all the way up here in Chacrasana and that one was ridiculously high on the radar. Today I found out though that I definitely wasn't imagining things, lots of others felt it too..
Only one more week until I get to go to Huarez in Ancash, very excited for that! After that only one more week and I will know my permanent site…I had my chat with Amelia, our supervisor for health again today but honestly, I think she already has in mind where we are going based on need over our individual preferences, so we will see how it all pans out in terms of where I get put...
Enjoy some pics below of the carbfest that was my dinner the other night, and when Jason came to visit the picture of the two of us that looks horribly awkward is because as it was being taken my host family was rambling on about the two of us as a cute couple in the sierra...hahahha no. The Scranton one is especially for you Joe...
Con Carino,
K.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Well, as I came up to the weekend I was looking forward to a little unwinding time, but I should have known better! Thursday night went really well, my host mom made the hamburgers and pintarrones…which were pretty close to what I had imagined, covered in honey. 5 other volunteers from Chacrasana came and after dinner came the dancing of course and we all danced for an hour or two with some of the neighborhood kids and one of the neighbors that I really like named Carmen. Friday I had my language interview which I felt went alright, and I just found out today that I did go up a level so I’m very happy with that and with my new class. Friday evening some volunteers went out to the ‘tavern’ (appropriately named) and I got to chat with and get to know some people I hadn’t met up to now (with 56 theres still some people I havent had a decent conversation with) . One of the guys I was talking with had been in Iraq with the military prior to coming to Peru and talking with him about his experience in Iraq made me think about IRC and how much I miss some of the interpreters I was working with and Ashley, Amelia , and Trisha (and everyone else for that matter at IRC…hi if your reading ladies…) Saturday we were all off to the “agraria’ again for an ohh so interesting lecture on raising chickens…in Spanish. I was never the type of student to sleep in class but I was well on my way to snoozing an hour in and the lady kept talking for another hour and a half!!! Needless to say, I did take away some things on the lineage of chickens, nothing I think will be useful, though I would like to know how to silence my three chicken alarm clock with something other than turning them into dinner ( I still think my families terrified I consider them food since they are strictly ‘pets‘…who get fed their relatives). After that we made a massive compost pile and I used a machete (yes I’m sure it was a hilarious sight) to clear half a field of lettuce plants…and the little lechugas and radishes we planted our first week there have started to bud yay!
I decided to tag along with one of the language teachers who was taking a group into Lima for some famed Ceviche, the dish we were told not to go near until a month in so our poor stomachs would be able to handle it. Ceviche is essentially a huge mix of raw fish chopped up and put into lime which is so strong it essentially ‘cooks’ out the germs in the raw fish….its eaten with ricotta (a very hot veggie) and onions, all with a super strong limey type taste. The risk in eating it comes with the fact that its raw and that if the vendor doesn’t leave it sit in the lime long enough it will wreak havoc on your tummy. I had no idea what I was getting myself into because the language teacher took us all the way to Callao to get this ceviche (2 hours by combi and we were already in Lima) but right on the coast….We stopped in a little tiny restaurant and incapacited by hunger and such a large group, just ordered massive plates of ceviche ’mixto’ to share ( none of us still have any idea what types of fish were involved) . It was pretty delicious I have to say, and I believe I had it once when I was here in 2006 but my Spanish was so horrible then I’m not even sure, anyway this time was better and I ate my fair share. Some other people ordered muscles but I did not want to take my chances with that, plus the shell was hairy….is that normal!?!?! By this point it was 5 and I still had to get back to Chacrasana, so two hours later I was back at home having some (guess!) rice for dinner….it was a long day but fun to see some nicer parts of Lima. I’ll admit I was predisposed to not like the place, but its growing on me each time I’m thrust into it and forced to find my way out…and the other day there wasn’t the usual fog, so that helped.
Saturday night I had the usual battle of stay in/go out and so I went out to the bonfire my neighbor volunteer was having, it was a good time with of course dancing but I came home fairly early as Sunday was the baptism of my sisters son, Mathias who is one year three months. I knew the baptism started at 9, and that the old volunteer who used to live in our house was visiting at 12 and so I figured it would be a short affair with a mass and small reception. A friend had told me the night before to expect drinking profusely but I was a bit baffled at that considering the thing started at 9 am. Everybody was dressed up and looked great, including Mathias who was in a super cute white little suit. The mass was really lovely, it was in a tiny church overlooking the site of where the future church is going to be…of course since I have a camera I was designated photo taker and I took lots ( see below!). After the mass, we headed to a dusty little room in Chosica that was decorated with all sorts of celebratory baptism pictures and had little cups of mousse and such out on the table. We got there at about 10, and at 11 the first round of champagne came, soon to be followed by 5 crates of Cristal (beer here)…I made my way through an empanada at 1, then danced until 2, had rice with liquidated potatoes at 3, and danced until 4...I could not believe we were still there, but I’m just along for the ride most of the time, so when 5 finally arrived I was very glad to hear we were heading out! I probably had half the beer everyone else drank from the communal glass in all honesty and not nearly enough to make dancing with Peruvians any less embarrassing, but little did I know that things were only beginning, we got back to Chacrasana and me and 7 other people packed into a taxi to get up our hill (literally I was lying on my side with my feet in the front of the car and my arms around the back of the drivers front seat) when we got to the house Jason (old volunteer) was there and so along came the tiny but strong cups of vodka and sprite. Jason is the beloved volunteer #3, he is the reason I had pizza to live up to (and smores). He’s living in Ancash, and it was great to talk to him about his time so far (hes been here a year and four months). I also had planned on making cookies for our families with Annie, my neighbor volunteer but since I was at the baptism all day she came looking for me and got sucked into our little fiesta, then another of our volunteers came by and soon it was gringo central which means one thing-time to dance! So after what had already been 5 hours of intermittent bailando at the baptism, I was heading into another 3...around 8 or so the volunteers left and I crashed….but the reggae tone blaring in the living room did not stop until 11 ( I‘m separated from the living room by a sheet)..I absolutely love, love, love that everything here is dancing but I have to say that come 11 last night I was ready to drown it out with some music by the weepies or any other English speaking halfway mellow band. I have to give it to my family though, I feel super lucky that they have had so much stuff going on, baby showers, baptisms, birthdays, and my host mom wanting to have volunteers over….I feel fortunate!
It seems however, that all the action this weekend decided to take its toll on my tummy which decided to stage a revolt…here I have to say that it is nothing short of miraculous that I hadn’t been sick up to today having heard the horrendous details from others…anyway, as of now I’m on strict regime of boiled rice and freshly picked yerba Buena tea (literally “the good herb” I suppose)…anyway, if this is as bad as it gets I can handle it…unfortunately I think it isn’t though…we had our third ‘common health problems’ chat with our PC medical officer, Jorge (who is pretty amazing…he used to be a traveling doctor for climbers before PC plucked him and is mentioned in Lonely planets Medic section) I got to see the worm that had come out of a volunteers tummy a few months ago….Jorge loves the graphics and so I’ve seen pictures in the past month of things I would never wish upon any of you to have to see and had conversations that I would never had considered having a month ago! Luckily (for everyone except them) only 3 volunteers contracted worms this past year, so its not SUPER common. After the worm, we passed around (in a bag) a spider he happened to catch in our infirmary (so comforting) earlier in the day that turns the area around your skin where it bites black and that if you don’t get to the hospital (Jorge reminded us its usually a good 14 hours to Lima from most sites) it can cause you to have to get your limb removed….he loves this business of scaring us gringos but he always keeps stuff lighthearted and gives us practical advice. Most of the horrendous things (like the spider) that he mentions rarely are an issue but I think he enjoys seeing us cringe a bit!!!
This week we have our first ‘practice days’ in our health program and I think we are heading to health posts to shadow some health promoters, so I’ll post on how that goes soon. We have also been picking up the pace in this new language class so that will be a good and welcome challenge for me.
Anyway, I also just want to note (especially for you Jenn) that at the baptism AND the baby shower I went to there are little cartoons of redheaded blue eyed babies up on the wall which is incredibly random, but also means that having a baby with what you so fondly call “ginger-vitis” isn’t looked down upon everywhere so there!
On a side note as well, I realize how horrendous my grammar is becoming so apologies for the run on sentences!!
In other news while I’m waiting for my books to make it out of the hole that is customs here I’ve borrowed David Sedaris’ “When You Are Engulfed In Flames” so looking forward to getting through that which judging by the pace of things during training might take ages…We also had some people in my group get robbed last weekend in Chosica so I'm going to be extra careful going there next time...the robberies happened because there were several people cramped trying to get through this ticket counter or something, and they got their wallets etc. stolen....not fun.
Below are pictures from thursday nights dinner, saturday on our quest for Ceviche, and sundays Baptism of Mathias. Theres also one of me with the guinea pig at the house of my language classes today :)
Con carino
I decided to tag along with one of the language teachers who was taking a group into Lima for some famed Ceviche, the dish we were told not to go near until a month in so our poor stomachs would be able to handle it. Ceviche is essentially a huge mix of raw fish chopped up and put into lime which is so strong it essentially ‘cooks’ out the germs in the raw fish….its eaten with ricotta (a very hot veggie) and onions, all with a super strong limey type taste. The risk in eating it comes with the fact that its raw and that if the vendor doesn’t leave it sit in the lime long enough it will wreak havoc on your tummy. I had no idea what I was getting myself into because the language teacher took us all the way to Callao to get this ceviche (2 hours by combi and we were already in Lima) but right on the coast….We stopped in a little tiny restaurant and incapacited by hunger and such a large group, just ordered massive plates of ceviche ’mixto’ to share ( none of us still have any idea what types of fish were involved) . It was pretty delicious I have to say, and I believe I had it once when I was here in 2006 but my Spanish was so horrible then I’m not even sure, anyway this time was better and I ate my fair share. Some other people ordered muscles but I did not want to take my chances with that, plus the shell was hairy….is that normal!?!?! By this point it was 5 and I still had to get back to Chacrasana, so two hours later I was back at home having some (guess!) rice for dinner….it was a long day but fun to see some nicer parts of Lima. I’ll admit I was predisposed to not like the place, but its growing on me each time I’m thrust into it and forced to find my way out…and the other day there wasn’t the usual fog, so that helped.
Saturday night I had the usual battle of stay in/go out and so I went out to the bonfire my neighbor volunteer was having, it was a good time with of course dancing but I came home fairly early as Sunday was the baptism of my sisters son, Mathias who is one year three months. I knew the baptism started at 9, and that the old volunteer who used to live in our house was visiting at 12 and so I figured it would be a short affair with a mass and small reception. A friend had told me the night before to expect drinking profusely but I was a bit baffled at that considering the thing started at 9 am. Everybody was dressed up and looked great, including Mathias who was in a super cute white little suit. The mass was really lovely, it was in a tiny church overlooking the site of where the future church is going to be…of course since I have a camera I was designated photo taker and I took lots ( see below!). After the mass, we headed to a dusty little room in Chosica that was decorated with all sorts of celebratory baptism pictures and had little cups of mousse and such out on the table. We got there at about 10, and at 11 the first round of champagne came, soon to be followed by 5 crates of Cristal (beer here)…I made my way through an empanada at 1, then danced until 2, had rice with liquidated potatoes at 3, and danced until 4...I could not believe we were still there, but I’m just along for the ride most of the time, so when 5 finally arrived I was very glad to hear we were heading out! I probably had half the beer everyone else drank from the communal glass in all honesty and not nearly enough to make dancing with Peruvians any less embarrassing, but little did I know that things were only beginning, we got back to Chacrasana and me and 7 other people packed into a taxi to get up our hill (literally I was lying on my side with my feet in the front of the car and my arms around the back of the drivers front seat) when we got to the house Jason (old volunteer) was there and so along came the tiny but strong cups of vodka and sprite. Jason is the beloved volunteer #3, he is the reason I had pizza to live up to (and smores). He’s living in Ancash, and it was great to talk to him about his time so far (hes been here a year and four months). I also had planned on making cookies for our families with Annie, my neighbor volunteer but since I was at the baptism all day she came looking for me and got sucked into our little fiesta, then another of our volunteers came by and soon it was gringo central which means one thing-time to dance! So after what had already been 5 hours of intermittent bailando at the baptism, I was heading into another 3...around 8 or so the volunteers left and I crashed….but the reggae tone blaring in the living room did not stop until 11 ( I‘m separated from the living room by a sheet)..I absolutely love, love, love that everything here is dancing but I have to say that come 11 last night I was ready to drown it out with some music by the weepies or any other English speaking halfway mellow band. I have to give it to my family though, I feel super lucky that they have had so much stuff going on, baby showers, baptisms, birthdays, and my host mom wanting to have volunteers over….I feel fortunate!
It seems however, that all the action this weekend decided to take its toll on my tummy which decided to stage a revolt…here I have to say that it is nothing short of miraculous that I hadn’t been sick up to today having heard the horrendous details from others…anyway, as of now I’m on strict regime of boiled rice and freshly picked yerba Buena tea (literally “the good herb” I suppose)…anyway, if this is as bad as it gets I can handle it…unfortunately I think it isn’t though…we had our third ‘common health problems’ chat with our PC medical officer, Jorge (who is pretty amazing…he used to be a traveling doctor for climbers before PC plucked him and is mentioned in Lonely planets Medic section) I got to see the worm that had come out of a volunteers tummy a few months ago….Jorge loves the graphics and so I’ve seen pictures in the past month of things I would never wish upon any of you to have to see and had conversations that I would never had considered having a month ago! Luckily (for everyone except them) only 3 volunteers contracted worms this past year, so its not SUPER common. After the worm, we passed around (in a bag) a spider he happened to catch in our infirmary (so comforting) earlier in the day that turns the area around your skin where it bites black and that if you don’t get to the hospital (Jorge reminded us its usually a good 14 hours to Lima from most sites) it can cause you to have to get your limb removed….he loves this business of scaring us gringos but he always keeps stuff lighthearted and gives us practical advice. Most of the horrendous things (like the spider) that he mentions rarely are an issue but I think he enjoys seeing us cringe a bit!!!
This week we have our first ‘practice days’ in our health program and I think we are heading to health posts to shadow some health promoters, so I’ll post on how that goes soon. We have also been picking up the pace in this new language class so that will be a good and welcome challenge for me.
Anyway, I also just want to note (especially for you Jenn) that at the baptism AND the baby shower I went to there are little cartoons of redheaded blue eyed babies up on the wall which is incredibly random, but also means that having a baby with what you so fondly call “ginger-vitis” isn’t looked down upon everywhere so there!
On a side note as well, I realize how horrendous my grammar is becoming so apologies for the run on sentences!!
In other news while I’m waiting for my books to make it out of the hole that is customs here I’ve borrowed David Sedaris’ “When You Are Engulfed In Flames” so looking forward to getting through that which judging by the pace of things during training might take ages…We also had some people in my group get robbed last weekend in Chosica so I'm going to be extra careful going there next time...the robberies happened because there were several people cramped trying to get through this ticket counter or something, and they got their wallets etc. stolen....not fun.
Below are pictures from thursday nights dinner, saturday on our quest for Ceviche, and sundays Baptism of Mathias. Theres also one of me with the guinea pig at the house of my language classes today :)
Con carino
Thursday, October 8, 2009
Coffee, bugs, and Michael Jackson..
This afternoon we have a bit of a 'descanzo' or rest, so I decided to seize the moment and come update on whats been going on before I (hopefully) return to my house to crash for a white rice induced nap!! This last weekend was a lot of fun, saturday night there were parties in not one, two, but three different communities where volunteers are living and so I felt compelled to participate in all three festivities. The first was in Tres de Octubre where the kids put on a big dance show, some of them were dressed up as devils and others had the Michael Jackson look going on with the white socks...it was a good time, and I suppose its tradition in past years to have volunteers perform a song so some of the guys in our group got up and sang a few songs...as a side note, I've probably had conversations about Michael Jackson 15 times since arriving in Peru!! After Tres de Octubre, some of us headed over to Yanacoto, the only community with a hill bigger than mine in Chacrasana and had a great time there witnessing fireworks Peruvian style..which is essentially a huge wooden sculpture thing lit up from the bottom and just when you think its done, the flame keeps traveling and another firework goes off and gives you the fright of your life...they also literally run around the people dancing in a circle, no regulations as far as fireworks go here! After 3 hours of dancing there, we went back to Chacrasana, the other gringos headed for bed and I was exhausted but my family was still out at the party they were having to celebrate Chacrasanas anniversary so I couldn't be the lame gringo who goes home to bed...alas, 4 hours later (5 am now...) I was still dancing with my host mom and her friends when I gave in and said it was time for bed...they ended up staying out until 7 am and you could hear the music all through the community...then my host mom went to work!
I thought she would be exhausted when she got home but off we went to mass, and another round of staring at statues in Chosica...I think she might think Im fascinated by the statues or something because when we go for walks around after mass she and I stand there for like 20 minutes having very intermittent conversation and admiring the statues (like the huge white Jesus)...maybe I just need to learn to slow down a bit more :) We also had some tres leches cake which I enjoyed, outside of the church women set up tables to sell different types of cakes by the slice.
As far as training goes this week its been pretty language intensive as usual, but also we've had sessions on Peruvian history which I've really enjoyed. We had an extensive discussion pondering how in gods name Alan Garcia got re-elected in 2006 (his first term was 1985 when he left the country in shambles and fled to Paris with the dinero). Tomorrow I have my second interview for language, I'm hoping I can move up a level but I'm not betting my life on that happening as I feel like I'm going through every possible verb conjugation every time I open my mouth like some kind of disfunctional (and small)encylopedia.
After classes yesterday I decided to take my nutritional situation into my own hands and went to the market, I stocked up on bananas, apples, and oranges yum then I went to the shop next door, called Las Vegas by the way, and brought oatmeal (or kwa-kerr as its pronounced here) that I can eat without it being in liquidy drink form, popcorn, yogurt (all yogurt here is liquid, but oh well) and granola....I went home and made a fruit salad with the granola and yogurt and it tasted nothing really like what it would in the states but I didn't care, I just missed being able to put together something that isn't rice and papas! Tonight, however, my family has decided to make 'pincharrones' and 'hamburgers' for me and told me to invite the other Chacrasana volunteers, apparently Pincharrones (im spelling it wrong) are like fried donut sweet things so wish my arteries luck for handling that one...
Yesterday I went to Chosica, land of the Novia del Sol, and apparently home of the most painful bugbites in this particular 10 miles of Peru. I was devoured by the bugs but on a more interesting note got to venture into the local emergency hospital...theres nothing to put painful bug bites in perspective than seeing someone ready to go into triage surgery. It was a weird experience because the hospital is essentially outside with little rooms adjoining where the surgeries get done, and the patients are wheeled through a maze of people and the surgeons are in and out in their surgical garments and people go in and out of the surgery rooms no problem...its just nothing like the intense sanitization I've always associated with hospitals in the U.S. It was pretty chaotic, we found out that they usually have about 500 people in and out most days for various things from vaccinations to emergency surgery, and the doctor we spoke to once again reiterated that even here where we are closer to the coast, respiratory infections are still the primary reason they see children. This particular hospital doesnt have preventative or diagnostic tools like MRI's etc, so for all those things people must go to the larger specialty hospitals in Lima. They also have one ambulance that takes people to Lima if they cannot be seen at this hospital in Chosica. It was a good chance to learn about the local medical services people seek most when that can't be taken care of at their community health post, and I was glad to see that the doctors were familiar with Cuerpo de Paz as well.
On a tangential and very complainy note, I really miss being able to make my own cup of coffee...every morning I go to the breakfast table, open my little flask and pray for cafe con leche, but most mornings (except tuesdays, Im noticing a pattern..) its either liquidated brown oatmeal goo, or boiled water with mandarins sliced through and dashes of oatmeal (???), or super SUPER sweet cocoa or thick egglike mixtures or something...so I've resorted to taking coffee however I can get it, for example, I've starting taking my coffee just black because there never seems to be actual milk around, and sugar is in everything else...and the other day at La Agraria I had instant coffee in cold water (try it sometime :)) I guess I just have to admit that it would be nice to just have one cup that tasted like coffee as I used to know it!!!!!! I'll manage to keep it in perspective though, don't worry :)
Below are some pictures, one is of the cards I've gotten I hung up in my room and the little pic my host brother drew for me, the other with the mountains is the view from the top of the hospital, they look so high but I think are still relatively foothills to the Andes, and some pictures of the fun fireworks in Yanacoto and my neighborhood last weekend.
con carino xox
I thought she would be exhausted when she got home but off we went to mass, and another round of staring at statues in Chosica...I think she might think Im fascinated by the statues or something because when we go for walks around after mass she and I stand there for like 20 minutes having very intermittent conversation and admiring the statues (like the huge white Jesus)...maybe I just need to learn to slow down a bit more :) We also had some tres leches cake which I enjoyed, outside of the church women set up tables to sell different types of cakes by the slice.
As far as training goes this week its been pretty language intensive as usual, but also we've had sessions on Peruvian history which I've really enjoyed. We had an extensive discussion pondering how in gods name Alan Garcia got re-elected in 2006 (his first term was 1985 when he left the country in shambles and fled to Paris with the dinero). Tomorrow I have my second interview for language, I'm hoping I can move up a level but I'm not betting my life on that happening as I feel like I'm going through every possible verb conjugation every time I open my mouth like some kind of disfunctional (and small)encylopedia.
After classes yesterday I decided to take my nutritional situation into my own hands and went to the market, I stocked up on bananas, apples, and oranges yum then I went to the shop next door, called Las Vegas by the way, and brought oatmeal (or kwa-kerr as its pronounced here) that I can eat without it being in liquidy drink form, popcorn, yogurt (all yogurt here is liquid, but oh well) and granola....I went home and made a fruit salad with the granola and yogurt and it tasted nothing really like what it would in the states but I didn't care, I just missed being able to put together something that isn't rice and papas! Tonight, however, my family has decided to make 'pincharrones' and 'hamburgers' for me and told me to invite the other Chacrasana volunteers, apparently Pincharrones (im spelling it wrong) are like fried donut sweet things so wish my arteries luck for handling that one...
Yesterday I went to Chosica, land of the Novia del Sol, and apparently home of the most painful bugbites in this particular 10 miles of Peru. I was devoured by the bugs but on a more interesting note got to venture into the local emergency hospital...theres nothing to put painful bug bites in perspective than seeing someone ready to go into triage surgery. It was a weird experience because the hospital is essentially outside with little rooms adjoining where the surgeries get done, and the patients are wheeled through a maze of people and the surgeons are in and out in their surgical garments and people go in and out of the surgery rooms no problem...its just nothing like the intense sanitization I've always associated with hospitals in the U.S. It was pretty chaotic, we found out that they usually have about 500 people in and out most days for various things from vaccinations to emergency surgery, and the doctor we spoke to once again reiterated that even here where we are closer to the coast, respiratory infections are still the primary reason they see children. This particular hospital doesnt have preventative or diagnostic tools like MRI's etc, so for all those things people must go to the larger specialty hospitals in Lima. They also have one ambulance that takes people to Lima if they cannot be seen at this hospital in Chosica. It was a good chance to learn about the local medical services people seek most when that can't be taken care of at their community health post, and I was glad to see that the doctors were familiar with Cuerpo de Paz as well.
On a tangential and very complainy note, I really miss being able to make my own cup of coffee...every morning I go to the breakfast table, open my little flask and pray for cafe con leche, but most mornings (except tuesdays, Im noticing a pattern..) its either liquidated brown oatmeal goo, or boiled water with mandarins sliced through and dashes of oatmeal (???), or super SUPER sweet cocoa or thick egglike mixtures or something...so I've resorted to taking coffee however I can get it, for example, I've starting taking my coffee just black because there never seems to be actual milk around, and sugar is in everything else...and the other day at La Agraria I had instant coffee in cold water (try it sometime :)) I guess I just have to admit that it would be nice to just have one cup that tasted like coffee as I used to know it!!!!!! I'll manage to keep it in perspective though, don't worry :)
Below are some pictures, one is of the cards I've gotten I hung up in my room and the little pic my host brother drew for me, the other with the mountains is the view from the top of the hospital, they look so high but I think are still relatively foothills to the Andes, and some pictures of the fun fireworks in Yanacoto and my neighborhood last weekend.
con carino xox
Saturday, October 3, 2009
All things…American?
So this week the U.S Ambassador to Peru came to have lunch with us at the training center and we got to have a back and forth discussion with him on current issues in Peru…one thing I didn’t know is that the most recent bilateral free trade agreement the US signed was with Peru…I asked him if he thought that some of the negative fallout/sentiment seen with other agreements like CAFTA where some local farmers and producers were displaced and forced to migrate have come to the forefront here and if there is a chance we might see some of that fallout in our sites but his answer was, naturally, more diplomatic than informative. However, the man has led a pretty amazing life and it was great to hear his take on many things including the ongoing drug trafficking wars going on here in parts of the highlands and selva. It was also interesting to hear his take on making it up the ladder in the State Department and Foreign Service, and he did do quite the plug for us to apply when we return…he also recommended some books I’m hoping to find somewhere….
On Monday night I went and got all the ingredients for my ‘pizza’ that my family must have asked me for 3 times last weekend, and was rather happy with myself after finding all the stuff I needed in Spanish (flour, yeast, peppers, chorizo, queso) I boiled my h20 (no chances!) and mixed the dough, my fellow PCT, Annie, came over and we chopped everything and then my host mom told me that the oven hadn’t worked in years and that I’d need to use this little spaceship like cooker…so that was weird but fine…so we put it all in and the thing is definitely hot and half an hour later we go to check on it only to find it has stopped cooking (!?!) so I asked my host mom, and as it turned out the spaceship cooker was teetering on broken as well…so after a first go round of rice as an ‘appetizer’ we decided our only option with our half risen pizza was to put it on top of the cooker and cook it on the ring, this was pretty hilarious as we were trying to balance burning the thing and cooking it, so 20 mins after that it seemed to be ready and I served it J It was funny to see everyones face, I suppose you could just suffice it to say that it was NOT the LAST volunteers pizza, but they ate it and pulled off pretending to love it pretty well! My one brother Kevin who is 13 didn’t really try to pretend though, his face was pretty funny…and a few minutes later he came in with a plate of yuka and rice instead J Next time I’m just going to stick to cookies or something and make sure we have heat!
In other random news, my host mom rearranged my room and put on pretty girlier sheets so now I no longer have a room covered in ‘Feliz Navidad’ decorations..yay!!! I also found a great market for fruit…it takes getting used to here because the fruit is much more ripe and looks like its almost bruised and ready to be thrown out by US standards…for example I probably spit out 50 seeds per mandarin versus like 3 in the states, but its because they are closer to being ripe when they sell. It makes you wonder just how many chemicals it takes to get our fruit gets to look so pristine and pretty….
I had my second session at La Agraria in Lima, learning to plant seasonal things here in Peru…it is so cold in Lima and make a mini greenhouse with plastic tarps etc, its incredible because you don’t drop much in altitude its just the neverending fog around the city that seems to keep the cold in and then when you get back to Chaclacayo its warm again. Unlike many other countries, in Peru people still buy 60 % of their day to day needs and groceries at markets and so we learned today about some of the wonderful diversity you can see in markets here in Peru...as depending on where in the country you are you will see varieties of fruit that maybe never make it to the markets in Lima. Farmers dont bother to certify things as organic here as most people would assume that their food is produced in a natural fashion and there isn't a market demand to have the same kind of 'organic' labeling as you would see in the US.
This coming week I have my second language proficiency interview as well, so I’m hoping I can go up a level, its been a bit tough in my class of 4 as everyone has been out for 2 days sick except me (my other friend has a parasite, gah! )which over the course of 3 weeks adds up to a lot of missed conversations etc. but my profesora gave me some specific pointers today about what I especially should focus on for the interview so I can work on that this weekend…and my class seems to get way more ‘homework’ than the others even the novice classes, but I think that’s sort of a blessing too, because we need all the practice we can get and I’d probably be doing it myself anyway so its good to have the feedback. In fact, the other day I had the oh so fun task of taking the stance that Marijuana should NOT be legalized during a debate in a larger Spanish language group class-you try taking that stance against 20 other Peace Corps volunteers (ha-ha ok I’m stereotyping now). Apparently that topic was too light for our profesoras and next up was abortion and the existence of a higher power…nothing like getting impassioned to get us talking in Spanish!
I’m putting together a 20 minute presentation in Spanish for Monday on a health topic, I picked early teen pregnancy prevention as we need to incorporate nonformal education techniques and such and we covered many of the stats on this particular subject this week , I also already know 3 girls younger than 20 with 1 year olds just after 3 weeks in the community, so in Chacrasana its very relevant, so wish me luck pulling that one off en espanol :)
The past few days we have had mini sessions on using bleach to disinfect drinking water and veggies, how to properly rehydrate babies who have been sick, and a large session on HIV/AID’s prevalence here in Peru. I don’t know if its fair to say that infidelity is a greater issue here in Peru than in the US-its probably just talked about more in the US-but they do see horrible patterns of married women being infected by husbands who travel from the Sierra to the Coast for seasonal work and return with the virus. We discussed different grants available for HIV/AIDs programs and so I might evaluate that when I get out to site, but it’s a larger problem in the very northern provinces of Tumbes and Piura and I don’t know yet if I’ll be headed that way.
I do know though that in 3 weeks I’ll be going to Huaraz, (not to be confused with the murderous Mexico Juarez), supposedly the provincial capital at the center of the Andes in the province of Ancash (high on my list of could be cool sites) for field based training for 4 days. Definitely looking forward to this as it will be our first opportunity to work hands on with what current volunteers are doing and see how they interact with their community partners (most likely they government run Ministerios de Salud.
Tonight the community of Tres de Octubre is having a festival (seeing as today IS tres de Octubre) so I think some of us will be heading over to check that out...
xox,
K.
On Monday night I went and got all the ingredients for my ‘pizza’ that my family must have asked me for 3 times last weekend, and was rather happy with myself after finding all the stuff I needed in Spanish (flour, yeast, peppers, chorizo, queso) I boiled my h20 (no chances!) and mixed the dough, my fellow PCT, Annie, came over and we chopped everything and then my host mom told me that the oven hadn’t worked in years and that I’d need to use this little spaceship like cooker…so that was weird but fine…so we put it all in and the thing is definitely hot and half an hour later we go to check on it only to find it has stopped cooking (!?!) so I asked my host mom, and as it turned out the spaceship cooker was teetering on broken as well…so after a first go round of rice as an ‘appetizer’ we decided our only option with our half risen pizza was to put it on top of the cooker and cook it on the ring, this was pretty hilarious as we were trying to balance burning the thing and cooking it, so 20 mins after that it seemed to be ready and I served it J It was funny to see everyones face, I suppose you could just suffice it to say that it was NOT the LAST volunteers pizza, but they ate it and pulled off pretending to love it pretty well! My one brother Kevin who is 13 didn’t really try to pretend though, his face was pretty funny…and a few minutes later he came in with a plate of yuka and rice instead J Next time I’m just going to stick to cookies or something and make sure we have heat!
In other random news, my host mom rearranged my room and put on pretty girlier sheets so now I no longer have a room covered in ‘Feliz Navidad’ decorations..yay!!! I also found a great market for fruit…it takes getting used to here because the fruit is much more ripe and looks like its almost bruised and ready to be thrown out by US standards…for example I probably spit out 50 seeds per mandarin versus like 3 in the states, but its because they are closer to being ripe when they sell. It makes you wonder just how many chemicals it takes to get our fruit gets to look so pristine and pretty….
I had my second session at La Agraria in Lima, learning to plant seasonal things here in Peru…it is so cold in Lima and make a mini greenhouse with plastic tarps etc, its incredible because you don’t drop much in altitude its just the neverending fog around the city that seems to keep the cold in and then when you get back to Chaclacayo its warm again. Unlike many other countries, in Peru people still buy 60 % of their day to day needs and groceries at markets and so we learned today about some of the wonderful diversity you can see in markets here in Peru...as depending on where in the country you are you will see varieties of fruit that maybe never make it to the markets in Lima. Farmers dont bother to certify things as organic here as most people would assume that their food is produced in a natural fashion and there isn't a market demand to have the same kind of 'organic' labeling as you would see in the US.
This coming week I have my second language proficiency interview as well, so I’m hoping I can go up a level, its been a bit tough in my class of 4 as everyone has been out for 2 days sick except me (my other friend has a parasite, gah! )which over the course of 3 weeks adds up to a lot of missed conversations etc. but my profesora gave me some specific pointers today about what I especially should focus on for the interview so I can work on that this weekend…and my class seems to get way more ‘homework’ than the others even the novice classes, but I think that’s sort of a blessing too, because we need all the practice we can get and I’d probably be doing it myself anyway so its good to have the feedback. In fact, the other day I had the oh so fun task of taking the stance that Marijuana should NOT be legalized during a debate in a larger Spanish language group class-you try taking that stance against 20 other Peace Corps volunteers (ha-ha ok I’m stereotyping now). Apparently that topic was too light for our profesoras and next up was abortion and the existence of a higher power…nothing like getting impassioned to get us talking in Spanish!
I’m putting together a 20 minute presentation in Spanish for Monday on a health topic, I picked early teen pregnancy prevention as we need to incorporate nonformal education techniques and such and we covered many of the stats on this particular subject this week , I also already know 3 girls younger than 20 with 1 year olds just after 3 weeks in the community, so in Chacrasana its very relevant, so wish me luck pulling that one off en espanol :)
The past few days we have had mini sessions on using bleach to disinfect drinking water and veggies, how to properly rehydrate babies who have been sick, and a large session on HIV/AID’s prevalence here in Peru. I don’t know if its fair to say that infidelity is a greater issue here in Peru than in the US-its probably just talked about more in the US-but they do see horrible patterns of married women being infected by husbands who travel from the Sierra to the Coast for seasonal work and return with the virus. We discussed different grants available for HIV/AIDs programs and so I might evaluate that when I get out to site, but it’s a larger problem in the very northern provinces of Tumbes and Piura and I don’t know yet if I’ll be headed that way.
I do know though that in 3 weeks I’ll be going to Huaraz, (not to be confused with the murderous Mexico Juarez), supposedly the provincial capital at the center of the Andes in the province of Ancash (high on my list of could be cool sites) for field based training for 4 days. Definitely looking forward to this as it will be our first opportunity to work hands on with what current volunteers are doing and see how they interact with their community partners (most likely they government run Ministerios de Salud.
Tonight the community of Tres de Octubre is having a festival (seeing as today IS tres de Octubre) so I think some of us will be heading over to check that out...
xox,
K.
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