montell jordan shout out!
so far away from anyone who knows how to really use a decent pair of shears, i have taken it upon myself to care for my own hair…for better or worse. however, i am left without a decent pair of shears and use the safety-tipped scissors that came in my med kit. so needless to say my hair dresser will be surprised this spring when i go to the states for a trim! woops!
almost.
not really.
you know, there are a lot things you just get used to while in service. number one, being that your stomach is never normal, and getting sick is like brushing your teeth. it’s a (almost) daily habit…that might be true for both things…but GUYS sometimes we have days without water…okay?
infected eye picture.
so along with my normal ailments, i have recently discovered a nice little bump on my eye hanging out next to my pupil. though it hasn’t obstructed my view, and honestly, i am not too worried about it. i did finally breakdown and call the doctors. they quickly made me an appointment at the approved health clinic in chiclayo. however, you need to remember that i am still in peru so even the best clinics are…well…i mean i am in peru. with that, i showed up, and was told that they do not have an appointment, so i told my doctors…they were just as confused as me, and so i am rescheduled for today. honestly, i am hoping to just some extra strong eye drops. there’s a ton of dust and dirt around town and i feel like i should honestly be wearing safety goggles everywhere i go…so i am sure it is a result from the dust in my eye.
dying in my bed.
with the failed visit to the clinic, i am positive that i contracted some other ailment, which resulted in me waking up the next day with a pretty bad throat infection. luckily, with the peace corps, if i am sick, i can actually allow my body to recover. so after my morning meetings, i listened to my body, that was in a lot of pain and just exhausted, and went home to rest. ate lunch with my family, and then was asleep at 2:30pm…only to be awoken for meals, i did not fully wake up again until 1:30pm the next day.
doing what i do best.
honestly, that sleep was the best thing that could have happened for my body. i spent saturday afternoon in bed, and still took it easy most of sunday, but on sunday my energy levels were back up and yesterday i really got busy with work. however, i still have some small symptoms, some congestion but not nearly as bad as all the other times i found myself with the gripe…so you know what? i’ll take it. and today i return back to the clinic for my next eye appointment. fingers crossed it happens!
this past few weeks i have been working on my vacciones útiles programs…literally meaning “useful vacation.” because most youth are either planting rice or traveling to lima in january, we waited to begin until the end of january and will continue them until the beginning of march. i have two official programs that i am working with people in my community with.
me with the different project examples.
the first, pictured above, is my environment group. there are 25 participants with ages ranging from 10 to 32. when originally conceived and gained approval from museum administration, i wanted to bring more environmental awareness to the community, and even have a few “clean the pyramids” days and a couple of art shows made from recyclable items with entry being paid with recyclable items…we would then sell the recyclables, and use the profits to pay for a beach day. however, as with most things in the peace corps, it changed and now it is namely a group that is learning how to reuse their recyclables into other objects, which still has a great message to it. and honestly, it is nice to be able to show up and craft with a group of eager youth. and it’s been fantastic getting to know some more youth in town.
for our first project we have been making bags from used catalogs. it should be noted that peruvians love catalogs. in fact, as i have gone around town collecting used catalogs, i have been corrected almost all occasions that they are not catalogs but magazines. but really, they read those things like magazines…needless to say it’s been a bit of a challenge to find them. the making of the bags is actually quite tedious, and i think i have spent over 15 hours on mine…and i am still probably at least 2 hours from being done…but i will post a finished product. we will start our second and final project next week, making traditional mochica art out of paper pulp!
not pictured…and honestly…not happening anymore (again, normal peace corps experience) is my pasos adelante group. honestly, the fact that this first try failed was a little bit of a disappointment, as i had been preparing for this for months, and hope to make this my primary project in site. however, it was just my first try, so there will be other ones. it is a health promoters leadership group…and one day there will be hopefully numerous ones in tucume. anyways, it started with a really strong showing. when i went to the classes to promote the group, i had 55 sign up, and having to wait almost a month the start the group, i still had about 20 show up for the first meeting. then my town’s fair happened, and it quickly dropped to 3 and then to 1 and then it just stayed at 1. and you know, that’s okay. at least one person was excited about the group, and i am reworking the work plan to present to the school with the health post this week, so that we can incorporate it into the school year.
also, thanks to the awesome feria…not complaining too much…because it really was awesome…but it’s even more awesome that it’s over…my cultural group that i was working on with a few other people has completely fallen by the wayside, but one thing that my community is starting to learn is that i am pretty persistent…so next week we will start discussing this cultural group again. woo! anyways, life has been busy. and it continues to be so with work being aplenty…even with the trials and errors, but that is the name of the game!
but really, who’s the boss? thank you community for answering this question for all of us. (i refuse to spoil the show for you).
anyways, the feria has started here in tucume. this month it is of the “purisma concepción.” my town has been talking to me about since i arrived in site in august. hundreds upon hundreds, if not more, are piling themselves in my small town. many are traveling from lima. family that has long moved away returns for this week.
the parque is bustling!
to get the week (more like 2 weeks) started, i attended a danza de los diablicos competition. the history of this form of dance is quite interesting. it’s a traditional dance dating back to the 17th century conveying how the spaniards would try to trick the natives into joining the catholic religion by hiding in the pyramids and coming out at night dressed as the devil. now with the dance, it’s a tucumano folklore to express their world under colonialism, and how the colonists used fear instead of love for conversion.
the promenade of the contestants.
i just love how they replaced the “2” with the “3.”
stayed tuned…a number of other cultural events will be happening over the next couple of weeks that have to do with this feria!
…when you can’t tell if those are freckles on your legs or spots of dirt engrained on your leg…
hello all. just a brief note and break from the previous “musings & ramblings.” i am quite delighted that i wrote the last post, because just as how this is the case with everything else in my life, when i start to outwardly state one thing, the opposite begins to occur.
i filled in a little of the free time with boogie boarding and swimming at a nearby pool with my family. but all of my other hours have been fairly full. between church, young women, vacacciones utiles prep, and the upcoming ferria, i have been quite busy. it’s been a delight. so much so that friday night resulted in my going to sleep at 9:30pm…however, i did have a solid night’s sleep that night…which is a rarity now. unfortunately with this heat, i find myself waking up in the middle of the night dehydrated and also needing to go to the bathroom because of the 1/2 liter of water i drank before going to sleep. i intend to FINALLY breakdown and buy a fan. i found a nice, tall one for only 50 soles. unfortunately i failed to bring my market bag this week. next week though…NEXT WEEK!
in other unrelated news: i attended a regional conference about job fair offerings and services which will be great for when i do put together a job fair for my town in the future…it also included swag bags with a t-shirt and awesome pen (obvs, it’s all about the little things here). also, i found a restaurant with a/c and salads! yesterday i dined on tacos and celebrated a friend’s birthday with her family, and attended a small business opening of another volunteer.
so i have found quite that work/life balance in site. however, tomorrow is my first day of my VU programs…and i think this is when the balance starts leaning toward the work side.! but i am more than excited. this one is my environment group with the museum. so there is a lot of hiking and recycling and recycling art projects. WOOHOO!
with that. it is time to catch a taxi. return to a land of limited speed internet. zero breeze. and lots of sweat. and i now bid you all adieu.
xoxox.
ps. yesterday, i drank 4.5 liters of water…and i still felt dehydrated…what is it with this heat??!?!
well. here we are. 9 pm on a thursday night.
honestly, i couldn’t think of another way to start that post. i suppose this would be more appropriate and quite fitting:
i was talking to my dad last night, and he suggested that since this blog is to express the experiences of my time in the peace corps that i should write about it. so…HERE WE GO!
i guess to skip all the build up, as really i have become more and more blunt during my service, namely because i can’t talk all rico suave in spanish…this has started to limit my english as well…but to get us back on track, i am/was/almost out of a little rut in my service. you know, during training they shared with us, multiple times, a handy graph with quite the squiggly, curvaceous line drawn across it that showed how the emotions of the volunteer can fluctuate during your 27 months in country…and about what time you experience these, and according to the graph, this one is right on time. honestly, i wouldn’t even say that the line on my graph has been as squiggly as the one they showed us in training, but i wouldn’t say that i am at a high point at the current moment.
now, before you all start calling me and sending me tons of care packages (which i am more than okay with), i am emotionally okay. i am not sad. i am not depressed. in fact, i am pretty happy. i am just in an in between hump (or rut). i came back to site from an incredible vacation, and i returned to blazing heat and few weeks to kill before i start my summer programs.
in my site, during the month of january, everyone is out planting the rice and/or traveling to lima to cool off, so my socios urged that we start our programs the last week of january. well, they are going to be awesome because i have been preparing away for them…maybe over preparing now. to help fill the time, i wanted to start my world map project and have that completed with the kids who are still hanging around town. however, my municipality is having me wait because they are going to repaint the wall that i want to use…hopefully this is sooner rather than later. i am also working on making some concrete plans for my next year of work and procrastinating on my final touches of my community diagnostic (it’s like a cockroach…it never dies…) and working with a group in town on trying to start some cultural workshops…but this has started to go from a collaborative project to me pushing and begging for us to meet to finalize details.
anyways, the truth of the matter is, no matter what, i have about one more week before my programs start, and honestly, i hate not being busy and it’s my job to get me out of this. i found myself watching too much of the oc…such good television…and not being able to settle on reading just one book…and having terrible nights of sleep….mainly because it is just too hot. i can’t open the window at night due to bugs (i have a mosquito net…), and i also have to worry about rats entering my room through the window as well…so, closed it stays.
so, if this is my job to get me out of this, what does one do?: well, to start with, i thought i would try to start some semblance of a routine. i mean, really, when else in my life, am i going to have the hours where i can leisurely include: studying my scriptures (english & spanish), studying my spanish, exercise, yoga, napping, and whatever else i would like to include and still have plenty of time to go out and do work…and maybe catch an episode of the oc….so really, i am kind of lucky…before my service, i was always a go-go-go person, and filled my schedule with things for all hours of the day.
another thing i have done is created a list of small projects i wanted to around my house for my family: make a solar oven (put this heat to some use), create an herb garden for my family (put all the plastic bottles to use), make shrinky dinks with samia in the aforementioned solar oven, and the list continues.
so really, at the end of the day: i am okay. and soon, i am going to be great. but right now, i don’t have too much to share…but in case you were wondering here are a few highlights of the last week and a half back in site:
with that. my brain is fried. i am going to read for a little while until i can fall asleep…
our last evening together.
despite the altitude sickness we still had a blast traveling around peru, and trying all sorts of new and delicious food and seeing incredible sites throughout the country. it was such a treat to be able to share my life, my site, my community, my family with mp, and now there is someone else back home who knows what i am talking about when i talk about the ants in my bed, the pig outside my window and how much samia has grown.
for our last night together, we had a grand finale of some sorts. we dined at the world-renowned astrid y gaston, listed as one of the top 50 restaurants in the world…and goodness it was worth all the hype. it has been almost 4 days since we have eaten there and i am still full. the flavors there were incredible and they really did take peruvian cuisine up a number of levels…which i, honestly, didn’t think was possible. plus, it was just fun to spend a nice quiet evening together before we said goodbyes at the airport.
today marks my first day back to work in site…which really means that i will be going from socio to socio to let them know i am here…that i didn’t move away…and to just talk and see what i can do to get myself back into the swing of things. site is still site. there are still a number of ants in my bed and they have moved back into my computer as well. the pig in my backyard has gotten a little bigger…samia has gotten a little taller as well…and the weather only seems to be getting hotter. i guess it’s summertime here…now i just need to see if the mangoes are getting sweeter…
also. just a short 3.5 months until i make my way back to the states for a quick visit to mp. considering that it had been 6.5 months previously, this should go faster than lightening…i hope!
in the plaza mayor in lima.
during my 2.5 months of training, i never went to lima all that often. i was, generally, too preoccupied in integrating with my family in order to increase my language proficiency, so having a few days in lima with mp was perfect. we went to the main plaza as well as visited the catacombs, which really gave me the heebyjeebies, but so much fun at the same time. i definitely recommend this stop while exploring central lima!
only smiles in the plaza mayor.
the cathedral of san francisco, where the entrance to the catacombs is located.
earlier in the day we visited my family in lima, and they gave us the best recommendation we received all week: parque de las reservas. at night they have a giant water show, and the park is filled with numerous other fountains with light and music and interesting structures. it was so much fun! however, i would say that we left wishing that we had worn our swimsuits, as it was so tempting to run and play in all the fountains as well.
we were soaked after running through the fountain tunnel behind us.
this one was a blast to watch. all the kids tried not to get sprayed until…
SURPRISE!!!!
if you ever have a free evening in lima, i highly recommend this. it is only 4 soles to enter and is located next to the national stadium. it is so much fun and will bring out the kid in you!
perusing peru... 