Training, Week 5

Try to contain yourselves. I know that my blog entry titles are super creative, not to mention thrilling, but my brain hurts daily from the constant translating, so getting to speak or even write in English for a little bit is now more therapeutic than attempts to be witty.

The big event of Week #5 was finding out our site assignment regions. We did not discover our actual sites, just the region (i.e., coast or sierra). I can’t remember if I have told ya’ll, but there are three basic geographic locations in Peru. The coast, which is mostly desert – hot, dry, dusty. If you get the coast region that does not necessarily mean that you will be living on the beach. There are coast locations “muchos kilometros” (a whole lot of kilometers) away from the beach. Second, there is the sierra region. Cajamarca, where I went on my Shadowing trip, is in the sierra – mountainous, green, rainy (in seasons). Like I talked about a couple of blogs ago, it’s is absolutely breathtaking, but you need strong leg muscles and a good pair of lungs. Third, there is the rainforest. There are no volunteers deep in the rainforest. It is too dangerous to our health, but Volunteers vacation there.

We were given a brief presentation about both the coast and sierra regions – the different foods, customs, climates, etc. and then we were given a piece of paper. If the paper had a horse on it, you were going to the coast; if the paper had an alpaca on it, you were going to the sierra. I got coast. Yaaay! This is what I wanted, but it is still so very, very vague. There is such a variety of sites on the coast. Learning that I would be living in the coast was a relief because I knew at the very least that I would not be climbing mountains every day, but it still left of so many unanswered questions. I have deliberated numerous times about why the Peace Corps reveals our sites to us bit by bit, deep into training, when I am pretty sure that they know where we are all going very early on. I have put a lot of thought into this, and my professional psychological opinion is that they are sadists. The whole lot of them. Not really, just kidding, but when you are in the moment, it sure feels like it.

Another highlight of this week was that I survived my first real earthquake. I had experienced probably 3 or 4 tremors by Week #5, but never a full blown earthquake. Peruvians are so used to the tremors that they feel the slightest little movement. I barely felt one and I am pretty sure that if my host mom had not told me, I would have missed it. Anyway, on Friday I was giving a charla with another volunteer. I had finished mine and turned the reigns over to Karl. Karl was incredibly lucky. Instead of being saved by the bell, he was saved by the earthquake. At the last minute that morning, my original partner had to go the Lima for a doctor’s appointment, so since Karl was in a group of 3 instead of 2, like the rest of us, they pulled him to work with me. He gave a charla that he saw someone else give a couple of weeks earlier on our Shadowing trips. He did a good job, but he finished about 20 minutes earlier than we were supposed to. Karl thinks on his feet, and he started a game, but less than 2 minutes into it, alarm bells sounded, and everyone had to evacuate the classroom and exit to the courtyard because we were in the middle of an earthquake. I still didn’t know what was going on and one of the students had to tell me. It felt like I was standing next to the highway a big semi-truck whizzed by me, but that was the extent. Someone told me that it registered a 5.something on the Richter scale, but Idk for sure.

Hairless dog. Just thought I woud throw this litte guy in since
the pics are lacking in this blog. These boogers are so ugly, they're cute.
Can't help but think of Dr. Evil's cat everytime I see one.

Just want to say thanks to everyone that leaves me a comment on this thing. It is a bittersweet ordeal anytime that someone does. One the one hand, I know that I am not forgotten and that I have a lot of people who care about me, but on the other hand, it always makes me a lil homesick. I can endure the pain for a measly two years, but there’s always no place like home.

Mas Training, Blah, Blah, Blah

Week 4: I have to start out by saying that you guys need to take another gander at the entry right before this one. My Internet was SUPER slow when I was trying to post it and apparently, all 30-something pics that I included in that blog didn’t make it, so I have put them back in. I’m writing all of these next few blogs in retrospect; this one, about 7 weeks in hindsight. I am now at my site, sitting in what is going to be my kitchen for the next 2 years, and I can actually breathe now. Training was sheer madness, looking back on it. Anyway, since I have the time now, I’m going to walk you through the last weeks of training as best as my memory will serve me.

The most that I can remember about Week 4 was that it was the 4^th of July, and I had my first language proficiency interview.

Independence Day, for a lot of us, was a difficult day. It was overcast and particularly cold…and of course we had to go to training. By this point most of us are ready for some sort of break besides just having a Sunday to rest, talk to our families in the states, do laundry (many of us hand washing, BTW), and prepare for the next week. The staff tried to do fun things, but a good portion of us were being Negative Nancies, myself included. One of my friends put it best, “Why am I not on the beach, sippin a ­­­­­­mimosa in my bikini instead of getting off a crowded combi in my chompa?!?!” (“Chompa” is Peruvian for jacket. Yes, I said Peruvian and not Spanish because there is a lot of Peruvian slang here.) When we got to the training center, the language facilitators had prepared a fun-filled morning of track and field games. I hate to sound ungrateful for their hard work, but sleeping til noon and then throwing some dead meat on the grill (or in a pit in the ground, to be more Peruvian) with some friends and host family sounded much more appealing to me than sack and three-legged races.

"Cuy" ("gerbil") races. This little guy was lunch later.
Not really, but they do eat these in Peru. On my to-do list.

Food eating contest. It included several different Peruvian
style snacks and ended with whoever was the first
to blow a bubble with their gum.

So, I was terrified that I would lose one of the three
large spoons that my family owns, so I wanted to
keep it in a safe place. P.S.-How cute am I?

That´s an egg on a spoon in my mouth...not on my face

Water balloon toss

Wheelbarrow race

Scotney, whoopin everybody in the sack race

I tried to put my best foot forward (not just in the races, ha ha ha), but all the indifference and negativity was contagious and intensifying. I was on the Fusia team with two people that spent more time in the kitchen than they did on the field, which cost us ten points. We lost every race except the food-eating contest. Mr. I´ll be Smiling While I’m Plunging to my Death in a Combi Inferno” who went to Cajamarca with me, Andy, is known as “The Human Garbage Disposal” by his parents.

This is Scotney´s burger, as anyone could tell
from the ridiculous amount of ketchup

In the afternoon, we were treated to an American-style cookout at the Country Director’s house in Lima. We had real burgers! I say real burgers because it is not difficult to find a “burger” here in Peru. HOWEVER, it is typically a teeny piece of meat, paper thin, without vegetables, but including fries and different sauces. Yup, they just put the fries right on the bun, basically doing you the favor of eliminating any taste of your paper thin meat. Don’t get me wrong, I really like Peruvian food, for the most part (I plan to write an entire entry later), but I would not recommend the burger to an American. We also had different types of salads, which was awesome. I have heard stories that Peruvians eat salad, I just haven’t witnessed it yet. We also had cake, American style in the shape of an American flag. "American style" because this is the first cake made in Peru that I have eaten without raisins in it. There were enough burgers for everyone to have at least two, so we were all pretty happy. 

Then I experienced my first “hora loca” (crazy hour). I have been in Peru for over a month now, and I have experienced more clowns than I have experienced lettuce. Think about that one! Hora loca typically involves a clown leading a group in dance or games or both, ya know, just to liven things up. There were balloons and confetti and a lot of laughs. They keep saying that we will feel like teenagers because we are constantly in class, and people are always telling us where to go and what to do. I migrated from feeling like an adolescent to feeling like a preschooler that day, but in all honesty, it was fun.

Hora Loca

Super awesome crazy disco clown

Those few with enough loca-ness to make it to the end

On Friday, we had our first language proficiency interviews. When I started this crazy adventure, my language level was “Bajo Bajo,” Low Low. Many thanks to the stupendous foreign language departments at three different institutions of higher learning! Five semesters and a couple of thousand dollars later, and I’m Bajo Bajo. Anywho, my amazing facilitator here, Pablo, told us all to just remain calm and try not to overstep our bounds. It was pretty informal. I talked about Texas A LOT. I thought the questions about Texas would never end. Do you know how hard it is to explain to a foreigner in a foreign language that Texas is known for having everything BIG. I had to leave that topic pretty quickly because I just kept digging a deeper hole the more I tried to explain. My interviewer does know all about the Big Texan and how you can eat steak for free if you have the stomach for 72oz. of beef. Lol. Then I had to choose a famous person and pretend to interview them about their latest work. Somebody please tell me what was going on in my head for me to pick Glen Close. WTH? Glen Close? Out of the billions of famous people in the world, why, oh why, oh why did I choose Glen Close? I’m pretty sure that I made up the words for “Fatal Attraction” during my brilliant interview of…Glen Close. Needless to say, the “3DO” (myself and the other chicas from my Tres de Octubre neighborhood that started Bajo Bajo) group was pretty indifferent about our results. Nobody felt like they nailed it, but this one is not the one that really counts anyway. Every trainee has to be at the “Intermedio Medio,” Intermediate Medium, level to go on to be a real Volunteer by the last week of training. I will not keep you in suspense for a week, like the good people at Cuerpo de Paz (Peace Corps). At the 5^th week, I am officially Intermedio Bajo. A relief that I only have to advance one teeny level to graduate.

Oh! I think this was the week when I got to teach a session. Without getting on my high horse for too long and now reflecting on my past work and educational experiences, my graduate program at Midwestern State Univesity was phenomenal! I signed up to just aid my tech trainers in an 1 ½ hour lesson about adolescent development…or so I thought. They introduced the topic and gave me and a fellow trainee total control of the reigns…sort of. We had to follow the established guidelines provided by Peace Corps, but I added my own little tidbits of interesting info and clarified and expanded on some of the topics required to present. (Shout out to Dr. Diekhoff for giving me the opportunity to teach Lifespan Development! Never thought that that would come in handy like it has here. A million thanks to you, sir!) For the first time in training in this countr, I felt respected by my peers and teachers. I got a certificate of appreciation and later one of my tech trainers asked me to please speak more in classes because I have a lot to offer.

Next up…Week 5! Same Peace Corps time! Same Peace Corps channel!

Any 1960s “Batman” TV series fans out there? No? Biff! Blam! Splat! No? Ok…that’s cool.

My Shadowing Trip

Week 3: Everyone is going to different parts of the country for 4 days to shadow real Volunteers to see what their routines are like. I am going with two pretty cool people, Chelsea and Andy. Andy is the dude that was going to be smiling on his way down the mountainside in the fiery combi of death. Chelsea plays the ukulele.

Andy and Chelsea, my "companeros" and "amigos"
(associates and friends)

We are going to Cajamarca, a province in Northern Peru, known for its huge Carnaval celebrations, cheese, and milk.

Cajamarca. San Pablo is kinda in the middle 

It is in the sierras, so lots of mountains and plenty of greenery. Also, this area is very traditional. Some people wear the big high-brimmed hats and a lot of women wear the knee-length skirts with the tall thick socks.

Couple of ladies in traditional Peruvian Sierra attire

San Pablo

The windy road that I travelled on to get to San Pablo

View from San Pablo

San Pablo

 Rumors are abundant that these trips either (a) are the same region (coast or sierra) that our final placements will be, or (b) the complete opposite of where we will be placed so that we can all experience the different geographies. I honestly don’t think that that much thought went into the selection of the shadowing trips. Our names were probably drawn out of a big high-brimmed hat.

Cajamarca is about 15 hours away from Lima. There are 11 trainees going to the province of Cajamarca, but once we get there, we are splitting up into 4 different groups and going to different sites. My Volunteer is Nick, and he lives in San Pablo, a little town of about 7,000 people.

We left on Tuesday around 2:30 from the training center. We got to the bus station in Lima about an hour before our bus left. We were all VIPs, so we got to chill in a lounge with Wifi (pronounced “Weefee” here. So adorable!) and free coffee and tea, hot of course. When I boarded the bus, I felt like such a backwoods country bumpkin. This is the nicest bus that I have ever seen. I am in the Peace Corps. I was expecting to ride for 20 hours on a Greyhound next to a random Peruvian that wants to talk to me in Spanish with a kid in front of me flicking his boogers in my general direction and 16 chickens in the front seat. Wow! Was I ever mistaken. I had my own seat, not next to anyone. My seat reclines to almost a complete 180 degree horizontal angle. There are two movies shown and free Weefee. We get a pretty decent meal of chicken, rice, dessert, and choice of beverage. There is even a BINGO game! The winner gets a free VIP trip to Cajamarca. There are only 7 of the 11 of us that ride 1^st class, so I pitied the other 4, but not enough to relinquish my seat!

I must mention that I had started feeling a bit under the weather last Saturday while in Lima. I was constantly sneezing, but I told myself that it was just allergies, even though I haven’t had allergies the whole time I have been in Peru and 3 of the 5 other trainees that live in my neighborhood had been sick the week before, I knew that it just had to have been something in the fog in Lima that was responsible for the sneezing. Yeah, right. By Tuesday, I was miserable. I didn’t have that achy flu feeling, just constantly annoyed with the runny nose. I took three different medications that are supposed to relieve cold-like symptoms, but nothing worked for more than an hour at a time. Terrible timing! The most awesome bus ride of my life and possibly my only time in Cajamarca plagued with watery eyes, itchy runny nose, and congestion. Where is that stupid animated allergy-pill-selling, Antonio-Banderas-sounding bee when you need him?

When we got to Cajamarca at 9:30 Wednesday morning, my group and another group were led by our Volunteers to a little restaurant for egg sandwiches and juice. Then my group headed to San Pablo in a taxi for 1½ hours, again, winding up a mountainside without guardrails. I am starting to get used to this. Well, I was able to get “the fiery combi of death going over a cliff” mental image out of my mind for at least half of the ride.

When we arrived, Nick’s mom treated us to a HUGE meal of soup, salad, some kind of “lomo” (stir-fry) with chicken and broccoli with rice, of course. Then we took a tour of the San Pablo. There was some holiday this week and the mayor extended the time off for everyone (government agencies, like schools and the municipality) by two days. The main purpose of this trip for us was to observe a few days in the life of a real volunteer, but since basically every organization the Nick works with was closed, we did touristy things.

Los matadores

Random crowd guy

Hard to see, but random crowd guy is now
trapped under the horns of the bull

The first night, we attended a mock bull fight. It was “mock” because the intention is to entertain the kids. The matadors were dressed in costumes, (Try not to faint when you see the blackface matador. Things are different here.) the bulls are not full-grown, and the intention is not to ultimately kill the bull. I really enjoyed it. My “companeros” (associates) were a little appalled by the treatment of the bull, but personally, I feel that unless you are a vegetarian, the treatment of these bulls (one got its horn knocked clean off, the matadors were pulling the bulls’ tails and riding them and pulling their ears) is pretty decent compared to the millions of bulls that make it to the slaughterhouse. I had more fun watching the reactions of the people (especially the children) than actually watching the bull fight. Everyone would get soooo excited, screaming and jumping up and down, when either the bull or a matador would get hurt. Towards the end, random men from the crowd started rushing the arena, fighting the bulls themselves! I could not believe it, but Nick said that that is a common occurrence. What guts! What ignorance!

The next day we took two unbelievable hikes.

Kuntar Wasi - Main Gaming Field

Monolith

Stairs leading down to a different sports field

The first was to some ancient ruins high up a mountain side. These ruins predate the Incas. The tribe was called Kuntar Wasi. The site was not discovered until the 1980’s by a Japanese mining company. Many of the excavated objects are now in Japan, which is a source of contempt for the Peruvians. I got all this info from a museum located at the bottom of the mountain. (Grad school taught me the importance of siting my sources J) I should note that I was unable to breathe clearly during this hike and have never felt my heart race as fast as it did this day. I was scared I was going to have a heart attack 10 miles up a mountain side, far away from any medical facility. I thought it was probably because I was a little sick. By this day, I was hacking up some of the most bright green, thick foulness that I have ever seen. (You must excuse me. Daily conversations with my fellow volunteers and Peruvian family about the inner workings of my digestive system have made me immune to the repugnance of conversating about bodily functions.) Later, my host mom and grandma said that I probably had a touch of the altitude sickness. Later, we travelled back to Nick’s house for a big lunch and a short nap. The following excursion was my favorite of the day. As much as I love museums and ancient ruins, the beauty of the second site was indescribable.

Complete with mountain goats

Locals call this "El Montana del Perro! because
it sort of looks like a dog´s head

If you look real close, you can see Nick and Andy at the top

Behind Nick’s dad’s sister’s house, there is a river with huge rocks going down a mountain side. WOW! I felt like I was channeling my mother for a minute because I couldn’t stop taking pictures. These pics do no justice for the actual beauty of the place. Nick and Andy took off up the mountain, while Chelsea, Nick’s dad, and I stayed at the bottom. We couldn’t climb up this one section of rock that 6’ Andy and Nick were able to. When we passed by Nick´s aunt´s house, some of his little cousins were playing on a "swing" that overlooks a cliffside. Total lack of fear!

The following day, we travelled back to Cajamarca city to meet up with other Volunteers and trainees and tour the city. We were the first to arrive, so Nick took us to some ancient Incan tombs. This is the site where a great Incan king was killed by Francisco Pizarro, a Spanish conquistador. It’s a great story, but this blog would be another 5 pages if I recounted it, so here is a Wiki link, if you are interested:

Later, we visited the Incan Baths, a natural hot water spring. First hot bath in weeks! You pay S/. 6 for 30minutes for a private bath, but TOTALLY worth it!

We all headed back home midafternoon on the same bus line. This time however, there were only 4 of us that got to ride first-class, and I was not one of them. Don’t get me wrong, there were not booger-flipping kids or 16 chickens in the front seat, but the seats did not recline as far, I barely slept, and I did sit next to a random Peruvian who did not say more than 2 words to me the entire 16 hours, but it could have been faaaaaar worse. I am just spoiled now.

Nick provided us with a lot of valuable information during the trip despite not seeing him work. I am so much more excited to get to site than ever. I think I will actually get some free time now and then. Nick said that his Spanish-speaking ability really took off after he got to site, and he has some truly meaningful relationships with his hosts and fellow volunteers. I really enjoyed seeing the sierra. It is breathtaking…buuuuut I hope I don’t get this region for my own site. The breathing thing really scared me for a few minutes. Besides just that one time, I was ALWAYS the last one to climb the hills, ALWAYS the only one struggling. And trust me, there was no flat land. Everywhere, even in the town, was straight up and down, up and down, up and down. It would be really great exercise, but I think I would prefer the flat land of the coast. Also, it was pretty darn cold at night. I had 5 blankets on my bed and I was still chilly at first. I know I like the heat of the coast better. If I get the sierra, I know I can adjust, but I have my fingers crossed for the coast.

Sorry it has been so long since I made a post on here. I have been super busy during Weeks 5, 6, and 7. This weekend is the first free weekend that any of us have had! It is Fiestas Patrias here. This is the equivalent of our 4^th of July, but Peruvians sure know how to celebrate! The kids get a 2-week holiday and a lot of people are off work for at least a week. We do not have training on Monday, so hopefully I can get some more posts up. Miss you all, but I’m having a great time!

My First Charla

This weekend was Father’s Day. My family celebrated by eating breakfast with Rebecca’s dad and eating a huge lunch with all of Carlos’ family. On Saturday Rebeca, Carlos, Yerlin, Gianella, and I worked together to make a cake for the occasion. Once it was in the oven, us girls kicked Carlos out of the house so that Gianela could finish making her gifts for all the papas in the family. We all worked together to make these little yellow car picture frames made out of cardboard and fuzzy cloth. Also, Yerlin painted my fingernails. All the girls at training are jealous.

 

 

Saturday morning I was teamed up with two other trainees on a “Mission Impossible.” We had to go to Chosica, a small town about a 20-minute combi ride out of Chaclacayo, to ask random people on the street where I could find a school and a gym. Once we found our two destinations, we had a predetermined set of questions to ask the people there. I was with an Intermediate-level Spanish speaker and another novice. We chose to accept our mission and found it to be possible. However, it was difficult finding a gym. The people we asked would point us in different directions, but it was all worth it when we found a restaurant with “Café Americana” (American coffee). It was expensive, but I splurged on a large mochaccino. My Spanish is already improving. I learn a lot of new vocab (Melis, note the abbrev) words each day, but I still have a long way to go.

Soooooooo…(I know you liked that opening, Grace Kelly) it is only Week #2, and we are going to go to a school to give our first “charla” (session, lecture) on Thursday. We are having language class in my casa this week, so I am not waking up til 7:00! Super late! Major sleeping in happening! We are mainly focusing on prep for our charlas. All of us in my language class are pretty nervous. We found out on Tuesday who we will be teamed up with and our topic. We were given a brief outline of a game we will play with the kids and how our lecture should proceed, but that was about it. We had no time in class for discussion. I pegged down my team members after classes to choose which part I would discuss. Pablo helped me work on it Wednesday morning and then we had two hours Wednesday afternoon to plan the details. I have to explain to the kiddies the difference between high self-esteem and low self-esteem and then how a person can improve his/her self-esteem. I am going to have the kids get into groups and write out these three categories on a piece of butcher paper. (Side note to all my fellow psych grads – It’s like I’m in the counseling dept all over again! They use butcher paper more than a… butcher down here!) I wrote out my script and feel pretty good about it. Rebeca helped me tweek it and make it a little more personal on Wednesday night. I basically memorized it, but I am still nervous that the kids are going to ask me questions that I won’t be able to interpret, so I don’t sleep.

The schools here are divided into primary and secondary schools. There are five grades in each school. My group will be presenting our charla to first, third, and fourth grade classes in a secondary school. Of course the most advanced speaker in my group is really, really late, so I am starting to panic a wee bit. She shows up and we get started. We play a game outside where all the kids have to tie a balloon around their ankles and try to pop everyone else’s balloons while protecting their own. The balloons represent self-esteem. It is hard to protect when everyone is attacking it. (Yeah, total stretch, but the game was so much fun.) I got to play because one girl had an injured ankle, but already had a balloon blown up. I had a blast! The poor guy in my group who had to explain the game was having hell. It was so incredibly loud outside on the patio and the kids were not wanting to listen when they have balloons and strings in their hands. The game was pretty rowdy, but it was my favorite part of the charla. My part was so much smaller than I had planned. I had prepared for giving extremely detailed instructions, but I had to say two sentences in each class, and the kids just took off. Of course, there were some kids that asked me questions, but I only had to get my more advanced teammate to answer them twice. Overall, it went way better than I thought it would and the smiles on the kids’ faces makes my looking ridiculous totally worth it J.

The kids here are very friendly and treat us like celebrities. They were lined up after we were all finished asking us for our autographs and email addresses. One girl asked me if I knew Justin Bieber. Her face lighted up when I said “yes.” When she was about to faint, I realized that she thought I meant that I knew him personally. It was really difficult to refrain from pretending like me and the Biebs don’t hang out every day, but I still lack the conversational skills in Spanish to attempt that.

Everything is still going well. I thought I would provide yall with some interesting differences that I have noticed between U.S. and Peruvian culture so far:

·         Peruvians drink very little, and when they do, it is hot/room temp beverages. At this point I am not sure if it is because it is winter here, ice is hard to come by, or if it is a regional thing (rather than a Peruvian thing). I do know that if someone is sick, some believe that drinking cold beverages will worsen the sickness.

·         Since I mentioned it above, I have noticed how relative heat and cold are. It is consistently in the 60’s here. (No, I don’t know the degrees in Centigrade yet!) I am in capri pants and my host mom is in long pants, a heavy coat, a scarf, and repeating “Hace frio, no?” (It’s cold). I know my real mom would be in shorts and a t-shirt in this weather.

o   Side note: I’m sure that packing til midnight the night before I left has nothing to do with this, but I ended up with one pair of jeans and one pair of denim capris. The main “jefe” (boss) of my youth development program strongly encourages business attire every work day, even in training. Any other current trainees reading this, I would like to note that I dress in business attire every day because of necessity, not cuz I want to impress the boss J. Every American that I have asked about buying some jeans says that Peruvian jeans fit really weird (too short, excess room in the hienee), so I am looking forward to that. Since I make S./10 a day, I probably won’t be able to afford a pair for a while anyway.

·         Being cold at night will make you sick. My host mom frowns upon me bathing at night. For those of you who may have forgot, since I have barely mentioned it in previously blogs, I take COLD SHOWERS. lol. I have Zumba class three nights a week and I hate waking up any earlier than I have to, so I prefer to take my showers at night. After a little talk about how it is almost as cold in the morning at 6am as it is at 7pm (remember, we are talking about 60 degrees), I probably won’t get sick, my host mom relented.

·         Did you know that eating too much salt will make you cry? This one I left alone.

Please keep the comments coming! Miss you all.

Typical day in Pre-Service Training (PST)

So, I wake up at 6:30 every morning. I eat breakfast with my host mom. Rebecca and family live actually live up the mountain a ways. They have a small house on the property of the owners that Rebecca works for. Rebecca wakes up at 5:00am every morning to fix all of us breakfast and our lunches to go. Carlos, Yerlin, and Ganellia are out the door by 6:45. Rebecca eats her breakfast with me. We are both huge coffee fans. I must note that I am a little disappointed with the coffee here. I guess since we are so close to Columbia I was picturing Juan Valdez climbing down the mountain every morning to grind my coffee beans and prepare it over an open fire, but there is more instant coffee here than freshly ground. I then take a “combi” (the main source of public transportation here - a van-bus hybrid thingy) to the training center.

 

A combi

My first combi experience – My host mom escorted all the volunteers in my neighborhood to the traiing center on our first day. We have to cross the “caraterra” (the main 4-lane highway that runs through town) which is extremely busy at 7:30 in the morning. There are 7 of us. We hop on the first combi that stops that is already packed to the brim with people. I am the last to get on board, and no sooner than I had one foot on the entryway to the combi, the “cobradora” (the money taker) is screaming “Vamos, vamos, vamos!” (“Let’s go”) to the bus driver. I am barely hanging on to the above head railing, the combi doors are wide open, and a teeny Peruvian woman (the cobradora) is hanging completely out of the combi behind me pushing me in and up on the next step while we are going at least 20 miles an hour! I was absolutely horrified, but strangely exhilarated at the same time. LOL. It is only 50 “centimos” (cents) to ride the combi to the training center, but my trip there and back is 1/7 of my daily pay. I do have plenty of money though. All my lodging and food is paid for.

Once I am at the training center, I have language class for 4 hours. I love my class. Scotney, Caroline, Rebecca, and I are all “novatas” (novices). We have a lot of fun while learning a lot. We are going to have class in each one of our houses. I am excited for that because that means that I can sleep til 6:45! Also, we will take some fun cultural trips sponsored by the language people. Our instructor is Pablo. I like Pablo very much. He is funny and obviously extremely patient. Four hours is a long time, but Pablo makes it fly by.

 

PABLO!!

 

We have lunch at noon. Lunch is the main meal of the day here in Peru. Breakfast is substantial, dinner is basically nonexistent, but lunch is not lunch without a huge heaping pile of rice (or pasta) and a half dozen potatoes in some form. I may be exaggerating a bit, but I am writing this in retrospect, and I am crying starch right now.

At 1:00 we are back in class. The afternoon classes vary. Sometimes the topic is safety and security, sometimes we break up into our specialty groups (business or youth development), sometimes they are about health. We had an hour-long presentation about poop. Seriously. Check out the Bristol Stool Chart online sometime. If we call our doctor with digestive problems, we are supposed to identify our feces according to this chart. LOL! Sorry to those of your with weak stomachs, but I am just sharing my experience. Between the novel bacteria and the enormous mounds of rice in our intestines, bowel movements are a daily topic around here.

We are out of class for the day by 5:00. Most days we either have a Zumba class that my language instructor, Pablo, leads or some people brought Insanity. All the novice Spanish speakers have to have tutoring a couple of times a week. I think that my tutor, Isabel, is the best. Our sessions are very informal, but also extremely helpful. We usually walk down the street to a little café and drink coffee and split a piece of cake while chatting (totally in Spanish, of course). She wants to go back to school someday to get her degree in psychology, so we share our own opinions about different psychological theories and theorists and practices. She is amazing!

ISABEL!!

I get home around 6:30 or 7:00, I take a cold shower on some days, (Don’t judge me until you have taken a cold shower.) I have a little snack with Rebecca, I do my homework, and I go to bed. Usually I watch part of movie while playing a game on my tablet or I read some of a novel. (I have already read Frankenstein and over half of War of the Worlds, which is more novel reading that I have done than in the past three years. Thanks grad school!) I am usually fast asleep by 10:30 or 11:00. I have turned into an old lady…Really though, having to translate every word that comes out of every person’s mouth is extremely tiring. I know that with time I will not have to translate, but for now, I am mentally exhausted. There is so much information being thrown at us right now from such a variety of topics. I want to concentrate most on Spanish because this is my biggest weakness, but there is so much other stuff that I am supposed to be learning also. While I tried to have no expectations going into this, this is more challenging than I expected. Lol.

Thanks to everyone who commented on my last few blogs. I love and miss you all. I am truly enjoying my experience here, but I think I get the biggest smiles when I hear from those most familiar to me. Thanks for all the support. I have a little free time today (for a change). I will try to get another blog post up and more pics. I have been traveling around Peru! I'll be sure to post 3000 scenery pics just for you, Mom! LOL.

Mi Familia Neuva - My New Family

We left the retreat soon after breakfast and headed to the training center in Chaclacayo. My initial impressions of the town were good. The streets are relatively clean, the town park is very pretty and the training center is very nice. You can tell that the training center used to be a house that has been converted, but it was obviously a very large house. It is gated with a beautiful yard (Espanol – “jardin,” pronounced “har-deen”) with huge palm trees and all different types of foliage, a back deck with comfortable chairs and couches, a pool (that we cannot swim in for insurance reasons), and a white Lab-looking dog named Lulu.


Back jardin of the training center

Back patio

First we had a brief session about some administrative stuff. Don’t send me packages! While I would very much like to receive stuff from the states, the cost is outrageous and hundreds of different items that are ordinary (several clothing items in one package, different foods) will alert customs. Anything over 1 kilo will automatically be put through customs and can cost me S/.50-70 to pick up. That is my entire week’s pay! Plus, I probably won’t have time to pick it up. Sending letters or cards is great, but they recommend not sending anything while I am in training because it can take nearly the whole time I am here (10 weeks) to reach Chaclacayo. I will have a PO Box when I get my site location. 

I thought I should explain what “S/.” is in the previous paragraph. The currency here is called “soles” (pronounced “soul-is”). Right now the exchange rate is about S/.2.75 = $1. During training, I receive S/.70 per week, so about $200 a week American. Since I have no bills and my family feeds me every day, right now I feel that this amount is pretty appropriate, but we shall see… 

I also learned that it will probably be about 4 or 5 weeks before I receive my cell phone. I can’t call the states on it anyway. Well, I can but a really brief convo would cost me three day’s pay, so it ain’t happening. Most everyone gets a phone card. They are really cheap. 

We then had an hour Q&A with current Volunteers with a focus on host families. At this point we were going to meet our host families in about an hour, and I think everyone was a little nervous. Some of the Volunteers’ stories were funny, but also somewhat anxiety provoking. Some of them have very little privacy and no one has hot water, but all agreed that their host families were great people whom they grew to love and provided the most support. Some of the families showed up 15 minutes early, so we ended our discussion. Each person received the same piece of paper with the neighborhood in which we were going to be living (5 total neighborhoods for all 35 of us), the name of our new mamas, and a phone number for each household. Then we also got a small slip of paper with our exact address, phone number(s), and a teeny description of each member of the host family household. We then organized ourselves by household and proceeded to the jardin to wait on our families to pick us up. 

I live in “Tres de Octubre” (The Third of October). Yes, this is the name of my neighborhood which is cool because it is something that I can actually pronounce. Other neighborhoods are much more difficult to say – Huascaran, Yanacoto, Chacrasan, etc. My mom’s name is Rebecca and my father’s name is Carlos. They have two daughters, an 18-year-old named Yerlin and a 12-year-old named Ganellia. When I looked at the paper I noticed that I have the same address as another trainee, Dylan. I had no idea what that meant, so my feelings were pretty neutral. Also, my roommate from the staging event in D.C. and my roommate from the retreat live in my neighborhood, so I was excited about that. They are both really great girls. 

So, there are six of us who will be living in Tres de Octubre sitting at a table outside by the exit. The families are supposed to arrive at one, but I can already tell that arrival times are a mere suggestion in this country (Note to Mom – you would totally love it! lol), so nobody was panicking when 1:15 rolled around and nobody from Tres de Octubre had been picked up yet. However, when it was 1:35 and only one of was gone and there were no other trainees from other neighborhoods, we were starting to feel a little unloved. The PC staff called our mamas and for some reason the Tres de Octubre mamas thought that we were getting picked up at 11:00, had already been to the center once to get us, and now they were having problems getting enough cabs for us, them, and all our luggage. LOL! So it turns out that our mamas were so excited to receive us that they showed up two hours early. It is because we are the most amazing group. I can tell already. Lol.  

Funny story. When our mamas arrived, each one stepped up and said their names. Then the appropriate trainee would move to greet her and give her a little kiss on the cheek (traditional Peruvian greeting for people who are close). My mom’s name is Rebecca, but there is a trainee named Rebecca in the Tres de Octubre group, so when my mom Rebecca said her name, trainee Rebecca stepped up and greeted her. My Spanish is so bad, so I was having a very difficult time explaining the situation, but everyone figured it out when trainee Rebecca’s mom said her name. It was really funny. It turns out that Peruvians have a word for people who have the same namesake – “tocayo/a.” So my new neighbor and my new mom are “tocayas.” 

So my living arrangement is unique. Dylan’s mom is my mom’s mother-in-law. We live in the same house, but my family lives upstairs and Dylan and his mama live downstairs. Peruvians build up to conserve space. I have my own room with a “cama grande” (big bed; it is a full size bed, but most I gather that most trainees only have a twin size bed), desk, chest of drawers, two shelves, and a window. I also have my own bathroom! Of course, I do not have hot water, but I have a toilet with running water, toilet paper, and a toilet seat! Super exciting. I am spoiled already. <Just a side note - you cannot flush your T.P. here cuz the plumbing pipes are teeny. This takes some serious getting used to. Throwing your paper in the toilet is not something that you consciously think about doing.> So, Dylan is fluent in Spanish. He is part Bolivian, and he used to visit his grandparents there every summer. This is absolutely fantastic because lunch would have been really awkward without him. My family was sure to make clear that Dylan cannot translate hardly any after today because obviously I cannot rely on him (or other fluent speakers) for the remainder of my service, or even training for that matter. 

My room with my cama grande

Another view of my room

 

It was after 2:00 by the time that we reached the casa. Everyone was really hungry and the ladies of the house were preparing a very special meal for me and Dylan’s first lunch in our new home. “Papas reinas” (Idk if I spelled that right) is a dish where you boil, peel, and mash potatoes and then form the mashed potatoes into a sort of a shallow bowl shape about the size of the palm of your hand. Then you put this mixture of cooked chicken, egg, onion, and olives into the potato bowl. (There may have been other stuff in this mixture. I missed that part.) Then you put another potato bowl on top and mush the edges together so that now you have a big egg-looking thingy. You coat the egg-shaped stuffed mashed potato with flour and then fry it. They were really good. I am not a big fan of olives, but I liked them. We also had potato salad, rice, and Inca Kola. Tons of carbs and lots of sugar! Inca Kola is this bright yellow soda that tastes like liquid cotton candy. I get diabetes just looking at it, but I like it.  

Street to Tres de Octubre

 

See, Ma? It is safe.



Our casa. I live upstairs.

I really struggled today with communication. I managed to squeeze out the phrases, “I’m hungry,” and “Can I help?” Honestly, I probably even said those things wrong. I was able to tell them a little bit about me, like my age, occupation, area of study, and where I live and where my family lives in the states. It was really difficult watching Dylan assimilate so quickly while I had to have everything either translated or repeated 17 times. I know I will learn, but for now things are a little awkward. 

Other info about my new family: My parents are in their early 40s, so they are only about 10 years my seniors. They are both “independientes.” I am pretty sure that this means that they do not have 9-5 jobs. Idk yet what Carlos does exactly, but Rebecca is the caregiver of a huge house up the hill from our neighborhood. Her boss’s family comes in on some weekends to get away from the hustle and bustle of Lima. My elder younger sister… (does that even make sense?)…Yerlin travels back and forth to Lima Monday through Friday (about an hour trip) to go to school. She is studying to me an architect. She really likes the drawing and creating aspect, but struggles a little with the math stuff. She also speaks some English. Her English is waaaayyy better than my Spanish. Ganellia is pretty quiet so far. To break the ice, I gave her a little LED light that straps to your finger and a teeny water shooter that looks like a ring but has a bulb that holds water that you hide in the palm of your hand. She loved the water shooter thingy. I know we will be friends eventually. La Senora Trinidad, Dylan’s mom, has a little bodega in her house. She sells snacks and small amenities. 

There are several bodegas in our neighborhood. Scotney, a trainee from Boston and all-round cool chica, lives about three blocks up the hill from me. Her family also runs a bodega, but theirs is bigger. Next to Scotney is Jojo, my roommate in D.C. Jojo’s family has a “cabina,” an Internet café. Rebecca lives one block over and about three blocks up from me. Her family does not have a bodega, but we like her anyway. And Caroline from South Carolina and my roommate from the retreat lives basically directly behind me. Her mom is my mom’s aunt, so we are now cousins. Caroline and Rebecca have WiFi. I do not, but I do have a cama grande. Lol.

Rebecca (trainee Rebecca, not my mom Rebecca), Scotney, Caroline, and D.D. -The novice Spanish speakers of Tres de Octubre!

 

 

I keep forgetting to take pics of my family, but I have nearly 9 weeks left here. More to come later! Miss everyone!