New mailing address

Hey hey everyone! I am only five days away from becoming a REAL volunteer, and as such, I will be moving to the very very very small town of Sacsa in the department of Ancash. If you are looking for it on a map, you probably won't find it. But if you look just to the north and east of the city of Caraz, I am in that general area. I got the chance to visit two weeks ago and see my new home and meet my new family. So while I am totally scared out of my mind, at least I know what I am in for. I leave for the department capital city, Huaraz, with a group of other Ancash volunteers on Saturday night, and from there I am on my own as I head to my site, probably on the 2nd of December. I will put up some pics and a more detailed post once I get to Huaraz, but for now I just wanted to call attention to my new mailing address, which is posted on the right, just in case...

back from the campo

I just got back from a week of field-based training in the department of Lambayeque, up in northern Peru, and what a crazy week it was. We got to explore the department capital city, Chiclayo, and visit three volunteers in their sites in the bosque seco (dry forest). Our activities for the week included getting blisters digging a garden plot, more blisters chopping wood with machetes (which is not as easy as the Peruvians make it seem), presenting a lesson and game to a class of 40 school kids, blisters on top of the other blisters digging holes and putting in fence posts, trying to control over 100 children during a garbage pick-up, and then sorting through that garbage bare-handed to pick out the recycling.

Here we are after conquering the bosque seco with our machetes. And another photo of our little group captivating the peruvian children with a lesson about trees.

Ah yes... I almost forgot about the donkey. The one that i rode for over two hours. In the dark. Yes mom, I know I promised that I wouldn't wander around the campo by myself at night, yet somehow I found myself, on my first night out in the country, seated on the back of a little burro named Reina with my twelve-year-old host sister, going out to the store to buy food for dinner. Little did I know that the store was over an hour away, and that it would be pitch dark by the time we got home at 8:30 PM. The whole time I just kept hoping that I wouldn't become another tally mark under the category of Peace Corps volunteers lost or injured due to stupidity. And all we bought was a bag of rice and some sweet potatoes. And we didn't even eat the the rice. After all that work, just potatoes for dinner. That is my life.

A couple more photos, just to prove that I am actually alive and well. Above I am with my travel group, plus a few more volunteers, putting my feet all over some ancient pre-incan petroglyphs. And again with a couple girls from one of the schools we worked at. The girl on the far right is my host sister, Victoria. The one who protected me on the donkey. In other news, I am excited about the elections tomorrow, finding out my site on Thursday, and going to visit it for the first time on Sunday!!! Until next time...

Nothing too exciting lately- just the usual madness. I went to a concert Saturday night that featured a group modeled after a cross between Ricky Martin and the Backstreet Boys. A line of men in tight white pants, t-shirts and blazers, and lots of choreographed pelvis shaking. Pretty painful, but entertaining. The local teens seemed to enjoy it. A couple pics to share with everyone- here is my host mom helping set the table for the delicious breakfast I made, and also a shot of my mom and me with her sobrino.

And here I am wearing my Cotting t-shirt, jumping off a rock on top of a mountain. Naturally.

We get busier and busier every day, and it isn't going to settle down any time soon. At the end of October we get to travel to rural sites with a few other volunteers to learn more about how to work with small communities. It will be nice to have a change of scenery for a week. And after that, there are the elections, of course, which we are all eagerly awaiting. I feel a bit guilty having such easy access to cable TV and internet, but it sure is nice to be able to follow the presidential race so easily. After Nov. 4th they can take away my technology and I swear I won't complain.

Life goes on here in Peru, and every day I feel a bit more prepared for what lies ahead. No, I haven´t gotten any better at washing my clothes, but everything else is coming along nicely. During our technical training, we have been learning about how to develop or manage waste management programs in small communities, starting with a diagnostic in order to decide whether we should dig personal landfills, or use a collection system (with carts pulled by donkeys, for example). Trying to manage recycling efficiently and effectively is also a huge part of our job. For more hands-on training, we go to the agrarian university near Lima every Saturday and have so far planted trays of lettuce to learn how to transplant seedlings properly, discussed different methods of effective organic gardening, and made compost heaps. Although 730 AM is a bit of an early start for a Saturday, the Agraria work is definitely one of the most interesting and engaging parts of training. I can´t wait to have a garden in my host community. We also get lots of training in personal safety (so mom and dad you can stop worrying), and of course, we have LOTS of Spanish classes.

Just to give you an idea of where I am, a map of Peru- my current local is just east of the city of Lima, which is located right about the middle of the coastline. The country is about 3 times the size of California, and as we learned yesterday in class, it is one of only 14 countries in the world that is considered an ecologically and geographically mega-diverse country. The coastline is almost entirely desert, the Andes mountains run vertically down the center of the country, and the eastern half is entirely rainforest. The population of the country is about 30 million, but almost a third of those people live in or around the city of Lima. The mountains and jungle are much less populated. I don´t know exactly where my site will be, but most likely in the central Andes region. Fingers crossed, because I would really like to be in a mountain site, even if it is a bit colder at 4,000 meters altitude.

The host family gets better and better every day- my host mother is a real riot- fiesty and independent, so we get along well. She tells me that I should be an ambassador after I finish the Peace Corps. We´ll see about that. At this point, I am really excited about 2 things: First, I made a delicious omelette for breakfast, which earned me big points with the mama. And 2nd, the rooster that has been waking me up every morning at 5AM is being served for lunch today. Hooray! Maybe now I´ll actually be able to sleep.

Here are a few pics just to give you a feel for my life right now. Today I climbed one of the hills that surround my neighborhood. This is a view of my barrio from above. As you can see, it is all pretty dry and brown, but the neighborhood is still being developed, so someday perhaps it will be green and well-paved like the neighboring areas.

The house is, obviously, the house that I am staying in, with my host mom Manuela and my grandma. Today I learned how to wash my clothes properly using a bucket, a board, and a bar of soap. After that I got to fight of the chickens to hang my laundry out to dry on the roof.

The best part of the whole laundry experience was when I walked out and saw my mom holding my socks, telling me that they were mal lavado and that I would have to rinse everything again. Oh the shame of being an incompetent American who can´t even get the soap out of her underwear. Better luck next time, I guess. Tomorrow we start our second week of training, and I will be learning in greater detail how to build landfills, start tree nurseries, and teach children in Spanish about protecting the environment. Can´t wait!

bienvenidos a peru

Hi everyone! I have just a few minutes between classes, but I thought I would give a quick update on where I am and what I am doing. I arrived in Peru one week ago, and am now living with my host family in the city of Chaclacayo about 30 minutes east of Lima. My days are currently filled by training activities, which include 4 hours of language classes in the morning, then 4 hours of technical training, safety instruction, and medical information in the afternoons. The days are long, but the instructors are incredible, and my fellow volunteers are some of the most interesting and friendly people I have ever met. I am pretty tired, partly because the chickens and guinea pigs that live on the roof over my room make so much noise in the mornings that I have been awake at about 5 every morning. Speaking Spanish all the time is also exhausting right now, but I know that will get easier. Hopefully I will learn to sleep through the animal noises as well.

The next 11 weeks I will be living in Chaclacayo, training every day and getting ready for my site placement. We volunteers in the medio ambiente (environmental) field have been warned that our sites will most likely be among the most rustic in the country, so we are enjoying electricity and running water and internet access while we still can. We don´t know our specific sites yet, so therefore do not know exactly what kind of work will be needed in our placements, but the three main focal points of the environmental program are 1) waste management and recycling 2) environmental education, and 3) reforestation. I can´t wait. For now, I am off to lunch and then class. Chau chau!

on my way...

Today is my last day in Minneapolis, and it hasn't really sunk in yet that I am leaving. But whether I believe it or not, my two suitcases are packed and waiting by the door, and I have a plane to catch at 7 AM tomorrow. I will then spend 2 days in Washington DC filling out papers and getting stuck with vaccinations, and then I am off to Lima on Friday with the rest of my training group. I don't really know what to expect yet for training. I know there will be a lot of intensive language classes (Spanish and possibly Quechua or Aymara) and also technical training for whatever work I will be doing as an environmental volunteer. Other than that, quien sabe. I guess I will just have to take things as they come. My main concern right now is trying to figure out how to look like a professional in the "business casual" outfit required for staging events- dressing up isn't really my thing. So wish me the best with my button-ups and slacks. For now I am going to try to get some sleep so I'm not too crabby for my first day. chau!