feels like I'm finally getting to work!

Since the last time I posted I have been doing a lot of baseline house visits. The goal is to visit the homes of all the participating families just to evaluate how their home is now and their level of knowledge in various preventative health topics. I check out the family's kitchen, the latrine, ask questions about how to prevent diarrhea, and what are 2 signs of malnutrition, etc. I am so lucky to have such an active community health promoter in Ayaque where we are working.

Florencia is an energetic 62 year old woman who is a volunteer community health promoter for Ayaque. On my first day of house visits she met me in a pair of flip flops, a long braid hanging out from under her baseball cap, and while we walked she was rolling thread into a ball. By around noon I was ready to be done for the day. I had climbed up the mountain to get to Ayaque and then Florencia and I climbed another peak to get to some of the farther houses. I would catch my self panting, sweating profusely, and stumbling in the loose rocks on the upward path, while Florencia effortlessly made her way in flip flops. Florencia kept me working until about 3:30 in the afternoon and I didn't make it back down to Tacabamba until at least 5pm.

We both wear the same kind of campo skirts, we both have our hair in braids mine blond and hers white, and we both wear our caps during visits. I really enjoy the company of Florencia she is a kind and hard working woman. I am so lucky to have someone who is willing to show me around the community, because the homes are so far apart. She also knows where the meanest dogs live and she has much better aim than I did when we had to throw rocks at them. Sometimes I like to remember how horrified I was when I first got here at seeing people throwing rocks at dogs or hitting them with sticks. Now, I'm the first one to grab a hand full of rocks. When I lived in San Juan a couple dogs bit me, but it was rainy season so they bit into my rubber boots (also a pig bit me once, they can be really mean).

Each time Diamond and I hike up to Ayaque it gets easier. I still get tired and sweaty, but now my body aches less. Maybe it's the altitude change or maybe I'm just out of shape, but by the third switch back Diamond and I usually stop talking to focus on heavy breathing and sweating off all our sunscreen. When we make it to the top we split up to go visit our various houses. We split the community in half so we could each form our own groups of moms to work with.

I try to carry at least a liter of water ever time, because Ayaque does not have a water system. Women and children have to haul water from ponds or creeks around their community-so I try not to ask for water as it is such a precious commodity. Despite Ayaque being such a poor community the families are incredibly generous. Often women invite me food. Here inviting someone food is a sign of respect and in some circumstances it is expected. I am always hoping not to get invited, because once you are invited it is rude not to finish your plate.

I bought myself a sling shot at the market. Apparently it strikes the Peruvians as very funny that I want to learn how to use a sling shot. I'm not sure if it is because I am a gringa, a female, or an adult. Sling shots are generally used by little boys, but the dogs in Ayaque are really mean and I think it would be useful to learn how to defend myself. I've been getting lessons from my host brother and from little boys in Ayaque sometimes when I'm up there.

The big budget meeting that the municipality was supposed to have this week; that I marked in my calendar 2 months ago as the day when we would find out if we got funding for the latrines project, never happened. When Diamond and I went to the municipality to excitedly ask if we had received funding they told us that they had forgotten about the meeting and it would be rescheduled for the next week. I was so angry, but not as surprised as I might have been when I first got here. I guess if the local government was really efficient and projects were happening here than they wouldn't need Peace Corps volunteers.

This week Laura's sex Ed classes started up again and I tagged along. Mostly I walked around the class rooms and tried to quiet students down or wake kids up. This last class in her project is about contraceptives and abstinence. She teaches the kids about abstinence and the various forms of contraceptives that are available at the Health post here; condoms, birth control pills, and birth control shots. At the end of the class Laura does a condom demonstration with a carved wooden dildo from the Health Center. I know that in public school in Ann Arbor we had sex Ed in 5^th grade, one year in middle school, and in 10^th grade I had another health class. I liked to help with an activity at the end of class where the kids read little dialogs with a negative attitude or pressure to have sex followed by a comeback response. Since a large portion of the population in Peru is Catholic we like to let the kids know that the Pope has fairly recently proclaimed that condom use is acceptable if Catholics are using them to protect themselves from HIV. Although there's not a whole lot of HIV in rural northern Peru there is a ton of teenage pregnancy, but if kids can justify using condoms during their sac religious premarital sex all the better, right?!

I included some pictures from the Peru 16 Despedida (goodbye) fiesta. My group is Peru 18 and the 16ers arrived in Peru exactly one year before my training group. They are starting to finish up with their service which is super exciting. For the party I tried to put together some homemade karaoke. I thought if I found the YouTube karaoke versions of music I could rip the music and videos with words so that we could have English karaoke songs. I probably spent about 6 hours downloading music and searching for good versions of the songs without lyrics. One of the restaurants the volunteers frequent agreed to put 2 cases of beer in the fridge for us and let us use the sound system for the karaoke (Peruvians usually drink their beer room temperature, gag). As it turned out the sound system at the restaurant was a little outdated and would not get along with any one's ipods, mp3 players, or my USB. So my karaoke was a total flop. It didn't matter though we still had a great time.

Thanks for reading!  Chau for now.
kb

Ellie and I being silly at the Despedida party-Ellie asked me to pick her up and carry her

Sunday morning breakfast with our 16ers.  Diamond designed a t-shirt for the occasion, a couple of us are wearing it in the pic.

reaping the spoils of the 16ers departure: loads of pads and tampons!!!  I dealt them out like cards so we would all get our equal share-thanks Kelsey for sharing

with our regional coordinator Jose

gringos on the dance floor!!!