Tacabamba Fest 2012

This past week was the Tacabamba fiesta. It was a big deal. Tacabamba was flooded with visitors. There were bullfights every afternoon for three days and nightly concerts. Peruvians are good partiers. The blasting sound systems at the fútbol field a few blocks from my host family's house that were converted to fair grounds where on nightly until around 4 or 5 am. I went to the fair grounds for the concerts a couple of the nights. Everyone groups up into drinking circles formed around crates of beer. There were also very large fireworks displays every night usually at around 1am, but the hour changed depending on the night.

Overall I am really glad that the party is over. It was really stressful to have so many out of towners around. I stick out. The stares and whispers get old. Since public drinking and drunkenness are not illegal people's inhibitions were down and my guard was way up. I remember when I was in high school I used to think it was kind of exciting to get a cat call from men-running on Dixboro road near my parent's house, but I have had enough of it for a life time. I mostly get called 'gringa', but I also get 'micha' which is Quechua for 'cat'. People with green eyes get called 'micha' here, because they have cat's eyes.

I was so excited when on Wednesday night my host brother and sister in-law asked me to go with them to the concert. Since my host dad Sergio is a police officer there are always tons of cops eating at the house (remember my host mom run's a restaurant out of the front of the house). So when we went to the concert my host brother Iban and a couple police officers that frequent the house bought a case of beer. I think I may have described a drinking circle in another blog post, but essentially big bottles of warm beer are cracked open and a small plastic cup is passed around. Depending on your company, men will pour the beer for the women. It is polite to-I want to call it salute, but I'm not so sure if that's the right word-the person to their left who has just passed them the beer. Then you drink what I like to think of as little beer shots and throw the foam onto the ground behind you outside of the circle. Finally you pass along the beer and cup to the person on your right.

I was excited to be invited by my host brother Iban and his wife Yanette, because I still feel like I have a lot of work to do with connecting with this new host family. Iban got kind of drunk and liked to brag to his friends that we are brother and sister, can't you tell? Also we danced a lot. I danced with all the men in the circle, even the police officer Luis who seemed like he hated every minute of dancing. My other host sister Paola came in for the party. She works as a police officer in Cajamarca (the capital city of this department= Cajamarca, Cajamarca). She is really sweet and patient. I was lucky she came with us to the party, because at 2 am when the guys bought another huge crate of beer she and I were practically falling asleep standing up so we went home.

The other days and nights of the party Ellie came in from the town about 30 minutes away. All 4 of us; Laura, Diamond, Ellie, and I, spent a lot of quality American time together. Laura showed us a music video called 'Gangnam Style' (sp?) and we practiced the 'horsey' dance from the video. We cooked good food, painted our nails, and just hung out. Laura is an amazing cook. She made quesadillas on homemade tortillas one night and lasagna with a loaf of homemade rosemary bread on the side. Carby and cheese city so good, yay!

There were 3 days of bullfights. I went with my host siblings for one of the days. I like bullfights, but they are very stylized and therefore repetitive. First the bull comes out and runs around for a while so everyone can get a good look at him. Next 2 men on horseback come out-both men and horses are heavily padded. The riders stab the bull in the back of the neck on a big fleshy part of the back behind the head. Then 2 men on foot; I guess they might be assistant matadors since they wear the same little outfits, run out into the arena and stab decorated foot and a half long sticks into the bull's back. These lances or sticks must have a hook or barb in the end of them because if they are stabbed correctly they stay in the bull's flesh for the remainder of the fight.

Then the matador 'dances' with the bull by himself. At this point the bull is usually heavily bleeding out of his back and his tongue is hanging out of his mouth with exhaustion. The bull charges, the matador jumps aside, and when he is ready the matador attempts to stab a sword into the same fleshy part of the bull's back. If he is a good matador his sword will go right threw the bull's heart and the bull will die pretty quickly. If he misses then they have another process. The matador gets one more stab and if he misses again they stab the bull threw it's skull instead.

It's not that a bullfight is boring. However, the fight I went to was 3 hours long and 6 bulls were killed. I just didn't feel the need to go back the next 2 days to watch the same thing over again and again. Sometimes I find myself cheering for the bull, because it seems cruel how they bleed out and run him around in circles until he is dizzy and tired. When one of the bull struck the matador I caught myself screaming with the rest of the crowd. I was happy to note that the meat from the bulls that are killed is sold in the street after the fights. Families can buy it to take home and cook up for dinner or buy some fried up right in front of you.

 

I forgot to mention that before the bullfights and concerts there were several days of fair.  People could bring in their livestock or vegetables to be judged.  During the typical plate contest Peace Corps and Predesci (a local NGO that works in ending malnutrition) teamed up.  First we tried to get the municipality to change the rules of the contest that plates would be judged on their nutrition, but they declined.  So instead we made healthy options and talked to anyone who would listen about nutrition.  Most of our vistors during the fair were kids that colored the vegetable pictures I made copies of to pass out.  Also Diamond and I were in a parade one of the days of the fiesta.  The parade started about 2 hours late and only lasted 10 minutes.  I was sunburned and kind of pissed off, but afterwards we had a fun lunch with the health post employees.  I guess the beer and shiringo (a typical plate from Tacabamba itself-basically a tuna omlette) made up for it and I laughed it off as another instance of getting perued.

 

This week Diamond and I had an important meeting in the community where we want to do our project.  I was under the impression that the meeting was already happening in the community and that we were just going to tag along taking advantage of everyone being in one spot.  However, there was a big miscommunication.  Apparently in order for us to call an official meeting we have to write an official document to the Teniente (I'm not totally clear on his responsibilities, but he's the only kind of leader/representative for this tiny community.  I don't even think he is elected....I have no clue) and he will set off 2 fireworks which is his way of calling everyone to a meeting.  This community is tiny and the houses are all very spread out.  People don't have electricity, running water, or latrines, so I guess it makes sense that the easiest way to call a meeting is with fireworks.

 

So we hike up to Ayaque which is about an hour and a half straight up from Tacabamba and we find out that the people will not come to the meeting since the Teniente didn't call a meeting.  I was really frustrated, but we did get to talk to a small group of moms that were very interested in working with us.  Also we met the Teniente and promised to get him an official document next week so that we could have a real meeting next Thursday.  On the whole the people seemed very interested and also very friendly-quite encouraging.  Now we just have to wait for the municipality to decide if they have enough money in the budget to fund the latrines building project. 

 

Project work is looking good.  I feel like I am making some progress in getting in with my new host family.  Host mom Rosa went to the doctor last week and found out her blood pressure is too high.  Her homework is to go on a half hour walk every day and I am her new walking buddy.

 

Thanks for the mail; Sesame, Kwapis, Nana, Pat, and Yamo family! 

 

Chau for now.  With love,

kb

setting up with the awesome Predesci facilitators/promoters

Ellie and I looking official in our PC polos

just beyond our table set up were big make-shift bleechers for a futbol tournament

some neighbor girls with their little brothers, they were some of the first kids to come visit our table

healthy plates; banana bread (admitantly not so healthy, but everyone loves it), tortilla de verduras (vegetable omelette), papas con queso y higado (cheese, potatoes, and liver), and camote con leche (sweet potato with milk)



our table and beyond the huge crowd of kids coloring

the whole gang

men setting up for the fireworks.  Every night they would construct these gigantic bamboo structures with fireworks attached all over and the levels would light up one at a time.



some out of towners brought in this llama and charged 2 soles to have your picture taken with him

waiting for the parade to start

Lulu and Minina crying to me from the top of the stairs, so cute

the arena had a really awesome view of the mountain range all around us

the rest of these pictures Yossi took for me.  She was acting bored so I handed her my camera-she killed the battery and filled the memory stick.  I only kept some of the better ones though.

he already looks angry and he just got in the pen

kind of hard to see, but the guys on horseback are in this shot.  He's stabbing the bull with his lance thing.

The guy with his hands above his head is jumping out of the way, because he just stabbed those little decorated sticks into the bull's back.

here you can see the flag sticks hanging off the bull's back

Tragically I didn't get to eat Priscilla the pig

Last weekend I visited my San Juan host family for the first time since I moved sites. I was really nervous and excited to see them. I missed them a lot my first couple weeks in Tacabamba and I continue to call my host mom Dalila every week to check in. However, I was nervous that things would be weird or that they would ask me about building an improved cook stove. Previously it something we were discussing, but it was always a topic that felt uncomfortable for me. I knew that the family probably had enough money to buy the materials and build there own improved cook stove, but they wanted me to do it for them. It always left me torn between wanting to do something nice for this family that I love, but also feeling a bit used.

Lucky for me the stove building conversation never came up. I was only in San Juan for a quick visit. Apparently too quick for us to eat Priscilla. Now that was disappointing. I went out behind the house gave Priscilla a good belly rub and said my good byes, and we ate rabbit for dinner instead. When I asked Dalila she said she though I would be staying through Sunday and they were planning to kill Priscilla on Saturday. Boooo!

I got to hang out with Witman and Eduar. We played frisbee and read Harry Potter. It was really nice. When neighbors passed the house or saw me walking around they asked me where I had been. I felt sort of frustrated that my host family hadn't told people that I had left. Unfortunately I was unable to make a public announcement or really say good bye in my town since the move was rushed. It was sort of like Diamond and I were evacuated. Diamond wasn't even allowed to pack her own things for the move, her host family packed all of her things and sent them down from her town by ambulance. The week that we left people in Diamond's previous site were attacking unknown cars with rocks and so our regional coordinator was afraid to drive up to her site in the Peace Corps car.

So that was also disappointing to find out that nobody in San Juan knew why I left or where I had gone. People just kept asking me when the next volunteer was coming and I had to tell them that Peace Corps had shut down their whole district for volunteers. There will be no more volunteers in the Bambamarca area for until Washington decides it is safe again. I found out that all the kids in the district will have to repeat a year of school, because they have missed so much during these protests and strikes. It's really sad. Especially when I think of the 6^th graders I taught English classes with, they were all going to have their promociones this December or graduation. It is a really big celebration. Kids get special presents and new clothes. There is a huge party and at night the whole community is invited for drinking and dancing all night long.

So the visit was nice. It felt good to see my family and I fit right back into my spot. I just felt a little sad for leaving them all over again. I hope that Witman and Eduar can make it to University some day and I worry about how will I keep in contact with them all. I almost forgot that I very briefly saw my enamorado or boyfriend while I was in San Juan. Good old Delphin; 105 and still walking the streets (err- it should be street, there's really just the one), and I gave him a good hand shake. I know his daughter better and her I gave her a greeting cheek kiss with a hug, but him I've have only met once for an interview about the history of San Juan. Anyhow, my host family thought it was hilarious that I went up and greeted him. I only wish I had thought to ask for a picture with him-it would have been super awkward to ask him, but I bet he would have gone along with it and I'd have the evidence.

I came back to Tacabamba and Diamond and I had a big meeting at the municipality on Monday morning. It turned out not to be such a big deal as we thought it would be. We had to wait for an hour and a half to be seen. When we were brought in it was in front of one regidor instead of all of the regidores and the mayor was also not present. We talked to the regidor Lisandro about our project plan and budget. He told us he could have an answer about the funding by mid-October. So it leaves us still waiting to get started, but things move slowly here and I try to keep telling myself that we now have a foot in the door.

This week the teachers went on strike. It is a nation wide strike, because the Peruvian government has passed some kind of law that the teachers need to take an exam every year. This new round of teacher strikes has brought up a lot of interesting conversations with neighbors around Tacabamba. Teachers only work about 25 hours a week here in Peru. Most public schools have classes from 8am to 1:30pm everyday. There is vacation from mid-December through March 1^st as well as 2 weeks off in August. What my neighbors tell me is that a lot of the teachers in the public schools lack any type of higher level education. In Peru to qualify to be a high school teacher, you only have to have graduated high school. Now the rules are changing and the government wants to move towards hiring teachers with bachelors or masters degrees. The trouble is what will they do with all the teachers that are working right now? It seems unfair to me to toss them out of their jobs, but also not really so fair to the students to have a teacher that doesn't have higher than a high school education.

So with the latrines project on hold and no sex-ed classes happening with the teacher strike it's been slow around here. Also next week is the town party in Tacabamba and everyone is just getting ready this week. Everyone is making last minute improvements on their homes so that they look nice for the fiesta. Also from what I hear lots of families will be opening up their homes to rent rooms to accommodate the huge influx of people that will visit for the fiesta. I haven't heard anything from my host family about people staying at the house with us, but there are 2 extra rooms that could potentially be filled for the fiesta next week.

This week I finished up with my secondary applications to 3 schools in Chicago; Loyola, Rush, and University of Illinois, and the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee. With all this free time I have been obsessing and worrying about getting in somewhere. I'm pretty sure I won't hear back for months so I am trying to stop thinking about it in every free moment. It is just so exciting to fantasize about coming back to the states, going to school, having an apartment, and feeling like I have control of my life.

Here in Peru most of the time I feel powerless. It feels like I can't do anything right and I don't understand how things work. I still don't feel like I can express myself when I want to have a meaningful conversation with someone. It's like in the US when someone doesn't speak English very well and you know they aren't stupid, but it is so difficult to look beyond their bad language skills to give them a chance to show you who they are. I totally understand people's reactions to me here in Peru and I just wish I could take back all the times I thought a certain way about people I met in the states that weren't totally fluent. I guess this means I should crack open my grammar text books once in while here, huh?

Also this week Diamond and I made pickles. It turns out pickles are surprisingly easy to make! In 2 weeks we'll be feasting on pickles, yeah!

Thanks for reading and chau for now,

kb

here's a list of some foods I miss:

cold drinks and drinks with ice

cereal and cold milk

bread; sliced bread, whole wheat bread, rye, sourdough, toasted bread

cheese (that isn't wet farmer's cheese, I'm talking stinky cheese that tastes so good and gives you terrible breath)

baby carrots and peppers

hummus

salsa

pickles*but in 2 weeks I'm gonna eat some

Mexican food, Thai food, Indian food, Middle Eastern food-any kind of spicy foods

BBQ anything, hot dogs taste weird here-I just want to go to a baseball game sometimes

greek yogurt

good beer

mom's lasagna, chili, black bean soup, that pasta salad with the artichoke hearts, homemade jam

brewed coffee- not that instant nescafe, yuck!

root beer

and mostly I miss cold drinks or milk with cereal

foods that I know I'll miss from Peru:

choco sodas

humas

aji

all the delicious new kinds of fruit that I've never seen before in the states; grenadillas, guanabana, surco, lucuma, maracuya, that weird cactus fuzzy fruit,

beet salad

chicarrones

cerviche if it's done right

maybe cuy...but chicken is probably better

With my boys Witman and Eduar, plus a couple favorites from english class Dresli and Nelver

Harry Potter times

in Tacabamba

the street where I live
 

I live here!  At Restaurante Yossy.

Diamond's Birthday, breast feeding marches, peruvian humor, and fish holes

This week has gone by relatively fast. On Monday was our site visit with Emilia-that was a long day. Then on Tuesday Diamond and I went up to Ayaque with Yovani. Also Diamond's host family threw her a special surprise birthday breakfast. Laura made pancakes and shared the Costco size maple syrup her family brought for her when they recently visited. Plus, the host family made tamales and birthday cake.

The Peruvians weren't super impressed with the maple syrup which was disappointing since to us it was like eating a taste of home. We sang happy birthday in English, then in Spanish, then a verse I didn't recognize, and finally they told Diamond that she had to take a bite out of the cake. This was the first time I have heard of this tradition, but where I lived before in the campo people don't usually have cake on their birthdays since almost nobody has an oven.

Diamond, Yovani, and I hiked up to a nearby community called Ayaque. Diamond and I are planning on doing a big latrine building project in Ayaque. Things happen slowy though so right now we are spending time writing up a draft of a plan and accompanying Yovani on her house visits with mom's in Ayaque. At the end of September we have a community meeting lined up in Ayaque and we are planning on getting families signed up to be involved at that time.

In the afternoon on Tuesday the three of us; Diamond, Laura, and I, went to the health post to give a presentation to the doctor and nurse in charge of child health about Peace Corps. Our boss Emilia asked us to do the presentation in an effort to get the health post to work with us more. They are very understaffed and don't really work with us very much. It seems like they can't bring themselves to take the small amount of time to coordinate with us volunteers, and if the would we could do a lot of great promotion work basically for them. We're talking work that the health post could take credit for on their monthly informes to the ministry of health, but the health post will not take the time to plan and coordinate with us. It is super frustrating. I hope the presentation helped.

On Wednesday in the afternoon we went out to a community with Melva another Predesci facilitator. Predesci is this amazing NGO that is funded by the regional government of Cajamarca. They work in rural health promotion; focusing in on pregnant women and women with children under 1 year. They are pretty much Peace Corps health volunteers on steroids. They are Peruvians so they speak the language, know the system, and they have very specific jobs to carry out designated by their NGO-unlike us volunteers since when we show up we are supposed to work with the community to develop a project that the people want.

The Predesci representatives are currently working on forming these groups called CODECOs; Comite de Desarrollo Comunitario or Commitee for Community Development, in the small poorer surrounding communities outside of Tacabamba itself. Diamond and I attended, because we thought it would be a great way to observe how to organize a working commitee since we are going to need to form 2 commitees for our latrine project. The community that we went to was the one where Laura did her latrine project and she needed to talk with them about some upcoming visits they would be having.

The meeting started really late, but when it finally started it was productive. It was really helpful for me to see how Melva ran the meeting and helped the people get themselves a little more organized. The idea behind these commitees is that now the people can represent themselves a little more. Instead of waiting around for the municipality in Tacabamba or for an NGO to come in and give them construction projects, they can now go directly to the municipality themselves with their requests and ideas. As a volunteer our job is to kind of hold our rural community's hand through the process of asking the municipality for money and working with the health post. The goal is that by the end of a big project the community can organize itself more and work together to do community projects. Sometimes it is a bit of a foreign concept here; to join together and get things done for the community as a whole.

Anyhow, at the end of the meeting I was able to make a short announcement about doing an older adult health class. I was surprised by how much interest there was. We'll see if the people actually show up to my meetings, but I now have a list of 15 older adults that way they are interested in coming to educative sessions about how to take care of their health. I am super excited to work with them. I think our first session is going to be on diabetes.

Yesterday I talked with my old host mom Dalila for the first time in a while.  She asked me how I was doing, I asked how the family was doing, and I also asked about how my 3 'boyfriends' were doing.  In San Juan my host family had this running joke with me that I had 3 boyfriends; the director of the secondary school, the care taker of the primary school, and our 105 year old neighbor.  The director of the secondary school was sort of friendly with me, but he always managed to avoid me when I needed to work with him on coordinating for the youth health promoters.  I privately liked to call him Warrio, because of his mustache's striking resemblance to the video game character.  The primary school care taker is a really nice guy-he even gave me an exta set of keys to use during my english classes.  The 105 year neighbor man is named Delphin which means dolphin in Spanish.  I met him when I was doing my community diagnostic report, because I interviewed him to ask about how San Juan was founded. 

I asked Dalila about how my 'boyfriends' were doing and she told me that Delphin had died.  I expressed that I was sorry to hear the news  and while I was talking she quickly replied 'he's not dead, I was just kidding.'  I have to give Dalila a lot of credit, because she totally get's me.  I was shocked that she made a joke like that, because it is so outside of what I consider to be 'peruvian humor' and it was hilarious.  The conversation ended with me promising to go visit San Juan next weekend.  We are planning on eating Priscilla my favorite pig.  I only hope that I get there early enough in the day to give her a good belly rub before we eat her for dinner!

Also yesterday the kids had school off.  I really couldn't tell you what the holiday was and neither could my brother Sergio.  There is this wierd hole in the floor where Sergio is trying to raise fish that he caught in the river.  It's really big and nicely tiled on the inside.  Maybe it was once a water tank of some kind.  Every once in a while my host mom Rosa asks little Sergio (that's what we call him, not to be confused with his dad; big Sergio) to wash out the hole in the floor where the fish lives.  This is so bizarre on so many levels that I had to take a picture. 

My understanding is that the end goal is for the fish to become big enough to eat and they can begin breeding them for a continuous supply of fish at the restaurant.  However, I have never seen anyone open that hatch to the fish to feed them.  To clean the fish tank/hole Sergio has to bale out all the water and catch the fish in a bucket.  The hole is much deeper than he is tall, so he practically has to swim during parts of the process.  I took a picture, becuase it just struck me as so ridiculous to have a hole in the floor where you keep fish.

Chau for now and thanks for reading,
kb

I added this picture as a reminder of what the kitchen was like when I lived in San Juan as a juxtaposition to the beautiful kitchen in Tacabamba at Diamond and Laura's host family's house.

This is a view from during our walk back down to Tacabamba from Ayaque

Diamond and I

a parade for the week of 'lactancia materna exclusiva' or 'exclusive breast feeding'

this mom's sign says that babies under 6 months should only drink breast milk not cow's milk

Sergio cleaning out the hole in the floor where the river fish live.

Diamond's surprise birthday breakfast.

pancakes with maple syrup!

Ancash Adventures

July 28^th is Peruvian Independence Day and volunteers get to take 4 free vacation days. I felt kind of guilty going on vacation when I only have been in my new town for 2 weeks, but I also really wanted to get out of Cajamarca for a while. A couple other volunteers planned the whole vacation to a department called Ancash. Ancash is internationally known amongst big time hikers and moutain climbers. The capital city of Ancash; Huaraz, is a pretty touristy place. We wanted to come for a visit to eat delicious food and try to do a little hiking. We have been talking about the bagels and micro brewery beer for months amongst ourselves in Cajamarca. (bagels are really hard to find and there is a cafe in Huaraz known amongst the volunteers for it's awesome breakfast food-especially bagels)

It is a long trip between Cajamarca and Ancash. First I had to get myself to Cajamarca city which took about 6 hours of bus rides. Next I took an overnight bus between Cajamarca and Trujillo; a bigger city on the coast. The following day I had another night bus to catch between Trujillo and Huaraz, but it left me with a day of waiting around by myself in Trujillo. Trujillo is a big city and I don't know it too well, but I found out that the grocery store in Trujillo sells green tabasco sauce, Heinz ketchup, and Snyder's brand pretzels. I was super excited to eat a big mac at the McDonalds-I hadn't eaten McDonalds since last year before I left the states. Peruvian McDonalds unfortunately does not have a dollar menu, but along with ketchup and mustard you can also serve yourself aji or peruvian hot sauce on your burger or you can have an Inka Cola instead of a Coke for your drink.

Thursday I finally made it to my destination Huaraz, Ancash. I met up with 4 other volunteer friends; Ellie and Jennifer also from Cajamarca, Allison a U of M grad too who lives in a department called Piura, and Julianne who lives in Lambayaque. The first thing we did after we put our things down at the hostel was to go eat bagels and drink good coffee. We spent the rest of the day walking around Huaraz and planning which hike to go on. We ate delicious Indian food-I know can you believe it Indian food in Peru!

On the second day in Huaraz we woke up at 5am to catch a combe; which is sort of like a extra large van that serves as the main form of public transportation, out to the national park where the girls had picked a hike. The hike was to a glacial lake called laguna 69, and it was supposed to be about 3 hours from the trailhead. The driver we had hired to drive us up to the park from the main highway where the combe let us off told us that we needed to meet him back at the trailhead at 3pm because he said the park would close at 3:30.

I'm not an experienced hiker, none of us are. The altitude got to us fast. The views were amazing and we were so determined to get to the lagoon. We started out the hike with a young Czech couple, but they passed us pretty early on. The directions we received from the driver were that after the first little lake it would only be about a half an hour until the big lake. So when we reached the first lake exhausted and freezing we just kept walking. The trouble was that the trail was pretty much unmarked after that and we were starting to run low on time.

So the sad part is that we did not make it up to the laguna 69, because we were starting to get worried about missing our car out of the park. Plus, we were exhausted and the trail was unmarked so we weren't even sure if we were climbing the right trail. We went back to the little lake to eat a packed bologna and cheese sandwiches. It snowed while we ate.

I got it in my head before we went to Ancash that I wanted to do a naked lake jump. It's something that a lot of volunteers do and I thought I should do it since I probably won't have another chance to jump in a glacial lake. It was very cold and I didn't really jump in. It was more of a fast dunk during which I shouted curse words. I cut my foot on something in the lake, but I didn't notice until we got back to our hostel. I must have been too cold to feel it very much. When we got back my sock was full of blood.

On our third day we went out to visit 2 other volunteers that live in Ancash. Their site was beautiful. We cooked lentil burgers and sweet potato fries on Katie and Ben's cocina mejorada or improved cook stove. It was so nice to see them. Katie and Ben are a married couple. Katie is a health volunteer and Ben is an environment volunteer. Their home was so cozy and nice. They are so happy and that made me feel good.

And that was the last day of vacation. After that Ellie, Jennifer, and I did the 2 days of overnight bus back to Cajamarca. In Trujillo we met up with another volunteer Christina and we all went to see the new Batman movie at the theater, and it was IN ENGLISH!!!!! We also walked around the stores in the mall and it felt like we were in the states a little bit. Especially, this one store called Sodimac which is bascially Peruvian Lowes or Home Depot.

The rest of the week was mostly uneventful so I'll just include highlights. My new host brother Sergio turned 12 and we had a really nice family lunch. He and I made a banana bread for a cake, but he also had some cake that his mom bought from a bakery. He also got a new puppy for his birthday. It is the tiniest dog I have ever seen. I worry she is too little to be away from her momma yet, but they assure me she'll be fine. Her name is Lulu and she is so little she doesn't even know how to eat food yet. Most of the roof guinea pigs that my host family raises are bigger than her.

Diamond and I got our first real assignment. We planned and gave a very successful training session for local health promoters. The topics were good communication, how to plan a class or training session, and how to do a good house visit. In Peru home visits are emphasized for more rural communities, but the health posts are often too overwhelmed with patients to go out and do door to door promotion. Local volunteers are supposed to get trained and help work as an extension of the health post, but it doesn't usually work that way. In my previous community the health post would claim a list of names as trained health promoters and gather the money from the ministry of health to fund the program. However, those people didn't actually attend any trainings or do any health promotion. It was just a way for the health workers to get a little extra money for parties or buying lunch.

I finished up all my secondary medical school applications, except for Wayne State I'm still waiting on them to send me theirs. I am so lucky to have my amazing Mom, Dad, and friends Carol, Laura, and Diamond who helped me proof read all the essays. I really appreciate all the help.

Also Diamond and I went to Conchon to visit Ellie to inaugurate her new gas cook stove. We ate sweet potatoes and tea for dinner. And I learned how to make a fishtail braid on Ellie. It was a good 2 weeks.

Chau for now,

kb

the pictures are a little out of order...

Dinner at the Indian food restaurant Chili Heaven

views during the hike

Host sister Yossy and brother Sergio at the family birthday lunch

Lulu the world's smallest dog

Lulu meeting a baby guinea pig

Diamond and I at our first real charla or talk

preping for the lake jump

lake jump surprise

Jennifer said that this donkey stunk

Jennifer and I rode the whole way up to the national park in the trunk of this guy's car to save a couple soles.  Boy was that an uncomfortable ride.  The road was really bad and one point the driver even had to pull over to change a popped tire.

visiting Katie and Ben in Shirapucru