Let Me

..have some more of this delicious bread!"

This afternoon we visited a bakery where they make the traditional bread from this region called chapla. The bread is round with about a 6-inch diameter. It is about 4 inches high and hollow. It is light tan with darker brown on the top and is a tougher, crusty bread. We have this bread in baskets every morning for breakfast.

The walkway to the bakery was lined with huge piles of firewood for the oven. We saw the three- hundred-year-old wood-burning oven and huge baskets filled with the big rolls. The biggest baskets I have ever seen. We are talking round baskets with a diameter as big as my arms spread wide. There was a little old man in charge of the money and a young woman in charge of filling the orders. We walked passed the giant oven to the back room where four Peruvian men were rolling out balls of dough. The mint green colored room had stacks (piled higher than my head) of huge bags of flour. I started craving fresh bread when I smelled the great smell of baking bread.

.

After hearing about the process of making the bread, I treated the group to fresh baked chapla. One nuevo sol (30 cents) for 5 big rolls. Great price. We all savored the flavor of the warm bread and agreed that this was a good outing.

Let Me, Pat Green

Here We Go

Today is another holiday in Peru. I think it is the Pope's Day, so we are not going to placement.

Funny side note story--When Logan and I were talking to a teacher about this on Friday, she told us it was "Dia del Papa." We asked her about Fathers' Day, but then we realized that had already passed. Then, we asked her if it was the "Day of the Potato" (because papa means potato too)...thinking that there are a lot of potatoes in Peru, so it could be possible. She said no. Finally, Logan remembered that Papa also means Pope. When we realized what had happened, we all laughed really hard.

Anyway, it was nice to eat breakfast slowly and enjoy a second cup of tea. I spoke with Ann, a woman who is from Scotland but lives in California and is in the importing and exporting business. I discussed the business opportunity for exporting my new favorite chocolate treats from Peru to the States. She helped Elizabeth and me formulate our plan of attack.

We headed down to the plaza about 10 am to watch a procession. We weren't exactly sure what kind, but assumed it was something religious to do with Pope's Day. Upon our arrival to the little plaza closest to our house, there were no signs of a procession. Thus, we decided on a trip further into town to the big plaza. I wanted to stock up on Kiwilocos (my new favorite chocolate treat), so we went to the grocery store. I bought 10 packs, and would have bought more but didn't want to clean the store out.

The doors of the big cathedral were open, which I have yet to see in all of my trips to the plaza, so I insisted we go in. The pews were filled with students in their school uniforms which look slightly military-esque. Lining the full pews were students standing holding various school flags. There were hundreds of small triangular flags around the nave. The priest was speaking in Spanish and we quietly walked around to the right side of the church. I looked at the huge gold altars to various saints along the wall. Two women were praying and pleading in front of one of the saints. I wondered what was happening in their lives. We stood respectfully for a few minutes and looked around at the cathedral and the ceremony. After we were satisfied, we walked back to the small plaza. I was happy to have finally seen the inside of the cathedral.

We arrived back at the small plaza just in time. The small church there had its doors open too and we peeked inside. Mass was going on and we saw a huge white altar/shrine for St. Peter and St. Paul. There were lights and flowers all over the big white rectangular box. There was also a ceviche festival going on in the plaza. Lime green and blue tents were set up all over the plaza and several stands were full of people clambering to get some ceviche. It definitely looked good, but I wasn't about to risk trying any. Delicious, I'm sure, but raw fish in rural Peru didn't sound like the best idea.

Soon about 10 men started carrying the gigantic altar out of the church and I was amazed they could even lift it. Little figures of Peter and Paul rode proudly on top. Five men made up a brass band and played some slow music as they followed behind the procession.

After a busy morning of sight seeing, we walked back to the house for lunch. A few hours of laying out in the warm sun made for a lovely afternoon.

About 4:45pm, I and about 5 other girls set out for the gym. We were going to aerobics and I was hoping it would be as exciting as spinning had been last week. And it was!! Aerobics in Peru is my new favorite thing!

Power Gym was the place and we paid our two soles (60 cents). The aerobics room was an enormous room, probably big enough to hold a basketball court in both directions and the ceiling was at least 20 feet up. The walls were covered with mirrors and there was big cement platform at the front of the room that was as high as my shoulders. I got the feeling that this place could turn into a night club later because there was a long winding bar on one side of the room. We each found a spot facing the platform and put our old red aerobics steps in front of us. The instructor was an average looking Peruvian woman with a gray and orange tank top and matching orange tights. She took her place on the platform and started leading us in some stretches. She moved slowly through the stretches and added a dancer´s touch so I felt we were doing more interpretive dance than we were stretching. My muscles were cold so the stretching didn´t do that much good.

Just as I thought we were warming up slowly, she turned on some really fast music and all of the sudden broke into the fastest grapevine I have ever seen...and I have been to a lot of aerobics classes over the years. I mean this came out of nowhere and I did not think it was humanly possible to keep up (come to find out this will be the theme for the class). I was worried I was going to pull something in the first two minutes into the class. I did my best to keep up and looked around at the other girls--they were struggling as much as I was-- and we could hardly contain our laughter and kept exchanging looks that said, "here we go." The rest of the class followed this same trend.

The dance remix of We Will Rock You came on next, but it was THE CHIPMUNKS SINGING IT!! Oh, wow! For the first fifteen minutes of the class at least, we could hardly workout because we were laughing so hard. We continued to do a variety of moves that proved to be impossible to keep up with...but we tried hard. My years of aerobics, kick boxing, and hip hop dance (well, actually only 8 classes of hip hop) training aided a little. Squat down, shimmy up, squat down, shimmy up, faster, faster. We were pouring with sweat.

The instructor kept yelling at us to keep up. We were breathing hard and trying to keep moving. She would show us a move a few times, then take a break to come down off her platform to walk around the room, so of course she was having no trouble with this workout. It seemed impossible for her to believe we couldn´t keep moving at warp speed...which we could have, had we taken as many breaks as she did. At one point she walked by me and yelled, ¨mas rapido¨(faster) like I was the laziest person in the world. Elizabeth later describe the instructor as looking at us with ¨hateful eyes,¨ and I laughed because that is exactly what it was.

One of the most impossible moves she showed us (which is quite a title considering how many difficult moves she had) was the "crossing her foot over the step" move. Standing on one side of the box, crossing one foot over it, touching the ground on the other side and back. Sounds easy right? No. Try doing this after 45 minutes of this tiring class at a speed that wouldn´t have even been possible at the start of the class or ever really.

Oh, but this was a good workout and so fun. Yelling and cheers came from various girls in our group at many moments of this class. I am not sure the other Peruvians appreciated it (nor the instructor), but we sure did. Though, it looked like the Peruvian women were having just as tough time (if not tougher) keeping up, which vainly made me feel better.

Toward the end of the class (what I thought would be the cool down, but proved not to be) another familiar song came on. It was the dance remix of Stand by Me. We did a twisting motion and all had lots of fun singing along. I could hear Elizabeth´s voice behind me belting out the words and my laughter spurred me on. There were some slower moves--which is what led me to believe this was the cool down--but then Peruvian Superwoman would kick it into high gear again every few moves. Couldn´t figure her out. Also toward the end, we flapped our arms like birds to a song with some Andean flute music (dance remix of course) and I enjoyed the Peruvian influence. Our arms flapped lower and lower the more tired they got.

We were still going strong at 6:15 (after an hour of this), and we had to make it back to the house so as not to be late to dinner. Making Paulina, the cook, mad was never something any of us wanted to do. We rounded up our group of gringas in a military style move of one arm circling in the air and then pointing to the door and put our steps away. We were at the front of the room, so when I turned around to go I realized how full the room had become. I also noticed the Peruvian men watching this aerobics class. Creepy.

We gulped our water and enjoyed the walk back to the house recounting our hilarious experience. I knew I wanted to come back later this week and I couldn´t believe I just discovered this fantastic workout on my last week here! I have been missing out on so much!

After dinner and freezing shower, the movie of the night was Transformers 2 (the first Transformers movie was the matinee showing, but I missed that and as a result had a hard time knowing what was going on). This was by far the worst quality bootlegged movie we have seen. The sound quality was bad and the screen went dark a few times or people stood up in the theater where it had been filmed...all of which just added to the real bootlegged movie experience. Several people left the living room because they couldn´t follow, but I stuck it out to the end. Though I did have to keep asking Sopé to pause it and have her and Frank fill me in on what was going on. I was amazed at the plot details they were able to catch when I had heard/understood nothing. The movie filming cut off several minutes before the real ending, and we all yelled with the frustration of having watched the whole movie only to be deprived of seeing the final minutes.

Can´t believe this is my last week here! The time has flown by as will the rest of this week, I´m sure.

Here We Go, Pat Green

You Know That´s Cold

My weeks of cold shower training finally paid off today! I stood underneath a freezing waterfall in the mountains outside of Acyacucho.

A little before 8:00 am, I finished my hot tea as I spread strawberry jelly on a traditional roll. I added two slices of white cheese to complete my sandwich, which would later by my lunch. Seven girls were heading out for a day of hiking in the Andean terrain. Pancho loaded us up into his van and we drove to the plaza for him to pick up some last minute snack items. I searched for my seat belt, but wasn´t surprised to not find on. Not that it would have help all that much if we drove off the winding road on the edge of the cliffs like I feared.

We drove about an hour through the mountains to a town on a hill called Quinua. People were coming to the Sunday market there as we piled out of the van. Pancho explained the driver would drive down the mountain and pick us up at the end of the day. I was slightly relieved to find out we would not have to hike back up this mountain.

All of us happy to be out of the house and doing something active, eagerly followed Pancho down the dirt alley. After the one minute walk to the edge of town, passed a few donkeys, we came upon a group of Peruvian men and women resting in the shade. They asked Pancho what in the world we were doing because they didn´t understand why we would want to walk when, being gringas, we could easily afford a taxi to take us anywhere we would want to go. Interesting observation.

We continued down the dirt path, over a creek, passed some eucalyptus trees, to a view over looking the valley. We could see Ayacucho far in the distance and Pancho told us it would take us four days to walk back. Glad we had the van to pick us up instead. The sun felt warm and the shade felt cool. The fragrant breeze blew gently and we could smell the freshness of the mountains as we hiked on. We went up and down some steep trails, the sand and gravel unstable under our feet. There were two bridges we had to cross that were solely a log or two. I felt like I was balancing on a balance beam. Exciting. Luckily, the creeks below were small and the logs were not too far off the ground.
At one point, Pancho told us we were going to take a short cut, so we followed him off the path down the mountain. Apparently, he didn´t really know where he was going, but it was OK because we could see the target of houses where were aiming down the valley. Brianna and I agreed we were glad we were not in a forest so we could actually see where we were going. We found a small path and followed it. We saw herds of sheep and several people leading donkeys. A small crumbling colonial house and huge red rock made a good stopping point for some pictures.
Finally, we arrived at our lunch stop. The eight of us plopped down on some grass under the shade of a tree. We each pulled out our sandwiches we had prepared this morning and Pancho presented the treats he brought. As he pulled them out of his stuffed backpack, we all cheered a little as if each were a great new surprise. Bright orange sweet-potato chips. Yay! Lay´s potato chips. Yum! Olé Olés (chocolate covered marsh-mellows). Hmm! Packets of chocolate sandwich cookies. Yipee! Cake. Wow! We ate until we were stuffed.
Next stop, a small swimming pool full of "therapeutic" waters. We walked up a small hill to the pool. The pool had a smooth rock deck surrounding it and the water in it was a dark green, blueish, black. We decided it would be nice to dip our feet in and rest a while. The water was cool and felt good on our tired feet. With our feet in the pool, we laid back on the warm stone deck. It would be difficult to get up now being so full, tired and warm in the sun.
After about 20 minutes, we decided we must push on. We dried our feet and headed down the field to an old colonial house. Pancho led us to a fence that appeared to be an electric one. Skeptical, the first girl climbed through the middle of the three wires as Pancho held one. After she made it safely through. Pancho jumped back quickly. Apparently he touched another one of the wires and confirmed that the fence was, in deed, electric by receiving a little jolt. The rest of us climbed under the fence as he held the bottom wire up with his plastic water bottle. What kind of adventure would this be without an electric fence?!

Two old rock walls covered with moss and cactus lined the path to the old colonial estate.
We walked up to the crumbling porch of this once great property. The landowner met us there. He was an old man maybe in his 70´s (it is very hard to judge age here because of the sun exposure, lack of dental attention, and years of hard labor). Pancho told us this man was once very rich, but as time has gone on and his land has been given away, his wealth deteriorated. I wondered what he and this estate were like back in their glory days. We walked through the house to a courtyard with a big white private church (complete with the old bell towers I love). Pancho told us they used to have small bullfights in this courtyard.After many pictures, we marched on to see the much anticipated waterfall. We weren´t far now. We walked another 30 minutes through the eucalyptus trees and red dirt paths. I was getting fairly hot and sweaty by this point and was ready for a swim in a cool mountain stream. Finally, we arrived!

I could feel the cold air near the bottom of the waterfall blowing toward me. We were in the shade now and I could see the huge waterfall pouring down from the mountain above. The water fell from maybe 100 feet (I am so bad at estimating) straight down the side of the flat rocks. It wasn´t very wide, but fell with a lot of force. Soft, green moss and a few ferns lined the wall closest to the water. I was eager to stand underneath it.

Sarah and I were the only ones brave enough, so we quickly changed into our swimsuits. I stepped my bare foot into the freezing water onto the sharp rocks and walked quickly into the knee-deep pool of water before I could change my mind. I had not been swimming in water this cold in a long time. Sarah followed as we walked toward the waterfall, using our hands to steady us against the rock face of the mountain. I was first to go under the waterfall and the cold water was surprising as it sprayed on me. Before I could think about it I was under the waterfall, letting the cold, powerful water hit my shoulders and head. I laughed, screamed and smiled all at once. I made sure the other Elizabeth was getting lots of pictures. My body was somewhat numb from the cold so I stepped out of the waterfall to let Sarah have a turn. My arms tingled, but I wasn´t really thinking about the cold anymore. A few more pictures with Sarah and me under the waterfall and we hurried out of the water the fastest our numb feet could take us over the rough rocks. Part of me wanted to lay down in the pool of water and swim, but I didn´t.
It felt so good to get out of the water for two reasons. 1)The cold water had been so refreshing. And 2) I was so proud of myself for actually doing something like that.

I wished Katharine had been there because she is usually the freezing-water-swimming-twin. I know she would have loved this!

Sarah and I stood in the sun and marveled at our accomplishment. We were so proud.

Finally, we changed back to dry clothes. That felt good too and our group headed back down the mountain to meet our car. We all enjoyed walking, but Pancho was getting hot, so he asked a few random guys to give us a ride in their van. Again, not something I would normally do, but since Pancho said it was OK and there were seven of us, I figured it would just add to the adventure. The drove us a few minutes down the red dusty road (which would have been many more had we been walking).

We piled out and completed our walk. I was happy to see our driver from this morning walking around a curve with a huge bottle of water. Apparently, a bridge was not finished, so he could not drive all the way to meet us. We walked over the cement bridge that couldn´t yet hold a car and piled back in the van. It felt good to be sitting down, heading home, after such a full day. We enjoyed the left over snacks from earlier as we drove. I couldn´t get enough of the sweet potato chips.

Upon our arrival back to the house, we found the new group of volunteers. About 14 new people had arrived during the day we were gone. I was happy to have new people and get to know them, but it felt a little strange having these unknown people come into the house and group to which had become so comfortable. I suddenly understood much more what the old volunteers felt when we arrived. I was too tired to greet them properly, so I headed upstairs for a cold shower. I was really hoping for a hot one, but after today´s waterfall the cold water felt like nothing. Clean and refreshed, I headed downstairs for some small talk. I met a few of the people. A college student and two med students from Canada. A girl from Florida.

We had dinner in the much more crowded dining room and I enjoyed the pasta with creamy tomato sauce. A woman originally from Scotland now living in California. A mother and daughter pair from the States.

After dinner, I helped organize a "welcome party" for the new volunteers. We went up to the open air roof deck of the house and started a fire in the stone fire pit. Someone had bought stuff to make smores and we cheered as each new person entered the party. With the fire going full force and most people roasting marshmallows, I offered a toast to the new group. We raised our warming marshmallows in the air and cheered.

We admired the black sky and tiny white stars above us. I pointed out the Southern Cross constellation to one of the new volunteers. We use chocolate covered soda crackers instead of chocolate and graham crackers to make the smores. Still delicious. You know how much I love smores, so you can just imagine what a night it was.

You Know That´s Cold, John Hammond

Back in Black

Tonight we were sitting, lazily enjoying our after dinner movie. There were about 4 girls in the common room watching the little, old TV with its colors slightly off. The rest of the volunteers had gone out for a night on the town.

All of the sudden, the movie shuts off and the screen goes blank. Great, what happened to the TV? Then we realized all of the lights had gone off too, even the bright street light outside had shut off. The house and the street were completely black and quiet. The power had gone off...on the whole street! No storm or anything. I ran upstairs to look out of our bedroom window at all of Ayacucho. The power in the whole city had gone off! The normally covered in little yellow lights valley was dark. There was one little patch of lights, but the rest of the town had disappeared. I thought about the Shining Path terrorist talk we heard this afternoon and for a minute thought of a terrorist attack. That was silly, so I pushed the thought out of my mind.

I went back downstairs to see that Walter, the doorman, had turned on some portable bright lights at the bottom of the stairs meant for an occasion just like this. Us four movie-goers sat with the other three remaining girls at the bottom of the stairs and wondered what the people that were already out were doing. I was glad I didn't have to be in the middle this Peruvian town in complete darkness. I wondered how long the lights would be out. We wondered when we would get to finish our silly movie (bootlegged 17 Again, I'll embarrassingly admit).

Well, about 15 minutes later the lights came back on and we all cheered. Nothing to worry about, but still a city wide power outage was exciting.

Back in Black, AC/DC

All I Can Do

I went to my first ever spinning class today, and wow, was it an experience. Chelsea, Danielle and I arrived at the gym at about 5:30 this afternoon. We walked in and payed our 5 soles (little less than $2) to the man sitting behind the counter. I was surprised by the big weight machines they had and the numerous cardio machines. It looked like a real gym. I guess when I pictured a gym in Ayacucho, I pictured a tiny dark, dusty room with two rickety treadmills, one of which probably wouldn't work, and a few hand weights. Nope, I was wrong. There was a big room with lots of equipment and there were about 20 huge posters of body builders flexing their much too large and certainly chemically enhanced tan muscles. I mean we are talking posters high on the wall where the men (and women) are at least twice actual size people. It was pretty funny.

We could hear the music blasting in the spinning room. We opened the door and walked in. I thought I had entered a discotheque. The room was dark except for three flashing strobe lights (a red one, a white one, and a green one). A muscular Peruvian man was the leader and his bike was stationed on a platform at the front of the room. He was wearing a yellow tank top, blue hat and pants. He must have been using some sort of muscle growth/enhancement something because he was the most muscular Peruvian I have seen all trip.

We navigated our way past the other people already biking hard and each found a bike at the back of the room. There were 18 bikes in three long rows placed end to end (no room to spare) nearly touching the end of the long skinny room. We hopped on and started pedaling to the strong beat of the music. I was dripping with sweat quickly and wished I had brought a towel. It was a tough work out and I was glad there was no clock in view. Pedal faster. Va, va (go, go). Danielle and I started making, "oh my gosh, I can't keep up," faces at each other. I increased the resitance on my bike. I pedaled standing up. I pedaled sitting down. Stand up, sit down. I loosened the resistance. Sweat was pouring out of my forehead. The skinny seats were uncomfortable. Super Peruvian kept yelling at us to pedal faster.

Out of breath, I turned around to see it getting dark outside. I also saw the fake McDonalds directly across the street. McBolas it was called and definitely stole the Mickey D's logo. Kind of ironically placed so close to a gym.

Finally, I passed my wall and started getting into the class. I was actually enjoying it. We saw Marisol, our volunteer placement director, pedaling in the front of the room. The smell of sweat and old gym filled my nose. My small silver St. Christopher necklace kept slapping me in the chin as I pedaled side to side. Chelsea and Danielle couldn't take any more. They left the room to do some abs outside. I thought, "all I can do is keep going." I wanted to finish strong.

I kept pedaling enjoying the feeling of a good workout. I also thought about how I am really glad I don't have epilepsy, as these flashing lights at the front of the room would certainly induce some sort of epileptic seizure. Finally, Super Peruvian turned on the main lights and slowed down the music. I think it was close to the end. I had survived. A familiar song started to play. It got to the chorus, "Don't want to loooose your luuuvvv toniiiight." I had flash backs to nights of karaoke or fraternity parties. We stretched and cooled down. What an experience!

All I Can Do, Jack Ingram

Another Day

After three weeks of being here in Ayacucho, I have settled into my daily life here. It is a nicely simple life free of cell phones and having to be anywhere or get things done by a certain time or date. I like it.

During the week, I wake up at about 7:00 am. Amy's little alarm clock beeps politely and I quietly pull my warm blankets off. It is quite bright at this point, and light fills our room. Many people say they can hear a roster crowing next door, which wakes them up, but I have yet to hear it. Our big window looks out to all of Ayacucho, as well as right into the house next door. Only one morning have I woken up to two men standing on their balcony several feet away from us with only the glass of the window in between. I put my feet on the cool tile floor and get out of my bottom bunk bed (it is a little like being back at camp). My jeans have become my uniform as well as my trusty gray New Balances. T-shirts and my black fleece complete the look.

I head downstairs to breakfast after packing my little bag with my wallet with about 10 soles (slightly more than $3) in it, my plastic water bottle, my miniature Spanish-English dictionary, and my sunglasses. It is nice to need so little. The dining room has two large wooden rectangular tables with 10 places each and a smaller table that holds an extra 8 people when the house is full (right now it is home to the tea, coffee machine and toaster). I have some hot tea, of course, and usually some cornflakes (boxed cereal is apparently a luxury here) with a banana on top. Though, yesterday I tried the big rolls that are always set out in a basket (but I've never bothered to try them until then). They are the traditional bread from the area. The round rolls are a toasted brown color, about 6 inches across, and are mostly hollow. Warm and toasted with a little of the salty butter from here and they are wonderful. Can't believe I have been passing on them this whole time. I have also discovered the amazing coconut yogurt. So delicious!

At about 7:45, Alejandro drives about 8 of us to our placements in the white van (the other volunteers either walk, ride with a different driver, or go later). Logan, a blond-haired senior at Alfred University in New York (state), and I get dropped off at Mercedes School. I have since found out that our school is actually a public school, not private, which I originally assumed because of the order, facilities, and uniforms.

I have come to love this placement. We help two different English teachers teach various middle and early high school classes. The students all stand up when we (or the teachers) come into the room and sometimes sing a greeting song. We smiled and tell them they can sit down. They also usually stand up when asking a question or giving an answer. How respectful!

The students have English workbooks that keep us on track and Logan and I usually conduct the lessons, helping a great deal with pronunciation. We did a fun lesson about vegetables the other day. We drew different vegetables on different sheets of paper with their names labeled in English. After reviewing them, we made different girls come up and hold the papers and everyone practiced saying the names and we cheered. They laughed and had fun.

I am able to speak to the classes in Spanish, explaining directions and translating what I am asking them to do. The students are very timid about speaking English (except like 3 per class) and I try to encourage them to practice. I tell them that while I can't speak Spanish well, I still just go for it. When I am speaking to them in English, I look at their faces of concentration and slight confusion. Then, it is funny when I translate what I am saying to Spanish and they all smile and say, "aahhh" and then seem to understand what I am saying. The teachers usually sit quietly at the back of the class, as we are able to manage things by ourselves. I think they are learning from us too. I feel like I am really helping.

During the 20 minute recess break, Logan and I walk around the school's big courtyard and the girls dressed in their navy and white uniforms are eager to come up to us and either talk or a lot of times they just stare, content with being next to us. We are certainly different than everyone else in the school. Sometimes we visit one of the two little stores inside the school to get a lollipop or a piece of fruit, which usually costs us about 10 centavos (like maybe 3 cents).

Logan and I wait outside the main gate and cement walls of the school for Alejandro to pick us up at about 12:00 pm. We hop in the van full of volunteers coming home from their various medical clinics and schools and ride back to the house. The little bell signifying lunch usually rings a few minutes after we walk in the door. All of us starving, eagerly rush into the dining room and sit down at our places.

Paulina, the cook, does a great job and fixes a variety of meals (only a few have been repeated since I have been here). There is usually rice, potatoes and some sort of meat. She carefully makes soy meat prepared like the other meat for me every meal too. There are a lot of vegetables and we have salads a lot. We have had soups and different veggie patties. One of my favorite meals has been the fried potato chips that she makes. I also loved the huge bowl of guacamole she made. We had that with big fried wonton chips (because they don't have tortilla chips here) which was a surprisingly good combination. At every meal there is also fruit for dessert. We have pineapple or watermelon a lot and at dinner usually a basket of assorted fruit. Kiwis are the hot item and I have to claim one early before they are gone. I also love the mandarin oranges.

After filling up on lunch, the afternoons are mostly free. A few days a week I lay out in the warm sun on the roof and read my book. I am averaging a book per week. I'd be lying if I said that doesn't usually turn into a nap too. Other days I spend the time after lunch blogging at the little internet cafe next door. Sometimes I walk with someone the 10-15 minute walk into town. We run various "errands" like getting money from the bank or buying a plane ticket back to Lima. I have also enjoyed walking around the markets looking at the various handicrafts or food. The rows of fruits and veggies are fun to walk around and the rows of meat sort of make me nauseated. There are slabs of beef and pork and whole chickens (with yellow feet and sometimes heads still attached) exposed to the open air. Piles of bread and cheese line other aisles.

Once a week we have a speaker come to tell us about various topics. Last week's topic was coca leaves. The older professor told us about the amount of coca leaves produced in Peru and how people use the leaves in legal ways. He spoke in Spanish and Rudy, our program manager, translated to English. Many people chew the leaves which helps with altitude sickness, gives people energy and helps with a variety of medical needs. Others are used for tea. Some for Coca-Cola. These coca leaves are also important in offerings to the apus (mountains) and Pancha Mama (earth). I remember Pancho scattering some coca leaves on the mountain when we were on the llama trek. The professor said there is an enormous discrepancy between the amount of leaves produced and how much are accounted for. Thus, the rest makes up the cocaine industry. He did not talk as much about this as I had hoped, because it seems so interesting that such a large "industry" goes so unregulated or unaccounted for.

The speaker this week spoke about the Shining Path terrorist movement that lasted twenty years. He told us about the history and how another terrorist movement was active during this time. What a terrifying era...so many murders, power outages, bombs and chaos. It was quite an interesting talk but it lasted about two hours by the time the translator told us everything in English.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I got to intermediate Spanish lessons at 5:00. Gustavo, our twenty-six-year-old Peruvian teacher, is really friendly and speaks nice and slowly so we can all understand. We usually speak for the first half-hour and then he helps us practice some sort of skill. Last week we worked on speaking in the past-tense and this week we practiced the subjunctive. We also ask him various questions about things we have encountered or heard during the day. It is actually quite fun. I am enjoying improving my Spanish (a New Year's Resolution 2009). By the time Spanish ends, it is usually dark outside.

Dinner is at about 6:30 and the little bell rings again. Everyone rushes into to the dining room like at lunch. Meals are similar to lunch, but we more often have some type of pasta. I enjoy sitting around hearing about people's days. It is funny how a lot of our days here revolve around meals.

After dinner, I usually brave a cold shower. It feels good to be clean, but it is usually more refreshing when I am hot and sweaty in the afternoon. At night it is just a little painful. Sometimes I luck out though and the water verges on warm. We have also started watching movies before bed. They are all new movies--thus, boot legged of course. You can buy the latest releases here for the bargain price of something like $1. Confessions of a Shopaholic and Star Trek are among two recent viewings. I also like to read a lot before going to bed. I finished a autobiography of an autistic savant and am now working on a novel about a guy who dies and relives his life over and over again.

I usually go to bed about 10:00pm, but the first two weeks I was here it was more like 9:00, exhausted. My bed is warm and it usually doesn't take long to fall asleep.

Another Day, Django Walker

Not a Drop of Rain

This morning we woke up in Paracus and celebrated D'Ann's birthday. Pancho surprised her with a big caramel covered cake. He bought it yesterday at Plaza Vea and kept it hidden from us. It was so nice of him. However, D'Ann in gluten intolerant, so she couldn't really even eat her own cake. She didn't say anything though and just enjoyed some of the rich icing. Birthday cake for breakfast, what a fun way to start the day!

Today we were boarding a boat to see the Ballestas Islands. These are know as the "Galapagos of Peru" or more amusingly called "the poor man's Galapagos" by my Lonely Planet guide book. We met our guide Luis at the small office on the water. We joined a group of about 10 more people and stepped on board the open top motor boat. We put on our over-sized orange life vests and set off into the ocean. I spoke with a father/son pair from California behind me, a girl from Colorado next to me, and a guy from Mexico in front of me. Luis was funny (which can be particularly hard when you are speaking a language that isn't your own) and he kept us entertained.

The air was cold, the sun was bright, and the water was blue. There were small mountains that looked like smooth, tan sand dunes that dropped off into the water. Soon we stopped to looked at an unusual carving into the side of one of these mountains. It is called the Candelabra and looks like a three pronged candelabra (or cactus) drawn into the ground. As with the Nazca lines, there are several theories as to how,when and why it was made. It is a huge drawing in the ground, but apparently is only about 30-50 centimeters deep. The reason it is so well preserved is that it never rains here. And when Luis told us it never rains, he meant it never rains.

We sped up and continued on to the islands. Along the way we saw a swarm of birds (seagulls and cormorants) feeding in the water and some huge pelicans. When we arrived to the islands the rock formations were beautiful. There were caves and big rock arches. Birds covered the rocks. We saw gray cormorants, Peruvian boobies, pelicans with brightly colored beaks, and penguins! The cute little black and white Humbolt penguins waddled along the rocks. There were even some high above walking along the top of the rock arch.

While driving around the islands, the strong scent of bird guano whirled around us. My nose wrinkled with the stench and I tried to concentrate on my conversations with the people around me. The rocks were covered with the white droppings and Luis told us how the guano was sold as fertilizer. I pictured the awful job of being the guy that has to shovel that stuff into containers for selling. Despite that thought, the scenery was gorgeous.

As we came around another curve, we saw two sea lions perched on a rock above the water! Luis informed us they were pregnant. We wondered how he knew. Then, he revealed his secret way of knowing that. Turns out, these sea lions are almost always pregnant. Two hours after giving birth they get pregnant again. Thus, they are almost always pregnant. What a life.

This tour was over all too quickly too, like so many of the amazing tours I have been on here. The driver put it into full gear and we sped back to our starting point. I enjoyed talking to the college student from Mexico in front of me as we drove. He and his brother were traveling all over South America.

Before our long drive back to Ayacucho, we stopped at a sea front boardwalk for some shopping and some lunch. I loved all of the beautiful and unusual seashells for sell. There were purple ones, pointy ones, white ones, peach ones, big ones, little ones. It was hard to restrain from buying them all. We enjoyed our lunch with great view of the ocean right in front of us and the sun shining down on us. Several of us got the famous ceviche and it was delicious. Fresh and light. Satisfied and fully, we waved good-bye to the coast.

Our drive back to Ayacucho proved to be just as death defying as my other driving experiences. HUGE trucks and double-decker buses sped to pass us and each other on the winding two lane road on the edge of the mountains. I tried to keep myself occupied with my book and not think about it. I pushed thoughts of careening down the side of the mountain in our little van out of my head. After many pages read, naps taken by everyone else, and several hours of driving, we all became bored. We got good laughs out of playing a story-telling car game. Each person had to add a sentence to the story and each story got funnier and more unusual with each addition.

The sun setting over the mountains was gorgeous. I reflected on what a great experience this is and how happy I am. Once it was dark we came over the mountains to see the lights of Ayacucho spread out in the valley. The rows of little yellow lights snaked through the city. The town was much larger than I thought. It was good to be back "home."

Not a Drop of Rain, Robert Earl Keen

Finder's Keepers

"Who is this Native American, complete with big feather head-dress, sitting in the front seat of our van smashed between Pancho (the driver) and Jesse (the front seat passenger)," I thought to myself as we were safely back in the van after the Nazca Lines adventure.

This little Peruvian shaman was now escorting us to his tiny museum a few minutes down the road. His scent of not bathing for a few days wafted toward me and I wondered how he suckered us into this. We arrived at his museum and looked around at the small, dusty collection of various bones, shark teeth, shards of pottery, and the worst taxidermy I had ever seen.

We saw a disheveled puma lunging at us with parts of its tan fur falling off and large black condor with its tattered wings spread wide. Its wingspan was more than my outstretched arms and its sharp beak and talons made me glad it was frozen in time. We also saw mummified human heads with hair and old cloth headbands still attached. Weird! This tiny museum also had mummified macaws (feathers were still surprisingly colorful), a dog, a monkey, and some babies. Ewww, strange. It made me interested to visit a nearby cemetery with more mummies that I had been reading about. I pictured the strange dried up mummies I had seen in Guanajuato Mexico many years ago.

The shaman then announced that he was going to perform some sort of ritual on us. He was going to balance our energies. Now this shaman (unlike the one yesterday) looked how a real shaman should look. He was a few inches shorter than me with rich brown skin and black eyes and shoulder-length, slightly messy hair. He wore a red cloth top and shorts, necklaces of long teeth and bones, and leather sandals. His headband had two large feathers sticking up from the front. After putting his wooden shaman walking stick/staff down, he picked up a bottle of orange liquid from his little table of supplies. We stood in a circle in the back of the museum (now, as I'm writing, I wonder what on earth someone would have thought had they walked in during this ritual).

The healer started by pouring some orange liquid out of the plastic water bottle (this container was the one part that didn't seem so "authentic") into his hands. He would then dab some on our foreheads, necks and palms. I didn't want him to touch my neck (and I guess I was a little skeptical of having the liquid put on my face as well). My turn came and I closed my eyes and inhaled the odor of strong smelling liquid, but couldn't place what it actually smelled like (aftershave, maybe?). Shaman man then instructed us to turn our palms to face the people's next to us in the circle and hold them a few inches apart. We had to close our eyes and he told us to feel the energy passing around the circle. He gently shook a rattle from our heads to the back of our knees as he walked around the outside of the circle. I could feel the warmth of the energy from the hands of the people next to me...of course, that could have also been slight burn of the unknown liquid that had been slathered on my hands. The medicine man finished the ceremony by dabbing some eucalyptus oil on the center of our foreheads. We all felt more calm and centered.

Energies balanced we loaded up the van and I insisted we drive the 30 minutes down the road to the cemetery to find some more bizarre mummies. Eucalyptus filled the van.

Chauchilla Cemetery looked like an expanse of sand and rocks. There were no grave markers or much of anything to signify anything was really there. Wait, there was a small blue sign and a hut where a woman was selling various sodas and chips. There were also a few huts spread between a path lined by painted white rocks. Apparently, most of the graves had been ransacked by grave robbers, so the site wasn't in as good of condition as it perhaps could have been.

Pancho lead us among the big pits that have been cleared and set up with bones and "mummies." While quite an unsual sight, many of the mummies were a pile of something (I guess we were supposed to assume the body, but I suspected something more like rocks, sand or maybe some bones) covered in tattered old cloth with a skull placed on top. It was pretty gross. We walked among the different pits and gawked at each different one. Some of the skulls still had long black hair attached. We are talking feet and feet of hair. Yuck! Pancho even joked that one of the pits had Rastafarian mummies and sure enough these three mummies did appear to have long black dreadlocks.

After being sufficiently grossed out by the mummies, we got back in our van and drove back down the bumpy, sandy road. Pancho was driving particularly fast, but I wasn't sure why. We had some lunch in Nazca and insisted on choosing the restaurant. While Pancho knew a lot about travel in Peru, he did not seem to have the best skill at choosing good restaurants. We had nightmares about the chain Peruvian TGI Friday's-esque restaurant he dropped us off at on Friday night.

Three hours back to our next stop in seaside Paracas. long the way, Elizabeth and I insisted we stop at the huge super store Plaza Vea in Ica which had first visited yesterday. At Plaza Vea "todo custa menos" (everything costs less), so you can imagine this super store like an clean oasis in the dustiness of the rest of our trip. The two of us were now hooked on these great treats called Kiwilocos which are chocolate (more accurately, rather, some chocolate substitute) covered crisps (like Rice Krispies) with a shockingly low calorie count and we needed to stock up. Elizabeth and I feared we could not get them in Ayacucho, so we bought out the store. All 14 of the 100 gram packs that the store had were now ours (minus one that we were guilted into giving to a girl in our group who wanted one pack). We discussed the potentially lucrative exporting options to the United States and vowed to investigate more later. (Elizabeth since emailed the company to ask about this, but only received a bounce back message saying that it wasn't a real email address...however, we have not lost hope in the business opportunity).

We arrived in Paracas, I enjoyed a long hot shower, and went to bed.

Finder's Keepers, Pat Green

I'm Trying to Find It

¨Happy Father's Day,¨ we all toasted Pancho, our tour guide, at breakfast this morning, as none of us had our own fathers present with whom to celebrate. At this point in our weekend we all started calling him Papa Pancho and I told everyone they would win the most points if they called him that in front of other Peruvians in public.

Today's adventure-seeing a UNESCO World Heritage sight-the Nazca Lines (http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/700). We loaded up Papa Pancho's van and headed to the small airport in Nazca. You have to see the lines from above, so we were going to have to take a tiny airplane and fly over them. It was a cloudy morning, so no planes were allowed to take off. Thus, we had to wait. Papa Pancho decided to take us to a pottery studio where we would learn about the pottery from the region.

Back in the van we went and about a minute down the road later we were at the pottery studio. All seven us took a seat around a long rectangular table with soft red clay and various painted pots placed on it. I could tell many a pots had been created here. The worn wooden table had remnants of dried clay and dust covering it.

A larger Peruvian man told us how his grandfather discovered some ancient Nazca pottery in a cemetery and figured out that because of the finger indentions inside, the pots were made without using a wheel. He went on to tell us how the pots are still made today according to traditional methods. The whole time he was talking he was working on smoothing out a small clay pot on the table in front of him. He told us about how the pots are fired only once...not like other pots that are fired once, then painted, then fired again, for a total of two times...but these pots are only fired once (a point he belabored). The man showed us how different glazes were made from different minerals in the area and he showed us the brushes they use. The bristles of the thin paint brushes were made of about two inches of soft baby hair. Human baby hair. Hmm...interesting.

When he finished talking, we were then escorted to the room full of pottery painted with earthen colors and intricate designs, which, of course, we were free to buy. I browsed a little, but pictured any of my purchases broken into hundreds of piece by the time I arrived back to Dallas so I decided not to get anything.

After a few minutes of browsing, Pancho told us the potter wanted to give us a present--for free. Right, for "free." Ok, what strings are attached? He gives it to us for "free" then we pay him or buy something else. No, Pancho assured me for real free. OK then. So we each got a little key chain with a black or brown rock attached with a different Nazca line formation etched into it depending on our astrological sign. I got a the monkey formation (see picture of real formation above) and was excited that Scorpio didn´t get the shaft for once. I fastened my new key chain to a zipper on my black bag I carry everywhere and said thanks.

Back to the airport for some more waiting. I read a little while, helping my growing pages read per day average which is bigger than it has been in a long time. The weather is colder than we expected so I put some tights on under my jeans and wished I hadn't left my warm hat in Ayacucho. I paid the airport tax so I would be allowed to fly. I have now encountered this several times and still don't understand why this is not included in the price of the ticket.

So the plane we were going to fly in is too small to hold our whole group of 7, so two of us have to go in another plane (that really tells you just how small these planes are). Adam and I are selected to ride in another plane and soon I can hear the roar of planes taking off. Adam and I say good-bye to our amigos and we go through the security line which simply involved one pass of a hand-held metal detector and a peek inside our bags. We meet our jovial pilot dressed professionally in his pilot uniform and our other three passengers. They were from some Spansish speaking country and one woman was wearing a Dallas Cowboys hat. I tell her I am from Dallas. She smiles. I can tell she doesn´t really care.

Getting more and more nervous by the minute about this flight, we walked down the runway to our plane. The whole walk Adam and I are joking about how old the planes look. The little red fire extinguishers sitting by every plane are not making me feel better. We get to the end of the line of planes to find two of the oldest looking planes. Of course we find out that one of these green and white death traps is ours. The happy pilot insisted that we take several pictures. One all together. One with just me and Adam. A lot of the other passengers. One by the propeller on the front. One sitting in the tiny seats. The other passengers seem way more into taking pictures than we are.

Adam and I get chosen to sit in the back of the plane. There is just enough room for us to sit side by side. No room to spare. I make sure the air sick bag is handy just in case. Considering my apprehension (ugh, rather extreme fear) when in turbulence in big airplanes, I still wasn't sure how I was going to handle this little aircraft. Deep breathing. Happy thoughts. We puttered down the runway and somehow to make it off the ground. Yep, just as scary as I was imagining. One big gust of wind and we would be goners. The plane moved back and forth easily as if we were sledding on a very slippery surface. Panic was over taking me and I looked around the plane with worried eyes. No one else seemed nervous in the least. It would be OK. It would be OK. Somehow I managed to relax slightly and tried to look out of the plane. Ahh, why are we turning at such a drastic angle!! Ahhh, we are going down!

Nope, in fact the pilot was just circling to show us the first set of lines. It would OK. I was looking out of the small plane window at the reddish ground below. I couldn't see these famous lines anywhere. I stared below trying to find it and all of the sudden my eyes focused on the white outline of a whale. Sure enough, there it was.

The pilot navigated us over the various outlines circling high above each figure to the left then to the right. Just as I was growing accustomed to the movement of the plane, the pilot turns around pointing with both hands at a small map of the figures. Shouldn't he have both hands the wheel! Again, I seemed to be the only one concerned about this.

We listened through our headphones above the loud roar of the engine as our pilot narrated first in Spanish then sometimes in English which figure was what. There was a astronaut (though I can't imagine the creators of the lines actually meant for it to be an astronaut...unless of course you are a believer in the aliens created the lines theory), a spider, a monkey, a heron, a tree, a parrot, a hummingbird (my favorite)..and a few others.

I had been looking forward to seeing these lines for much of my time in Peru and the ride was over all too fast. I tried to enjoy the scenery out of the plane. There were clusters of mountains. The flat ground where the lines were had squiggly lines all over it as if dozens of tiny creeks had once flowed there. Though the brown and red land seemed so dry I couldn´t picture much water ever being there. We flew in a near straight line back to the airport with the black asphault of the Pan-American highway below us. At this point I was sure wishing I had taken my Dramamine (or three) this morning. The movements of the little plane had made me so nauseated and the sun beating down on me sure didn´t help. Almost there, almost there.

Before landing, my life flashed before my eyes yet again, but the expert pilot landed us safely. On wobbly legs I stepped out of the plane into the cool, fresh air, and I breathed a big sigh of relieve when my feet were firmly back on the ground. I lived! I lived to tell about it!

I´m Trying to Find It, Pat Green

Don't Stop Believing

After our great sand boarding adventures this morning, we returned to our hostel to take much needed showers and pack up. We headed out for lunch at the nearby wineries.

The winery we chose had a lovely shaded patio. We order our food before embarking on our education walk. Pancho took us past several rows of grapes to the vats where they make the wine and pisco. He showed us a huge cement vat where each March there is a festival to squish all the grapes. I hoped they cleaned the vats before then. He showed us pictures and told us how people dance around and mash the grapes with their bare feet. I wished I could have been there for that.

Next, he showed us another huge cement vat where the wine and pisco are drained into tall ceramic pots. The old reddish-brown pots were about up to my shoulders and were fat the top and narrow at the bottom. Clearly, these were the traditional jars that were used because many looked extremely worn. Some had to be more than 100 years old.

After the wine fermented in the huge pots, it was poured into a deep hole with a huge kettle at the bottom. I am still not entirely sure of this process, but I gathered that this was now the making pisco part. The liquid would then be heated with a hug fire underneath and allowed to cool and drain through a long skinny tube. We walked around to a little dirt floor room where there was a faucet for the pisco to drain. Above the faucet there was big cross covered with flowers in order to bring a blessing on the whole process. Pancho explained that the liquid would would come out in three different levels. The first that would come out would be blue, and then the liquid would be clear. This clear liquid is the liquid that could be drunk as pisco. Last, it becomes blue again and that would be thrown away.

Finally, we got to try some of this pisco. Our pisco "somalie" handed us tiny clear plastic cups. First, a pisco sour mix (minus the froathy egg whites)-delicious...a little like a margarita. Next, pure pisco (the good stuff though)-yuck! Are you sure you didn't just serve me rubbing alcohol? I'd hate to try the bad stuff. Next, "Peruvian Bailey's" pisco mixed with milk and sugar among some other things-again, delicious! Some sweet wine next and I found out why Peru is not known for their wine-no good. Last, a delicious pecan covered in carmel and chocolate called a tejas--right up my alley!

We enjoyed our lunch on the patio on our yellow table cloth covered table and after a few purchases we headed out. Before leaving Ica though we drove down a bumpy dirt road to a "witch village." All of us expecting extremely weird things, we were a little disappointed.

First stop at the witch village was an old palm tree where three local boys who were maybe about 9 or 10 scrambled to be our guides. Pancho chose one of them and he began telling us about this "seven-headed" tree. The other two boys sat back clearly looking jealous and disgruntled that this first boy got chosen.

It was quite a weird sight as the huge tree had several different "stalks" each growing in different directions. A few of them had even grown under ground only to reemerge to make that part of the tree look like a serpent coming out of the water. There was an elaborate legend which was somewhat hard to decipher as Pancho was translating what the boy said and adding his own ideas in his faulty English. Something about a witch jumping from the top of the old palm tree and maybe a curse somewhere in there. The end of the legend required a lot of imagination. The boy was pointing out different "animals" that parts of the tree looked like. And when I say a lot of imagination, I mean a lot.

Last stop was a "shaman/healer". The outside of his shop was painted with bright colors advertising his services, and while it didn't seem so authentic, I had to give him the benefit of the doubt because he had to make a living too. We entered the "shop" and it was a dark room with a dirt floor. I was frightened by the bookcase containing two rows about about 10 human skulls. The was one candle burning in front of the skull shelf on the floor and a vase of flowers. Creeeepy. I looked around another low table covered with all sorts of jars, shells, carved wooden sticks, potions, small figurines and who knows what else. There was also a doorway leading to another room that had a thin cloth covering the entrance. I wondered what was back there. Finally, I saw the "shaman" and my ever growing doubts were confirmed. This guy was wearing jeans, a button down shirt, and white tennis shoes. What kind of shaman was this? He didn't look like any kind of shaman I had ever pictured. While I guess Peruvian people don't stop believing just because of what he was wearing, I sure did.

We piled back into our van, passing on the option for him to tell our future, and settled in for our two hour drive to Nazca. We watched the sunset over the hazy sand dunes while we drove and it was beautiful.

Don't Stop Believing, Journey

Into the Great Wide Open

After seven hours of driving yesterday afternoon, we arrived in Ica which is on the Southern coast of Peru. We spent the night in a town called Huacachina, which is the most stereotypical oasis in the middle of the desert I have ever seen. The town wasn´t super nice, but the setting was unique.

I was with six other volunteers and our leader was Pancho, the CCS tour guide. My roommate was Elizabeth, a Senior at the University of Georgia who happens to be a Phi Mu (sound similar to anyone else we know?!).

We woke up this morning to some cool weather and some low clouds. We couldn´t see the sun and it was much colder than we had anticipated on the coast, so we decided to have a long breakfast and kill some time before our first adventure. While the bread, jam, butter, and coffee and tea we were given were good, all of us wanted a little more for breakfast. Thus, after asking nicely we enjoyed some eggs too. Poor Pancho had to put up with some picky American eaters this weekend (a vegetarian, a girl who is allergic to gluten, and a girl who just had surgery who can only eat really bland things).

Finally it was time for the adventures to begin and we piled into a huge dune buggy to go sandboarding. We put on our glasses, similar to the kind you had to wear in high school chemistry class, and fastened our safety belts like we were getting ready for a ride at Six Flags. This picture to the left is NOT our group, but it is a picture that I found that looks exactly like the one we rode in.

The engine roared and we headed out over the dunes. We picked up speed and soon came to the top of a huge dune. As we headed over the top I expected to see the ocean, but instead there was a vast expanse of huge sand dunes. We quickly went over the top and the driver sped up as we went straight down the other side of the dune. We all screamed and I was now certain this would be like a roller coaster at Six Flags.

We sped through, over, and around the dunes. The wind was cool and the fog looked beautful over the dunes in the distance. I loved riding. I was laughing and screaming and fully enjoying this. We stopped for some pictures and the grey mist was gorgeous in the distance.

Next, our driver drove us to a tall dune and started getting the sand boards out of the back. We walked to the edge and he put wax on the bottom of the boards. I was reminded of the huge grass hill near our old house my sister and I would slide down on cardboard boxes when we were in elementary school. But this was much taller. And steeper. Pancho and the driver tell us we are going to go down the hill on our stomachs with our heads first. This went against everything I was ever told when sliding down anything.

Nervously (and quite skeptical) I watch the first volunteer give this a try. It was our favorite little Asian with a British accent Vincent who went first. He dragged his feet in the sand to slow himself down. He survived. Next, DAnn, a tall cross country runner from San Antonio. She survived and even went faster than Vincent. Ok, I was ready! I could do this. Adam the sarcastic British guy who lives in New York went next. Another survivor. Thus, I put my board down and took a deep breath. After a little push from the driver, I was off down the hill going faster than I imagined. It was great! Thrilling and fun. My board slowed and came to a hault. I stood up with a cheer and with the relief I had survived. I was ready for more!

Our sand buggy driver picked us up at the bottom and drove us to several more tall dunes. We took turns and each went down. We learned quickly to keep our mouths closed despite the urge to yell in order to keep the flying sand out of our mouths. DAnn and Jesse were brave enough to try sandboarding standing up. I was good on my stomach. Seemed more fun that way.

After sliding down several dunes, we got back in the sand buggy for a drive around. We waved at other groups as we passed. We screamed over hills and I put my hands in the air. I nearly couldn´t control my laughter when my seatbelt/harness came loose a few times on some big bumps...defeating the purpose of the seat belt.

We stopped at another smaller oasis and took some pictures and then our driver drove us around. I loved this part. I was reminded of favorite times tubing behind a ski boat. I pictured my Aunt Dorothy driving us on her ski boat as we clung to the tube behind the boat desperately hanging on as she tried to throw us off. It was so much fun and so was this!

The ride came to an end much too quickly (I could have done it all day) and we piled out to take showers before our next activity. What a fun morning!

Into the Great Wide Open, Tom Petty

I Won´t Back Down

So, did you know they have Olympics in prison? I did not either, but today, I went to the opening ceremony for the Ayacucho Prison Olympics!

We brought volleyball jerseys for the women´s team and I did not fully understand this until we went to the crowded main courtyard for the big ceremony. Marisol and I scooted in late and took our seats under one of the three tents they had set up for the VIPs. (The only time in my life probably I will get to sit at a VIP tent for any kind of Olympics) The sun was hot, so the shade of the tent felt nice. The courtyard, which is a little bigger than a basketball court, was lined by crowds of spectator (ie, the male prisoners not participating as athletes). Our seats in the tent were directly behind the "godmothers" of the teams. These were three women with their hair done up, dressed in their nicest prison clothes, with maroon velvet sashes around them. They were inmates too. They were also holding big bouquets of flowers. I wondered who got these for them. Was it an expense for the Ayacucho prison?

The announcer was rapidly and very loudly narrating. There were at least ten teams, all in different uniforms, all inmates, lined up in front of the VIP tents. Each team had a banner that was held in front of them by eager supporters. But the icing on the cake was definitely the mascots. Yes, there were mascots (Now this explained the huge Silvester the Cat I saw earlier in the hall). There was a Pink Panther, one or two lions, a Tigger (from Winnie the Pooh) and a boxing monkey. All of the mascots were dancing around and acting silly like a good team mascot is supposed to do. Hilarious!

The announcer yelled Spanish into the microphone and a guy stared singing and playing the keyboard even more loudly into the huge amplifiers. Yes, there were huge amplifiers as well as a huge sound board. They pulled out all of the stops for this!

Next, was the lighting and running of the Olympic torch. Wait, they were going to let an inmate run around the other hundreds of inmates with a big burning torch. Yep, sure enough they were. The slim runner dressed in a white soccer uniform and some running shoes proudly held the torch for it to be lit. Then, he ran slowly around the entire courtyard as we cheered. Finally, he placed the torch in an old coffee can that was hung on the end of the courtyard. Soon whatever was inside the coffee can caught fire and the Olympic flame was up and going. I asked Marisol if the flame continues to burn the entire games. She laughed and said no because the games go on for weeks and weeks.

I keep forgetting I am in a prison right now.

Now it was time for the parade of the athletes. The herd of athletes turned and circled around the courtyard so that the would walk right in front of the main tent. Some teams waved to the crowd. Some saluted. The women´s team had traditional dancers from Puno (costumes looks a little like a tacky Quincenera dress mixed with a stripper outfit) dancing preceding their athletes. There were soccer teams, basketball teams, volleyball teams, and even a few boxers. The members of the last team to go were each holding small yellow flags that said, "maxima" on them...as in maximum security. They might as well have said, "I won´t back down...ever" Yikes, I didn´t want to mess with them.

As the parade of athletes was coming to a close, Marisol and I had to leave. Alejandro was waiting in the parking lot to pick us up. Oh, what a day!

I Won´t Back Down, Tom Petty

For So Long

This morning I went back to the prison and had my favorite volunteer experience so far. Today we did not take the children out of the prison for an outing, but rather we helped the older men celebrate Father´s Day.

Alejandro (my favorite driver here) drove Marisol (our volunteer coordinator) and me on the dusty, bumpy road out of town to the prison. Our arms were loaded down with a huge cake, two bottles of red soda (Peruvian Big Red maybe?), and some volleyball jerseys (will be explained in the next post). Our entry today was expedited because of our tardy arrival, me being the only gringa, and we were not taking any children out of the prison. I got my two stamps on my arms thinking, "this is the closest I´ll ever get to having tatoos." There was a quick search and we were inside the walls.

It was a busy day in the prison. There was a big ceremony in the main courtyard (this too will be explained next) and a health campaign with tents and doctors in another courtyard. We entered the women´s area and Marisol was greeted like an old friend. The inmates do not wear uniforms and are all dressed like normal people on the street. Thus, it is difficult to tell who is incarcerated and who is not. There is a small stand with candy and a few other things like juice at the front of the women´s area, so three women seemed to be running that. I smiled and tried to speak with them. One pretty woman was named Carmen and she was particularly happy. I wondered what they were in for.

We also took care of a little business. My jeans as well as another volunteers jeans were torn, so Marisol asked if they could fix them for us. It was going to be about 2 soles (about 60 cents) to fix. What a bargain! I hope I see those jeans again.

While we waited for the Father´s Day celebration, I watched the action that was taking place. There were some people dressed in suits, important people from some company, a man dressed in a green dinosaur mascot suit and his escort, a highly make-uped woman in a tight yellow suit with her hair pulled tightly into various clips. They were walking around passing out big green and blue balls to the children. There were of course several people to take pictures of this to make sure they got the proper media coverage for their do-gooding. It was quite a funny sight particularly because I kept remembering we were in a prison. Also, several of the children were frightened of the dinosaur man because they had no idea what he was. Can´t imagine they see lots of those around a prison.

After a about half an hour of waiting, it was finally time for the Father´s Day celebration. We were escorted through the crowded hallway, through the packed courtyard where the health campaign was taking place, into a smaller room. I think it is normally used for the daycare/nursery. I walked through the long lines of male prisoners waiting for their turn to talk to a doctor and couldn´t help but feel extremely self-conscious. Every eye was on me. I do not say this in a conceited way at all, but in a matter-of-fact every prisoner watched me (the only gringa for miles) coming and going.

A group of about 26 older male prisoners were escorted into the room and they sat in one line on either side of the room. I helped to set out the tres-leches cake we brought on a table at the front of the room. The cake joined piles of churros, small donuts, rolls and sandwiches. The smell of fresh baked pastries surrounded me. I help to pour the red soda into small clear cups for each man, after awkwardly spilling some when I first opened it.

I looked around the room at the men´s tired, wrinkled faces. There eyes looked worn and a little sad and I wondered many things about them. I wondered how long they had been here. I wondered what they did to get in here. I wondered if they were sorry. I wondered where their children were and what they thought. I wondered if the men would get out soon or if some of them would die here.

Soon the "ceremony" started. The main social worker started by welcoming them and introduced the organizations that had helped today and through out the year. When they turned to Marisol and me to thank Cross Cultural Solutions, I wanted to announce, "I only carried the cake." But I didn´t. I just smiled. Then, we passed out the treats. I tried to serve each thing like I was serving my own grandparents. I smiled at each man and looked them in the eyes, (just like my mother taught me) if they did actually look up at me. Several said thank you and about two men looked up and smiled at me as they did. The main social worker wished them a Happy Father´s Day and said that we hoped they would have a good Father´s Day on Sunday with their families.

Marisol offered me a churro and I didn´t take it at first, but thought to myself, "how many times can I enjoy a churro in a Peruvian prison?" It was actually the best churro I have ever had. We enjoyed some more treats and I tried to just keep smiling. Just as I was thinking to myself what a nice, happy little celebration this is, the main social worker stood up to close the ceremony. That was fine. But then, one of the men stood up to say a few words. He was the nice man in the maroon sweater who had smiled at me earlier.

As he spoke, I was over come with emotions. Of course he was speaking in Spanish, so I didn´t understand every word, but I was still touched by the sincerity in his speech. He first said thank you on be half of all of the men and his gratitude is what made me choke up. He continued. My lip quivered. He spoke of how many of their children had gone on with their lives and have forgotten them. Now, I had to turn around and open my eyes really wide to hold the tears back. I looked around at the faces of the other men and thought of how I won´t be with my own father on Father´s Day. However, I get to celebrate later with him. And next year too. However, I wondered when the last time they were with their own children at their own houses for Father´s Day. Or for a birthday. Or for their child´s birthday. I was glad I could be there to celebrate with them. I thought my dad would like this gift better than anything I could have bought or done for him.

Another man spoke too, and by this time I could see the red in a few of the other men´s eyes. Wow, I almost lost it at this point. Several men came up to us after the ceremony to thank and hug us. I was touched by their appreciation and I just wished I could have done more. All I could really do was stand there and smile. I also forgot for several moments that we were in a jail. They were just old men and I didn´t see them as criminals. I even wished they didn´t have to be in here for so long.

For So Long, Honeybrowne

Single Ladies

Negative Nancy from yesterday is gone and optimistic Elizabeth is back!

I switched my placement today and this morning went with one of the other volunteers, Logan, to an all girls private school--Mercedes I liked it SO much better. Just walking into the place instantly made me feel more calm. We were greeted by the school´s assistant head and he enjoyed talking with us for a long time. I practiced my Spanish and am feeling more and more confident everyday. He was interested in why I don´t teach my students to read and write in Spanish (because they are just learning to do this in English). I did reassure him that they begin learning to speak Spanish.

Normally, we would be teaching English, but today they were busy getting ready for their Father´s Day celebration tomorrow. Thus, Logan showed me around the school and we enjoyed speaking with the little girls. The would surround us when they saw us and were eager to talk to us (though many were shy at first).

I think this will be a much better place for me and I am looking forward to the next two weeks there.

Single Ladies, Beyonce

Hey, Hey

So I haven´t felt moments of frustration like I did today in a long time. Andersen Kindergarten--don´t recommend it.

It all started Monday when I finally got to go to my actual placement--Andersen Kindergarten. The school had been closed last week because they were on vacation. Within minutes of my arrival Monday, I was left alone with about 11 five year olds, 10 three and four year olds, and a few more six and seven year olds. All of the teachers and the director of the school were having a meeting, so I was left to fend for myself. (I just still can´t understand why they would wait until all of the kids were at school to have this meeting. The kids only go until 12:30, why not then?)

I will tell you that my thoughts of, "I can handle this" proved to be totally wrong. Children were running all around the tiny courtyard. The were hitting each other and wrestling, standing on the tables, and certainly not listening to a word I said. At one point, when I tried to break up one of the many "fights," one child attempted to bite me. Well, he actually did bite me but luckily my trusty North Face fleece was between my skin and his teeth. I did however get a nice bit of slobber all over my sleeve. I did not even know how to react. Turns out though that this same child would attempt to bite me on Tuesday too.

After what seems like an eternity, the teachers returned and got everyone situated in their own little seats. While the teacher in my class gave a long lecture and reading lesson, some of the children wandered around the room, yelled out, and walked out to go to the bathroom with no regard for what she was saying. Didn´t seem to bother her though. I sat in the back of the room in shock.

Tuesday was slightly better for two reasons:
1) I was given a task of handwriting the homework into each child´s notebook. Copying Spanish in cursive takes longer than I would guess.
2)I had resigned myself to the chaos. If the adults weren´t going to worry about the kids hitting each other, then I was going to try not to either.

Today, however, almost brought me to tears. The day started out with the teacher telling me that a wisdom tooth was coming in her mouth so she couldn´t talk a lot. Great. Then she tells me that I am going to teach my English lesson first thing. We were supposed to be reviewing the shapes, and then learning the parts of the face. Well, I am pretty sure most of the kids had diffculty knowing these words in Spanish let alone trying to identifying them in English. Oh well, here we go.

So I am "teaching" in my broken Spanish to a bunch of kids with blank looks on their faces. After several tries of repeating all of the words and drawing them on the board, I decide they need to stand up and move around, so I tell them to come play Simon says with me. I am trying to play with them and pointing to parts of my face and say them in English. Do any of them have any idea what is going on? Do I? One kid (same one as always) is not paying attention and wandering around the room. I make him sit by himself and tell him that he can´t play because he isn´t listening. He pouts. I wonder to myself it is the first time he has been told he can´t do that.

Now we are going to draw a funny face using shapes. I give them paper and tell them to write their names on the top. Can any of them even write their own names? Turns out, some can and some can´t. I give them instructions to use different shapes to draw a face. Could they even do this if I were speaking perfect Spanish...maybe, maybe not.

Ah, finally time for snack and recess. Though it seems like around that school all the time is time for recess. Another hour of chaos (which I try to ignore just like the other adults around are doing...it´s hard to do). Luckily, I don´t wear a watch so that I can´t watch the minutes tick away. One child keeps laughing inside in the most high ear-piercing voice you have ever heard. The floor and walls are all concrete so there is nothing to muffle the sound. The teacher says nothing. It happens again and again. The teacher says nothing. Finally, I can´t stand it and tell him to stop. He doesn´t really listen. Of course, why would he listen to an adult.

After we finish writing the homework in all of the notebooks, the teacher collects all the kids and gets them seated in their little red chairs again. She is telling them in Spanish that now they are going to review left and right with me. I get the feeling she is going to leave me alone. YEP, she does. Oh, but she tells me she will be right back. Right, just like you told me on Monday. You would think I could handle a room full of five year olds, but nope, you and I are both wrong. It is really difficult to tell them what to do when you don´t really speak enough of their language AND when they DON´T listen anyway. The order deteriorates quickly, and even the stickers the teacher left with me to bribe the kids to behave don´t work. In fact, one child proceeds to rip part of the sticker sheet out of my hands. Not really sure whether to scream, run, hide or just watch, I stood in shock for several minutes. Finally, I went out to find the teacher. I tell her in Spanish that I need help and they are not listening. She comes back and makes them sit with their heads on their desks. I just stood with my arms crossed and really could not even speak. Even though I knew it was getting close to pick up time, I wanted to run out of the school and find my own way back to the volunteer house. (Really, the thought did cross my mine).

Thank goodness---I see Pancho walking into the school to pick me up!!! SAVED! I don´t think I have ever been so happy to see someone as I was to see Pancho there to get me this morning. I muttered a fast good-bye and walked to Pancho´s car as quickly as I could. All I could manage to say to Pancho was, "today was muy mal, muy mal." I seriously needed a minute to collect myself because I wasn´t sure if I was going to yell or cry.

Finally, I was able to tell Pancho about my frustrations, but felt so bad for complaining. He reassured me that other volunteers had had many problems at that school too and he would talk to Rudy, the CCS program manager, about it. I planned to talk to Rudy about it too.

Right before lunch Rudy found me and offered to switch my placement. I think I am going to take him up on it. I just have to decide where to go. There are many other schools that seem like better options. I want to help, not waste my time or theirs.

Hey, Hey, Honeybrowne