People Pics

As requested by family members, here´s some pictures of Brian and I at our swearing in ceremony. (Don´t worry mom, I did have a nice skirt on for the ceremony but changed as quickly as possible due to the 8 million bug bites I acquired on my legs during the ceremony.) Yes, we´re now official Peace Corps Volunteers. Everything was going well until our host family started crying as we left. It was really sad, as they are the reason why we stayed healthy and happy these past three months. We´ll miss their laughs and all of their genuine kind support.... The pictures are of us with either training faculty, Chosica neighbors, or other volunteers (the bottom is our host family and the guy in th red shirt is the daughter´s boyfriend).

Top Three Spanish Words

My three favorite words.....they just don´t have an equivalent in English without laboriously explaining yourself!!

3) Falta
·used for just about everything, kind of means that something is lacking. For example: ¨falta mas¨ = we have more to go, or ¨falta tres¨ = there´s three left, or ¨falta Brian¨ = Brian´s not here, or ¨falta esos¨ = these aren´t right yet.....etc. Pretty useful, hugh?!?

2) Demorar
·means the amount of time something takes or lasts. For example: ¨Angela demora mucho¨ = Angela taks a lot of time, or ¨quanto demora¨ = how much time will it take? One word for an entire phrase in English - exciting!!!

1) Aprovechar - the absolute best word in Spanish!!! I just love it because it´s so forward-looking and positive.
·means to take advantage of something in a positive way (well, mostly positive). For example: ¨aprovecha el tiempo¨ = use time to your advantage, or ¨aprovecha el sol¨ = enjoy the sun while you still have it, or in my case, ¨aprovecha el Peru¨ = do everything I can to make sure I get the best out of Peru possible.

*****DISCLAIMER****** My deepest apologies to all of my fluent Spanish speaking friends who will probably say that I have no clue whatsoever about the Spanish language and that I´m completely misusing my favorite words. But, as Helen The Linguist knows, I can aprovechar my right to turn their meanings into anything I want since language is subjective anyway! :)

Enjoy!!!

Sweet, sweet classroom memories

Ya know, classroom aren´t all that different around the world. Brian and I gave a class on self-esteem to some third graders in our barrio. They had never heard of it, so we first did a play about the issue and then modeled a ¨self portriat¨. In the drawing, the kids were supposed to draw a picture of themselves including all of the things that they feel they are good at/like to do. I´m not so sure I want to translate this kiddo´s drawing, but the same would always happen in my classroom in the states too. Except that we´d have to turn the drawing into the school counselor. Albeit, the sweetie was quite proud, and I´m sure that was good for his self-esteem!!

Sleep, guinea pigs, and organic coffee

Okay, first the photos (left to right, top to bottom):

Brian with our host brother in Chosica, a nursery in Sicchez (Piura) where a grower association is raising trees to reforest their fields, a typical view of where we will be living (green hills all around...pretty!!), playing volleyball in the rain in the town center of Sicchez (can you find the gringa?), the road leading up to our house in Sicchez (the smoke is from the fire for breakfast - they cook with firewood), a garden at the local school, a typical view of a road in Sicchez, our new home, school kids in Chosica (Brian and I gave a lesson on self esteem), our host sister and brother in their uncanny sleeping positions.

Our site visit to Sicchez was awesome, kind of like we walked into a Peace Corps dream village. A seven hour bus ride from Piura city takes you up into the hills that get greener and greener the higher you go. Our site is at about the same altitude as Denver. Every hill in site is completely covered by agriculture, the people there take advantage of every square inch of land. It´s a bit strange to the eyes at first, we´re so used to seeing mountains with intact forest. They mostly grow sugar cane, coffee, bananas, mangoes, avocados, chirimoya (deeeelicious), papaya, and other fruits in their fields. There is an intact forest just beyond our caserio (pueblo) that one can explore...we can´t wait to check it out!! There are other caserios nearby, and Sicchez is kind of like the ¨city¨that governs the other little pueblos. The closest caserio is about a 45 minute walk away. The climate is subtropical, with a 3-4 month rainy season between January and March/April.

Brian and I were treated with such respect and kindness during our visit. About an hour after meeting our new family, we went to a meeting with all of the community leaders. They had so many kind words for us and are very motivated to better their community. We all introduced ourselves, shared some sugar cane liquor and ate dinner (chicken with some vegetables). Over the next two days we were showed around the town and learned all about how things are organized. There is a strong association of organic coffee and sugar cane growers in Sicchez. They work with an NGO to export their product; these same growers are working the the NGO to reforest their farms. Sicchez is extremely proud of their organic products and the leaders of the community have a slowly developing sense of environmental consciousness. They also have a organic milk and yogurt project that some older students of the local school are working on and an organic garden in the secondary school. It seems like the community is very united and organized, but I think our work will lie in tying the vision held by the community leaders into everyday action taken by the people themselves. Even in a town with organic coffee and a garden in the school, there is a lot to do with bettering the projects they already have, waste management, viviendas saludables (healthy rural homes), nutrition, education, and helping them to develop these goals sustainably.

Our family is very cute and kind, the grandma of age 83 has infinite energy - she cooks, cleans and generally runs the home. Our room is a bit small but big enough for a bed, dresser, and gas burner for cooking. There are no vegetables in Sicchez, and only a tiny store with basic provisions. So we´ll have to travel 7 hours to Piura once a month to stock up on Angela-approved food.

Our visit also included a meeting with the town leaders of a nearby caserio who also want us to work with them, equipped with sugar cane liquor and beer to quench our thirst. I´ve never sat and drank in a municipality before, but as I said, it´s almost impossible to explain how very hospitable and kind the people of Peru are. The night before we left, the town of Sicchez had a party for us complete with dancing, drinking, and traditional food. As usual, Brian and I had huge plates of food while the others had tiny servings. And the biggest honor of all, guinea pig (¨cuy¨ in Spanish). It was only served to us, as it is considered a delicacy. Yes, the whole animal (head, feet, toenails, rib cage, innards) served up on a plate with potatoes. I had to eat it, as to refuse that kind of generosity would not look so good. We did our best to peel away all of the skin and take out the little meat that existed. Brian is a trooper, but I don´t think he was too crazy about it. The evening ended with beautiful words about how lucky they are to have us and how excited they are to work with us. They are also very excited to meet any and all of our family and friends intrepid enough to journey there. I have to say, it is WELL worth the 7 hour bus ride from Piura to see this beautiful and friendly town!!! We reeeeealy hope you come visit us here!!

In general, Brian and I are excited to just settle in and get our lives situated. These last two weeks of training are kind of gratuitous in my opinion, but we´ll definitely have some sad feelings upon leaving our family in Lima. The first three months in Sicchez we will be doing a baseline study of the community (a diagnostic) --- yes my fellow teachers, it´s data based pedagogy all over again!!! It´s a really good thing though, because that way we will have a more complete view of our community before we make decisions about how to approach different projects. It´s a good way to integrate into the community to since we´ll be mapping, making house visits, conducting interviews, following people during their day, etc. It´s actually exactly like teaching in that you collect lots of data, make decisions, follow through with them, and analyze whether or not you were effective. Peace Corps is not turning out to be a hippie-free-for-all, it´s a pretty legitimate and serious development organization (that sentence is for you, Smith!!) There will definately not be a lack of work.

Also, if you are now tantalized to visit our fair caserio, e-mail me and I can send some dates that the town has festivals and celebrations.

Miss you all!!!

Piura!!!

In three weeks Brian and I will be settling in...our new home, Sicchez, Piura. In fact, we´ll almost be Ecuadorians! About 1,500 inhabitants live in Sicchez, it´s tucked in the Andean foothills and is very green. They grow sugar cane, coffee, bananas, and do small animal husbandry for income. And very hot at 4 degrees south latitude (with a rainy season to boot). In theory, I´ll be working with the municipality on agroecology and reforestation. Brian will ensure the health of all inhabitants. Our tentative family consists of a couple living with their parents. We´ll have electricity, running water a few days a week, and a public phone. All info points to the fact that we´ll have a relatively large room with it´s own entrance with a space to cook (we´d have to buy the stove and stuff - which is generally cheap). If you´re interested in visiting us, be prepared - it´s a 7 hour bus ride from the capital city of Piura. Next week Brian and I will go to Sicchez for seven days to meet our community contacts and stay with our family.
We´re extremely excited and also incredibally overwhelmed right now. The training calendar leaves little room to feel human sometimes, the ¨you are a volunteer 24-7¨mentality. Lots, lots, lots of assignments and requirements.
Aunt Joyce, thanks a million for your letters!! Can you post a comment and tell me what days are good to call you at home during the evening?

El Bosque Seco

Last week Brian and I took a trip up north to check out different sites. Since he´s health and I´m enviornment, we went to separate Departments (like states in the US). He went to Piura to visit different volunteers. I went to Lambayeque to learn all about the economy and ecology of the dry forest (bosque seco). Since I´m the one with the camera, you guys get to hear more about my trip to Lambayeque. It´s an understatement to call it dry. It´s really dry. The main tree is called the "algarroba", it´s a mesquite. I was excited to find that ficas grow under them - I´ve always wondered what the natural habitat of my houseplants are (Anya, you have my fica tree). There is no ground cover between the trees, but in areas that aren´t already disturbed/destroyed there are lots of shrubs. Like any desert, the bosque seco has lots of life if you pay close attention. It isn´t obvious at first look.

The people there live a very rural lifestyle. They mostly do animal husbandry and small scale farming for substience, but therein lies the problem. There´s no water, and like in the rainforest, people cut down the forest to make space for farmland. There´s one small area that is officially protected by the government, but every area of the bosque seco (protected or not) is subject to "invaders" who cut the trees for firewood (they ALL cook with firewood) or who want to clear a space to live. Some communities are organzied and have volunteer groups that patrol their area, but most are not. The volunteers in the bosque seco are mostly working with communities to develop economically viable means of living sustainably in the dry forest. We talked with beekeepers and visited a site that has a tree nursery. The nursery has algarrobos for reforestation, and lots of other fruit trees. The intention is to sell some trees and plant the others so that they can sell the fruit. The main goal is not to replace what they already do, but facilitate the development of a diversified income source. That way, when one thing fails, they have other options. And it´s easier on the environment.

I stayed with a different family each night in the campo (countryside). I have experienced nothing short of extremely generous hospitality with the Peruvians that I meet. The people I stayed with do not have much: no electricity, running water, etc. and are so willing to share all that they have to offer. Often times, I would be served a huge plate of food while the rest of the family shared a single bowl of rice and some chicken. I feel so grateful to all of the families that we met, as it must be hard to open your home to a bunch of strangers who come from a completely different standard of living.

We will finally discover our assignment next Tuesday and will promptly post the big news. Our Spanish is for sure improving, but it just feels like there´s such a long way to go. I did tell my first impromptu joke in Spanish and made everyone laugh. It felt like I won a contest, I was so elated to have told my first ¨second language¨ joke!

Again, here are some unorganized pictures of my trip to Lambayeque. If someone out there knows how to post pictures on blogspot in an orderly fashion with captions, PLEASE HELP!! I also realize that some of them are small and you can´t magnify them, I blame the computer I happen to be using at the moment, although I know Krista and Doug (for that matter ALL of our computer literate friends) will secretly know that I truly don´t know how to manage a machine.

p.s. The pictures of the dry forest with the big dirt hills are actually ruins of a 2,000 year old culture (pre-Incan)

Love you all!!

La Presidente and her First Man

Here are the pictures that I didn´t post last time....

Quite a surprise today: Ang was elected president of the Peru 10 (our group) Junta Directiva (association). I didn´t campaign, but maybe it was Brian´s good looks that got me in. It doesn´t really signify too much, we`re just practicing how associations work in Peru.

We´ve been going to a ton of festivals and we´re begining to learn that one can always find a festival in Peru. And they are usually week-long parties with parades, dancing, contests, ect.

Last weekend we went to a festival in our little barrio. They were celebrating one of the many saints. They had live bands playing ¨wino¨music - a really unique sound from the sierra with it´s own dance to boot. Lots of chicha (fermented drink), beer, dancing, and a completely crazy and dangerous fireworks show. Suffice it to say that we were covering our heads from the little sparks flying everywhere. And the big one didn´t happen until 4 am. Good times!!

Ang has decided to ditch the ¨conform to the food¨route after a day wretching in bed after some admittedly delicious home-made ceviche (¨raw¨ fish cooked in lime juice, onion, ginger, and garlic). It´s actually pretty easy to eat vegetarian here and her body is waging a war against meet.

We had our language proficiency tests today. We both improved and are stoked at being able to talk like 5 and a half year olds now!!

Thanks for the comments, we love you so much!!

Also, feel free to email us too. We are by no means limited to blogworld only.

Goodbye Frisbee

Peru swallows frisbees like nobody´s business! The kids in our town were stoked to play with such a cool new toy... for about 5 minutes before it ended up on the roof of the tienda (store) next to our house. Now it´s back to soccer matches that are more akin to a circus of gringoes with balls rolling between their legs. At least it´s good exercise! You can just barely make out the frisbee in the picture above.
We live in a little barrio outside of Chosica (picture above). Basically, Chosica is along a busy road that follows the River Rimac up out of Lima into the mountains. It´s a complete and unabashed desert here. The foothills do not have a single plant on them, completely rock. I think the only rain on this side of the Andes comes in the form of occasional floods. Our barrio, like most of them, was formed by squatters about 40 years ago by the employees of a nearby country club. Lots of folk from Lima come up here because there´s more sun here during the winter (Lima is locked in with constant cloud cover). Our barrio has about 1,000 families. The main road is dirt, there´s a school, health post, church, and a bunch of tiendas. Every day we have about a 15 minute butt buster walk up a hill to our house. Of course, lots of dogs to guide the way.
The Peace Corps training center is a 10 minute bus ride from our home in a different neighborhood. The busses are called combis and they play really loud music. It actually reminds me a lot of India with the music blasing out of a vehicle filled to 400% capacity. Basically every day we have 4 hours of language class a day and 4 hours of technical training. It´s going well, there´s a lot to learn. The whole language thing can be pretty exhausting, as there´s really no true rest until your head hits the pillow. It´s a lot like being a child again. I feel so dependent on others for so many of my basic needs: food, where to go, how to get there, when to do things, ect. Not to mention that we basically have the vocabulary of a 5 year old with which to communicate. It´s hard to give up so much independence!
That said, our language is defiantely progressing. Our host family is so kind and takes the time to explian everything about five different ways so we know what they´re talking about. They are truly about the LOVE - so kind and truly good people. We spend so much time talking and laughing together every night. They love to joke around and will even kill the moment by explaining exactly WHY something is funny.
In the beginning our family worried a lot about what to cook since Ang is a veg, but Peruvian food is actually really basic. Quinoa, rice, rice, rice, rice, vegetables, fruit (it´s been fun trying all the different types of new fruit), potatoes, potatoes, potatoes, and rice. Breakfast is super small, some bread and juice. Usually we eat the same thing for lunch and dinner. Our host family (the wife) makes tamales to sell to the barrio every Sunday. They are KILLER!! We put up a picture of Ang tying some of them togther. They´re basically corn meal, chicken boullion, hot pepper, and spices with a piece of chicken, onion, and an olive wrapped up into a banana leaf and steamed for two hours. We eat them every Sunday for breakfast. We also put up a picture of the 1 year old with mango all over his cute little face.
Last weekend, the local school had a dance for the community. Each class dressed in traditional clothing and did a dance from different regions of the country. Two of the kids in our family, 8 and 13, danced. It was pretty awesome (pics above).
Oh yeah, we found out that we´ll be placed somewhere in the north of Peru, but we don´t know exactly where yet. We should know within three weeks.
Sorry about taking the snail mail address off. I was informed that it´s agains the rules to post specific addresses on a blog. I´ll email out to you Krista and AM. If anyone else wants to know it, let me know and I´ll email it. We also learned that it costs 3 DOLLARS to send a LETTER, so I´m not so sure that it is a viable means of communication for us.

Esperate! Falta!

Translation = wait! there´s more to come!
We´ve got lots of funny stories and some great pictures...I´ll try to work on the blog this week. Right now, Brian is what they say ¨con la bicicleta¨ (I´ve gotta go help him find the bathroom again).
No, really, we´re so extremely busy that it´s hard to find time for leisure.... More to come this week...

The Dust Is Starting To Settle

¿Que tal amigos? We are finally here in our humble town and officially beginning training. Let´s just say that beginning a new life somewhere foreign has been a bit different than travelling. Overwhelming may be an appropriate word.

Our trip to D.C. was awesome, Brian´s uncle Dennis showed us around town and we spent much quality time with Brian´s sister´s family: Jenny, Joe, Payton and Owen. Nephews are a blast!! I got in trouble in front of the Department of Education building for taking a picture, but I´m posting it here and thus calling the photo: ¨No teacher left behind¨

We are in a small barrio an hour outside of Lima. There are lots of hills that are completely barren, only rock, as it is a desert here and apparantly never rains. Our host family is amazing! They love to joke (most of them over our language deficient heads) and laugh all of the time. We´ve spent hours every night talking together. They have four kids, two boys and two girls, ages 1, 3, 8, and 13. Brian and I have our own room that is quite nice with a bed, dresser and desk. We do have electricity and running water, although no hot water. Quick showers!!

Since we are immersed in Spanish every day at home, plus language lessons that are all in Spanish, plus Spanish training sessions, we´re doing relatively well and improving each day. It can be quite frustrating to speak like a three year old, but I hope that within three months we´ll be ready to rock.

Sorry about the photo technical difficulties, I can´t figure out how to put them where I want with captions. Brian is in our room, and the other is of the training center where we spend our days.

We love you all!!

Alamosa Party

Hey friends!! We had such a BLAST over Labor Day weekend! Thanks to everyone who made the trek down to Alamosa to hang out with us. Brian and I think we can remember about 75% of the weekend. Sand Dunes, hiking, hot springs, rattle snakes, coyotes, jack rabbits, fires, food, libations, and tons of laughs.

Love it!!! I'm going to try this picture thing out....enjoy :)

Pre Departure Info

Heya! We're scheduled to depart for D.C. on Sept. 9th. We'll have a few days of shots and lectures, then we're headed for Peru on Sept. 12th. More to come...
There will be 11 weeks of training about 60 min (by bus??) outside of Lima. During this time we take language classes, do field visits, learn skills for our assignments, etc. After all of this, the PC decides where to send us permamently. As far as we know, we'll be living with a family the whole time in Peru.
We're sure going to miss everyone!!!