Foxes, Earth Day, and Peanuts

So, we have this plastic covering on the ceiling of our room so that mud doesn´t fall down from the adobe roof. There´s lots of little animals that like to scurry around on top of the plastic. For about two days, I heard this wierd sound somewhere on the floor of our room. I found this little one. S/he apparently fell from the plastic, because it could barely move. I felt so bad for the little thing, so I moved it into the bushes outside hoping the mommy would find it. When my family found out, they killed it because apparently they like to eat little chickens. They called it a ¨zorro¨, but it is clearly not a fox. So, we have no idea what it is. R.I.P. little one!!

By far the coolest thing to happen in the month of April here in Sicchez, Peru...hearing ¨The Never Ending Story¨ playing over the radio while preparing dinner one fine evening. I know I don´t need to explain how cool that was! We get one Peruvian and one Ecuadorian radio station in Sicchez. Up here in the northern sierra of Peru, there is a very distinct local music, not what most of you would consider ¨Latin American¨ music with rich African beats and horn sections. It´s more like a cross between cumbia and wayno (a type of music very common in the northern and central Peruvian sierra, and no, not the Andean flute genre we generally associate with the Andes). Compared to Central American countries, Peruvian music and dance – especially in the sierra – lacks the soultry, fluid, hip-swiveling qualities. It´s more of an upper-body-stiff, move back and forth, stomp the feet in a complex pattern kind of thing. Locals don´t like salsa or merengue all that much. The best way to describe wayno, as heard by my foriegn ears, is like opening a child´s music box and hearing a high-pitched voice singing along with the music. Okay, maybe a more objective way for you to understand would be to search some sound bytes on the internet. Actually, I´ve gotten pretty good at dancing wayno, and am learning to appreciate the subtle fluctuations in the music.

We taught some Sicchenans how to play charades (spelling??). It was a hoot!! We stayed up until 5 am drinking and dancing, the classic northern sierra style of course!!

Earth Day
We organized an Earth Day celebration with the local kinder, primary and secondary schools. What to say.....we gained a lot of insights and revelations. To start, we held meetings with local authorities (principals, agro-tech for the municipality, govenor, mayor, head of the health center, and others who did not show up) to delegate tasks to help prepare for the event. I held environmental education classes with every grade in both schools for a month leading up to Earth Day to teach the kids about trash, contamination, the ¨network¨of nature, etc. We made signs to carry in a parade with the kiddos and secured donations from the local stores for prizes for a clean-up contest. The day started with a parade around town with all the school kids, their signs, and their modest band. We ended in the main plaza where I gave a broken-language talk on Earth Day and how the kids have the power to affect change, etc, ¿¿what did she say?? Then each grade was assigned a sector of the caserio to pick up trash on the street. Met with great enthusiasm, kids went everywhere – literally everywhere...even the town dump!!! – to collect the most trash in order to win the contest. Selected seniors from the high school (actually, they only go up to 11th grade in Peru) weighed the trash from each grade and selected the winner. We were going to plant lettuce seeds with each class after, but by then the school day was over. Lots of kids stayed around to play volleyball and soccer. I planted seeds with every class during the next couple of days.
The positive aspects of the event: the community knows about Earth Day, some kids are now really motivated to have an environmental club, the streets lookd clean (if at least for a day), the kids are more aware of the trash situation in Sicchez, and Brian and I now know all of the kiddos (who are by far the most fun to work with).


The kindergarten at our Earth Day parade!! So CUTE!

All the kiddos marching around town.

Kiddos waiting to start the cleam-up contest in the Plaza de Armas.

Dedicated youth!!

Sorry for all the pics, I just love these kiddos!

Very proud of thier creative trach-collecting techniques (these guys went to the dump to collect it), some boys pose with their plethora of solid waste.

My host sister is in the pink hat.

One great plesure of Sícchez - making home-made peanut butter from fresh-roasted peanuts grown in a local village. We toast the peanuts in a pan (collecting pools of saliva beneath my mouth as the smell inundates my senses) and put them through a molina to grind them up. Add a tiny bit of oil and salt and the joy begins.

Yes, still rainy. This mud slide occurred about 3 days ago on our way back from visiting another volunteer the next county over (about a 2 hr bus ride). Brian got out and helped them shovel the heavy liquidy mud. It took about 2 hours to make a path big enough for the bus to get by.

The manifestation of love. They have no idea we´re gonna eat ´em.

Last Part, I Swear:

We also completed –YAY!!! – our community diagnostic and presented the data and accompanying conclusions to the authorities. It was really great. We shared a lot of data about health, trash, deforestation, nutrition, living conditions, etc. For example, I did a calculation estimating how many trees Sicchenans cut down every year in the district to frame the problems they have with deforestation. Even the authorities are not accustomed to thinking in quantitative terms, and were taken aback by the numbers. They know there are problems, but don´t really apply the same analytic skills as Westerners tend to use in the problem-solving process. In the end, a lot of people were (are) motivated to work with us to help improve the community.
Some things we learned during the meeting: based upon the skills demonstrated by community members with respect to being proactive in their own development, the purpose of our work here leads to a more hidden realm. If we are to really be of service, we must help develop leadership within the youth, help the local leaders develop systems of accountability, and teach the community how to find and utilize local resources to support projects. They don´t need resources or other people to do things for them. They need to develop their own self-sufficiency. Forever the idealist, I can´t really tell you how Brian and I will actually work in this regard. It´s a lot more ephemeral and harder to define. Part of our answer lies in defining success in smaller bits. If I can create a community-based trash committee that continues to function after I´m gone, and nothing else, I´d be extremely successful. If Brian gets three families with pregnant moms to have functioning, sustainable gardens who eat their vegetables – and the babies are not malnutritioned after three years – he will have acheieved success.

Anyway, if you´re looking for funny stories, lobby Brian to add to the blog. He´s got lots of them and is a hell of a lot funnier person than I am. As you all know, I tend to think too much and as a result you get to read more boring Angela entries. If you really want a funny story, ask Brian about how two roosters outsmarted him! Classic!!