Vacation

Hey all,

The title of this post is vacation, but that´s not strictly true as the first half of the week we had meetings in Pacasmayo, a coastal town in the north about 26 hours from my capital city by bus. I actually didn´t really go to many of them, because I got sun-burned badly the day we got in, got ill from bad seafood I ate soon thereafter, and already had a pretty bad cough and congestion problem. I then slept funny from the sunburn and couldn´t move my neck for three days. So, all in all it was a pretty bad few days, although I did get to hang out some with some folks I hadn´t seen in three months.
On Wednesday we had a Thanksgiving dinner together with most of the traditional dishes. That was really nice, as I think a lot of people were missing that Thanksgiving meal and fellowship. We all then scattered, the majority going to Trujillo, a famous beach to the south to soak up some sun and just relax together. That was a bit better of a time, although I still wasn´t feeling perfect. Now, on the way back to my site, I finally feel pretty good. Go figure.
It was great getting to see the other volunteers that are so far to the north and get a change of pace from our cold, very campo (backwoods- country) sites. Still, I´ll looking forward to getting back and finishing up the school year as well as starting some new projects for the winter. The rain is fast a-coming, and that will really change up how I work, probably for the slower. Still, I will do my best to fill my time and keep checking in with everyone.

Catch-up

Hey,

Missed this weekend´s installment. This week will be a quick one, as we are soon off to the sunny beaches of the North for our Reconnect meetings, which will catch us up on everything our training classmates have been up to over the last three months. We will be four down from when we started training, which is a bummer, but it´ll be nice to see everyone that is still kicking in site.
The school year is also wrapping up, with yesterday being my last day in the primary school. It was nice to get a little love from the students on my last day and I´m already looking forward to next year when I´ll have completed my new English curriculum. Still, it´s nice to have a break to work on other projects. I have two more classes with the high school and 3-4 more for inicial, and then it´s summer vacation! The only problem is that is when the rains will come, so I´ll be pretty much cooped up with my work for a few months.
Well, I´ll be sure to update with how the meetings went when I return and get back to talking about random subjects...

History

Hello all,

This week I didn’t accomplish a whole lot. School wasn’t in session on Monday and the Spanish agency AS had to postpone for Tuesday, making my Thursday meeting moot. So I did a lot of sitting around when I wasn’t in school the rest of the week, either in my house or waiting for the various members of the local government to coordinate a few things. Next week will have to be extra busy because I have a lot to prepare for my residential tourism organization.

I realized this week that I have not yet talked about the history of Peru. I’m no expert, but I can fill in a few details that should give some background on the country and where it is today. It once boasted one of the largest empires in the Americas, the Incan, which was particularly impressive because they governed an empire of thousands of square miles despite never having developed writing. Their heritage and language, Quechua, is still evident today, along with famous ruins like Machu Picchu.

What brought about their downfall, as with most of the indigenous empires of the Americas, was the arrival of the Spanish. Francisco Pizarro was in charge of the expedition and taking advantage of warring factions quickly captured the Incan emperor, Atahualpa. He demanded a room full of gold and silver as ransom, and after receiving what he asked for he killed the emperor anyway. Soon after this he made Lima his capital, which a change from the Incan capital of Cuzco, and it became one of the richest and most influential capitals in the world due to the natural resources of the country.

Peru gained its independence from Spain in 1824, although it was announced in 1821, due to Argentine General San Martin, part of an independence movement sweeping the continent. In the late 1800s Peru fought and lost a bitter war with Chile, which still colors their relations today. That is about all I know of Peruvian history until the 1980s.

The 80s were a difficult time for Peru, due to several blunders by young President Alan Garcia, including trying to change the currency. Alan Garcia was actually reelected for a second term and is President now once again. These years are vividly remembered by the population today, and I’ve heard stories of kids not going to school to wait in bread and milk lines for their families. These times spawned several domestic terrorism movements that locked down the country and are also often recounted by people around here, although this area wasn’t touched too much. Refugees from the most affected areas are one of the reasons for Lima’s rapid population growth, to a bustling city of 8 million now.

After Garcia came Japanese-Peruvian economist Alberto Fujimori. He defeated inflation that was well over 100% and all but destroyed the several terrorist movements in the country, making him one of the most popular presidents in Peruvian history to some areas of the country. The bad of his presidency was the methods he used to crack down on terrorism, many of which were down right illegal and contra human rights. This is why he is now on trial for human rights abuses. There aren’t many world figures that have been such a mixed blessing, and he still has his fair share of supporters and detractors.

Things have taken a turn for the better after Fujimori, even though his successors Toledo and Garcia are two of the most unpopular presidents in their history. Peru has an excellent rate of economic growth now and things are looking up, although there is still much work to be done, especially in rural areas outside of the capital.

Chivay

Hello all,

This week was pretty much the same old same old as far as work goes. I tried to meet with my artesans but they were no-shows, so I had to content myself with the schools and teaching computers to the Water Commission (Comision de Regantes)- which is the most important group in town because they regulate water usage for irrigation purposes in the fields. I´m in the capital city of Arequipa right now for my monthy meetings and we´re going to grill out American style tonight, which should be a good time. Tuesday I´m going to try to get somewhere to watch or track the election results, but other than that this should be a standard month until Reconnect, where all of my class will be getting together to find out what exactly we´ve been doing so far... definitely looking forward to that.
This week I think I’ll talk about Chivay, the closest city of any size, although it is probably better classified as a town. It is pretty much the only place to get most of the amenities of modern civilization such as internet, consumer products and food, or contact with the governmental resources that are necessary to get big projects off the ground here.
Chivay has maybe 20,000 people, a pretty sizeable town square with a beautiful white adobe church, and a bustling tourist trade as it sits at the end of the highway from Arequipa and at the mouth of Colca Canyon. It is pretty much the portal for the canyon and has all the connecting transportation for the region as well as plenty of hotels and adventure sports agencies.
I try to get in once a week to meet up with the other volunteers in the canyon, buy a few things I need, and check my email and the news. I also get my weekly shower in at La Calera, the regional hot springs. My town does not have a showerhead in it to the best of my knowledge, so I’m pretty much dependent on the hot springs or ice cold bucket baths to stay clean. La Calera is a complex of 5 or 6 pools, indoor and outdoor, and compartmented into the more expensive tourist baths and those for locals. I’ve been able to convince the staff by my frequent presence that I indeed live in the canyon so I can use the local baths. The water is quit hot and the showers, though public, do the trick.