Monday, June 30, 2008

Weekend

I don´t have anything educational to talk about right now, but I thought I´d let you all know what a typical weekend for me is, and how mine went.
Typically we have planned activities in the morning on Saturdays, and then have the rest of the day free to spend in Lima or return home. The next few Saturdays we´ll be in the agriculture university in Lima, learning about various topics such as animal husbandry and grain farming. This week we planted some vegetables out in the fields, tried various interesting fruits that are unheard of in the U.S., and took a tour of the greenhouses. The planting especially was interesting, and I wouldn´t mind doing some work with farmers, etc. at site. After that we kind of Americaned it up by going to the upscale Jockey Plaza center. We ate at Chiles and watched Get Smart in English just as a break from all of the cultural bombardment we´ve been having. It was fun, although next weekend I´d like to do some of the tourist stuff that Lima has to offer (visit the Cathedral, etc.)
Saturday night there was a festival that kept on going until early Sunday morning. I only was there for a small part and got to see the marching band wander through the streets, but not the other customs that I hear are pretty interesting. There is a festival at the end of July that I´ll be sure not to miss that is similar. What I did do was go to a cousin of my family´s party, did a little casual drinking, and got gifted a wooden spoon and a Chihuahua puppy to be named later. More on that later if anyone´s interested. Sunday I went with some compañeros to some 2 thousand year old pictographs sketched up in the mountains behind my community. They´re not well known, but older than the Nazca lines (and smaller). As always, pictures to come later. Sunday night I went to Chosica and hung out with my brother, his girlfriend, and her kids, which was nice. There was dancing in the square corresponding to different regions of Peru, which was interesting, and a giant illuminated white stone Christ statue that was the main draw of the town. Overall a pretty satisfying weekend, although I could have used a little more rest...

Friday, June 27, 2008

Geography

I thought I´d talk a little about geography today. Peru is one of the most diverse countries geographically in the world, with 50+ distinct microclimates and three basic zones. These are La Costa, or the coast, which is generally flatter with warm, humid weather, La Sierra, or the mountains/highlands, which has colder but wetter (three months of rain) weather, and La Selva, or the rainforest, which is what one would assume it would be like. There are also deserts, wetlands, plateaus, etc that fall into one of those three zones.
The Andes mountains cut through the country and are actually fairly close to the coast. This means that even the coast is a bit hilly, and I live on top of a giant, steep hill, which is fun walking up in the afternoon. Around me are dry mountains, not unlike Northern Mexico, where there is almost no vegetation and aren´t high enough for snow. It also is often foggy here, and a bit chilly at times as it is winter right now. Lima is in a bit of a depression, like Los Angeles, and the weather is usually pretty bad there, humid, cold and misty with a dash of pollution thrown in.
On the other side of the Andes is the rainforest, which covers a suprisingly large part of the country. There are no volunteers there for various reasons, and I´ll be placed either on the cost or in the mountains, which are generally more behind development-wise but whose beauty draws my interest more. I´ve lived in cities obviously, and am ready for something completely different (although ideally still with electricity- we´ll see). Anyway, the origin of the Amazon river is in Peru, which I hope to visit, as well as other natural attractions like Lake Titicaca, which I believe is the lake with the most elevation in the world, although I may be making that up. True or not, I´ve heard it is pretty impressive.
That´s about what I´ve learned. On the personal side, we´ve been doing a lot more hands on stuff in training lately, from giving charlas, or small lectures/chats over marketing basic business at a local instituto, or community college and visiting a coastal town that featured a beach complete with trash and a massive sea lion carcass (yes, I´ve got pictures). I know it´s winter, but trolling for dead animals might be worth the effort. As everywhere, city budgets are always a concern, though...

Monday, June 23, 2008

Architecture

After talking to my Pa among other folks I´ve decided to talk periodically about how various everyday things happen here. Stuff is already starting to look familiar to me, but this blog would be a whole lot more interesting to everybody else if I described the world I now live in more. Any opinions I may offer are pretty much half-formed and subject to change as I´ve only been here a couple of weeks, but I¨ll throw them down here anyway. It´ll be interesting to see later what stuff has changed and what has simply been reinforced. I got a question about architecture earlier, so I´ll tackle that now.
In Lima first off, there aren´t really any skyscrapers or modern buildings of note that I´ve seen so far. Everything seems to be held to ten stories or less, and old buildings are renovated and reused again and again instead of being torn down and rebuilt. This is good for the large amount of pre-U.S. architecture that is still around, but less so for the more slummy areas that may only be 40 or 50 years old. Lima also has a pretty interesting habit it seems of painting random blocks in a single pastel color. So, around the Plaza de Armas, which is the historical hub of the city, most of the buildings are yellow with black trim, and in the area where I bought my guitar most buildings are pastel blue with white trim. That is certainly a nice touch. There is also a large cerro, or small dirt/rock mountain, with a cross on top of it overlooking the city. I´ve heard the view is impressive and I´ll have to check it out some weekend coming up. Anyway, this hill has house built stacked upon house, each painted in a different pastel color. This is a really cool effect that´ll jump out at you as you´re walking down various streets in the city center.
As for the Plaza de Armas, the architecture is mostly 500+ years old. The Catedral is really impressive on the outside, designed by the conquistador and city founder Pizarro himself. The presidencial palace, which resembles a palace in every way, was built where Pizarro was murdered, which was probably a fitting end. The President apparently comes out a la the Pope every Tuesday (believe that´s the right day) he´s in town and waves to the many people in the Plaza de Armas. I¨ll talk politics and history some other time, preferably when I´ve learned more.
In my town, Yanacoto, there is a jumble of architecture. The house I´m in is really nice, with two levels, tile floors, and all the amenities of home except for hot water and toilets that can handle toilet paper (we use a wastebasket instead). You get used to that pretty quickly, although the frigid shower on a cold morning is still kind of rough. Many of the other homes are in various states of construction. This is because the people of this community seem to be very optimistic. Every house that doesn´t have a second level has rebar and bricks on top awaiting the money necessary to make a second level and beautify the facade. My friend Salvador lives in a house that certainly is more modern and prissied up than my own in the U.S. So, while there is much poverty in my town even, people are spending smart and putting together a pretty nice existence for themselves. As you climb the mountain from my house, the houses get smaller and poorer until you have shacks put together from whatever material was handy at the time. Often these are the same people that are working on a house below as they get the money until they have enough completed to move in. It´s very interesting comparing my living situation to that of other volunteers living in my town, most of whom aren´t nearly as spoiled as me. That´ll all change at site though, and I had probably better enjoy my plumbing while I have it...

Saturday, June 21, 2008

Lima

First off, it doesn´t hurt to throw the following down:

Disclaimer
This blog represents a personal Peace Corps narrative. The opinions expressed here are my responsibility and are not intended to reflect the official views or policies of the US Peace Corps.

This was stolen verbatim from one of my compañeros blogs, and it´s good to throw out there because we´ve been warned about what we post on our blogs. I don´t forsee putting up something that will reflect badly on the Peace Corps, but just in case...

Anway, I just got back from my second visit to Lima. We are technically not in Lima, but in one of the outlying towns. It takes about an hour and a half by very bumpy and stop and go bus to get to the city center. Traffic is insane here, with two lane roads being converted to three/three and a half lane ones with regularity. We actually are prohibited from driving during our term, but I wouldn´t if they let me. Anyway, the transportation situation isn´t ideal and can be intensely frustrating (like when I had to stand for more than an hour of the trip back from last week, exchanging what was pretty much tender embraces with the random other people packed like sardines with me). That was really the only bad experience, and if you get a seat you´ll find that the breakneck driving doesn´t bother you that much.

As for Lima, we had a few activities involving talking to people about the neighborhood, safety, etc, and then we were on our own. We started in Miraflores, where we were able to hunt down a Starbucks and later a Burger King. This is kind of sad to say, but both were really nice after just two weeks of new thing after new thing. Not that I have any complaints about the Peruvian food; as posted before it´s excellent. Miraflores is the definite nicest part of town, and besides the spectacular ocean view is a bit on the boring side sightseeing-wise. About the ocean, as I was looking at it it ocurred to me that I had never seen the Pacific Ocean before. The experience got all the cooler after that.

After our activities we went to the center of Lima, which was my second visit. We saw Catedral and the presidencial palace again and then broke up a bit. I went with two others, which was ideal because traveling in groups of more than three is more of a bother than it´s worth. One can get things done more efficiently and better enjoy the experience when there aren´t so many people yapping in your ear or pointing in opposite directions. Anyway, we went to the Iglesia San Francisco, a Franciscan church with a mudejar, or southern spanish, design. To see the architecture of Andalucia again did my heart good, and there was plenty of interesting art, including a painting of the last supper where the main dish was cuy (guinea pig). Underneath the church are extensive catacombs, which we also toured, and they didn´t cop out by removing the bones like in Rome. Very macabre, but interesting.

After that we went on a shopping jaunt to get some things that my compañeros, Jason and Camila, needed and then some stuff that piqued my interest. I may have mentioned this before, but central Lima is set up like a giant mall, with entire streets dedicated to products like eyeglasses and school supplies. On a street there will be dozens of stores selling pretty much the same thing pretty cheaply and tons of people everywhere. In a previous trip I picked up a cheap guitar which I´m going to try to learn in my prodigious free time at site (since we have to create our structure at site we will suddenly have more time than we know what to do with). There are several excellent players in our group from which to get some tips over the next three months. Today I grabbed another outlet converter, a fedora since I lost my baseball cap on the way down somehow (kinda lame but practical considering the sun and I think it looks good), and a Barce (Barcelona soccer club) jersey on the extreme cheap. Not a bad day altogether and I´ll have to come back to check out the rest of the tourist sights before too long.

Speaking of soccer, I have really taken to it all over again. I just thoroughly enjoyed my first 0-0 game, which I never thought would happen. The aesthetics of the game are really interesting and there is always something going on, although on the bad side they do do a lot of play-acting injuries like in basketball. World Cup qualifying is going on right now and all the national teams in South America are playing eachother. Peru´s is particularly poor, but the games are interesting nonetheless.

Well, that was quite a bit. I´ll have to make a point to be pretty regular now, because when I get to site I will probably only be able to post once a week...

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Stuff

Hey all,

Nothing much to report. I was done with a pretty wicked set of stomach problems over the last 24 hours, but I´m feeling a lot better n0w. Other than that, not a whole lot has been happening. A lot of us are having issues as were accustomating to the food and conditions, but nobody seems too bad off. Below is my mailing address for those who wanted to know, and I´ll report back when I´ve got something more interesting to report...

PCT Zach Jeremiah
Cuerpo de Paz
Calle Via Lactea 132
Urb. Los Granados
Santiage de Surco
Lima 33, Peru

PS- I hope to have internet in my room before too long and when I do I´ll have the time to post some pictures of where I´m at, Lima, and the like, so keep checkin´

Thursday, June 12, 2008

More Stuff

I just got some comments about the food, so I´ll tackle that today. Oh, and Gale: I am indeed lucky to have a family with an internet cafe, very much so.
Peru is popularly recognized to have some of the most diverse and delicious cuisine in the world. The diversity is such that you don´t find many foreign restaurants outside of Lima because there are so many dishes and cuisines here that they just aren´t that popular. Some of the most popular are pachamanca and ceviche. Pachamanca, which I´ve tried, is a prepared by heating stones and placing ingredients like potatoes, yams, and chicken with spices wrapped in leaves on them, and then burying the whole mess. After several hours the wrapped food is dug up and served. I definitely liked it and would go for it again. I haven´t tried ceviche but want to. This is prepared by immersing raw fish in lemon juice, which then cooks it because of the citric acid. There are many types, but I have been warned against getting it just anywhere because of the stomach issues that are likely to ensue. I have been eating dishes mainly consisting of rice, potatoes, chicken, beans, carrots, and the like. They are all spiced or prepared differently, and I haven´t run across anything I don´t like.
As far as ingredients go, the Peruvians use some interesting things. They eat a lot of cuy, or guinea pig, which I also haven´t had but am willing to give a shot. They also have many more types of potatoes than you would find in the U.S., which keeps things fresh. There is also a lot of fruit that I´ve never seen before and can never remember the name of. Most of that is pretty good, although I´m not the biggest fan of papaya (which I´d heard of but not eaten much). Breakfast usually involves rolls and something to put therein, the most interesting of which so far has been avocado. Good but not really breakfast fare. I´m also dying for a cup of coffee that is brewed instead of instant, so I hope to get a fairly rural assignment to make that a reality (and for a lot of other reasons).

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

Stuff

I just got some posts asking what I´m doing exactly and I realized that I probably didn´t do a good enough job explaining what all what I´m doing entails. I´m going to be a business volunteer here in Peru for the next 2 years and 2 and a half or so months. Actually, I´m not sworn in yet and have to go through training, but I don´t feel as if that´ll be too much of a problem. For some who are starting from scratch with their Spanish, it may be though. Anyway, I will be working in a community with a counterpart agency (local government, an artisan collective, farmer´s association or the like). The counterpart agency will already have a project in mind that will be my primary one, but I can do as many secondary ones like teaching English or starting a youth sports league as I like. I won´t know this information until I get sworn in after training, more or less. As a big picture, the Peace Corps is trying to aid in the sustainable development of small and microbusiness in Peru. This has many benefits for the community and individuals, and is a catalyst for more living and social improvements. There are several other categories of volunteers here as well, from health and environment to youth development.
As for what I´m doing right now, things are hectic. I actually get to sleep in until 8 tomorrow, which is a blessing. We´re at the training center nearly all day doing either business or Spanish activities, and afterwards I usually get in protracted (but very interesting) conversations with my host family and sometimes go out with other volunteers living in my area to explore the town or just hang out. I think I´m going to be popular because of the shear quantity of movies I brought along, and we may be doing some movie nights in the future.
My town is at the top of a huge hill and reminds me a lot of the little I´ve seen of Northern Mexico. That being said, most of the houses are pretty nice in the inside and I am more blessed than most with my full bathroom, nice bed, and electricity. The food is both different and excellent, and my host family is very nice. They own an internet cafe which is pretty convenient and I believe that I´ll even have internet in my room pretty soon. My brothers are in their thirties and very talkative, which is good. One works for a beer company in Peru and travels a lot and the other is a graphic design student by day and a roadie by night. I definitely have no complaints and will be posting pictures of the surroundings when I get internet on my computer, which will be in a week or so if I understand correctly.

Sunday, June 8, 2008

Yanacoto!

Well, the last 24 hours were pretty interesting. I went out after my post last night and did more dancing than I should of. My fellow volunteers are a pretty fun lot and I got roped into doing some very bad salsa or something along those lines because I can´t say no to a pretty face. So, I didn´t get the sleep my body is craving last night either, but I will at some point, probably next weekend.
Today we walked to the Peace Corps training center in Chaclacayo, which, along with the title of the post (which I´ll get to later) is a suburb of sorts of Lima. We did a couple more talking sessions, including a very informative one by current volunteers, and then we broke for lunch to learn a bit about our host families before we met them. Mine, the Sebastianos, is very nice and accomodating, and I think that I struck the mother lode once again with host families as my room is very nice and sizable and it looks like I will be getting internet as well, which can´t be too common. This is because they own an internet cafe and my room is just a couple of doors down from it. I´ll be doing dinner here before too long, which will most likely be delicious, and then I´ll settle down for some much needed rest (and unpacking).

Saturday, June 7, 2008

Peru!

I need to cool it on the exclamation marks, I guess, but this week has kind of been one. I am finally in Peru, and was pretty bummed last night mostly because I was working on very little sleep and everything on the way to getting in my bed was running late. However, we all survived and today has been a lot nicer.
The portion I saw of Lima driving through last night was pretty impoverished and reminded me a lot of the old ghetto scene at home. I am looking forward to seeing more of the city, as it has some pretty interesting architecture and sights in the city center. I am actually outside Lima about 30 minutes in a town called Chaclayo, at a kind of Girls and Boys club resort (reminds me more of summer camp than a spa... so not too swanky). The weather is actually pretty warm, although I understand it´s quite cold in the city.
All day we´ve been doing information sessions and interviews to determine what spanish classes and host families we´ll be with over the next 11 weeks. I should meet my host family and move in with them tomorrow, so I´ll have more on that later... For the rest of today I´m going to try and get some rest to recover from the long trip down. Oh, and on a last interesting note, the time zone is Central right now, as they don´t have daylight savings time here. Other times of the year it´s Eastern.

Thursday, June 5, 2008

Goodbye USA!

Hey all,

Tomorrow is my last day in the USA. I will be flying out at 5pm and should be in Lima 5 and a half hours later. Craziness...
Today I had some very long and informative training sessions that would have been aided by coffee on my part. I also got to eat at a hole in the wall Cuban restaurant for lunch whre everyone only spoke Spanish and had a cuban sandwich for dinner, so I feel that my Miami cuisine requirements are fulfilled. At night I went to Miami's South Beach (technically the hotel is in Coral Gables). It has a pretty retro 550's night club kind of feel and is pretty cool. I think I was more impressed by the look of Miami's downtown, although I didn't get to walk around there. Me and a couple new friends of mine went out on the beach, wet our toes, and lit up genuine Cuban-rolled cigars. That was a pretty neat experience and was a nice nightcap.
Well, I'll be off to training outside Lima before too long and should probably get some sleep. Everyone keep in touch and I'll try to stay regular with these posts.

Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Miami!

I'm now in Miami, which is sweet. I've been meeting the 30-odd members of my group/class over the last few hours and there are some pretty cool people. It feels a lot like the first day of college, where everyone was awkwardly meeting everyone else and it inevitably boiled down to board games in somebody's room. In fact, that's where I'm headed now, but I fully intend on taking a walk down to South Beach and seeing the ocean Miami-style at some point, which means I'm not likely to get a whole lot of sleep. That's o.k., though- when am I next going to end up in Miami?

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

Welcome!

Hey all,

Welcome to my blog about my upcoming journey to Peru and places beyond. Check in whenever you're wondering what I'm up to- I'll try to post what's going on in my part of the world every week or so. I'll also throw up some pictures and whatever else occurs to me. I'm not sure how the comments section will work for this, but if you want to get in touch with me otherwise I'll still be alive on Facebook and via email at zijerem@gmail.com. Thanks for all of your support and I hope you all keep in touch!