Delay

Sorry I didn't get my blog post up this past Sunday. Should be coming shortly, but if it doesn't come in the next day or two, expect a really long post this coming weekend. Hope everyone is well.

Elections, Food, Mototaxi Party

This last week passed by much faster than the first one here as I’m starting to get used to my training schedule. Most people who live in my town do not own a vehicle of any kind. So to get around, they rely on public transportation or small, three-wheel cars called mototaxis. Imagine something like a motorized 21^st century rickshaw. These mototaxis stay within the town limits and essentially run one route, back and forth on the same half mile stretch of road that links our town to the main highway. In the mornings, they take people down a major hill (often coasting down the hill without even turning on the engine) to the highway as these people go off to work for the day. And in the evenings, the mototaxis wait at the bottom of the hill, for these same people who are now getting home from work. It’s very basic, and I would imagine pretty boring, but a lot of people in town drive these mototaxis for a living, including one of my host brothers, Jimmy.

(Vaca, my family's puppy)

Mototaxi Party

This past Saturday, my town had a party to celebrate the anniversary of the arrival of the Mototaxi to Yanacoto. This would be my first experience at a party in Peru. I arrived to the basketball/futbol court, where the party was taking place, at about 10 PM

with Jimmy. There was live music, but dancing wouldn’t really start for a couple hours (I didn’t take part, though I plan to eventually). Jimmy and I joined a couple of other guys for my very first Peruvian drinking circle. The idea is that you buy a bunch of beer to share in the circle, but the beer is consumed through a single cup, which is passed around the circle the entire night. Once you have finished your cup of beer, you dump the last drips of your beer (backwash) and pass the cup to the person standing next to you and so on and so on. I’m a fan.

The one other thing worth

noting from the party is the sheer number of fights. Machismo and drinking seem to be pretty big, at least in th

is part of Peru, and I saw this firsthand last weekend. And while I was hoping the fights I saw were uncommon in Yanacoto, it seems like it’s fairly standard. One of the beer vendors was roaming the basketball court to

grab and dispose of an empty bottles of beer for fear that they might be used as weapons later in the evening.

(view from my outside my host family's house)

The Food

I have very few complaints about the taste and quality of the food. Almost everything I’ve eaten here as been at least good, if not very tasty. The one complaint I have is about variety, or lack thereof. Carbohydrates are the staple of every meal. Bread, pasta, rice, and they serve a ton of potatoes. If I’m not mistaken the potato originated in Peru, where there are apparently 2000+ varieties of potato. For breakfast, I have a couple of pieces of bread basically every day, usually with jelly or sometimes avocado, onions, and lime juice (mmm). Lunch and dinner are usually about the same: some chicken and rice dish, or pasta. The main difference is that I usually have some fruit with lunch and soup with dinner. The fruit has been very good so far, with me discovered some stuff I’d never had before.

I went into Lima yesterday for training and had free reign for lunch. I didn’t want to avoid Peruvian food after being here only two weeks, but after two weeks of potatoes, rice, and chicken, I needed something different. Some friends and I ended up going to a Mediterranean restaurant and thoroughly enjoyed it.

The Elections

Today they had their country-wide mayoral elections. They don’t have a two party system here, like we do in the US so they have a ton of parties with candidates running. - so many that I haven’t been able to keep them straight. With so many people running for the same spot, most of the ‘winners’ are taking the cake with only 30% of the vote. I saw one town’s election coming down to three candidates tied, each with about 15%, and the rest of the candidates taking a combined 50%. Not crazy about the two party system, but not sure how I would feel about Peru’s system either.

I learned two interesting things about their election process in the last week. First is that that voting is mandatory. Those who do not vote have to pay a fine. Some people seem to be irked by this law, but resigned to vote, seem to educate themselves at least a little bit before stepping into the voting booth. Also, I learned that the entire election weekend is dry. To buy, sell, or drink alcohol publicly is illegal for the weekend. Different, but interesting.

Finally, I should mention the mayoral election of Lima. The contest is essentially between two women, which is huge, because Lima has never had a female mayor before. And being mayor of Lima is no small deal, either. Lima is the capital of Peru and by far the largest city in Peru. If you’re elected mayor, you’re really only second to the President when it comes to political power.

I've Arrived

So I finally got my act together and got this blog started. The first week in country has been a little busy, but I’ll try and paint a quick picture of my setup down here as well as give a short summary of highlights from the first week. I’ll try and get photos posted up as I go along.

I am part of the 16^th group of Peace Corps volunteers (PCVs) sent to Peru since Peru and Peace Corp renewed their partnership in the early 2000s after a long hiatus with no volunteers in country (due to political reasons). They call us Peru 16 for short. I believe there are now 77 of us, broken up into three different sectors, Health, Environment, and Water and Sanitation, or WatSan, as they call it here. I find myself in this last group. We took part in a one-day orientation in DC on Friday, September 16^th before flying out the next day. After having burgers the day before, Kelly and I decided to have Thai take-out as my last dinner in the US.

The next morning, we had to be on a bus headed to the airport at 7:30 AM for our 1 PM departure (thru Miami). Both our flight and airport pickup were delayed. By the time I was in my ‘hotel’ room and in bed, it was about 1 AM CDT. We spent the next day on the hotel grounds, taking part in more orientation lectures, before meeting our host families the next morning.

When I woke up the next day, I noticed that my mouth felt strange. I went to the bathroom and was shocked when I saw that my upper lip had exploded to literally 3-4 times its normal size. I had been bothered during the night by mosquitoes buzzing in my ear off and on. I can only guess I was bit on the lip and had some sort of allergic reaction. I immediately took some meds, which helped get the swelling down some by the end of the day, but I can only imagine what my host family was thinking when I introduced myself with a ginormous lip.

I live with a family of five in a small town called, Yanacoto, located in a dry, desert climate on the side of a hill (or what might be considered a small mountain in the US). Landslides are not an issue because it’s so dry here, but I wonder what a strong earthquake might do to the houses in this town (we had one during the night this past week). My parents, Felicia and Cesar, are probably in their upper 50s or lower 60s and have three children, Alian (29), Jimmy (24), and Madeleyne (15). They’re all very nice, but most interaction takes place between the parents and me. The first night at their house, Cesar made me feel very welcome by inviting me to have a few beers (to share food/drinks, also known as ‘invitando’ another person, is very common here). It was a nice gesture and I think it helped all parties to loosen up a little and get to know each other. They also have a cute puppy they named Vaca (cow, in Spanish) because it’s white and black like a cow and when he was born, they nursed it back to life on a mostly milk diet. As far as water/sanitation goes, the tap water isn’t safe to drink, our bathroom is an outhouse, and the shower only puts out cold water. But, all in all, I’ve either managed or learned to adjust.

Each morning, during the work week, the other 12 or 13 PCVs in Yanacoto and I take the ridiculous public bus/vans, called ‘Combis,’ to our training site some 40 minutes away. It’s there where we meet up with the rest of the PCVs for language and technical proficiency (read: WatSan) training. I have been placed with four other WatSan PCVs into one of the higher-level Spanish classes where the small group, intensive Spanish has been very helpful for me, even after only one week. Also, the Peruvian accent and manner of speaking Spanish has been much, much easier for me to understand than the Chilean Spanish I thoroughly struggled with during study abroad. Chile is a tough place to learn the language. WatSan training sessions haven’t been too interesting or exciting yet. I expect them to pick up soon.