Moe the Chicken, Cuy liberation, and my new piece of heaven

So I should start by saying that I do remember that I said I would post more. This post will be worth the wait.

First story is Moe the Chicken. My nemisis for my first four months in site. Quite possibly the ugliest chick ever to inhabit this planet. Moe was a female but due to poor egg production and personality you would never know. I could never get a good photo of it because it was that type of sleezy bird. We are just starting to raise chicken in my house. I can not beggin to tell you how gross that actully is. So we grew them for two months and they started to produce eggs and offspring. All except for Moe. So now I have 16 chick that run around the house making rukus. By around the house I mean on the counters, on the stove, and they lay thier eggs underneathe the chair I eat my meals at. Moe was a lot bigger than the other chickens, and with no offspring to protect she became very aggresive. She would pick on the others. I was very vocal about my distain for the most repulsive creture on the planet. We all know that chickens when growing eventually lose thier down feathers. Well Moe did, but not on her head, so she was left with a black bowl cut, even by peruvian standards it was an aweful haircut. My grandma kept telling me we could kill her if she bothered me so much. I would respond by tellikng her that I new that we need her to produce to profit from our birds. She never did. So when my grandmothers 87th birthday rolled around her time was due. They let me do the honors, boy was it awesome. I have never had that much discust for anything. The meat was flavorful and cooked to perfection. I would of eaten it raw just to proven a point but the others saw no need for that. It ends up that when I was gutting her that she had four eggs she was to lay in the next week. Timing is everything.

For the next story I will start by say the Guinea Pig her is called cuy and I will refer to them as such. We also raise cuyes here. There are a lot of work to get at the meat but are quite delicious. I of couse being American am acustomed to having them as pets. So I adopted one as my new amigo. We would go for walks, watch sunsets and talk. He was a strong little guy and enjoyed my company. The rains have brought a plentiful crop of alfalfa and thus we are doing very well for are cuyes. It is important to mention we only raise animals to eat. When thier is no aminmal to kill we go weeks witho out eating meat. I named him Joe. I originaly had a calf that I would play my harmonica for but we moved him back to the mountians went we had gotten him to change his diet from milk to veggies. When he left I was lonley. So I took the first cuy that was born. He died in two days. I am a sucker for runts. So when I chose Joe I was a little more careful. My time with Joe was short spent. I had him for about two weeks. Then one day I was with him gardening and he split. I thought that liberation was probably the best thing for Joe. He was not like the other cuyes. Two days later I found a nine foot snake with his belly full. Timing is everything.

My last story has to due with my work. The rains have slowed everything here. So I decided to do work on my property. My dad gave me section of land to make my own. I have not included a picture because it is still under construction. I will go into further detail when it is complete (June). It is where I will do all of my thinking. The first photo is of moe the chicken, the second is a picture of my community getting lights. My house is still about three months off. You will all hear about it when it comes. I suggest clicking on the picture and checking it out. I like that no one is looking at the guy on the post. The third is of me on one of my wekly hikes, my pannts are a little big. It is kind of hard to afford new ones on my salary, it is now 45 pounds I have lost. Peru has the numberone biodiversity in the world for butterflies picture four id from my garden. The day I took the picture I counted seven different spieces with in a square meter. The last picture is of my girlfriend Deysi. She is a chemist in Lima. She is a really nicde girl and I enjoy spending time with her. She does not speak english, but we amke it work. I will try to be quicker with the next entery. How are the MAriners doing?

Semana Santa

I know you all can´t believe it I am getting 3 entries in two weeks. Well don´t get used to it. Huaraz is one of the most amazing places I have ever been in my life. The mountians are big, the food is american, the poeple are amazing. Wow! I had a blast we spent a day on a guided tour. Sort of a mistake, but interesting none the less. I got to see a large part of the country side and how people live in areas similr to mine, with respect to being rural. The pictures are of the celebration of semana santa. They are using sand and saw dust, dyed of couse, to make large mosaics in the prinicle street in Huaraz. Some actually use flowers. The second and last picture are from our tour. This is a glacial lake, about 10000 feet up. The native trees to this are are amazing. Thier bark is like colored tissue paper. The mountians areoud us are something like 15-16 thousand feet. You really feel small in the valley. In 1970 Huaraz ws leved by an earth quake. so the building are not very apealing but when to have view like picture three, who cares. The view is frm a american sttyle cafe it is not what you would expect in Peru. I am eating a breakfest burrito at the time I snagged this pic. The valley in leading into the lake have a lot of water falls like four. You kind of have to turn your head to get it. I hd a blast in Huarazz nd I will be going back no later than August. So feel free to make plans with me.

Well I guess I do not write as much as I should. The rains are pretty increadable. They turn everything to mud. I got cut off from my town due to flooding. You can see in the first picture a river always passes over the road. Well during the rains the river rose a whole foot nd we could not cross. The result was a diet of tea and crackers for week. Then I left for the beach and the rains stopped. It is relly increadable. The rainy seson actually mean rainy season. My garden actually needs more sun. My melon plants love this weather though. I am going to be eating cantlope until it comes out my ears. My beets, lutuce brocoli, and cauliflour are slow coming but are growing. My work has really slowed down due to thew rain.

I have found new project that looks very promising. I am going to clean up and reforest a hill on the way to the nature reserve. In the second picture you can see the pre-ican ruins that ly top of the hill. I m standing on the 1000 year old wall in the fourth picture.

In two days I am going to leave for the mountians of Ancsh. I am really excited. I will post afterwards with more pictures. I am sorry this is so short, but the rain is starting again. If I want to get home I need to leave now.

And the winner is........ Giardia

I have offically been sick for seven weeks. I have lost close to forty pound last time I checked. I am sure it is more by now. I have taken two stool samples, and I now now I have giardia. I am still able to live my day to day life it just makes things a little harder. The Peace Corps office in Lima has sent me medicine. Now I just need time off to go pick it up. Maybe next week.
Things are starting to pick up here. I have English classes twice a week for two hours. I am getting a good turn out. I also am right in the middle of my World Map project. It is really time consuming. Especially since the youth are not around to help. I do not see the benifit of this project and think that it is an aweful idea. It distracts me from real work and is slowing my intergration into the community. In the next few week I am very occupied. I am working with the medical post to write a curiculum for the nurses. They will go to the rural schools twice a month and give the youth lectures. They will be about hand washing, drinking clean water, common disease, and so on. I am working with four different schools to develop a tree planting and organic garden component to thier classes. I will be revising the curent cirriculum on monday. I am working hard in my own garden. I am very pleased to say that I am finally having succes. I have about five hundred sprouts of 25 varities of veggies, herbs and fruit. I am forming a group of artesians. This group is very lost and I really have no idea what I am doing we will have to see how it works out. I have also started talking to two different NGOs about funding projects and how I can work along side them. I went out to the tabacco plantation today to learn about Peruvian style hydroponics. I am going to be trying to revise my counterpart in the next couple months. The system they are using right now is just plain aweful. They need a lot of help but do not want to take suggestions.
It is really hot here right now. It is downpours mixed with 90 degree heat. I miss the snow. Humid is a huge understatement. I have site visit from my boss on the first of March followed by a three day workshop with all of the volunteers from my group. I have a lot of worthless work to do for both and do not know where I will find the time. I hope all had a good St. Val's day.
Matt

Month two. Done and Done.

I have some how forgotten to write everytime I come to the internet. A lot has been happening. I have been sick with what I can only guess is a intestinal parasite for the last month. I weighed myself about a week ago and I had lost over thirty pounds. I am glad to be getting to a healthy weight just wish I was doing it in a healthy way. My grandma is convinced that I need to eat more of the rancid food that they feed me. She tells me that I need to eat or I will die soon. I explain to her what colera is, and that it is only passed to other people when you do not wash you hands after going to the bathroom. Kind of like how she never does. She proceeds to tell me I am crazy, and I proceed to talk under my breathe in English. Nothing gets resolved and we have the same conversation when the next meal that I have previously said I do not want to eat arrives.
I have developed this really awesome super power here. I like to call it English. I can talk to selected people in it and everyone else looks at me baffled. With out it I am what I like to refer to as the ¨Mayor of Struggletown¨. In the sector of work I have been moving forward slowly. I am starting to paint my wall. I go the run around for a month and now the project is finally in my hands. I have collected a group of youth to help me, and found some youth who want to help. I can not wait to get this done. In the mean time I have been putting togeather a survey to ask the people in my area. This will be very hard to proceed with. People here are very friendly and do not like to tell you no. In fact they will answer with a response that you want to hear. I am forced to give this servey in my first three months before I have built confidence with my communinty. This should be good. I have alredy been told that I am too white and young to be asking people such questions. How do I respond to that. I will prevail. My main goal is to get it out of the way. On my own time through conversation I am making alliances-friends all over the place.When ever I go any where the people go out of their way to greet me. I really am enjoying my self. I can not tell you how much I could get done if I was healthy.
You know every person has their own reason for joining the Peace Corps. You know besides having this deep inner desire to save the world. I think I found my reason the other day. It had been raining for about 18 hours straight, and my world had been turned up side down. I mean you could not even walk outside because of the mud flat that now covered the entire valley. And that was it. I had my realization. How special it was to be in a place living amongst nature. Where the rainny season really meant the rainny season, not that you had to put on your gortex jacket and boots, or that you had to use your wind shield wippers, but that it was raining and that was that.
My garden had finally produced a plant. I am jubilant. I have a few sprouts, and I can not explain how happy I am. I was thinking in the southern hemisphere things were done different, but to my suprise things can be planted here. My grandma was very adiment to tell me that plants here do not need water until they are three inches tall. I questioned her and she told me that she had the experience and what did I know. I could not say anything besides I was a biuogeochemist and that that is not the way things work. She responded by telling to get my vudoo(science) the hell out of here and until I had some food for the table, I had nothing to be able to question here with. I love this lady. In three months I will have the most amazing garden including. Seven varieties of fruit trees, 14 varieties of vegies, and 13 herbs for starters.
I have pictures but they will have to wait. Untill next time, by that I mean next week.

It Has Been a While

So I should start with New Year's. There are a couple of traditions here that are very different than in the States. First of yellow is to be worn like St. Patty's day green. But for the least you need to ware yellow underware. On the day of I went looking. I did find some, but not my style of choice. They were nothing short of a banana hammock. To top it off they were brand name, by this I mean they were Stripper brand. I wish I was joking. I was strickly a boxer man before I came here, and some how in my first five months I have moved on to thongs. Somehow I do not think this was part of the cultural assimilation the Peace Corps was planning on. The soncond custom is to eat twelve grapes on the strike of midnight. The grapes have seeds in they, but when you are drinking quite possibly the cheapest bottle of champane in the world seeds are a welcome change of taste. The last and probably my favortie custon is the burning of a life size hey filled doll. I had some friends who the doll was made in to G.W. (not by thier choice), and others who the doll look strangly similar to them. I burned one with much less character. It did seem to turn heads though. I get stared at although I had three eyes and was a car wreck victum all of the time so it did not come to me with much suprise. But when that doll was on fire and gringos were the ones who set flame it was quite the spectacle. The night went well and I had a good tranquil b-day to follow. The next week was a bit troubling though.
I will write this to warn all of you that worry about me on the regular. Do not worry more so do to these next stories. They are a bit strange, but I am not scared myself.
The day I got into town after my birthday I was met with some starteling news. My neigbor had been murdered. The stroy goes that he was a natorious wife beater. His wife finally called it quits the day after christmas. Domestic violence is the most popular crime here in Peru, but there is no system to punish or stop it. She left her home and went with her children to Chiclayo. Around New Year's her husband fed up with the whole deal went to find her. It was not hard she was at her family's house there. He tried to get physical with her once again, but this time in front of her brothers and father. As you might of guessed they did not stand for it. They proceded to stab him to death. This is the troubling part. They are not being charged with anything. Vigilanty government is very accepted here, but it gets worse. They did not want the body there so they cut it up into small pieces and sent it back here to my town.
Now I am not too bothered by this. I am very against domestic violence and think that with out a better form of govenment this thing is bound to happen. I mean c'mon trying to beat your wife in front of her family. I do not think his punishment was completly deserve, but it is what it is.
That very same night my family was robbed. Not like what you would think in the US. Who ever stole from us snuck on to our property and stole a goat. It is a shame because at my house we give so many things for free to people in the community, and in reality they were stealing from an 86 year old woman. Shamful in my opinion.
The last story I think is boarderline funny now that it is after the fact. I lent my power cord to my computer to my site mate in expectations I would get it back the next day. She left town for the day and did not get back until 8 at night. So I was not expecting to have to ride home at night, therefore did not have my headlamp. I was about half a kilometer from my house when I noticed that a mototaxi was approching, but at an increadibly slow rate. As it got closer I decided the driver ws probebly good and drunk. My suspitions were later confirmed. As the it got with in 30 meter I noticed we were about to have a problem. He was on my side of the road. At about 10 meters I figured I better turn because this guy was not going to. So I did. A second or two after me he turned. I slammed on my brakes as he cutme off to get to his side of the road. He finally hit his brakes about five meters after he passed me. He got out and proceded to yell at me, "Where are you from", (he did not know I was not Peruvian at this point) "What are you doing on my side of the road." I was still stopped in the road in the same place I had stopped originally. On my side of the road. I was actually really mad and felt that maybe if I hit him it would knock some sense into hi. I did not and once again swallowed my pride and admitted it was my fault (you have to lower your self to amazingly low levels sometimes). He told me that if it was not for god himself I would be dead. I told him he should go drink some more and pray becasue God loves getting prayers from those who so greatfully let people like my self by even though they have made great errors. At this point he realized that I was white. His attitude changed immediatly. He was all of a sudden really nice and admitted that he could of been at fault also. I quickly bid him ado and was on my way. As I left I notices the house who we were in front of thought we were robbing him. So he chased down the other man. I proceded to my house. This is where things get a little harry. I looked up and realized that a giant sugarcane semi truck was coming down this barley one lane road. I got off my bike and moved off the road. As it got closer it became evedent I was not going to have enough room to fit with the truck. I fell over into the thorn bush (on purpose). as my luck would have it a piece of cane came racking though the bush above me as the truck passed. I got up went home and came to a really important conclusion. They country here and the country in the US are very different.
As far as my work is conserned things are going very slow. My projects have been put on hold due to sure layziness. I am meeting new important people daily. Which does not serve much good right now, but will pay off big in the coming months when I go to start my large projects.
I will write next week with some pics and hopefully news about my Mapi mundial and my garden.

Closing in on a month

So the holidays are a great time to share stories. I am having a tough time narrowing down the ones to share. Of course I will have to include one of my grandmama, and the chocolatada, but what else.

First the one with g-ma. If I have not mentioned it ehough I will continue to say that she is very senile, and I mean that in the nicest way possible. I spent x-mas with her my dad and thier family. I should mention that I am completly comfortable with being the only english speaker, white guy, person who does not eat with thier hands, blonde, person with a degree, or the plethera of other things that make me unique here. But I was the only person (out of 19) that was less than 55 years old. I kind of felt that the family was stealing my youth, this could also be because that I had the same conversation 27 times ( I had to repeat it with about half of the crowd).

The first awkward moment came when I entered the house. Everyone was sitting in a circle, so following cultural guidlines I started my way around the circle shaking hands and kissing the fam. My grandma was about third in line and she threw a wrench in to my other wise smooth entry. I went to shake my grandma's hand a give her a kiss on the cheek and that is when things got wierd.

My grandma has a grip of a bear. Which is really suprising for a near perilized 4'2" 86 year old. I have gotten used to it. Before I go in for the greeting I get about a foot away and put my feet shoulder with apart and try to center my balance. Thier really is no way to tell which way she will jerk me so I try to prepare for the best percentage possible.

After giving her the kiss she told me to greet the other in the circle (like her touch had made me forget everything I was doing just seconds before hand). She told me, "Meet them white foriegner, meet them", and introduced the next and the next. I was quickly falling behind, but to no fault of my own. She had a death grip on my arm. To be dead honest I do not think she knew she was still holding my arm. In turn she started to get mad at me for not shaking hands with people. So I lifted my arm so that her grasping limb was dangling infront of her face. It still took a minute or so but she finally let me go.

The night only gets better from there. So at midnight exactly the family gathers around in a circle to celebrate. For the last month every house has had a nativity scence set up in thier house, but with out a baby jesus. At midnight on the 24th/25th he gets delivered to the manger, but only if the acting godparents are there. In my family's case my grandma was godmother, and I was godfather. That is right I was the godfather to jesus. In true Peruvian fasion they just expected I knew what my responsibilities were. As I stood there with baby jesus in my arms and a briliant look of dumbfoundedment on my face they decided that instructions were in order. I took the baby around the room and each person kissed him and gave a little shout out. Finally when I was done I was to put him in the manger. As I lowered him twords the nativity scene I felt the air leave the room. I had forgot to kiss the plastic doll my self. Here I was trusted with Christmas itself in my hands (literally) and I was about to blow it. Luckly I had a whif of genius, devine intervention if you will, and I pulled back. I could here the fam breathe easy as I kissed jesus and did a backwards (not intentionaly) catholic cross thing and laid jesus down. Then we sat down for dinner.

Dinner is kind of like thanksgiving dinner. It has many different plates that are only served for x-mas. Like empanadas rellenas there are empanadas filled with chicken and olives. We also had fruit cake this is like apple pie to americans. The meal was rounded out with champane, white wine, turkey, hot chocalate, and about four different types of sweet rolls. The meal started out well. I ate my food and was ready to call it good. I am not really acustomed to eating a meal that large at one in the morning, but the family had other ideas. They invented a game I like to call, how much food can we stack on the gringo's plate. The winner is no one, but they sure can stack a whole lot of food. Each time the put more my face was a little more awkward and they laughed a little bit harder. I did not end up eating any of the third, fourth or tenth serving but it was fun to watch.

So on to the pictures. I was selected to be the piaso or entertainment for my counterparts holiday party. Children do not recieve many gifts if any for christmas, but they do get to go to some chocolatadas. This is a party where they get a toy, fruit cake, and hot chocolate. There is also games and we gave away some soda. The first pic is me playing chubby bunny with the kids. For those who do not know this is where the kids put a sweet roll in thier mouth and have to say feliz navidad. If they do this sucessfuly then they get another roll and repeat. The winner is who can say it with the most in thier mouth. The second is a little one getting her soda. The third is me handing out some gifts. The fourth is some of the five hundred kids with thier hot chocolate. And the last is of my favorite kid in all of my casorios. I affectioatly call her, "Tarzan Baby."

I hope you had a merry christmas and have a happy new year