Yello fellow Americans, I am finally spending my last three days here in Chaclacayo, Peru. Training is winding down, people are getting antsy, and I now cut more classes than I did microbiology 365. I got in from Tumbes on Tuesday afternoon, after traveling in a bus for a cool 21 hours. These bus trips will now be referred to as “penance” for mankind’s world sins. Seriously, the seats were cloth, smelly and I had a nice plastic covered leg rest which made a weird sticky sound every time I moved my legs. But alas, I will not dwell on the negativo. I will instead, detail for you all, my 10 day trip to the departments of Piura and Tumbes.
So as you all know, I have been assigned to work in a little town of about 4000 in the department of Tumbes. Tumbes is the smallest department in Peru, and is right on the border with Ecuador (which also means three degrees from the equator). While it may be detailed as a little more dangerous than the rest of the departments volunteers are headed to, it definitely makes up for its faults with its beaches and mangroves. I say it’s dangerous because it is a border region and a lot of drug trafficking passes through but whatevs. I’m told that as long as you’re smart about your surroundings and keep alert, you dramatically reduce your risk. So I’ll just plan on that. But ANYWAYS…
The past ten days I spent in both the departments of Piura and Tumbes doing regional and site based training with other volunteers, and later, by myself. This included giving educational sessions of charlas in the elementary schools about handwashing and HIV- AIDS. We played with babies during an early stimulation session and put on a show about brushing your teeth where I ran around with a broom and was called ¨Super Cepillo.¨I got to wear a neon hat and a towel as a cape so that was cool.
During these ten days, we were put in some rather weird living slash sleeping situations. For example, the first night, ten of us slept in the child stimulation center on those gymnastic pads things. While having the worst night sleep of all of our lives, I woke up to hear my friends Caleb and Allyse discussing the animal that they just felt. Too tired to care, I tried to forget it and went back to bed. It was only until later that morning when I found out it had been amouse that ran across Caleb´s face and Allyse´s neck before scurrying somewhere else. I was one person away from Allyse. Call me high maitenance, tell me I´m a bad volunteer, but after clogging a toilet earlier that day, dealing with digestive issues and not sleeping, I was being worn down to I think the last straw. Needless to say we slept in a hostal the next night and it felt GLORIOUS.
After spending four or five days in Piura, we all headed north to Tumbes by bus. I am replacing another Peace Corps volunteer who just finished her two year stint in the same town. She did a lot of work with HIV/AIDS and that’s where I’ll be picking up. I’m super stoked to be doing AIDS prevention because for a country whose people don’t really practice smart slash safe sex, Tumbes and it’s people are pretty liberal and don’t find it too taboo to talk about.
I am living in a house WITH RUNNING WATER BOOYA, electricity, and wait for it……INTERNET. This definitely did not sound like the campo to me, but as I walked around the town and took a drive to neighboring casarios, it became clear there is still a lot of work that can be done. I have a cool mom and dad, my pops a mechanic, a brother aged 17 (it’s debatable if he is as cool as Jeremy), and a sister ranking in at 13 years old. There is also a cursed parrot named Polly, which I do not get along with. After attacking me and pulling my hair, I have decided that Polly’s days are numbered. I can’t really say more about my family except that they seem pretty cool, a little less loud, but are well-respected throughout their community for being pretty good people. And when I say community, I mean their extended family because I swear to God my family is related to everyone else somehow (my dad is one of 11 I think and my mom is one of 13 and they all live in the same vicinity).
With regards to my room, I have few complaints. It’s high up, with two windows that let air in, lime green and it has a mango tree right outside that I can pick my breakfast from. After listening to my friend’s sites and their room situations, I feel a little spoiled, but I’m not complaining. The only thing I can complain about is the loudspeaker that is located next door. It goes on at about five in the morning for about an hour and a half preaching religious stuff or something rather and then plays intermittently for the remainder of the day that I still have trouble translating. The decibel level is insane. I can’t hear anyone while I’m talking on the phone. It’s very possible that one day the village people will emerge from their houses to find the loudspeaker cables cut and destroyed.
In Tumbes there are six other PC Peru 14 volunteers with me. Since Tumbes is so small, we’re all located pretty close to each other, which is SWEEEEET. That also means that we are all also located fairly close, if not on, the beach. Last Saturday I spent my morning lying out on the beach and swimming, eating a freshly picked mango, and tanning. Despite the fact that I suffered some serious burns (even though sun block was applied), it did not feel very Peace Corps-esque at all. It felt like vacay. But while you all reading this might be silently cursing me for having such a lovely time here, I can assure you, Tumbes and my site definitely have its hardships, such as:
-extreme, intense, sun (I feel like I am living on Mercury)
- the smell from everything rotting in the sun
-EXTREME MOSQUITOS
-malaria and dengue (resulting from the insane amount of mosquitos)
-machismo (the male-dominant attitude that is pretty significant here)
-not looking like a site straight out of middle earth or the sound of music (like places in alta piura, Cajamarca, ancash, junin, or arrequipa)
But, positives and negatives included, this is my home for the next two years so I better get pretty comfortable. The last night I was in Tumbes actually I went out to a concert for a town’s anniversary with three other PC volunteers that lived nearby. While dancing to the beat of the cumbia music and sharing Cusquena (type of beer) with about a million other people in my dancing circle, I kind of had a “moment.” I thought about how far I had come and how a year ago, there was no way I would have thought that I would be dancing at a concert in the middle of nowhere, Peru, and think that it was normal. It still amazes me everyday that I’m here and that I have become so comfortable in a place so foreign from anything I had known before two and a half months ago. I hope things keep going that way!
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