Bienvenida 2009

Happy New Year everyone! 2009 huh… weird right? I made sure and switched my cell to Spanish before I made a couple texts to my friends. Feliz ano is different than feliz año.

So here, as in many latin cultures, it is tradition to stay up late on holidays partying. Here, the town fiesta goes until 6am, and the drinking… whenever you can make it home I guess. I had a great time and was able to stay pretty sober throughout -to my astonishment. I had made sure to eat a lot beforehand and take a little nap to raise my tolerance. I made it through 3 drinking circles and had a decent amount of beer, but for the first time in Peru, I held my own. The circles included one of community members, one of my friends, and then a circle with the family (mainly the uncles).

You may be catching a sense of sourness from me toward alcohol, and I guess I should admit that I am definitely starting to feel this way. After seeing the effects it has on the community as a whole, I am really developing a bit of detestation for alcohol. I want to point out that even though I perceive alcohol in such a bad light, I don’t really sit and judge the people (or the culture or community) that drinks. With the way it’s handled here and accepted, I am in no place to judge why people make the decisions that they do because it’s not something that I can understand since I am not from here. But I hate the fact that I know some great people here who are great friends but change into Mr. Hyde when they hit a certain point. One incident that I won’t talk too much about on this blog left a cute little 5 yr. old girl (who was alone) crying in the middle of the fiesta at 4am after a drunk guy stumbled by her with a rock in his hand looking to fight another guy. I got her to sit with the family for a bit and thankfully she felt better after I let her take some pictures with my camera.

Well, turning the mood a little bit (sorry to get so downer), I did have a good time and enjoyed experiencing the New Year’s fiesta in a place I would never expect to be at this time… rural Peru. I stayed up late and it took me about a day to get back to things.

This morning I was able to get back to my routine of running in the morning and was very glad that I did. The community was soooo beautiful this morning. Everything is getting greener from the rains and the community was covered in a giant cloud. As I ran in the hills above I was ran through the clouds and as I was coming down the clouds were clearing a bit and I could see the community below along with the sunrise. Later in the morning the clouds were huddled around the surrounding steep mountains. I think I am starting the take the beautiful setting for granted a bit, but this morning I realized how lucky I am to be in this place.

In answering some questions asked, I will get into some of my everyday life here. Many of tasks are outlined and highly recommended by Peace Corps (with good reason in my opinion). For example, during these first three months, it is most important for me to become submersed into the community and become ‘known’. This also provides a method of security because as we become accepted into the community, the community will begin to look out for us. Also, trust (confianza) is a huge deal, especially in more rural areas. It is key to build this throughout our time here as a volunteer. In the meantime while trust is being built through interaction with the members of the community, we are also collecting information about the community. This information guides us as to what types of projects are needed/useful and desired by the community. I highlight desired because even if the community needs something, but doesn’t want it, this will not be a sustainable venture and will end up being a waste of our time. Moving on from preaching a bit, my tasks up to now have therefore been participating with the people here and visiting the diverse groups within my community (the mayor, municipality employees, doctors, store owners, lay people, etc.). From this data I can assess what types of activities into which I can put my time. Possible ideas are working with the wastewater system (because right now it goes straight to the river), working with building latrines in the surrounding more rural areas, and capacitating the JASS’s (groups that deal with the water and sanitation services) to be more effective. My location is a little different that most Peace Corps volunteers because I am in a bigger community. With this comes some great advantages (internet, higher probability of toilets, diverse types of people, less isolation), but then there are also disadvantages (more work to be known, more complex community dynamic, bad community habits are amplified).

As I said before, I don’t really have a normal Peace Corps living situation with a host family, but I am really getting to know and like my ‘host brother’ Humberto who is the owner of my apartment and his brother Cesar who lives next door to me. Yes, washing myself and my clothes can be hard because I don’t have a tap inside my house and going to the bathroom can be inconvenient as it is outside, but day-by-day it turns out fine and I know I am in a much better living situation than my fellow PCV’s without light, water, walls, doors, and other such ‘necessities’. After talking with Humberto today, I found out it might be possible for me to put in a spiket and drain right outside my door to nowhere on the’ balcony’. Speaking about my other family, I spend a lot of time with Sasha’s host family, who also accept me as part of their family. The mom, Charo, is a teacher in segundaria, and the husband Felizardo is a tech at the health post. They have 2 daughters, Caty 18, and Cinthia 23, and one son, Paul 25, who were all home for the holidays along with other cousins and aunts and uncles. They are a very modern family for my community in many ways.

Ryan on speaking Spanish: So, as you may or may not know, I am pretty annoyed with my lack of Spanish speaking ability. I think I may have some learning deficiency or something in this area. I really feel like I’m going nowhere with it sometimes. But I try to have fun with it a little and am learning to read people’s faces, which is pretty hilarious sometimes. I wonder ‘Did I just say what I meant to say?’ or ‘Did they ask me how long I’ve been here or how long I’m staying?’. In short, I am making some progress, but not as fast as I would like and hoped. I know you’re thinking ‘you’re from NM and your family speaks and therefore it should be easier for you’, but maybe that was the problem. I knew a few phrases and accents and such, but maybe I tuned out the rest growing up because I couldn’t understand what my mom was telling my grandma so I gave up on listening, and now I’m used to tuning Spanish out…. Or something. Yeah… that will be my excuse K. I usually do not get too tired of speaking it as some of my PC friends do, but then again I have Sasha here as an English outlet.

Wow… kinda long blog this time, yeah. Well, I will get to more questions another day along with the upcoming story of tomorrow morning: The slaughtering of a pig followed by: The eating of a pig. Hope you guys all had a Happy New Year’s and begin the year right!