happy new year!

So I have been at site for a little more than a month, which is kind of hard to believe. Time has been moving kind of strangely—the weeks seem to shoot by, but sometimes the hours just seem to drag on forever. Part of the problem is that I just don’t have all that much to do right now. The first months are supposed to be spent doing a diagnostic, learning about the community, meeting people, but no big projects. As a result, especially cuz people know that I am here as a development volunteer and expect me to be getting things done, without having concrete work it’s really easy to feel as if I’m not doing anything, especially because the people here do a lot of hard physical work. So yea, things are a bit slow. But in two weeks I am going to start teaching summer school to the primary school kids, twice a week English class and twice a week environment classes and I’m pretty excited about that.
And overall things are generally good. All the kids know my name. A lot of the adults do too, or else they just call me “gringo,” which pretty much signifies any foreigner, or “papi gringo” which I think is a bit more affectionate. And I have a hard time remembering anybody’s name, so I don’t really mind at all. The food is fine to good—my diet continues to be based around rice and potatoes, with sides of bread and corn thrown in as well (and other things, but the emphasis is definitely on carbs). One evening last week for dinner, my bowl was filled with one part rice, one part potatoes and one part spaghetti. That was a fun one. But I can’t complain, I’m generally eating well.
There have been some interesting cultural experiences as well. About two weeks ago I got sick for the first time. Nothing serious, just a loss of appetite and some general stomach pain. From what I learned in my medical sessions, I can expect much worse. But anyway after two days, my host family was concerned. In my town we don’t have a health post or a doctor, but we do have an old lady who takes your pulse and diagnoses the cause of your ailment. So after we convinced her to take a break from doing laundry, we went inside her house, she took my pulse and told me I had a very bad stomach infection and proscribed a specific type of antibiotic. I’m not sure what or if I’m going to tell my hosts next time I am not well…
This past Monday was the graduation ceremony for the primary school, which is the only school we have in town (the kids go to the next town over for high school). There were 11 kids who graduated, which involved them getting dressed up (boys in ties, girls in matching prom dresses), a ceremony and a big meal and dancing with most of the community. I think one of the funniest things I have seen so far here is a bunch of 13 year olds in fancy clothes trying to eat a heaping bowl of potatoes and cuy, with a spoon and without a table. After the meal the adults broke out some cases of beer, which is an experience in it of itself here. When Peruvians drink beer, they open one bottle at a time, someone fills up a glass, drinks it and passes it to the next person and so on. I’m not going to get into any moral territory of alcohol, but this custom does have a nice communal ring, when you see people my age sharing with people who are the age of their parents and grandparents and everyone is having a good time together…
The other big event of the past couple weeks was of course Christmas. Now just about everyone here is Catholic, but it seems to be a much more relaxed, laid back sort of Catholic than what we are used to in the States (I am of course no expert on Christian sects). So they definitely celebrate Christmas, but it felt a lot different here than it does at home. First of all, it’s summer here, not winter. Also, they don’t have the money to celebrate in the same way we do, with lots of decorations and gifts. So we woke up Christmas morning and had hot chocolate and paneton (kind of bready fruitcake…I’m a bit ashamed to admit I really liked it…) but then everyone went out to the fields to tend the crops and animals. I guess I’m really used to everyone being distinctly really happy at Christmas time, and even though my family doesn’t celebrate, we are usually together and we usually spend the day relaxing and enjoying each other’s company. It was strange to have it be just another day.
So yea, that’s life in Yanamito more or less, or at least the interesting parts that came to me off the top of my head. And as one last possible point of interest, I haven’t showered for a little over two weeks, but it’s cool here, so I think I can get away with it…I hope the holidays went well for everyone and I wish you all a happy and healthy 2010.

The above represents solely my opinions, not that of the Peace Corps nor the US government.