Hello from Yanacoto Again.
[Pictures coming later--Internet is slllllow as we're all on right now-->look above for reason.
While we anxiously await for our site assignments—essentially where we'll be living for the next two years, I found myself with a free Saturday.
The initial plan was to go to a host aunt's house in Chaclacayo at 10 and therefore wake up at 8 and do laundry for an hour or so. These plans quickly changed.
In a household with a two, five, and eight year old, you DO NOT wake up past 8:30 regardless of what you do or how good of a sleeper you thought you were before coming. Therefore a hangover is never muy recomendable. As a short side story—The Hangover movie here is not called “La Resaca”--(the direct translation of hangover as one would assume it would be called) instead it is called ¿Q pasó ayer? (What happened yesterday?)--Anyway that was pretty funny to try to find in a pirated DVD market—it basically involved me describing the plot line in a memorable Spanish conversation –4 huys that get drunk in Las Vegas, y lose an amigo... Just like all conversations here—eventually you get the point across and get what you need—sometimes your neighbors think you just asked them if they are burying a dead body instead of planting a garden (in my defense, I have a Vermont accent mixed w/ español and huerto-garden y muerto-dead person sound pretty similar) but it all works out in the end.
Anyway—back to Today. After stretching my sleep as long as I could until 8:27, I pulled myself out of bed to face the world. I quickly learned from my host mom that we were not going to the aunt's house—plans seem to change pretty quickly around here, and that aunt failed to tell us that she actually wasn't in town until 11 p.m. the night before we were headed over there. Therefore that left more time for laundry—which ended up coming in handy. Washing by hand is no easy task, and when you're lazy and don't do it for several weeks it makes for an even more difficult task. Fortunately, my host mother likes Stephen Kellogg and the Sixers as much as I do, so music helped pass the time as I washed my entire wardrobe that was covered with two weeks of Yanacotan dust (see picture of underwear washing and drying). At least two to three hours later I was done and we had a nice lunch together. After lunch I showered by bucket—I'm surprised how clean you can get after one bucket of water— that's shampoo and shaving--yes ladies, still single :), no still not growing an impressive Peace Corps beard. Recently I constructed a tippy-tap (I call them drippy-drop cause that's more fun)--it's basically a sink and helps wash hands, and is more effective than washing them with a bucket.
After the shower, I walked down the hill w/ Matias the 8 year old to go help w/ one of the other trainee's mini-community projects—painting the soccer concrete field with a map of Perú. Unfortunately we didn't get a jump with this today—things tend to move slow, but we are all set to paint tomorrow and it should be a lot of fun.
After going down, I went to the ferreteria (hardware store—one of the few non-food stores here in Yanacoto—which I think demonstrates one of the key stages of development--Construction..). I asked Elmer, the owner's son if he could fix my computer charger which recently broke. He said he could so Matias and I climbed the hill and returned. Matias and I sat and shot the shit (they need an expression for this down here, cause we seem to do it a lot) w/ Elmer while he fixed the broken cord for easily over an hour. We talked about US culture, and I received plenty of questions about the US—wars, politics, racism etc, and I brought up almost as I always do that “depende de la persona o la región”.
Afterwards I returned w/ Matias, got my computer and went back down to see if the fix would work.
Thanks to Elmer's hardwork and saudering skills, my plug now works again and I can write this blog entry. How much did 1 hour and a half of repair work cost? The friendly conversation and a picture. Elmer only wanted to help, and he told me he likes challenges—all he wanted was to give me his business card and take a picture to remember the day. He also threw in an extension cord—most people are very generous here.
In a good mood I climbed the hill and bought a few ingredients for a cake for tomorrow's get-together and called my real sister Katherine to ask for her famous recipe for chocolate chip cookies. It still amazes me that with 13 numbers and a phone I can call anywhere in the world.
After this success, I went home and ate dinner—fried bananas and rice and we watched some Discovery Kids—Channel 37 is pretty popular in this house. We also decided to watch some of our pirated version of Toy Story 3—lucky for me the version we bought is in English, and it's not dubbed in Spanish, so we put on Spanish subtitles, but for some reason all the signs in it are in what I think is Russian—what do you expect for 1 dollar?
After shaking out my bed for bed bugs, my bed should be free of bichos, my clothes are drying, I'm listening to SK6ers, and the dogs are barking. Good night from Yanacoto. ¿Q pasará manaña?
