Peace Corps: Peru

My Photo
Name:
Location: Lalaquiz, Piura, Peru

Friday, August 17, 2007

Earthquake

As you probably know, Lima and Ica were hit by an earthquake a couple days ago. I live in the northern part of the country which was uneffected. We only felt a small tremor. Please continue to pray for the families of the 500+ who died and for the injured.

Thursday, August 02, 2007

K.O.

I’m not much of the betting type… for various reasons… but this Sunday was different… I mean, how many more times in my life will I get a front row ticket to the local Peruvian cock fight??? It was pretty much exactly how I envisioned it would be. It was in the “backyard” of the house of a friend of a friend whose father is really big into raising fighting cocks. The arena was probably 35 feet wide and 30 feet deep.. just big enough to fit about 125 people, I don’t know how many cases of beer, and a circular fighting ring fashioned out of chicken wire and cardboard. The men were really obnoxious since at least three quarters of them were highly inebriated, but the actual event was quite captivating. First the official named each of the days match ups and each bird owner presented his fighter. Then the first two birds were prepared for the battle. This involves fastening a sharp 2-3 inch spur onto the back of the rooster’s foot/leg with a few feet of electrical tape, some sort of hot wax/glue and a metal brace. While this is going on, one guy from each side walked around the room collecting bets, keeping tally in a small notebook. Once the birds were ready, they were released to go at each other. It was quite a spectacle…with feathers and blood flying everywhere. The fight ends either after one bird kills the other or at the expiration of a ten minute time limit. This particular day, the time limit was reached 4 out of 5 times. The birds were pretty well torn apart, but they weren’t dead. In this case, each better is returned his money. In one fight where there was actually a winner the winning side (which I so happened to be a part of) is awarded their winning.. generally they double up. I won 10 soles….just over $3.

I guess I’ve been slacking a bit on the blog entries. I just realized that it has been over a month since my last entry. In that time my soccer team was eliminate from tournament play. I didn’t actually participate in two remaining games because we somehow, legitimately or illegitimately acquired a number of really good players. I think the guys must be a bit worn out, because they haven’t been playing ball for at least a couple weeks now. I’ve been trying to take advantage of the break taking a number short bike rides on the back mountain roads.

Work-wise I’m slowly, but surely progressing. I have successfully organized a group of about 25 women who are interested in starting a weaver’s association. Half are from Tunal and half are from a village about a 2 hour walk away. I am currently coordinating with an NGO of Artists from Piura which has offered to help teach the women a number of new weaving techniques as well a help with the designs and color combinations of the weavings. Just a couple days ago they submitted to me a project proposal which included a rather ridiculous budget. So, we’ll have to see how that works out, but it’s at least a start. The products that they’ve show me were really nice, especially their hand woven shawls. The women are starting to get excited about the possibilities of having the opportunity to make money…so that’s fun to see. This Sunday we have a meeting to elect the executive team. From there we’ll be planning a trip to visit a well established weavers association in another mountain town or Piura and we’ll arrange for a number of workshops focused on crochet and sewing. It’s already been quite a learning experience for me. It’s a bit different that the big business management that I studied in college, plus it’s all in Spanish… another detail that makes it just a little more difficult.

I spent a week and a half visiting other volunteers last month filming their projects and gathering information about their experiences. It was neat to see what my fellow volunteers are working on as well as where they live. At the end of the trip, however I was pretty exhausted. In total I traveled 30 hours on bumpy mountain roads and walked about 25 miles (including a one day 8 hr hike!) I finally have repaired my computer, so I’m pretty excited about starting the video editing process.

As far as my health goes, I’ve actually been doing quite well. There’s always the occasional rough day or two, but for the most part I’ve been pretty fortunate. However, about 3 weeks ago I came into contact with the yuye once again, leaving me with another wound the equivalent of a bad, blistery burn. (The yuye is a small black bug that secretes some sort of acidic liquid causing the burn-like sore. That’s pretty much healed by now, though I still have the scar. More recently I suffered a rather nasty scrape on my right arm and knee as I lost control of my bike returning from a visit to a nearby village. This particular road is made of a very, very fine dirt which overtime is ground into powder from the traffic...so in some stretches the road is as much as 3-4 inches of pure powder. In one of these sections my bike somehow slid out from under me… since there was no water in my house, I had to go to the health post to get it cleaned up.
It’s hard to believe that we’re already in August. Exactly a year from now I could potentially be back on US soil… though I’m definitely not counting down the days!! This month my sister-in-law’s cousin is coming to Tunal to volunteer at the health clinic for a few weeks. I’m excited to have an English speaker here for a while.