Thanksgiving in a Box

Well, a lot has happened since my last blog. But I feel as if I’m too far gone to fill in everything that has happened. So I’ll just start from Thanksgiving and move on from there.

The day before Thanksgiving I was a little bit worried. I wasn’t sure if we’d be able to pull off the Thanksgiving that we had in our minds. We had a few things against us: our stove and oven are bobo (as Hanna would say), we didn’t have all the same ingredients that we have in the States, and we were short a few pots and pans. But we were determined to have a Thanksgiving like none other.

A few weeks prior my mom had sent a few boxes with Thanksgiving ingredients; Thanksgiving in a box. However, it was Thanksgiving day and we hadn’t received them. That morning we made our way to the post office to see if our packages had arrived. Hanna opened up the mailbox to find a few slips indicating that we had packages waiting for us. One of the slips was for me, but I knew that my mom had sent a box before the Thanksgiving ones, I was a little bummed. But I figured that we could just use the ingredients for a Thanksgiving meal #2.

As we sat waiting for the immigrations officer to look through all of our boxes a lady told us she had more slips. She started to read off the names, all of which were people from AMOR projects. Two of the slips had my name on them. Thanksgiving in two boxes had arrived! I was so excited.

The rest of the morning was spent picking up other ingredients for our Thanksgiving feast. Around 1:00 we walked in the door arms loaded with bags of Thanksgiving feast ingredients. We all set to work peeling, chopping, mixing and all the other things that go into preparing a grand meal.

At 7:00 that evening our table was filled with just about every Thanksgiving dish one should have. Hanna and Stephanie had decorated the room quite festively and everyone was gathered around the table. We had our Thanksgiving prayer and as soon as the word “amen” was said, it all went crazy. Everyone was trying to get every dish on their plates, it was loud, it was unorganized, it was great.

I sat down with my plate full of yumminess and a smile on my face. I was so excited to see creamy mashed potatoes and gravy, sweet potato casserole, green bean casserole, the best turkey I’ve ever had, stuffing, cranberry sauce, empanadas and gluten (for the veggies) all piled on my plate. I couldn’t believe we’d pulled it all off. Food-wise, it was pretty much like home. We even had two pumpkin pies and an apple pie.

Thanksgiving here was good. I did miss my family. I missed cooking with my mom, and having my brother and dad stuff themselves two or three times over. I missed the cool weather, wearing a sweater at the table, and going for a hike to try to get over our food comas. But I loved being here with my Student Missionary and Peruvian family. It was great having everyone crowd around the table. My favorite part of the evening was when we all went around the table and said what we’re thankful for. I am truly thankful for the chance to be down here. I’m glad I got to have a Peruvian/American thanksgiving. All my Thanksgivings run together, but I think this one will stick out as one of my favorites.

November´s Scent

“It smells like November,” I told the Peruvian guys. As soon as the words left my mouth a roar of laughter followed. I was trying to explain to them the scent of a candle that a previous Student Missionary had sent us. The guys couldn’t understand how a candle could smell like a month.  But the Student Missionaries knew exactly what I meant by those words.

November. At home the leaves have changed colors and have descended to the earth below. Students are bundled in their coats, and scarves warm their necks as they rush from class to class. My mom has just pulled out a fresh batch of pumpkin cookies, and the scent of cinnamon and warm apples ascends from the pot of cider bubbling on the stove. At home you can feel the change from October to November.

It’s been an adjustment having hot weather in November. My brain tells me that I should be wearing sweaters and shivering, but the climate here tells me otherwise. However, there are advantages to not having cold weather: my hands aren’t cracking from dryness, my skin only itches from mosquito bites not from dry skin, and I don’t have to worry about avoiding wool scarves that will give me hives.

But, in all seriousness, I am truly blessed to be here. How many other people get the chance to take a year off of school and experience life in a different country? Though there are things that I miss about November at home, I am thankful to be here in Peru.

As we were heading back home in the motorcar today, I began to think of all the things that I am thankful for. Here’s what I came up with:

·         Running water (many people have wells, and at one point KM 38 did not have running water).

·         Two good stove top burners (we don’t have to search for wood to make meals).

·         Several great cooks (who knew we would eat biscuits and gravy in Peru?).

·         The Doctor (I have no worries about being sick here because I know he’ll take care of me).

·         Internet in Campo Verde (a lot cheaper to go to Campo Verde than Pucallpa, and where else will I get to listen to “Jenny from the Block” four times in one hour?).

·         Cloudy days (sometimes it even feels like fall).

·         Sunny days (free highlights and dry clothes).

·         Green grass and clean air (it’s nice to come home from the smog filled city to fresh air).

·         The stars (we can actually see them twinkle here).

·         Empanada lessons from Hermana Welfa (now we’re set for the whole year, and a million possibilities await us).

·         My students (sure sometimes they drive me up the wall, but I wouldn’t have it any other way).

·         My SM family (there are not enough words to describe how much I love each one of them).

The list could go on, but you may get bored reading it, or December’s newsletter will be finished by the time you get to the last item. In other words, God has given me so much to be thankful for. And I have discovered that living here in Peru has made me thankful for the simple things in life. I have experienced the richness of God’s blessings here—the blessings that are too numerous to count. So, this holiday season, when the rush of meal prepping has worn you down, or Black Friday has you in dizzy mess, take a moment to breath, to find the simplicity in life, and to give thanks for your many blessings.

“Many, O Lord my God, are the wonders you have done. The things you planned for us no one can recount to you; were I to speak and tell of them, they would be too many to declare.” Psalms 40:5

Lima or Bust

November 7, 2010

Tuesday, November 3^rd Hanna, Chris, and I headed for Lima. Hanna needed to go to the U.S. Embassy to renew her passport and she needed a traveling buddy. We decided to take the bus back to Lima with Chris. When would we have another chance to ride the bus to Lima? Or the time? Who knew? Here in Peru we live by Nike’s moto:Just do it.

We sat in our front row seats of the bus, enough snacks to last us a week  and enough clothes to last us about a day sat above us. The bus attendant lady stood up to make an announcement.

“Welcome, we are glad to have you on Transmar. This trip is expected to be about 18 hours, we will be serving lunch soon. There is a bathroom on this bus, only to be used for urinating…”

Other things were said. We were surprised to hear that they would be serving us lunch A few minutes after the announcement the poo hit the fan, almost literally. The smell of a freshly used bathroom began to permeate the bus. Seconds later the bus attendant walked purposefully up to the front of the bus and said something to the bus assistant. She then made her way, perturbed, towards the back of the bus. Five seconds later she came rapidly down the aisle to speak with the bus attendant one more time. This time the bus attendant accompanied her to the back of the bus.

By this time I was quite curious. I turned back to see what was happening and saw the two of them pointing fingers and speaking forcefully to a person inside of the bathroom. The next thing we know the bus workers and their “criminal” were walking to the front of the bus. The bus driver proceeded to pull into a gas station.

Some curious travelers asked the bus attendant what was going on.

The crime: “He defecated in the bathroom.”

There was obviously no protection of privacy. Although, the smell pretty much informed everyone of what was going on.

For the next 10 minutes the poor guy was humiliated as the passengers snickered and watched him clean the bathroom. With the bathroom and bus smelling fresh as spring we were on our way.

The rest of the bus trip went like this:

`           *Lunch served in little aluminum tuperware.

            *Awesome popcorn.

            *Jackie Chan movie in Spanish

*Conking out from the “altitude sickness drugs” (really high dosage of benedryl).

*Beautiful green rolling hills sprinkeled with thatched roof houses.

*More conking out from drugs.

*Jagged cliffs with rushing river next to the road.

*Waterfalls

*Pit stop in Tingo Maria-50 centimos to use the bathroom.

*Another meal in an aluminum tuperware.

*More yummy popcorn.

*Another movie in Spanish.

*Winding roads.

*Guy vomiting from bus-sickness behind us.

*Freezing.

*Finally arriving in Lima.

The bus ride was an adventure. I’m glad I did it, and I’m even more glad I didn’t throw up. Gross.

A Familiar face at AMOR

November 5, 2010

What a week. It all started on Thursday. Chris Clouzet sent me an e-mail saying he didn’t have work on Monday and that he wanted to come visit. Yay, excitement, but I didn’t want to get my hopes up in case it didn’t work out. Then he said he couldn’t come. Understandable, plans always change here in Peru. Then Friday afternoon he called saying he was coming. Man, talk about rollercoaster.

It was nice having a familiar face around AMOR Projects. We showed Chris around the house. We informed him that our shower had one temperature (cold) and that the toilet paper was not flush-worthy. I helped him set up a mosquito net and showed him how to tuck it under the mattress to keep out as many mosquitoes as possible. I know Chris chose to come visit us, but I felt bad for making him sleep in a mosquito net, cook in a kitchen with roaches and flies, and take cold showers. But it is what it is.  We almost live in a different world.

Saturday night we decided to show Chris “the town.” Some Saturday nights we all go into Campo Verde for papas fritas (French fries), ice cream, and soda. Most of the time there’s a volleyball game going on. Not this night however. In the square was a comedian. Several people were gathered around him. Curiosity got the best of us and we made our way towards the show. We watched from a distance. The comedian had a male friend dressed in a short red dress and leggings. As we stood there along with several adults and their little kids the comedian turned on some music and started dirty dancing with the guy in the dress. It was pretty awful. I was disgusted, but the locals around me acted like it was normal.  I began to get upset. There were kids there as young as 4. How could their parents just sit their and let their children watch this nastiness? We decided to leave. I wish the parents would have made the same decision.

The rest of the weekend was pretty uneventful. We showed Chris our market where we buy our groceries, took him around Pucallpa to eat ice cream at Cest si Bon, and visited our new vegetarian restaurant. Chris’s time with us was too soon and it was time for him to return to Lima. But…..Hanna and I were going too!

Hola, hola, hola.....

October 31, 2010

Sunday morning we packed up the truck and loaded our new (for us) van. Some affectionately call it the love van, or Big Bertha, we haven’t settled on a name yet.  It’s a retired combi, which is another form of public transportation here. They can usually be seen packed to the brim with people, animals, produce, whatever can squeeze it’s way in.

So with the cars packed we headed down the road. People kept flagging us down for rides thinking we were a taxi, it was pretty entertaining. I felt slightly rude for just passing them, but what can we do?

We arrived at the small, quiet town of Nuevo Tunuya ready to attend to patients. As we were trying to figure out our clinic location Dr. Mathews asked me to go to the town’s P.A. system and announce tat we were there to have a clinic. I was really excited because that meant I cold do what I’ve always wanted to do since our river trip.

I climbed up the wooden ladder to the second floor of the town’s announcement system. The “D.J.” handed me the mic and I was ready.

“Hola, hola, hola.” I had been waiting for the opportunity to greet a town over a sound system the same way the guy in Nuevo Saposoa greeted us our first morning in their town.

“Buenos dias Nuevo Tunuya. Vamos tener una clinica para ustedes. Tenemos un grupo medico y dental tambien. Vamos tener consultas, y medicinas para ustedes. Todos es gratis Venga, venga! Traen sus hermanos, hermanas, sus primas, primos, esposos, abuelos, traen todos!”

(Good morning Nuevo Tunuya. We are going to have a clinic for you. We have a medical group and dental group. We are going to have consultations and medicine. Everything is free. Come! Come! Bring your brothers, sisters, cousins, spouses, grandparents, bring everybody!)

The clinic went smoothly, I helped in triage, cleaned some teeth, a little bit of everything. Good times in Nuevo Tunuya.

The River

October 12, 2010

Amidst the craziness of our return trip from the river I forgot to write about the robbery. So here it goes.

Friday morning we packed up the boats for our return journey home. I was so excited to be going back to 38. As everything was being loaded onto the boats I noticed that my backpack was loaded on the other boat, the one I wasn’t riding on. I thought,  “Eh, I could just leave it there. But then again, I might need something from it later and it will be a hassle to get it later.”

So, I asked the boat driver to hand me my backpack.  That was probably the best decision I made the whole trip.

With everything packed on the boats our driver pulled out of the port. We began to make our way back home. Somewhere along the way the other boat got separated from us. Later we learned that they stopped to let Rachel go to the bathroom.

I kept looking back to see where our other boat was, but never saw it. After about 10 minutes wondering what happened to the other group, I figured they would catch up with us at some point. So, I journalled, napped, river watched, and napped some more.

About an hour or two into our trip, our driver stopped at a sand bank to refuel. As he was refueling I felt the urge to go to the bathroom. I asked our driver if he could pull onto the sand bank so I could have some relief. He said he could. We started driving closer to the island and the guys in our boat asked what was happening. I explained that I had asked the driver to stop for me—they all protested.

“Jenessa, we solved that problem.” They held up a 2 liter coke bottle with half of the top sawed off.

“I am not going to use that.”

“Why not? We made it girl-friendly.”

I was not about to go to the bathroom in a boat full of guys. I told them I wasn’t going to use it and said that the driver had already agreed to pull over. As he began to pull over we saw another boat about 500-600 yards away. We thought it might be ours but we saw it pull off towards the shore and another boat with it, so we figured it wasn’t ours.

He stopped and I hopped out. The immediate bank had some scraggly bushes. In the distance I saw some thicker bushes and a log. I decided that was going to be my best choice. I took off toward it in a jog cause I didn’t want the boat to have to wait on me too long.

I finished my business and started to head off toward the boat. As I got closer to our boat I saw another boat about 300 yards away speed off; it was a lot faster than any of the other boats we had seen on the river. I then heard Lauren yell out that the boat driver wanted me to hurry up and get in the boat.

As I made my way in, our driver started to say something. He kept pointing towards the speeding boat saying something about a yacht and “de repente” (suddenly), but I couldn’t understand him. By that time the other boat was coming towards us. We realized it was our other boat. I could see Hanna, Steph, and Rachel all huddled in the front. They looked shocked. I thought maybe their boat had tipped over, but they didn’t look wet. I asked what happened but no one said anything at first. They just stared. Then Laura answered,

“We just got robbed, they took everything.” Then she made a gun signal with her hand.

“What?! You just got robbed?!” They were all too shaken up to explain what happened. We later learned that a boat came and hit the side of their boat pointing guns at them. The robbers told them to close their eyes and not to look at their faces.  They began to go through all the stuff. They pulled out clothes from everyone’s back packs and suitcases looking for valuable items.

They searched everyone’s pockets and even took 20 centimos from Rachel’s pocket. After they got onto the boat, one of the buys began interrogating Dr. Mathews. He asked him what we were doing. Dr. Mathews told him that we were doing a medical campaign and that we were helping people.

The guy then asked where the other boat was. Dr. Mathews told him that we were far away. The thief asked if there were soldiers on the other boat to which the Doctor replied.

“There are angels on the boat.”

“Yes, there are thousands of angels,” Shirley told them in agreement.

The boat driver said that we were armed. The thieves took what they wanted including Hanna’s, Steph’s and Rachel’s entire backpacks. Then they said they had to go and hopped back onto their boat and took off.

Apparently, while I was using the bathroom the boat drove close to us, slowed down and then sped off.

It really was a miracle that they didn’t stop at our boat as well. I believe it was a culmination of God doing little and big things. If Rachel hadn’t of stopped to go to the bathroom and if we had heard them calling us to stop we would have been traveling together.

If I hadn’t been going to the bathroom on the little island, we would have been out in the middle of the river more vulnerable to the robbers.

We also think that the robbers saw Caleb waving his arms at them and Jonathan and Anthony playing with the machete and Chris looking ticked off. I think they also saw our angels protecting us.

Although the other boat had a terrifying experience, no one was hurt. Things can be replaced, people can’t.

God has been tangibly working in our lives the whole time we’ve been down here. Being an SM is a life-changing experience. It’s also a Christian-strengthening experience as well. Praise the Lord for his protection.

Bathing with Piranhas

October 5-7, 2010

Warning: The next two blogs are rather long. Read at your own risk.

Wow, what a week. It’s been four days and my body is pretty banged up. I look like I have chicken pox on my legs.

Tuesday night we pulled into a little village right off the Ucayali River. It was pretty sandy and a few huts dotted the beach as far as we could see using our head lamps. The arrival there had been pretty rough. We had to stop several times to adjust our lights on the boat so that the pathway would be visible. After a couple hours of putting through the water we finally arrived at the first village. Hanna and I scoped out a place for our hammocks. I was pretty excited since this would be my first time using my hammock. Hanna helped me set up between two poles right on the beach overlooking the river. I was pretty excited about the view I would have the next morning.

That night I fell asleep to some locals playing card games and laughing away. The next morning I awoke to locals chit-chatting and Dr. Mathew’s infamous laugh. I popped my head out to see the sun shining off the river and boas floating by.

           

“Yeah, I think I could live like this,” I thought. We packed up our stuff and ate breakfast in a little hut right off the beach—rice, platanos, and frijoles.

           

After breakfast we made our way to the clinic location. As we walked over, announcements were being made over a loud speaker.

“The American’s are here to do a medical clinic. Here they come, they’re 50 meters away.”

We came upon the building where our clinic was to be held. It was a really nice building, it looked fairly new, quite large. As soon as we arrived people started coming. By the end of the morning we had seen about 132 medical patients and 35 dental patients.

With clinic finished we were pretty hungry. We had a little mix up with food, and in the end the guys decided to purchase food from the same lady who made us breakfast while the girls decided to cook the food that we had brought with us. First order of business, we needed water to cook our pasta. The Doctor told us to go down to the river to get our water. Hanna and Steph went in search of a “good” place to collect water. They were gone for about 15 minutes. Hanna returned with the pot and a slightly disgusted look on her face.

           

“What is it?” I asked, “What’s wrong with the water?”

“You don’t even want to see it. Just don’t look at it.”

With that Dr. Mathews took the pot from her to put on the borrowed fire-burning stove of a little woman in a hut. Curiosity got the best of me and I went to go inspect the water, it was yellowish, not clear, and had some floaties in it. Yum.

Dr. Mathews thought we were all a bunch of babies for being turned off by the water. “Oh, my water is not clean, I want to go home, wah, wah, wah!” Then the infamous laugh. For the record, we said nothing about wanting to go home. We were just trying to get over the fact that our cooking waterwas less than clear, and had stuff in it before we started cooking. That’s all.

The water had come from the place where the boats pull in. It looked awful, green, brown, stuff floating in it. I’m pretty sure it was waste infested. But, then I thought back to breakfast, I’m pretty sure she made her food with the same water, and we had survived. Besides we were boiling it. I just had to suck it up, pray, and eat it.

After we finished eating our parasite pasta we packed up the boats and made our way down a little tributary to another village. On the way there the other boat stopped to bathe in the river, our boat kept going because we had a couple passengers to drop off.

           

We arrived at the next village, which was only about 40 minutes from the first one. Some people in my boat then decided that they wanted to bathe too. So we pulled out of the port and headed back in the direction from which we had come. The water was looking pretty muddy, and kind of bubbly. The boys jumped out and soaped down. As they did, the boat driver told Lauren and I that there was a well back at the village where we could bathe. We thanked him for the info. In the end we just decided to bathe in the river off the sides of the boat.

We finished bathing and headed back to scout out our living quarters, which ended up being a school with a wall-less building next to it. Most of the group camped out in the school while Rachel, Steph, Hanna, and I set up our tents and hammocks next door. 8:00 rolled around, the mosquitoes were merciless, and we were ready for bed.

It was a good thing we went to bed so early because at 5:30 am on the dot our village alarm went off. Peruvian music began to blare over some loud speakers; I was so confused. What is going on?

After the music ceased, a male voice came over the P.A. system

“Hola, hola, hola, hola, hola, hola.”

Once he was sure his voice could be heard, he went in to his announcements. I think he was speaking mostly in an indigenous tongue. He did speak some in Spanish and I caught his announcement about the American having a clinic in the village.

Before our clinic we needed to cook breakfast. We found a lady who would let us cook at her house. Dr. Mathews and Shirley set to work preparing fish and platanos. Steph, Rachel, and I went to the boat to get some pots, oatmeal, and other useful utensils. The walk to the boat was sweet smelling; sugar cane lined the walkway.

In about an hour and a half we had a jungle-made breakfast of oatmeal, papaya, fried eggs, boiled platanos, breadfruit seeds, and various types of fish, including piranha. I ate piranha; it actually tasted pretty good., it was tougher meat, the texture was almost like grouper.

The clinic went well, a lot of the same symptoms we saw in Pucallpa. I was thinking we might have some more interesting cases since we were in the jungle. But everyone here seems to have the same things. Bichos, headaches, bone pain, arthritis, and diarrhea. The medical clinic finished before the dental clinic so I asked if I could do a teeth cleaning. They happily handed it over. I decided after that teeth cleaning that I didn’t want to be a dental hygienist.

(If you are still reading at this point I am very impressed. Feel free to stop reading and go back to the happenings in your life. I won’t ever know the difference).

After seeing many patients we were hungry yet again. The girls, Dr. Mathews and Shirley went back to our “kitchen” to cook up some lunch.  Steph, Lauren and I began to prepare the rice. We were running out of plates/blows to prep with. Steph found a yellow little bucket.

Perfect, just the right size. We began to measure out the rice and water and put the seasoning in. When the water finished boiling  Shirley was ready for the rice. Lauren took the rice over to Shirley.

“Girls, where did you get this bucket? Is the yellow bucket ours? Lauren asked.

“No, we got it here, it’s their bucket.” We replied.

The next thing we heard was disgusted yells and screams.

“Do you guys know what this bucket is?” Lauren asked.

“No, what is it?’

“That’s the bucket that the kids pee and poop in!” Lauren exclaimed.

Shirley was still making disgusted sounds and shaking her head saying, “chicas, chicas.”

We didn’t know, we just grabbed the bucket. In fact we had been using it to wash our hands. At this point I wasn’t disgusted. We had been using water that probably had poop and pee and other things in it. Had that been the first day I might have vomited. Instead we made jokes about it. Sopa de kaka, arroz con kaka. What could we do now? (For those of you who may be hurling, let me set your mind at ease. We changed out the rice and the pot and started over with fresh ingredients and pots).

Lunch/supper was good, but we all felt really grimy, so the girls decided to go bathe in the lagoon. We hiked out and found a spot. I didn’t want to get in the water because I knew that was where the piranhas were caught. So we all lined up on a log in our underwear and bathed. As the water got soapier fish arrived. There were tons of little fish waiting to bite our fingers or whatever else happened to get into the water. Half way through our bath some local women with their kids came down to bathe. The kids were swimming away in the water, apparently the nibbling fish didn’t faze them anymore.

It was fun living like the locals for a few days, but I was really ready to go back to Km 38 after that. It really made me miss my Peruvian home. 

Oh, and I didn´t get diarrhea, praise the Lord. 

Thoughts From a Boat

October 5, 2010

I’m writing from a small boat heading up the Ucayali river. We are on our 2^nd big campaign. We are going to be visiting a few villages off the river to do dental and medical clinics. The river is spotted with long skinny boats carrying snoozing passengers and their luggage. Herons can be seen on the coast and the motor constantly hums.

We’re going to be spending four days here on the river, really roughing it. I think I’ll be sleeping in my hammock for the next few nights. I’ve also heard this is where I’ll probably be getting diarrhea. Fun. For now I’m just enjoying the adventure. We’ll see how excited I am after the first day.

You Have Bichos

September 27-October 5, 2010

Last week was the longest, craziest, most tiring week of my life. From time to time we will have visitors here at AMOR Projects. This last week a doctor from Wisconsin came to stay with us for a couple weeks. He’s not Adventist but he wanted to do some sort of mission work. He happened to come across our project on the Internet. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that he’s here.

Anyway, we started our first major clinical campaign last Monday (September 27^th). Sunday night we had a meeting to discuss how the clinic would work and assign leaders fro certain jobs. It was decided that Caleb would be the first leader for the Dental clinic, Stephanie would be the leader for medical, Hanna would be the leader for triage, and I would be the translator for the Doctor. What?! Translator? How in the world? I knew that it would only be by the help of the Lord that I would be able to translate. We were all a bit overwhelmed that evening. There were a few tears. After the meeting a few of us stayed up trying to do some last minute medical term cramming. I went to bed that night praying that God would fill in all my missing vocabulary. What was scaring me the most was not being able to understand all their symptoms and missing something vital.

The first day we crammed our stuff into the truck and the rest of us on a taxi, still overwhelmed and quite nervous. We arrived on a dusty road at an unfinished building that looked much like a church. It would be our dental/medical office/pharmacy for the next five days. A few people were gathered waiting for their treatment or just curious about all the white people showing up in their neighborhood.

We set up our stuff and soon it was time to begin. Our first patient sat down, I sent up another quick prayer and asked her about her health problems—a stomach ache, pain in her head, her bones, oh, and bishops. I translated all her problems to the Doctor and awaited his reply. He wanted to know more, I asked her more questions, more translating. Ok, Mebendazole, Ibuprofen, and vitamins. And that’s about how the rest of the week went as far as medical. Everyone had stomach pain, bichos, head aches, and pain all over their bodies for their whole lives.

There were a few interesting cases. One lady had a huge infected gouge out of her leg that had happened a month prior. She e had to keep coming in to get it cleaned. Another lady came in with Huntington’s. We also had a kid who had stuck a bead in his ear. We had to flush it out.

Other than that, it was a lot of the same symptoms, which was nice to translate for cause I just looked at the triage papers and pretty much knew what to ask. I was called “Doctora” a few times, which I thought was pretty cool.

On Thursday we received a call from home about 3:00 pm telling us to hurry back because a fire had started in the chakra (the fields). A big portion of the jungle was pretty black with little fires here and there. By the time we had arrived it was pretty controlled. Amongst the ruins of the jungle was a poor sloth. He was just hanging out on a limb a little scorched and looking pretty scared. The boys worked on trying to catch him. They were successful and brought it back to the house to live in the lemon trees. It only stated there on night before being returned to the jungle.

The rest of the week was spent fighting various fires multiple times an evening –some bigger than others. For three nights in a row we were bomberos (fire fighters). It was pretty tiring and I hated fires after those three nights. Only in Peru can you be a translator, pseudo doctor, and a firefighter, only in Peru.

Ask First, Drink Later

September 22, 2010

            What a fun night/day. Today I just had one class in Santa Elvita, but this whole week the schools have been having spring activities. So, today Hanna and I made our way to school. I had prepared some activities, but I was expecting to not have class. Right before we left I found out that the dental team was having a clinic at my school.

            Pretty sure I won’t have class. Sure enough, as we got there the kids were all outside. The classes had little grass/tree leaf huts set up outside of the classrooms. They were really impressive. Each little house had some history of food or animal information about Peru. My class had food in their hut. There was pork, some sort of vegetable soup, and rice.

            Hanna and I decided to have a tour of the houses. We made our way across to the secondary school. In one of the houses, there were plants and food. We asked the professor in the hut what everything was. He told us about the plants and fruits. There were pineapple plants, banana trees, coca plants, and other trees. Then he uncovered the food. He said he had two drinks typical of Peru: Aguajina and Masato. The first drink was made of the aguaje fruit. The fruit itself looks really scaly on the outside, and on the inside the fruit is orange. I don’t really like aguaje, it’s really sour, and it doesn’t really have a sweet flavor like you would expect from a fruit. The other drink was made of the yucca root, milk, and sugar.

            The teacher asked if Hanna and I would like to try the Masato (yucca juice). Hanna replied, “Sure, I’ll try anything.” The professor handed us a small cup of the white liquid. It looked like horchata, which I love. I don’t know why, but I was half expecting it to taste like horchata, WRONG!

            Hanna took the first sip, and then handed it to me. I sipped it, it tasted sweet at first, but then as it went down my throat it burned, it tasted rotten. Sure enough, after we had tried it, the professor decided to mention that the drink was fermented. That would explain the burning sensation in my throat and the sour rotten after-taste. We still had half the cup to finish. Hannah and I gulped it down in an effort to not be rude. He then handed us the aguajina, I was leery of this one, I expected it to be fermented like the first, but it wasn’t. But I didn’t like it very much cause it still tasted like aguaje. We said, “Thank you,” and made our way to the next hut.

As we entered, the professor asked if we wanted to try masato. We quickly declined saying that we had just tried some. He insisted his was better, that the other guy didn’t know how to make it. So he handed me a cup with a little bit of masato in the bottom. I cautiously sipped it. To my surprise and pleasure, it actually tasted pretty good. It was sweet and lacked the burning sensation and rotten after-taste. He was right, his was better. I told him I like the drink.

Inside this teacher’s hut were live parrots, pictures of various animals in Peru including giant anacondas. After checking out the hut we said our thanks and moved on our way.

            Later that afternoon the school held a Miss Santa Elvita pageant with three candidates—one from my class (Katy) and two from the secondary schools. The first outfit competition was supposed to be a traditional costume, all handmade. One girl had on a very short skirt and a bra. Attached to the underwear were CD’s in the shape of flowers. She also had a headdress made of CD’s and straws. It was very ingenious. Katy had on a really cute dress made out of newspaper, complete with pleats and a bow. It was very impressive and cute. 

After indigenous clothing the next category was casual wear. I’ve realized that girls here kind of dress skanky. One of the older girls had on really short shorts with a purple sheer top and a black strapless bra underneath, really classy. The other girl had a mini skirt and a crop top, bearing to the adolescent boys her midriff. My little student was cute, wearing jeans and a cute little blouse.

It was a regular old Miss Universe pageant with wardrobe changes and question and answer time. All that was missing was the choreographed dance number.

I wanted m student Katty, to win. She was so cute and innocent looking. As we watched the competition I couldn’t help but wonder if she would turn out like the other girls, unfortunately it would probably happen.

The pageant ended, one of the scantily clad girls won. I went home hot, sweaty, and hungry, we missed lunch.

From Mel Gibson to Cupid

September 20, 2010

As a teacher here in Peru I encounter a wide range of professors. I’ve met a couple interesting ones for sure. The other day I had an interesting conversation with a professor out at Yerbas Buenas, an elementary school about 4 Km away from AMOR Projects.  It started out with:

            “Tu eres una maestra bonita,” (You are a beautiful teacher) that seems to be my alternate name here. I tend to just ignore it or roll my eyes. First he asked me where I was from.

            “Georgia,” I replied.

            “Oh, Georgia, that’s one of the states that was separate from the United States,” all in Spanish of course.”

            “Yes, that’s right.”

            “You know the movie Patriot?”

            “Yes, I know it.”

            “With Mel Gibson?”

            “Yes, Mel Gibson is in the movie.”

            “Yes, he drinks alcohol.”

            “That’s true, he does drink alcohol, his life is a little sad,” I replied.

            “All the lives of Hollywood are sad right?”

            “Not all of them have sad lives, there are some who don’t drink alcohol or take drugs and have happy lives. But yes, there are a lot of sad lives.”

            “What do you think is the message of Hollywood?”

            “The message?”

            “Yes, the message of Hollywood.”

            I had to think about that. What is the message of Hollywood? Based on the majority of their movies I would have to say, sex, drugs, provocative clothing, dirty dancing, spending nights at the club, driving fast cars, having multiple women, I could go on. But the only thing I could say was,

“Uh, no say, pero el mensaje no esta muy bien (Uh, I don’t know, but the message isn’t very good).” Lame.

            It did make me think. If all that people here in Peru see of America is our movies, it’s not surprising that they think American women are loose and want to be whistled at, hollered at, and honked at among other things, cause that’s what the women in the movies like.

            Well he was done with that subject, moving on.

            “Who did you vote for? Did you vote for Obama?”

            I’m not sure what they think of American Presidents or candidates so I pretended not to understand the question. It worked.

            “There haven’t been any black Presidents before right? He is the only black President in your country?”

            “Yes, he is the first black President in the U.S.”

            “That’s because of the racism—there has been a lot of racism in your country.” Man, did this guy read all of our history books? Or just watch movies on the history of America?

            “Yes, in the past there was a lot of racism. There still racism in the U.S. now, but not as bad as in the past.”

            “Yes, I know. I know your history. There was a lot of racism in your country in the past. His family is black too right? His wife and kids?”

            It would appear that would be true….”Yes.”

            “Do you have a love in the States?” Goodness, this guy jumps from subject to subject as often as he blinks.

            “No, I don’t have a love in the States,” wrong answer; always say ‘yes.’ But I didn’t want to have to make up a boyfriend.

            “Do you have a love here in Peru?”

            Say yes! Say yes!

            “No, I don’t have a love here in Peru.”

            “Oh, that’s ok, cupid will find you, and he’ll bring you a love.”

            “Thanks.”

            “What’s your name?”

            Hm, that probably would have been a good question to start out with.

            “My name is Jenessa.”

            “JA-nessa?”

            “JE-nessa.” My name is so hard to pronounce here and no one ever remembers it. I usually don’t care, but I will be living here for 8 months, I kind of want to be called by my name.

            “What instrument is that?” He points to the backpack containing the ukulele on my back.

            “It’s a ukulele, a small version of a guitar. It only has four strings, a guitar has six.”

            “Play a song for us.” By now there are two students from the secondary school listening in on the conversation.

            “Uh, ok.” What should I play? I decided to play/sing the camp song I had just taught the kids, Your Everlasting Love. I finished, they clapped, I said thank you, then put it away. By this time the other professor was ready to take me back on his motorcycle. The same one that burned my leg, I’m really cautious when I get on a motorcycle now. Too bad I had to get burned to learn that.

            Random conversations with people, I like them.

Grime and Impromptu Sermons

Today I decided to be a true missionary and by going two days without showering. Actually, I didn’t really have a choice in the matter. Early Sunday morning the power decided to go out. There were power outages all the way out to Pucallpa, which is 38 Km away from base camp. Apparently this is a once a month occurrence. I still haven’t  figured out why this happens--I think it has something to do with the power plant being overloaded, who knows.

So here I sit in my own filth, dreaming of cold water to drink, swim in, bath in, anything but dirt. But then again, it could be worse. Two days isn’t really bad. So to get my mind off my own grime I shall recollect on past happenings.

I’ve come to really love my Church in Santa Elvita. By “church” I mean a house with a few roughly made pews sitting next to it. I really enjoy the simplicity of the church, it’s pretty impromptu, from the special music to the sermons.  Which shouldn’t have made last Sabbath shocking for me.

As the kids were putting the finishing touches on their coloring pages, a church member informed us that one of the SM’s would be preaching. Stupidly, we thought that the members wouldn’t ask us to preach since it was our first Sabbath—never think that. I should have seen it coming. Caleb, an SM from La Sierra, was asked if he had a sermon prepared. Of course none of us had come prepared. Two other SM’s were asked before one of the summer workers approached me, “Jenessa, can you preach the sermon?” What else was I going to say? No one else was left. I heard myself reply, “Yeah sure, give me a minute.” What?! How in the world could I preach a sermon, I hadn’t even had a full conversation without picking up my dictionary and saying, “Como se dice…..?”

After being asked to preach, I frantically searched through my Bible, trying to think of what I had read for my devotionals that week. I prayed, “Please Lord, direct me to something!” A few seconds later I turned to Matthew chapter 5 (which  happens to be the chapter of my favorite verses). “Perfect, thanks Lord!” I jotted down a few thoughts about being salt and light to the world. I barely had time to find some supporting texts before it was time to file to the front.

All the SM’s and I made our way to the front to take our seats for the service. We nervously stood there singing hymns in Spanish. After some off tune singing and garbled pronunciations,  one of the girls was asked to come forward to recite a verse of her choice. I didn’t quite pick up all she said, but I did catch where the verse was found, Matthew 5:16! I leaned over to my translator and asked if the verse the girl just recited was indeed what I thought it was. She nodded yes. “I can’t believe it, that’s what I’m preaching on!” Coincidence? I don’t think so.

The program progressed and it was finally my turn. Ah! I was so nervous; I said a quick prayer asking God to bless my words. The sermon went pretty smoothly,  it was more like a sermonette. But I think God still blessed. Just having the little girl recite the verse I was preaching on was such a blessing. I didn´t really care how the rest of the sermon went after that, I knew God would do His thing. My sermon ended and I breathed a sigh of relief. As we stood at the back of the church the members thanked us, said, ¨Feliz Sabado,¨ and gave us cheek to cheek kisses (I really like that expression of affection here by the way). I realized that the members didn´t expect perfection, just willing spirits. Which is what God expects of me too. There´s no way I could ever be a perfect missionary, but all God wants is for me to be willing.

Well, the power is back on now. Time to go  wash this grime off. One thing I’ve learned from this power outage is to take a shower whenever you can. Cause you never know when you’ll be without water.

A is for Apple

First of all, I apologize to those of you who have been checking my blog only to discover that nothing has been posted. 1.) I am terrible at keeping any kind of journal/blog (but I am trying to overcome that). 2.) I have been quite busy adjusting to life here and teaching. Anyway, no more lame excuses.

Life in Peru has been an adventure. I think I've recovered from the shock of being here. For the first few days I kept thinking, "What am I doing here? I'm here for eight months? Am I capable of doing this?" But as the days and now two weeks have passed by, I've settled into this place that I will call home for the next eight months of my life. 

A lot has happened in just a couple of weeks. I preached my first sermon, I rode on the back of a motorcycle, I've used an outhouse (affectionately called the squat pot), seen a toad the size of a cantelope, and have been called "gringa" more times than I can count.

I think what I have enjoyed most is teaching, which I guess is good since that will be my primary job here at AMOR Projects. The kids have been great, with the exception of one rowdy class, but the Lord got me through that day--I think they just wanted attention and that was how they chose to beg for it.

I've been spending the majority of my mornings and afternoons with kids in three different schools--Yerbas Buenas, Santa Elvita, and Km 37. They range from ages 3 to 13, all cute and in need of lots of attention. The kids here have been picking up English quite quickly. Class time is spent teaching the kids various vocabulary and useful phrases. My favorite day was when we learned how to have a simple conversation on the phone. At this point in time my kids can say, "Hello, this is ___________, is Jennifer there?" So maybe we have a ways to go, but there are four more months left of classes. My students have also been helping me with my Spanish along the way. They tend to finish my sentences with the correct vocabulary.

While I've been out teaching, the rest of the SM team has been training for their first campaign. SM's have been practicing giving IV's, carbocaine, and stitching up pigs. On one afternoon after my classes, two of the SM's taught me how to suture a pig's head--it was pretty exciting. I don't know if I will ever use those skills while I'm here, but you never know.

Since I so conveniently chose to blog two weeks after my arrival, I have too much to tell and not enough stamina to type it all out. I'll attempt to get better at this blogging thing. Until then, thanks for your prayers and support.