Feast Day of St. Francis de Assisi

Man, I am way behind. This entry finishes up stuff from before our trip back to the States for 2 weeks in October.

The Thursday afternoon prior to our  departure was the feast day of St. Francis de Assisi. So of course the Hogar (de San Francisco de Assisi) celebrates in grand style. We arrived to find a set of high school kids in their uniforms playing music for the Hogar children. They performed several songs all on Andean pan-flutes but later saw nothing wrong with bringing out the electric guitar for a little rock-n-roll. Later, tweenager Julia joined the kitchen ladies in a display of traditional Andean dance and the one blind boy showed his prowess at classical guitar. By then it was dark and time to parade the Hogar statue of Saint Francis de Assisi through the neighborhood and take him visiting.

In Peru, saints are personal and local...in fact, it's not really the historical saint that is worshiped, it is the local icon, the statue. Like rockstars, their names are stickered on buses and taxis: for example, "El Señor de Cachuy" = "The Lord of Cachuy". In this city of refugees from the Andes, a taxista with this sticker is proclaiming his allegiance to the town of Cachuy and asking for the specific protection of that particular Jesus statue. The celebration of the main statue in Lima goes on for all of October, with adherents wearing purple all month as they march "El Señor de los Milagros" through various parts of town. Meanwhile, many institutions and homes have their own personal saints. I am guessing this is like when Catholicism mixed with Haitian slave theology to create voodoo, but in our case it is Catholicism mixed with traditional Andean temple theology. Incadoo, perhaps?

So all of us at the Hogar set out while men traded off carrying the wooden St. Francis on his 4-post palette. One of the main women walked the whole procession backwards, with her hands on the palette. A quartet of brass and drum played a plaintive, shuffling tune, reading the music from sheets taped to the back of the man in front. A cadre of schoolkids had made candle torches by affixing 2-L coke bottles onto sticks and decorating with paper-maché (they looked great, though many melted into a toxic mess by night's end). At one stop, Jen and the Hogar's clinical therapist had an encounter with a driver who did not like that we were blocking the street..."I have a crippled child I have to take to the house right over there!" he said. "So what," Jen responded, "we have a whole bunch of crippled kids!" "Carry him!" said the therapist. Of course, to their chagrin, the kid the man carried to the house turned out to be a very large teenager, very severely handicapped. Oops. When we stopped at the local school, the nuns had their students lined up to sing and recite poetry into a completely non-functioning microphone that they passed around. At the mayor of Chaclacayo's house, he introduced us to his two house saints that they had brought out to the sidewalk with candles and sandwiches. When we got back in front of the Hogar, the band suddenly perked up the tempo and the 4 main women took the palette and actually danced the statue around the street while a wicker firework structure lit up the night. I think when I get back to the states, I want a big decal on the back of my car that says "El San Francisco de Assisi del Hogar de Chaclacayo"!

If you are a Facebook friend of mine, you can see a video at:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10201548831655828&set=vb.1028344610&type=2&theater

On an earlier weekend we were at a lady's home with the Hogar kids and she had four very old textiles on the wall (1000yr +). The photo here is a detail from one, "from a coastal culture". It looks to me like the two characters are playing jump-rope with a 4-legged, laughing fish. I'm sure it's really a net, but still the overall effect seems light hearted.

Carter and Julito catching a ride on Julio's back.

We  got away one weekend with Julio and Maureen's family...this photo is in the pool at the little casitas up in Santa Eulalia.

Julia, Mariza and Angela #1

Another weekend, we took some of the "tween" girls from the Hogar to a club not far from the home. It's so easy to interact with the young kids, but of course the older kids are away from their families too, going through very long treatments, while having all the normal issues of growing up. For instance, right when we got to the club, Jen had to show one of the girls how to use a tampon. I also sometimes forget that these kids are in a very different world with us...I introduced one of the girls to a water fountain, having to stop her from washing her hands in it.

[On a different day, I had to explain a toilet seat to a younger boy after he peed all over it...but that might just be because he's kind of slow].  Anyway, clubs here are walled compounds, with lunch and a pool and games, etc.This one was pretty fun, with some petting zoo animals and big rollaround balls the kids could get in. Aracely really enjoyed the swimming pool and everybody enjoyed a chicken lunch.

Aracely, Julia & Angela #1

Random Events of August

The final weekend of July in Chaclacayo.

August is the month where things transition back to normal. July, the patriotic month of winter vacation, departed and Carted started 2nd grade with his new teacher. Traffic is all snarled again and September holds no big plans for us. But in many small things, our lives here continue to be interesting.

Santa Rosa de Lima...on the 200 sole bill that doesn't
really seem to circulate.

The Hogar where we go out and visit the kids continues to be a big part of our weekends. Recently, it was the holiday for Santa Rosa de Lima, the first South American saint, in which people traditionally go to her home in Lima and throw wishes into her well. The Hogar kids were all invited to a rich lady's house in Chaclacayo for a lunch and play. The kids love the lunch and, even better, love the giant trampoline and little wading pools the lady sets up. I noticed a couple of the long-term volunteers savoring a rare can of beer. Victor, 13yrs old, sat happily in a tiny wading pool for over an hour...like a pigeon in a bath. Even though the hostess suffers Parkinson's tremors, she insisted on doling out the ice cream afterwards.

Archery

In a strange moment that day, as we were on the van heading over to the lunch, we saw Jimena out on the sidewalk, not coming with us. Oh, said the doctor, she is going home today. We struggled to the window for a futile farewell wave as the van drove off. Jimena was one of the very special ones, a handful, a pain in the ass sometimes, but energetic and engaged and loving despite being a 9yr old covered in burn scars and a fused hand. I know we should be happy, she is going back to her family, her treatment is going well. Blah blah blah. Just this last week we learned that Jenny is going home soon...she is the cerebral palsy girl in the wheelchair in the first photo up top. This feels a little different...we are certain that going back to Jenny's family simply means she will be parked in a corner and ignored. We could be wrong, but we've met the mother and I doubt we are wrong.

Other little things: Marcela, Carter's Spanish tutor, rewarded him with an Archery class...one that I was able to take part in as well. The lovely little fruit aguaymanto has come into season just in time for me to experiment with pisco infusions. These infusions are great in a couple of the signature Peruvian cocktails: the pisco sour (1pt lime, 1pt simple syrup, 1 egg white, 3pt pisco, shake with ice, dash of bitters) and the chilcano (pisco & ginger ale & a bit of lime).

Jennifer and I went late one night to Brisas de Titicaca, a exhibition dancehall that alternates displays of traditional Peruvian dances with opening the floor for guests to dance. Jen and I had a hard time finding it, a few times incorrectly turning down the dark street where hookers were loitering in their skimpy dress. The native costumes in the hall, though, were fun to see. Brightly colored, modeled from different regions, with accompanying group dances. Also, I have mentioned the marinera before, the dance where a barefoot lady twirls her handkerchief and the man twirls his sombrero. Finally I got to see it. It was elegant, as expected, but also athletic and subtly erotic in the same way that the Argentine tango is. The footwork is forceful and the dancers circle around each other like cranes doing a mating dance, but then quietly come together and hide behind the hat for a beat or two.

Marinera

We had met up with Sanjay and Garima. They are in their final months in Lima as Sanjay prepares to take over the Country Director position in Mozambique. The new Country Director is coming in from his post in Ecuador and we hear good things about him.

We also went to a circus. Apparently, winter is circus time in Lima. We went with several people from Peace Corps to a special charity show in which all proceeds and the performance are all donated to a local child-welfare organization. A street-wise priest runs a program in one of the poorest areas out on the outskirts of town. Many of the kids from the neighborhood attended as well and we were amused to overhear "Mirá, gringos!" and watch as Carter's fair curls earned him a few new girlfriends. Central Lima is so cosmopolitan and the conquistador blood still so in evidence that gringos like us don't usually garner more than a glance or two. The show was good, intimate, with acrobatics and trapeze and horses and clowns. At the end, the performers all came out for a farewell and a speech about the charity. One of the acrobats, dressed for her role as a tough, scowling gladiator broke down weeping and kind of hid behind the others. I guess there is some overlap between what the kids in this program experience on the streets and what Peruvian circus performers experience. 

Finally, I posted this on Facebook, but for those of you who haven't seen it, here is a picture of Carter's note from when he and a school friend had to apologize to each other.

Everybody loves their mummy

Black & White Ball (and other social engagements)
Friday was a full day. Our niece and nephew, Dominick and Nicole, plus Carter and I went out to Chaclacayo to the Peace Corps training center. The most recent group of trainees were being sworn in and it is fun to see their excitement: they've been assigned their sites and the whole experience is clearly becoming real for them. Jen and I also get the privilege of seeing volunteers later, at the end of their term, and seeing how they change. So I know that 2 years from now, these new volunteers will be talking about their joys and tribulations (learning the local dance, connecting with the village kids, sampling local cuisine like fried guinea pig brains, pooping in the bushes with makeshift toilet paper, etc etc). Jen deals with her fair share of crises, so ceremonies like this swearing-in are feel-good events.

By good fortune, the training center just happens to be in the same town as the Hogar we visit. So after the reception, we take our niece and nephew over to meet some of the kids we know. Being their on a Friday evening is different: Jen helps with homework while I pitch in around the dinner time with bathroom trips and toothbrushes, mostly for those with limited mobility. There are volunteer tutors and I see that the kids get some computer time. There is even one who is watching an anime cartoon and Dominick and him have a brief anime-geek moment, even if they can't speak each other's language. [As an aside, Dominick researched and found a local mini-mall that specializes in anime...and when I took him there last week, he almost peed himself he was so excited by the 15 stores all focused on anime and video games merchandise.] Anyway, the kid at the Hogar quickly hid the cartoon because the Doctor came down for dinner and does not allow the computers to be used for stuff like that.

We got home at 9pm, but our Friday was not over. Jen and I had tickets to join several people from the office at a "Black and White Ball", all to celebrate Marcela's birthday (Marcela works in the office and also tutors Carter Spanish 2X per week in our home). Since Peruvian nightlife doesn't really get going until 11pm, we had plenty of time to don our B&W attire and still be some of the first guests to arrive. The venue served ice and mixers, but we all came with coolers to prepare cocktails and snacks. Something fabulous about Peruvians is that no dance floor stays lonely for very long. The mix of music would swing around through American 80s music, Latin dance-pop, and traditional oldies from the Andes or the Amazon. Also, the soundtrack to Grease. Peruvians love the movie Grease (though here the cable guide calls it "Vaselina"). Anyway...we didn't get home until 3:30am.

Skull from the burial area, still with jawbone, skin & hair

Cerro de Oro UNCOVERED
I have written in the past about the Huari ruins and burial grounds we have visited a few times (click here). After struggling out of bed Saturday morning, we took Dominick and Nicole and headed south of Lima to the site where we met up with Greg "Goyo" Plimpton, one of the few silver-haired Peace Corps volunteers. Dominick and Nicole were treated to the obligatory walk through the grave-robbed area, with the millions of bones and skulls and artifacts. In addition to the broken pottery, twine and woven fragments, Nicole and I each found a weaving shuttle, and I found an almost complete cotton tunic. But then Goyo walked us over to the archeological dig. It was his energy and bullheadedness that finally brought an

Goyo, at the dig

The mummy's tomb.

archeological team to the area and the results are amazing. To his surprise, the team completely ignored the burial area, useless to them I suppose, and started literally brushing sand away in an blank spot of earth. But they knew what they were doing, they uncovered the outlines of walls, then painstakingly dug down to reveal the whole buildings and even some walls still plastered smooth. Then, incredibly, they realized one wall was hollow and broke through to uncover a tomb with a fully intact mummy and several artifacts. And then, they found another one! The mummies have been taken to Lima for analysis. The artifacts include a heavy bronze knife (curved), a sculpted jug, some kind of complex decorative weaving...all seeing the light of day for the first time in 1000yrs. This stuff was all gone by the time we visited (these artifact photos are from Goyo), but it was great to see the site and to know it is being properly appreciated in at least a small way. Peru has tons of mummies, so this won't make the news probably, but to me it feels personal and amazing. I hope Goyo knows what a cool thing he's done.

Paracas / Islas Ballestas
Afterwards, we continued south to Paracas...also something I have written up previously (same link as above). It was chilly, but the kids and I played table fusbol and we all wandered around the beach. The boat trip out to the Islas Ballestas on Sunday morning was the same as before...dolphins, sealions, penguins, millions of cormorants, boobies, Inca Terns, etc etc. By the time we got back to shore midday it was beautiful out, so we ran back to the hotel for a swim and some lounging around. Then, on our way out of town, we stopped at a little lunch stand in the village so Jen and I could share a mixed cebiche and a mixed fried seafood. It had fish, octopus, shrimp...and then as we left we noticed that sea turtle was on the menu too. We really hope we didn't eat turtle by mistake, but there were some unidentified things in our mixto.

Anyway, it is Tuesday as I write this and I just dropped off Dominick and Nicole for their long flight back to Portland, OR.

P.S. Yesterday, Carter advanced a belt level in taekwan-do.









Below are some extra photos:

Intricate woven object from the tomb.
What is it?!

The bronze knife and other stuff.

Coool animal ceramic...but what animal?

The weaver's shuttle from the burial area

Plenty of donkeys in the area.

Jennifer schooling the new generation.