Kutiri Kutiri Kutiri... that seems to be the word that I live and breath right now.  And for good reason; Katie, Katherine, and I have started a youth center named Kutiri here in Cutervo Peru.  We have been putting in 7-12 hour work days (depending on the day) and can proudly say we have a regular group of 70+ kids showing up on a daily basis to participate in games, movie nights, parties, breakfasts, and workshops of varying themes.

Here is the result of our hard work!

We have a lot of planned improvements for the new year, including membership cards and a points system to encourage attendance at the workshops and classes.  The next big step is getting as much participation by community professionals as possible because up to now we have been running everything.

Unfortunately we have had a recent detrimental set back to our shot at sustainability.  My amazing new site mate, Katherine, has been forced to resign by the country director because she was caught in Lima without permission.  I cannot express how disappointed I am by their poor decision.  Katherine was what we call a "super volunteer" because of all the hard work she put into our youth center and her own project working with disabled children.  In fact, she had been in Lima to buy some materials for her sensory deprivation room for autistic children in site.  Now I am not condoning her illegal vacation but it is my understanding that volunteers get at least one warning in situations like these.  Whatever the reasons, the decision to let her go has severely hurt our project, a project that Katie, Katherine, and myself have poured out hearts into and seen reasonable levels of success considering the challenges we face. 

Her absence is not just a personal loss for me but a significant loss for the Peruvian community of Cutervo, Cajamarca.  So I am left with a sense of emptiness and frustration at progressing the Kutiri youth center without her.

I wish to thank her for getting us this far and letting her know that no one in her community (or anyone who knew her for that matter) agrees with the decision forced upon her.  We would never have made it this far without you Katherine - Thank you!

Introducing the Kutiri Youth Center of Cutervo!

Boy have I got a lot of information for you guys! A lot has happened since my last post and for me it really feels as if that time has just flown by. It really is a surprise to me that my last blog post was in June!

I have been a very busy volunteer lately, and that is exactly how I like it. Just to recap what I have been up to and the newest developments...

1. I am doing English pronunciation classes with a local school.
2. I am working with the local municipality and health center to establish a sustainable youth center. We currently have our space and I have already begun work with the youth leaders. We had our first official event (a movie night) a few days ago. We named the center Kutiri – the native origin of the name of our town, Cutervo.
3. Katie has joined me here in Peru and will be teaching English classes and helping me with my youth center. One of my counterparts at the health center wants her to help with nutrition workshops as well.
4. I have a new site-mate! Her name is Kathryn and she is a special education specialist. She is going to be working on the youth center with me as well.
5. I am working with another volunteer close to my town (an hour away) to create a huge job fair. We have the support of both our local governments and expect to have around 850 kids attend!

So instead of the usual long-winded story telling. I am going to just show you a ton of photos with descriptions :)

Enjoy!

Bird watching with the kids and a local expert, Willy Castro (how cool of a name is that?)

This is the Arenal (sandy area) on the mountain above our city.

We like to play ultimate frisbee here :)  This was the first time most of these kids had even seen one.

My youth leaders and I at the top of Mount Ilucan.

Just monkeying around.

My kids spent a good half hour trying to catch a tadpole... without avail.

Katie arrived in August, a really great birthday present!  We went on vacation for two weeks to...

...Arequipa!

I love Arequipa city and the surrounding area.

We went hiking in the Colca Canyon - the deepest in the world!

When we got back to Cutervo it was time to get to work.  We finally have the new youth center!  Katie and my new site-mate Katherine are helping me get it going.

We have three spaces in the new market.

The two spaces with windows are ours.  We will put a library in the top one and a computer center on the bottom one.

Our third space is shared with the municipality and comes complete with chairs, tables, and...

This is one of the spaces up close.

... a kitchen!  We are going to have sunday morning pancake breakfasts here.

So that is it for now!  I have been super busy - in a good way.

Of course, like any start up non profit, we can use your support.  Right now we have 75 books and I am writing grants to two non-profits for more.  I am going to be working through a DU organization to get funding for the computers and everyone here would appreciate it so so much if you could help us out when the fund raising drive gets under way.  I have one more year here and I am very confident we can leave Cutervo with a self-sustaining youth center by then.

If you would like to send any materials or goodies for the center/kids, you can send it to my address in an envelope (no boxes please) weighing no more than 2 pounds.

Chris Huey
Pasaje Yoyo Flores 180
La Familia Espejo Sanchez
Cutervo, Cajamarca, Peru

Please check us out on www.kutiri.wordpress.com and friend us on facebook.  My kids will get a kick out of seeing all the support from the US.  I will be updating the Kutiri blog often with our current activities and successes, so please keep checking in.


Thank you again for everything!

Time's Fun When You are Having Flies

Wow!  I can't believe my last post was more than a month ago!  I intended this post to be back to back with that one so you all don't think everything is horrible out here.  Unfortunately I was so busy that it took waaay to long and many of you wrote me with kind words of inspiration and support.

Actually, a lot of really amazing things are happening for me as well and I wouldn't give up my life here for anything.  I having a lot of fun and many of my other projects are going along as planned.  I just got a little carried away with the "frustrations" post I think.  So here is my opportunity to get carried away with a "life is grand" post!

So much has been happening lately it is hard to know where to begin.  I guess I will start with the fun stuff.  Right now Cutervo is celebrating it's annual town fiesta.  There is a whole week of bull fighting, great food, fireworks, booze, and fried foods - a knockout combination if there ever was one!  They do fireworks displays right here by building huge sugar cane towers with spinning spokes of fire and color, each level lighting before the next and ending in a huge display right in the center of the plaza de armas.  It is all very dangerous and highly amusing!  I have been up pretty late every night and I can see why they only do this one week out of every year.  It is exhausting!

Plaza de Armas - Cutervo

Being the only gringo in town, my host dad was able to get me a press pass for the bull fights.  I get to stand in the ring right outside of the fighting arena with all the "rodeo clowns" and trainers.  I can say I have started to become de-sensitized to the massacre and have even found myself enjoying the event.  Of course part of the reason for this is the adrenaline rush of being so close to the action.  The first day one of the bulls actually lept over the barrier wall and began charging around the outer circle I was standing in.  We could only tell which way it was running by the people jumping up the walls and screaming in a counter-clockwise wave.  The two guys I was standing with calmly but briskly pushed me towards the fighting arena and told me to jump the wall before the bull reached us.  I did so without a problem and waited while they corralled it back into the arena.  We switched sides again and the action continued as if nothing had happened.  Not long after that, the same bull did it again!  It was a blast and my family looks at me like I am a little nuts when I describe the event with some excitement.  I secretly wish for it to happen again this week.

I was standing in this outer circle.

The Matador makes it look easy sometimes.

The Matador goes in for the final blow.

As for work, life is not as bad as I made it out to be.  Professors and school directors have been seeking me out to plan programs for their classes.  I am currently doing a Life Plans course (9 weeks long), an english pronunciation course (12 weeks long), a parenting course (TBD), leadership/self esteem charlas, and I am planning a course for english professors with the regional school board.  All of this activity is allowing me to make close connections with people who are interested in seeing a youth center succeed.  I have a list a mile long of kids who are reading to get started with group activities outside of school.

Life Plan Class

My English pronunciation class.  Katie will work with them when she gets here.

A leadership/self esteem charla in Socota with Annalise

I recently received a grant from the DU Peace Corps community of $350 which I will be putting towards filling the center with furniture and other items we need.  The space is reserved but getting all of my socios together to finalize things is like herding gigantic balding Peruvian cats.  They all "promise" me that we can begin the real work after the town fiesta.  So I have a huge meeting planned for the 6th of July where we will finalize the rent agreement and we should be able to move into the space a few days after that.

The new space for the youth center

The courtyard of the new youth center

Inside the youth center

As for home life, my sisters are really comfortable with me - we are constantly teasing and poking fun at each other so I know they have welcomed me into the family.  My madre and I spend a lot of time cooking together and sharing recipes.  I love her food and I have been sharing my favorite dishes (bread, pizza, pasta, cookies - all healthy) with her.  She even wants me to show her how to make the pizza for her restaurant... she is the only spot in all of cutervo where you can get pizza and it always sells out really fast.

Saludos from the family!

Best soup ever - Made by Lilia Espejo

I eat well... too well.

Making pizza.

I am about to take a vacation as well!  At the end of this week I will be headed to Chachapoyas with a huge group of friends for our 4th of july vacation.  We are going to hike, see ruins, cook, drink, and get of to all manner of shenanigans!  I think it will be a good break and refresher.  I won't leave site again until Katie comes up here on the 25th of August.

This brings me to the next really awesome thing!  Katie will be here for a long chunk of time.  She will be doing some research on nutrition, teaching English at a local high school, and helping me with the youth center when she has time.  She has her own apartment and living situation already set up.  I am kind of jealous of her since she seems to have more structure than I have and she hasn't even arrived yet.  I am sure we will make a great team - we have already been tossing around ideas for youth activities and organizations.  It will be really nice to have a partner in crime to motivate me and keep things fresh.

Speaking of a "partner in crime," there is a possibility that a new volunteer specializing in special education will be coming here to my site as well.  So if all works out, there will be a gringo invasion of Cutervo!  The city's youth can certainly use some native English speakers to practice with... actually the teachers themselves really need it too.

On a non-Peace Corps related note, I am still working out what I want my masters paper to be about.  I keep switching between youth development ideas and human trafficking... but I just can't find the research I need to inspire a full paper.  I recently met a guy who works for the Peruvian equivalent of the FBI and he is very interested in giving me some info, so that is one lead.  Also, I have been contributing to the Aware! blog, dedicated to fair and rational discourse on the Israel/Palestine conflict if you want to check that out.

I have been having a blast out here.  My life is a fast-paced blur of events, classes, vacations, meetings, and great food.  I hope to have all of the youth center logistics worked out within the next couple of weeks (nothing happens quickly in Peru) and then we can really get the ball rolling on the community youth development.


Thank you for all the kind wishes!

 
P.S. ~ I have figured out the mail thing as well!  Send only packages in envelopes weighing no more than 2.2 pounds and it will get to me without a problem.  Anything in a box, even if it weighs less than 2, will get sent to Chiclayo.

P.S.S. ~ For some reason the flies have been awful even though the rainy season is over... there, I got my pessimistic remark in AND made the blog title relevant.  Go me.

Youth Center? What Youth Center?

Hello everyone!  I would first like to apologize for the long time between posts.  I know many of you are interested to hear what I am doing out here and I owe it to you to post more.  Also, please forgive my lack of phone contact, my skype account ran out of credit and I cannot contact anyone by land line or cellular anymore.  However, if you wish to add me as a skype contact so we can talk for free, my username is christopher huey.  Now back to your not-so-regularly scheduled blog...

As most of you know, I have been here in Peru for almost a year now - in Cutervo for 9 months.  I feel I have had a lot of personal development; I know spanish, I have received a lot of training in various subjects, I have learned how to bake...  But one thing I feel that I have not done is contribute anything meaningful to my host community - yet.  For the last 6 months I have been working with my local counterparts to find and rent a space where we can start a youth center.  This will provide the adolescents with a safe and fun space to spend their free time and receive workshops from local professionals.  I have the support of professors, psychologists, social workers, government staff, and other NGOs and yet, we have been unable to secure such a space.  Why?

I can easily  deserve some of  the blame due to my constant trips out of site and my inability to maintain contact with all the important players in Cutervo, but there are so many more factors that contribute to our failure to get a youth center started.

1).  Local Politics - It is not uncommon to have two different counterparts tell me that the other possesses many unsavory qualities and I should, therefore not work with him/her.  I often have to tip-toe around these kinds of "gossip circles" but lately I have been more prone to being blunt about not being interested.   I have also found that I need to appeal to the vanity and ambitions of local leaders in order to get the necessary connections or resources for the youth center.  I had one director of an organization here make it perfectly clear that since I had nothing to offer him he was uninterested in the project.

2).  Social / Cultural Norms - I arrived assuming that doing business would, more or less, be the same as anywhere else I have visited and worked but this has not been the case.  There is something here called "La Hora Peruana" in which it is common, nay expected, to arrive to all meetings at least 30 minutes late.  Often times these meetings drag on hours longer than they should, making it nearly impossible to schedule  back to back events in a day.  I had to learn patience because most meetings are 80% niceties and 20% business.  For example, when someone enters a meeting late, they are expected to walk around the room and say hello to each individual and then they are rewarded their tardiness with the floor to say what they like - completely interrupting whoever was speaking before.

3).  Money - This is an obvious challenge, and one that every social program struggles with on a daily basis.  We have been offered only 150 soles (around 50 dollars) from the local government, which is not even enough to rent a space, let alone pay for utilities.  I have been trying to make it clear that without a commitment from the community there can be no commitment from foreign donors but it is hard to explain how the investment in a youth center will benefit the community when they have never offered youth services and there is a severe lack of...

4).  Statistical Data - I have lots of anecdotal evidence suggesting that teen violence, vandalism, drug and alcohol use, and adolescent prostitution are all on the rise but the police and municipality do not keep those kinds of records.  They only records I can get to show an increased risk for youth development is the rising pregnancy rates.  The municipality wants hard data to suggest why a youth center is necessary but they themselves have failed to gather that data.

Combine all this with the fact that my most active counterpart stole money from me and has fallen off the grid and one can understand my frustrations.  However, despite the odds stacking up against me I have found a new group of counterparts who have risen to the challenges and have offered to help me gather some data, write a formal request for funds, and help get the project off the ground.  I can only hope to contribute something tangible to the whole process but it has become very apparent that I do not understand how business is conducted in my region.

So, dear reader, please forgive the tone of this post but it is important that my friends and family understand that my work here is not a walk in the park... Even when working with dedicated and passionate individuals who understand the process and work very hard to achieve a sustainable social service - it is no a simple feat.  Not even to rent a room.

Your frustrated and hopeful Peace Corps volunteer,

Chris

A Day in the Life of...

So what exactly does a Peace Corps volunteer do?

I used to ask that question all the time to friends at DU who had just come back from their service at the far corners of the world and quickly realized I was never going to get a straight answer. The truth is that a gajillion factors determine what a volunteer might do in site. Your country, your site, your assigned goals, your personal goals, your ability to integrate, your ability to learn the language, your confidence and self-esteem levels, your prior experience, support from administrators, support from friends and family back home, even your ability to stay healthy in site all have an impact on what you do out in the field. I can only describe my own experience because even the volunteer living an hour away from me is living such a different life that she might as well be in some other country.

I live in a city of approximately 15,000 people. It is called Cutervo and it is located in the department of Cajamarca in Northern Peru. We share a boarder with Equador, and in fact I can get to that boarder in about 5 hours if I wanted. We are nestled on the front range of the Andes mountains that is dryer and resembles the Rockies in a lot of ways. It gets pretty cold at night but it never snows. Just an hour outside of this plateau you can find a tropical forest area, which is where my fellow volunteer lives. If you go further in that direction (12 hours maybe) you will hit the Amazon. For those history buffs out there, Cajamarca city is where Incan Emperor Altahualpa made his last stand against Pizzaro. But I don't live anywhere near that city. In fact, it takes me about 10 hours to get there by bus. Hour-wise I live further from Lima than any other volunteer, except my friend an hour further away. When the roads are bad it can take me up to 21 hours just to get from my site to the coast.

Now that you have an idea of where I live I will give you an idea of what I do with my time here. I often hear about how Peace Corps is basically a two year paid vacation, and it probably is for some volunteers. For me I was placed in a site that was eager to have me around – in fact they specifically asked for a youth volunteer to be placed here and I was greeted by social workers and professors that couldn't wait to start working on some projects. I work with a non-profit called the Cutervo Youth Association (APROJOC), the regional department of health promotion, the municipality, the directors of all the high schools, and several other random individuals. Together with this great support network we have some really big plans for the future of Cutervo youth... mwahaha! (an evil laugh seemed obligatory there).

I usually wake up pretty late. Maybe around 9 or 10. I am a volunteer after all! I have breakfast with my host mom, Lilia, and we chat for about an hour. Then, if I have a lot of things on my list of things-to-do I head up to my room and work until around 2. During this time I am usually planning and writing up charlas (workshops), youth development courses, youth center proposals, presentations, and solicitudes (formal requests) for help and resources. After lunch ends at about 3:30 I either head to the office at the Health Department to have meetings and plan upcoming events. The majority of the meetings lately have been to get a youth center up and running before I leave for the States in March. I have also had my fair share of time on the radio and television – so yeah... i'm kind of a big deal.

I usually give two or three charlas a week. I give a weekly english class at an organization called Data Mundo, I give random charlas on leadership and self-esteem to kids at schools, and I also do a monthly parenting class at a local pre-school. A typical charla is between one and two hours and I usually start with an introduction/warm up game. I then lead a discussion on the topic and we play two or three games that relate to that topic (debriefing after each one). We wrap it up with some kind of group activity or competition and I like to give prizes to keep them motivated. We end the session by doing a check for learning to make sure they got the point and might demonstrate some of the behaviors away from class. In reality, most of the kids I work with are lacking basic self-esteem and just getting them to play and participate in a group is incredibly important for their overall development.

I don't like free time. I think free time here is a death sentence for a volunteer. It allows you to feel lonely and start wondering what you are doing with your life... also, it's boring. I use up my free time by helping a few friends with english, translating written material for other friends (including a book on birds by my host uncle), and playing guitar with my buddy Oscar (he is teaching me all sorts of spanish guitar songs). I also go hiking when the weather is right. I live in such a beautiful country that it would be a shame to spend all of my time inside. I am just a 20 minute hike away from amazing vistas of rolling green hills with nary a building in sight.

If I am not doing any of those things I am usually traveling outside of my site (more than I would like). I leave for meetings, trainings, charlas, parties, packages, and camping. As you all know, even a trip to go get my packages in Chiclayo can take almost a week of my time. But it is nice to have the excuse to see new places and sometimes I just want to get away from the day-to-day of Cutervo.

In the evenings I go to the new hamburger restaurant my host mom just opened. I sit at the bar with her and my sister Madoli and we joke around, drink tea, and play video games. Yep, I corrupted them both and they can't get enough of Bejeweled.

I am a lucky volunteer. I have a great family, lots of active coworkers, a comfortable living environment... I love my work and I feel validated to be doing something that I think will help the city of Cutervo. It took me about 5 months to get the point where I felt like Cutervo is home but now I revel in the realization that I cannot walk two blocks down this city of 15,000 people without someone calling out my name and having an lively discussion about my work or life. I feel accepted and loved here in Cutervo, Cajamarca, Peru, and there is really nothing else I could want for the work I do.

UPDATE ON PACKAGES:

ok, so the Chiclayo trip is costing me too much time and money and I had to figure out how to change the situation. I talked with the post master here in Cutervo and he said I could give him a notarized statement for them to open my packages in customs without my present and then send them directly here. Also, he said that if I don't want them going to customs at all you can just put it in a packing envelope and make sure the weight is under 2 kilograms (about 4.5 pounds).

I love receiving just letters or magazines too!

As always my address is:

Pasaje Yoyo Flores 180

Cutervo, Cajamarca

Peru

Ole!

I have always wanted to see a bull fight. It is not so much the violence I have craved as much as seeing a guy in tights try and dodge a massive raging bull. I got my wish this past week during the town festival of Socota – a tropical site only an hour away from my own. I arrived with a lot of assumptions and left with a lot of disillusions.

For example, I had always assumed there is only one type of bull fight. From the rare glimpses I have had of this “sport” in the media I had thought that it was mostly a show of acrobatics – much like a modern western bull-riding is about the strength and skill of the cowboy, so to is bull-fighting about the abilities of a torero (matador). I assumed they would put on a show of how easily and gracefully the matador could manipulate the bull. I didn't expect there to be actual violence. Apparently, my idea of a bull fight does exist, but in Socota I went to the latter.

However it felt less like a bull fight and more like a bull slaughter. They start things off by arranging various matador “assistants” around the ring. These assistants (for lack of a better term) are basically the rodeo-clows of the bull fighting world. Their job is to distract the bull when necessary. The bull is released and it is pissed... I have no clue what they might have done to it behind the arena to achieve this but it is out for blood – or the color red, for some reason. It charges at anything moving and red, which the assistants happen to be waving.

After they have spent a good chunk of time teasing the bull a man on a blinded horse trots out onto the arena. The horse is equipped with some special equipment for this phase. It is blinded with cloth so it doesn't realize that a pissed off bull is rampaging around it trying trying to catch a red clothed clown. It is also wrapped in heavy leather to protect its legs for said bull. Finally, the rider has his legs inside of pvc piping to protect his legs as well. The rider carries a long and menacing looking pike. It is now the job of the assistants to maneuver the bull next to the rider so he may critically wound it behind the neck. I should also point out at this point that the bull was already exhausted from the teasing and was frequently falling to its knees and panting... but it really wanted to kill a clown (can't blame it really).

So now the rider, having wounded the bull, trots his horse out of the arena, leaving the bull literally spurting blood out of its back. Now the brave matador struts in to the wild applause of the crowd. Seriously, these guys are like rocks stars here. He grabs a big red piece of cloth and the assistants run for cover so he becomes the target of the dizzy bull's aggression. This part was pretty cool. He would deftly dodge the bull and as he gained more confidence he would get to his knees and taunt the bull that way. It's really something you have to see to understand how crazy it was.

After playing around with the bull for a while he gets up and grabs two small spears (about a foot and a half long each) and as the bull runs straight for him he must lunge these into the back of the bull's neck and at the same time avoid being run through by the bull's horns. I would say this is the closest part to actually being an equal fight between matador and bull (not forgetting of course the bull is already weak and wounded).

Now the matador turns his back on the panting and wounded bull. The crowd goes wild. I mean, they go absolutely nuts at this blatant and bold turn away from the dangerous bull. He plays off the crowd by walking around the arena as the bull, now standing in the middle of the ring, looks around almost confused at what he is supposed to be doing. Apparently, if there is no guy taunting him with red, he is one lost bull. The matador struts to the sidelines and gets some water, takes a brief break, and grabs a sword.

Now is the part where I get flashbacks of the movie “Gladiator” where the hero has been drugged so the emperor can defeat him the the ring. The bull is bleeding to death from the pike wound and the two to four tiny spears sticking out of its neck. It is struggling to breath and is more often than not falling to its knees from the exhaustion of the last 20 minutes of fighting clowns and a jerk with a red towel. I have no doubt this bull is wondering where it went wrong in a past life to deserve such retribution from a clown army.

Anyway, the matador plays around with the bull a bit more – sword hidden behind the red cloth. Eventually the bull and the matador stand face to face. The matador raises the sword from its hiding place and aims it over the bull's head and taunts the bull to charge one last time. If the matador's aim is true the sword will slide almost effortlessly to the heart and the bull will lose its strength and fall to its death. Unfortunately for the bull, its heart is a small target in comparison to, lets say, its lungs. The matador misses, the crowd and the bull are instantly aware of the mistake as the poor animal's eyes go so wide you can see their whites in the back rows of the arena.

The bull begins to violently cough up blood, backing up away from the sight of it. The blood is spraying everywhere and the audience becomes quiet. That silence made it so much worse to watch the bull struggling to breath – literally drowning in its own blood, now totally unaware of the matador or clowns surrounding it. Finally it falls to the dirt, convulsing between gurgling gasps as a merciful clown approaches it from behind and severs its spinal cord. Four legs kick and twitch as the blade makes its way through the sinew, fat, bone, and nerve. At last the eyes, only a moment ago wide with panic, roll up into the bull's head. It is over. The crowd politely applauds the not-so-great job of the matador and the clowns reset for another bull.

I watched three fights that day and I would only describe one as a fairly clean kill. I fulfilled my wish of seeing a bull fight and in that I also got my fill of bull fights. I don't need to see a wounded and outnumbered animal be stabbed to death over and over until it is finally put out of its misery. I am not alone and it is not just me speaking from a cultural gap as I have spoken to many peruvians that are not so wild about the sport either. From now on I think I will be sticking to the bull fights where the matadors show how well they can dodge a bull and call it a day. But hey, try everything at least once, right?

Somos Peru!

I would like to take this moment to thank all of you great people for sending me packages.  Yes, you may have sent them out more than a month and a half ago but rest assured that as of today I have gotten my grubby mits on them.


You may be asking yourself, "why did it take so long?" and I have a pretty good story for that.  It is quite an epic story actually.  One of adventure, travel, love lost and love found... but above all, this is a story of paperwork and bureaucracy.  


To begin, you probably need to know something about the package system here in Peru.  If you send me a package that is really heavy or in a box of any sort, it will get sent to the nearest customs processing center (which for me is in the city of Chiclayo on the Peruvian coast 11 hours away from my home).  This in itself is not a problem because, lets be honest, who wouldn't want an excuse to go hang out on the coast for a weekend?  No, the real problem comes in the form of... well, forms.  I first knew you all had sent me packages over a month ago while I was in Ancash for my early In-Service-Training when my host mother called me to tell me so.  I found out I would not be able to get them on my way home (where I pass Chiclayo) because I needed the forms she was holding in Cutervo.


No worries, I can make another trip to the coast later in the month right?  So finally the day came where I could make the time to travel.  I had to do it quickly because the forms told me I had to pick up the packages by January 3rd.  It doesn't say why or what will happen if I fail to get them in time, but that "or else" clause loomed over my head like an angry storm cloud.  I arrived on the 31st only to find out I would have to stick around until Monday because of the new year.  "Ok," I told myself, "this is my bad for trying to get them on the new year."  So I made the reservations for the hotel and dug in to spend a ton of money in the big city - something I can hardly afford.


Monday rolls around and I am sitting at the post office early in the morning anxiously but patiently awaiting my chance to tear into all those great goodies.  I could almost taste the reeses and twizzlers...mmm  So I waited... and waited... and waited.  Finally, three hours later (because they don't form lines and don't call names on a first-come-first-served basis), it was my turn.  I walked into a little room and sat in front of the man between be and my twizzlers.  He took my passport copies, attached each one to the forms I had brought from cutervo, filled out three new form each with three carbon copies, stapled it all together and then looked up at me expectantly.  Funny thing was, I was looking at him expectantly too - surely this was the part where I get my twizzlers.


I was wrong.  He asked me for my ID.  I pointed at the three copies of my passport and he said "no I need the original."


"Ummm, I don't have the original."  I stammered, "The organization I work for has it to make my Peruvian ID.  They told me I wouldn't need more than a copy to get packages."


The man glowered at me from across the seemingly expanding desk.   "Well, they are wrong, the law says you must have your original and until you bring it here I can't give you your packages. NEXT!"


"Wait!" I cried, "What am I supposed to do?  I live 11 hours away, my passport is in Lima, and according to the form this is the last day I can pick up the packages."


"I can't help you. NEXT!"


I left the office exasperated and shaking.  I pulled out my phone but was at a loss about who to call.  I flipped through my address book a few times and tried to call a few numbers of some peace corps staff but no one was answering.  By the time I got to one of the Lima staff member's numbers I was close to having a nervous break down and began hyper-ventilating a little.


I may get frustrated with peace corps own bureaucracy sometimes but I they really stepped up to the plate for me on this on.  I got ahold of one staff member who connected me with three more right then and there.  They called the post office and that very mean man was outside of his office within 10 minutes acting as if I was the bloody king of jolly old england.  "Yes sir, right this way sir, here are your packages sir."  Complete 180.  This didn't change the fact that three more sheets and lots more signatures and copies had to be made and I still didn't leave for another hour.  But I am proud to announce that after 11 hours of bus travel, four days of waiting, hundreds of soles, and a near-nervous break down I have a twizzler dangling from my mouth as I write.


So I have come to the conclusion that if you would like to send me anything else (and I really do love it when you guys send me things) you should stick to envelopes (large or small).  These come directly to my house and save me a lot of trouble.  I hate that I had to learn this the hard way but at least I did learn it right?  Right?


We have a saying among the volunteers when life here get out of our control - "Somos Peru" or "We are Peru."  No telephone service for a week? Somos Peru.  Your bus just stopped in the middle of nowhere because the driver forgot to fill up with gas before leaving? Somos Peru.  Water is out and you haven't showered for a week? Somos Peru.  Some guy won't give you your packages after you traveled 11 hours to get them?  Somos Peru!


And while the small things like these remind me that I am here for a reason; attempting to education my kids on the importants of showing up on time, keeping commitments, and the importance of planning in advance, these small things also remind me of something else - namely that I would damn near kill to get a reeses or twizzler.