carnaval.. the end of the month of water balloons

Recently, life at Casa has been a lot more routine-y, with lots of work painting, painting, and re-painting everything yet again, (we've painted the front entrance door three times now, since no one can decide what color they really want it to be), preparing for the Bishop's visit and the celebration of the orphanage's 25th anniversary. This is will be pretty much a day-long party with a bunch of important priests, benefactors, and generally important people from the States and Lima this Wednesday. I've been teaching an English workshop to the kids three times a week for the past month, which has been SO much fun!! We just had our last class this past Friday, where I taught them how to play kickball while speaking only English--we had such a great time! My favorite part about playing any game outside here is that within minutes, it never fails that kids will start running from all directions to come play too. :)

So this morning, I had a pretty eye-opening experience as Jess and I visited another orphanage near us.. It really made me realize how different Casa Hogar is from the typical orphanage here--we use the Boys Town program, and the kids are all arranged in families, with at least 1 adult ("family teacher") per 8 kids. Although we are constantly in desperate need of money, donations, and supplies, the kids are happy, well-provided for, and are surrounded by loving staff. The orphanage we visited consists of a chapel and a giant, run-down building with peeling paint and stray, flea-covered dogs. It's home to over 120 children, who have about 1 staff member for maybe 30 kids, and no organization or teaching whatsoever. In mass I had to watch one boy pinch and hit the one next to him until he started sobbing. Eventually, I intervened since no one else did, but sadly this was the case with just about all the other kids in the chapel.. It was just hard to see that I've kind of been living in denial about the incredibleness that is Casa Hogar and neglecting to realize the reality that is most orphanages around here--way too many children that are taken off the streets but are still just as neglected, if not worse, in an institution with way too few staff members, too little organization, and so little financial support that they still have clothes full of holes and sores on their legs. Unlike our kids, they still have no idea what it's like to feel love, have someone in their lives that believes in them, or what it's like to be a part of a family. They have never had someone to teach them how to treat others with respect and kindness. It was unbelievably frustrating to feel so helpless, knowing how many children there are in our world who have no one they can depend on or to love them. Yuck. Moral of the story, any chance you ever get to help someone, no matter how trivial, it's worth it. And donate to Casa Hogar!! Kids need you!!

Okay. And on to more positive things, the past month (the last month of summer) has been Carnaval here. All day every Sunday, there's a live band that plays in the central plaza, and everyone goes there to watch & dance--this is one of my favorite things here, especially since any sound anywhere echos off all the cerros and sounds like it's right outside our windows. Carnaval also means that if you're walking anywhere in town outside the grounds of Casa, you're likely (especially on the weekends) to get hit with water balloons from anonymous children running around on rooftops. You're lucky if a)it's just one, and b)it's full of water, not paint. So today was the last day of Carnaval (unfortunately, because it's so hot here for a Minnesotan, and I can't get enough spontaneous water-ballooning from kids I don't know), and I discovered what Last Day of Carnaval means, at least in Lurín. We wandered into town in search of popsicles and butter, and happened upon a parade of soaking wet people covered in multi-colored streaks of paint, carrying buckets, and accompanied by a drum and 3 marching-band tubas. Last Day of Carnaval also means random parades and random explosions starting before 8am. (Random explosions are actually pretty normal here--now there's just a reason for them, and there's a lot more than normal). So it was really exciting, and if you know me, there's nothing I wanted more than to be involved in a wet, mud- and paint-soaked parade, but unfortunately I was too late. So I guess I'll just have to come back. Like next year. ;)

I LOVE PERUVIAN BANANAS

This is an informative post, because since coming to Peru, I have learned something very important that has kind of changed my life. If you don't know a lot about bananas, please read on and change your life too! Until coming to this country for the second time, I never realized that there was more than one kind of banana. Really. In the US, you go to the store to buy a banana, right? And when you think you're going to come home with a banana, you know what kind of banana you will get. Because you know that a banana is a banana. Is a banana. There are also plantains, but they're hard to find, and you're not quite sure what you'd do with them if you found them, anyway. End of story. Wrong. Apparently, though (upon researching Google) there are somewhere between 500 and 1000 varieties of bananas in the world. (I just wanted to be exact. Exact-ish.)
Now, THESE are bananas. Just a few kinds of bananas, though (note they're the size of a 5-year-old/small animal/at least the woman's arm in the picture). Some of the ones pictured below are what you use for frying--they're way denser than what you eat in the States, orange-ish yellow, and really sweet. REALLY sweet. So now, I found yet another reason to love Peru. This country is the reason why I now love to pieces the one fruit I'd previously written off as boring. I love life-changing moments.

Oxapampa, Paracas, and Nazca--story half

After a day of hiking and climbing in Pachacamac (neighboring town), playing Soccvollike (we invented a new sport of soccer+volleyball+a kid on a bike) with the kids, then finally settling down with one of my favorite 7-year-olds to eat grass and talk about important life issues, here I am. The Killer Ant Situation still is not under control, but life here is still great despite all the creepy-(but friendly-) crawlies I shoo out of my bed each night before tucking myself in.

Jess, some of the staff, one of the priests, and I went with the kids who'd graduated (from high school/the orphanage) on a graduation trip to Oxapampa, now probably a couple weeks ago. It was SO refreshing to finally get out of the city and see green things. The journey there involved a bumpy 6-hour drive in our convi (a 15-passenger van, which is also the most common form of public transportation here), a stop at 4,828 meters (high enough to freak out our lungs), a couple throw-up stops, and a lot of switchbacks, we arrived in the dark at our destination in the middle of the jungle.

The next day, we woke up to an absolutely stunning view--mist-shrouded, leafy mountains divided by a roaring river. The river's noise had been a lot more soothing to fall asleep to than the normal city-sounds of lonely dogs barking, big trucks, and music. On the way to the actual town of Oxapampa the next day, we stopped at a butterfly garden, full of butterflies and flowers native to the jungle, which was complete with a random zoo behind it. There were a group of banana-eating turtles that lived in the same cage as some alligators (for some reason they live together well).. We then explored Oxapampa, which I realized was the home of the BEST yogurt I've ever eaten, as well as locally-made (and incredibly delicious) honey. We actually bought one store out of their bottles of yogurt, so we asked around and went on a wild goose chase thorugh the mazes of side streets in the convi looking for more yogurt. :)

Father Joe, the Polish priest who'd started our orphanage, also had some land in the outskirts of Oxapampa, where the re used to be another orphanage. Unfortunately, he'd had to close it because of finances, but we were able to take the students up into the hills and see an absolutely incredible stretch of rolling, tree- and flower-covered hills where it used to be located. There's also a home for the elderly that Fr. Joe started which is still in use--it was great seeing hte kids interact with the people there for awhile and explore their wonderful garden. On our return trip, we decided to go to Lima a different way so we could stop at "Bosques de Piedras" (Rock Forest--if you know me, you can imagine how excited I was to wander among fields and fields and fields of HUGE boulders with a bunch of kids!!) After an hour-long hike, we piled back in our little convi and continued on our merry way, until we happened to see tiny patches of snow through the windows. The kids went absolutely crazy, because they'd never seen snow before in their lives, and finally we pulled over after cries of "NIEVE NIEVE NIEVE NIEVEEEEE!!!" (SNOW!!!) and begging Fr. Sebastian to stop the convi. It was such an unforgettable moment to see a group of 17- and 18-year olds trample each other out of the convi screaming to a few tiny piles of snow and throw the first snowballs of their lives! (A picture of this will hopefully follow soon!) The rest of the ride back to Lima was supposed to take about 6 or 7 hours, but mysteriously ended up taking over 10 hours because of broken and sometimes non-existent roads. All in all, it was great.. and exciting :)

The dog from the air (courtesy of Wikipedia) :)

A few days later, a few of the staff (plus me) went to Paracas and Nazca, which are areas about 5 hours to the south of Lima. The highlight of here (other than dune-buggying, where my camera decided it'd had enough of life and broke on me, and a boat ride in the ocean through a beautiful national reserve) is the famous Nazca lines, a serious of giant, mysterious drawings in the ground. They're believed to have been created between 400 and 650AD and include pictures of a monkey, a dog, a hummingbird, a pair of hands, and more. Because the lines are so big, however, they can only be seen from the air. So this meant going up in the tiniest airplane I've ever been in (4 passengers!!) Compared to what I'm used to flying in, this plane shook so much I thought we were going to drop out of the sky any second. Needless to say, even though I love being up really high, my hands were sweaty enough during the whole flight for me to realize I prefer hanging from something I trust, like a rope or a parachute. And speaking of parachutes, that's a story for another day. ;)

ANTS OF DEATH

I'm going to start by apologizing, because I know this is definitely not "Oxapampa, Paracas, & Nazca--story half" but at the moment, what's concerning me (and everyone else here at the orphanage) most is the Killer Ant Situation.

Take the picture above, look at the ants, and multiply it by at least four. Then add all those ants on the same sized surface, and that's kind of like what the Killer Ant Situation is like. Normally I think ants are cute, although maybe kind of annoying at a picnic. Normally I feel a little bad if I kill one. ONE. Here, however, I wish I had radioactive strings of Killer Ant killer inside my hands and I could run around and shoot them all with poisonous goop like Spiderman would. Basically, if we even look at an object wrong, suddenly we realize we're crawling--literally crawling with ants.. One tiny tickle now makes me go crazy because usually it's an army of ants crawling up my arm, or on my floor, or in my bed.. And THEN, a giant cockroach or six scuttles in front of my feet. But hey, it could be worse :)

Anyway. New post to come soon, with no more ranting and plenty of happy stories !!

oxapampa, paracas, and nazca--the picture half :)

Into the jungle!! On our way to Oxapampa--some of the kids

Butterfly garden near Oxapampa

I was SO obsessed with this banana-eating turtle that lives with the alligators

monito :) cage :(

The students and some of the staff

The location of a previous orphanage related to ours--it was closed and the land sold soon before Father Joe passed away

Peruvian "mosquito" bites.. not hives.. on a good day :)

With Paloma at a home for the elderly in Oxapampa that Father Joe also started

In Paracas--El Candelabro--120 meters long

Penguins, sea lions, pelicans, penguins, penguins, penguins, pelicans.. oh my !!

Our trusty 4-passenger Cessna pilots, in whose hands I decided to put my life for an hour :)

The sand dunes and our crazy tubular vehicle!! One of the last pictures my camera saw :(