Peru and Spain 09-10´

Weddings and Waterfalls.

2010-03-19T13:31:00.000-07:00

There are some things I will never take for granted in Chachapoyas. One of those is the market which takes place everyday and is filled with literally hundreds of vendors. It is continually filled day after day with fresh fruits, vegetables, meats, cheeses, and grains. Shopping is a daily activity here: the only way the food could be fresher is if you picked from a tree, plucked it from a bush, gathered it from the earth, or dug it from the ground yourself. The food system in Chachapoyas is the dream of ecological minded folks in the United States. Almost all the food comes from within 6 hours drive, most of it comes from much closer. The hills are literally covered in fields and gardens of corn, potatoes, wheat etc... and in the most impossible seeming places!! For example, the photo on the bottom where there are no people, no cities, nothing.... there are potato fields on the tops of those mountains. Yeah.

A week ago I took a trip to the third tallest waterfall aptly named Gocta which means something like monkey scream. After an ardous two hour hike through forests with orchids, palm trees, wild birds, pinapple and sugar cane fields, and various hidden hill gardens, we descended to the bottom of the waterfall, to a moss covered cliff face, and a pool of glassy rain water. The waterfall was so tall, in fact, that nearly half of all the water was blown away by the wind before it hit the ground. You could literally stand underneath the waterfall and, looking up, see the waterfall change it´s past in slow motion, drastically swaying from left to right with wind.

I have a friend named Charito who I met because she is living with Enita, the woman who I eat breakfast, lunch and dinner with. Charito is from a small farming village outside of Chachapoyas.

Last thursday she invited me to a wedding of her niece in her village, Lauman. I left early in the morning on thursday and dozed intermittently as we drove for 2 hours on dirt roads, rising and falling through valleys, bumping along, until finally we arrived to the district of Santo Thomas. Her city Lauman is on the side of a hill in a vast valley defined by two giant rock outcroppings. On these two outcroppings existed ancient Chachapoyan buildings built high into the stone.

Revash, high up in that rock believe it or not, are buildings.

In her village I met with her family and friends. Her sister served me breakfast of whole wheat oven baked bread (wheat from nearby fields) and sweet watery coffee. Within minutes I made great friends with a seven year-old girl named Kli (kaylee), who took a great liking to me and my hairy arms. We walked up the muddy road to Charito´s sisters house, picked sweet green peaches from trees, and then stood looking across the valley staring at an unbelievably high church carved into a stone cliff across the valley. For lunch we gathered in the adobe one room kitchen of Charito´s sister. At first her sister was a little embarrased, but Charito assured her that I eat everything. Lunch consisted of boiled free roaming chicken noodle soup, steaming from a cast iron pot cooked over a wooden fire in the corner of the room. On the side where whole fresh dug roasted potatoes, bread, and a plate of corn and beans. It was hearty and delicious, and when really well with the sugary coffee I used to soak my bread in.

Kids were dirty, a testament to the rugged life. Working in the fields there is hard, harder than working in Lima I was told by Kli´s father. HARD. He moved to Lima when he was in his twenties, and when he came back after a few years, he couldn´t handle the workload. ¨here there are no doctors, no... nothing. You work in the campo, that´s it¨ ¨When I came back from the city I hit a wall, I couldn´t it¨

The wedding started at 8pm. Actually it was two weddings. One side of the church was filled with one group and the other was our group. As the father said his thing, children ran around the room and women nursed their babies with casually exposed breasts. The father was very animated, and the ceremony was very religious. I actually agreed with most of the things he said, though I realized that I might have problems in the future if I try and marry a catholic.. haha!

After the ceremony, we filed out to the party into a small decorated room. After champagne, there was a second ceremony (the official legal state marriage... religious and state marriages are separate) and then dancing and beer drinking started. Music blared and everybody in the room danced, we danced and danced, pounding the earth floor with our feet, passing beer, until 4 in the morning, until there was only left a few drunken campesinos, the couple, and myself. My ride back to Chachapoyas arrived at 430 in the morning, I slept the whole way home, and then in my bed soundly into the next day. Happy and content in the knowledge that I shared something special - a world that almost all visitors to Peru do not get to take part in.

Carnavales

2010-02-17T15:00:00.001-08:00

For the past couple of weeks I have been recovering from Typhoid and splitting my time between Guadalupe and the desert beach community of La Barranca. I recovered just in time for the biggest Carnaval festival in Peru in Cajamarca, the historic city where the Incan king Atahualpa was captured and killed. Noah (Guadalupe´s only other Gringo guy) and I road up to Cajamarca in the back of a beat up blue toyota pick up. It was an open air ride into the heart of the Andes, wind whipping our faces, standing up and soaking in the beauty as we wound up up up into the clouds. As we got higher we were confronted by water, which came in two forms. One was a torrential downpour as we burroughed into the clouds. The second was children on the side of the road with buckets of water and water balloons. Being two gringos in the back of a pick up during Carnaval is dangerous, because los carnavales are basically one huge waterfight, and who doesn´t want to soak to foreigners in the back of a pickup??

Needless to say we arrived to Cajamarca cold and soaked. That night we met up with another gringa, Dani, from Evergreen and went to the main plaza to take part in the festivities. The plaza de armas in Cajamarca is large and beautiful, and everywhere groups of young and old people stood in circles singing songs, banging drums, with trumpets or guitars, drinking rum and beer and warm chichi. The streets were packed, and people danced in the middle of their circles traditional dances. We danced late, ate soup, and went to bed exhausted from travel and merriment.

The next day we decided to explore. We made it only two blocks from the house before we were mauled by water balloons from a balcony, then seconds later, we were rushed by a group of kids who threw buckets of water on us. In ten minutes the three of us were soaked from head to toe. We quickly realized we needed defenses so we bought the biggest watergun we could find and a couple bags of water balloons. The rest of the day was spent wandering the city and engaging in urban water warfare. It was incredible!! No one was safe. Everyone was a target. Not only that but one had to watch out for paint. Buses, cars, buildings, people.... you could find paint covering them all.

after an epic day of waterfighting .. on my final night I found my self dancing in a group I had met after half a bottle of rum, drinking Chicha and soaking in the music and songs until 4 in the morning. It was beautiful and I left content, content, content.

From here it´s time to recover from a cold, then I got to the beach for a day and after that... Chachapoyas!!

A Christmas in Peru

2009-12-26T16:31:00.000-08:00

After a long journey to Chachapoyas, then to the overwhelming city of Chiclayo, I eventually returned to Guadalupe to pass Christmas with the Ramirez family. I arrived at 5:30 on the evening of the 24th, sweaty and red from the Sun and streets of the city. Oh Guadalupe! Small town of wonderful friends. After dumping my stuff in a corner under the stairs, I waited with everyone else until midnight.

In Peru, christmas starts when the clock strikes twelve. In the house of the Ramirezes, the chubby golden hearted eight year old chris was counting the minutes by jumping on couches and giving updates on the passage of time. Slowly the table was set with salads and sides and flowers and panetons, then finally glasses filled with champagen. As twelve struck firecracks popped in the streets and we all gathered around the table. With glasses raised we went around the table with the giving toasts, taking sips of sweet champaign, until every person had given thanks. Then dinner of turkey and deliciousness comenced, with coffee and spiced hot chocolate and wine and other comestibles of various levels of high desirability.

After dinner the tables were moved aside and a dance party commenced. Like all events I have attended everybody danced. Beer was passed around and around and around and around. At 3 30 in the morning a few of us left to the Discotec. We danced for an hour with friends until finally the lights came on and out came two strippers on a stage in front of a pool. The guy was danced as Santa and the woman as.... uh... a present? I´m not a big fan of strippers, to be honest, but it was interesting way to pass christmas, so I shimmied to the side near the front to watch. The dance didn´t last long, and soon a guy with the microphone announced that they needed two volunteers. I was looking around the large group assembled when the female stripper grabbed my arm and pulled me to the front of the pool, facing everyone. Holy crap. My face was already red from a sunburn, but it turned even redder as I contemplated the possibilities of what I was now supposed to do. My first thought was, why did I have to wear my most unflattering, worn through the seems, semi see through underwear? I was quite preoccupied while they found another male and two more female ´volunteers.´The women went first. There was lap dancing and imitation sex. I was turning redder by the second, antipating the worst. Finally the time came and the female strip brought me to the front of the pool, in the bright light, and whispered in my ear just do what I do which was a relief: I didn´t need to get naked or pretend to hump on the ground in front of a crowd of people. Problem was, she was as lithe as a snake. I tried to imitate her dance moves but next to her probably looked like robot. But I shook my arse and wiggled my shoulders and swiveled my hips as best as I could and soon it was all over. I kept thinking, of course, this had to happen to me. It wasn´t even because people thought I was a gringo: I was announced as a Guadalupano. What luck!

Anyhow, the dancing continued well into the light of morning. I left at 8am and on the way home ran into some friends who were returning from the disco as well. I walked them to their street where we ran straight into a street party that was still going strong. A stereo had been dragged out into the street and beers were being circulated with great dedication to the sacred art of drunken celebration. So we joined them. In the corner of the street I noticed a giant paper mache cow.

Early in the evening, before christmas started, there was a competition of paper mache cows. Street communities, and groups of friends, and children all made big paper mache cows and marched through the streets. I watched from my friends Juice bar as they came parading by with tin cans banging and the giant fake cows bouncing crazily past us.

Anyhow, at some point me and a drunk curly haired brother of a friend hoisted the cow over our heads and made it dance cumbia to the pleasure of all. After much dancing I had to take a piss. I entered the house of my friend and when I returned the same curly haired brother and smashed a beer bottle and gotten into a fight with his cousin. Brothers and mothers and uncles and neighbors had wrestled them apart. There was blood on tshirts and broken glass on the ground. As soon as the curly haired brother had been taken away, laughter erupted and the drinking and celebration continued.

Finally at 3pm, i fell asleep. While not the most family friendly christmas I´ve had, it was definitely the most fun and interesting of my life.

friends. Murphy, Rachel, Mohammed

Plaza de Armas, christmas decoration.

The Virgin of Guadalupe

2009-12-06T12:37:00.000-08:00

I arrived in Guadalupe on Sunday. Back into the dreamy sweaty cauldron of the magical small city near the Ocean, cut through by the Panamerican highway. I returned for the feria, celebration of the towns Saint, the Virgin of Guadalupe. Over 350 years ago the Spanish brought over a carving of her which rests in the towns Iglesia, and every year two weeks of rituals, drinking, dancing, and singing are performed in her honor. For me, there is a profound timeless and spiritual feeling in the air, the connection to ancestors, the continuity of overlapping layers community throughout generations. I may not believe in Catholicism, but I believe in ritual. The dressing with icons to me is exactly that, a dressing of the more profound connection to those past and to the sacred mystery of life.

Saturday and Sunday are big days, because lots of people gather and carry the statue of the Virgin of Guadalupe up the solitary mountain that rests at the city´s edge. On friday night the streets are filled with people constructing elaborate arches of flowers, stringing decorations, balloons filled with confetti. On Saturday, the virgin is carried slowly, stopping frequently while dances are performed, or for songs of devotion sung by community members on stages, or for prayers. Saturday night everyone climbs the hill and to the sound of a brass band playing northern peruvian coastal music, watches fireworks spin and burn into the desert midnight.

Sunday, today, the statute will return, and the festival will continue for 3 more days of dancing and celebration. Some of the biggest bands in all of Peru are coming to this small city for concerts. At night the plaza de armas is filled with everybody, walking in circles, young people making romantic eyes, small groups of guys drinking rum or beer, mothers and daughters walking arm in arm, older men chatting, kababs of meat sizzling on smoky grills, vendors selling cake and candied figs with cheese & all under palm trees surrounding an elegant dry fountain.

One of the things I love most about Peru is that everybody dances, from the ages of two to eighty years old. Popular dances for all ages include Salsa, Cumbia, and Merengue. In addittion, Peru is home to a variety of beautiful and traditional regional dances, and everywhere I´ve traveled I´ve discovered that people of every region respect and know the dances of the others. But perhaps the most famous, intricate, and difficult dance is the Marinera. It is a courtship dance with ancient Peruvian roots and there are lots of children who learn it at a very young age. On friday there was a contest of Marinera for children. Here are some videos of th 6 and under group:

Love to everyone,

Daniel

images from my life.. of peru.

2009-11-30T08:35:00.000-08:00

Left to right, clockwise: Marinera at my friend´s uncle´s 60th birthday party, Leymebamba trip, Mendosa where I will probably be working in March, and Guadalupe at night.

How I became a Stanford Professor overnight.

2009-11-24T07:48:00.000-08:00

I was supposed to be at Kuelap, the Machu Picchu of Northern Peru, however plans changed. Now I was headed for Rodriguez de Mendoza, the high jungle eastern edge of the department of Amazonas. On Saturday night, a friend of mine, who I will call X for privacy purposes, invited me to accompany them to a political meeting in the region, and to meet some mayors and possibly secure some work teaching English. Being too good an opportunity to pass up, I promptly returned my ticket to Kuelap and on Sunday morning we set off on a four hour car ride on the bumpiest, most pothole ridden, cliff clinging, stream filled, muddy road I´ve ever experienced. It was beautiful. As we wound down from the high mountains of Chachapoyas, the trees became denser and taller, the air more humid, flowers drooping, palm trees abounded, rivers roared.....finally the road opened to the steamy valley of Mendoza.

On the way we stopped in a small village, Molino Pampas, for some coffee and the converse with the Alcaldera, the mayor of the district. We were greeted by the mayor and sat down for a quick cup of coffee. The rain was relentless, and locals glanced at us (the mayor, the gringo, and X) over steamy bowls soup. In short time, with out me knowing it, X had secured me a room and board in exchange for teaching English to children. I was informed afterwards, and it occured to me that I was in fact in one of the remoter regions of Peru: Amazonas as a department is off the beaten path, and the muddy, bumpy, difficult 4 hour road to Mendoza even more so.

X, I discovered (and for this I refer to them as X) was a former very high ranking governmental official who worked extensively with mayors all across Peru. Now X is traversing amazonas, meeting with mayors, holding meetings, and building a foundation to run for Congress in the 2011 elections. Congressmen and women are very powerful In Peru. The government is divided into the judiciary, the president and his cabinet, and 130 members of congress, that´s it.

We arrived in district or Longran, in Mendoza, and pulled up on the steamy muddy road next to the house of the mayor. He paid our cab fare, and welcomed us into his home for a late lunch of juicy fried dried meat and plantains and yucca. During lunch the mayor and his wife kept looking out the window across the street. I had no idea what was going on. Finally everyone got up, and said come on, and we walked across the street to a building with benches where 50 townspeople were assembled. How interesting I thought to myself I get to watch a political community meeting. There were four chairs and a table at the front of the room. When I went to grab an inconspicuous seat the mayors wife grabbed my arm and pointed to the front of the room ¨up there, that seat is for you.¨

Oh.....

So there I was facing the roomfull of Mendozans, and the mayor began to introduce us. He introduced me last ¨And Daniel Carr, a professor of English from Stanford University¨ What?! I shot an incredolous stare at the back of X´s head. A professor from Stanford?! I regained my composer, though lost it quickly when I realized that I was expected to give a speech in Spanish. Thank god they were passing around a cup and bottle of sugarcane whisky. My speech went over well. Afterwards I was approached, welcomed, invited back, and the mayor offered room and board to teach English.

And that is how I became a Stanford Professor.

........................
I´m amazed. I now have 3 mayors who have invited me to come live in their communities and teach English. All in Amazonas, Peru. Looks like I´ll be returning to the region. But for now, I have week left in Chachapoyas, then I set off for the desert coast once again.

Lots of love,

Daniel

Leymebamba

2009-11-19T17:00:00.000-08:00

A break. I´ve been working 6 days a week teaching English since the day I arrived in Chachapoyas. Yesterday the semester at The International Language School ended, thank god. I love my classes, and most of my students, but I´ve needed some time to see Amazonas, the department of the northeast Andes, and the Westernmost edges of the Selva.

It´s starting into the winter rainy season here, though it´s almost summer everywhere else in Peru. In January the sun steams the moisture from Selva, collects water from the Ocean in it´s warm hands, and throws the wet air headlong into the Andies to be wrung out against the mountains in giant billowing gray storms. The clouds block the summer glare, and this plus the altitude provides a chill, thus producing the North Andean winter. But for now, the roads are still passable. Sometimes the downpours are so unrelenting that creeks become rivers, and the roads become rubble.

Today, I left Chachapoyas for the first time since I arrived three and a half weeks ago. I climbed into a combi, a small rundown minivan, filled with people and weighted down with cargo on the roof and set off for Leymebamba. The road wound along a river, cupped by mountains of orange gray rock the flaky texture of halva. On the slopes stood agave-type plants that, summoning all their earlthy strength, had shot up erect stalks 20 feet in trees of striking fertility. Cacti burst out of rocks, and trees and green foliage filled in slopes and the remaining crevices. On the valley floor, next to the road and river, we passed fields of Sugar cane, stone houses, small pueblos with blue and red houses, banana trees, cows tied to plows (including a cow and an elegant white stork nuzzling eachother), lush fields of grass, and trees that had been colonized by hanging plants of magenta and green blades that exploded out of their limbs.

After three hours of travel we arrived in Leymebamba where I was greeted by Menita, friend of Enita (my saint who I live with in Chacha). We prompty set off on a tour of the city... a small pueblo with rock streets, surrounded on by rivers and backed up against a mountain. We wound up the hill behind her house on a narrow rocky road, encountering wandering pigs (big and baby), horses, chickens, and trees,plants, herbs: baby papayas, manzanilla, figs, and many more. From the hill we could see all of Leymebamba, the two converging rivers that circumscribe it´s territory, green hills in all directions and other pueblos in the distance.

As we descended down a set of rock stairs we stopped at a friends house of Menitas. Inside lived two older women, one wearing an intricately woven straw hat and a blue embroidered shirt, who was maybe ninety, but who´s eyes lit with the playfulness of child. We stopped and ate sweet limes on her porch, next to coffee and tobacco plants, and she rattled on laughing and poking fun at me.

After the hill we visiting a cockfight, ate locally produced sweet yogurt dyed pink and yellow and green. Retired to Cena of milk soup (leymebamba is famous for it´s dairy products) and succulent pork.

Love you all, pictures soon.

2009-11-09T08:25:00.000-08:00

Settling into Chachapoyas

2009-11-05T17:01:00.000-08:00

Me in the doorway of my school

My school

Well, I´m into my second week of Chachapoyas, and thus my second week of teaching. It´s alternately thrilling and ardous, the latter because for most of my classes I follow a set curriculum that borders on being completely lame. But I´m thankful for the job and not just for the money (which helps a ton) but also because I get to interact in an intimate way with kids and adults from the community.

I have no desire to be a tourist here, at least in the traditional sense. I don´t want to see Machu Pichu, or fly and see the Nasca lines, or bunk with other gringos for a few days of sight seeing in the jungle. I can´t afford that mode of travel, nor is appealing to me. I am thankful, and grateful, and blessed to have people here who are friends of friends. It is strange for me to watch other gringos in the city, most of who come for a few days for sightseeing. I imagine what it would be like to be in their shoes, the city and people as an unknown and exotic backdrop for the adventurous sightseers. But how lame and superficial and alien it seems at the same time. Yes, here exists the worlds 3rd largest waterfall, and an ancient city of Kuelap, and numerous archeological sights. Yet it seems many -though not all- people come to stare only at water and rocks, to taste foods, see places - not to know the people.

For this my philosophy of travel: I only travel places where I have a personal connection, and where I will spend some time, because am interested in knowing the people of a place first, everything else comes later.

That said, things in Chachapoyas feel remarkably comfortable after 1 week and half. It´s a small city, and after volunteering in a local school and teaching, and hanging out with the 3 peruvians who rent rooms in the house I´m staying in, and their friends, and Enita and her friend Menita, and meeting folks at the discotek, and spending time outside of class with students, I already have many friends and feel a part of the community (though i´m sure i still look like a day'tripper).

And I couldn´t be staying in a better place. Enita, the spunky 6o something year-old women I live with, is a saint. She gave me her room and has helped me in many ways, including food, advice, delicious food, and superb, kind, and funny company. I even have become accustomed to the most obnoxious rooster I have come across (though I must admit this morning when he woke me up I hurled a rock at his waddley noggin.)

I´ve been busy. I now have 5 classes, and am working 6 days a week. Here is a video of one of my favorite classes.

All the buildings here in Chachapoyas are white, with overhangs to protect against the passionate and unpredictable weather. One day it rains, it´s cold. The next day it´s blisteringly hot: I´m in the north of Peru, the next country is Ecuador, the sun doesn´t get much more direct than this latitude, especially as we near the South American summer.

Chachapoyas is at times, literally in the clouds. When the sun shines you can see huge green mountains, steep canyons in the distance.

People dress nice here, and to me, Chachapoyas seems wealthier and more orderly than other places I´ve visited so far. The market is large, in a permanent building with 3 long isles of fruits and vegetables and women mixing spices. It has a second story with tiny little kitchens, shops with cheese and beef jerkey, and fish, and trinkets.

There are four main clubs, discotecs, in town. I´ve been to them all, in one weekend. I´ve discovered I love Cumbia, and have reawakened my love of dancing. My friends here are surprised, because most foreigners who visit don´t like to dance. What I don´t like is the beer. Everybody her drinks budweiser-heinekien type beer I can´t stomach. Unfortunately, drinking copious amounts of this beer is part of the culture of going out. They drink different here in nothern Peru too! They drink kind of like we smoke pot in the states. That is, someone buys 2 beers (a guy) and brings it back to the group (3 to 10 people) along with 1 (1) cup. Everybody drinks from that cup, one at a time, passing the bottle of beer along, dumping out the leftover beer foam in the cup on the floor. When it gets to a woman, the man before her pours her cup, if two women, he waits and pours both of their cups, and then he passes on both the beer and the cup to the next man. It´s been awkward as i´ve learned the rules, but now I think I´ve got it.

Now, even though I drank less than everyone else, I am sick and have been so all week. Thus I have time to write, because I can´t speak my throat is so sore.

2009-10-26T20:30:00.000-07:00

On Sunday morning I left Guadalupe, the swealtering desert town near the sea, with it´s heat and dust and beautiful people, for Chachapoyas, a cloud forest on the eastern slopes of the Andes. The bus was slow, full, and hot. Every hour we stopped and children would climb aboard selling fried banana chips, lemons, popcorn, and water. At one stop one of an adult passengers rose, grabbed a briefcase, stood up and proceeded to give a half an hour presentation on health. He wandered the isles, passing out packets of balms and various medicines, then return and ask for money. At another stop, a young boy, 10 maybe, climbed aboard and paced nervously. After a minute he lifted his voice and begin to recite a long poem, almost a song, and though nervous he spoke with force. I respected his bravery, and my heart extended towards his need. When he wandered the isles for money I gave him 20 soles, half the cost of my 14 hour bus ride. He sat next to me, shook my hand and thanked me deeply with his eyes.

As we traveled the landscape changed from dry desert, to high lush rice filled valleys, to hot papaya highland jungles. Pigs and goats wandered freely by the side of the road, small villages passed quickly, with all the childern in summer clothes playing volley ball in the streets. In Bagua Grande, a sprawling hot mountain city, we stopped for supper. I ate a hot hearty bowl of chicken soup for 50 cents. We left and in the swealtering night, we barelled on over streams, along cliffs and up steep valleys, into the darkness. I arrived in Pedro Ruiz late at night, and was quickly ushered into a taxi. From there we drove for an hour up into the cloudy wet hills of chachapoyas, dodging piles of boulders that had fallen from the high rock cliffs along the roadside.

It was midnight when we entered the damp, wet city nestled in the hills. I called Enita, the sister of Homero, mi tio, who was preparing a place for me to stay. Homero had warned me that his older sister was very religious. I pictured a stern, serious, and devout catholic. Instead I was greated by a young looking and lively 62 year old woman who spoke fast, smiled often, and laughed both to herself and everyone else. We went to her house, entering through a giant wooden door and passing through a corridor of houses. Her house was small and in the back, behind a wrought iron fence. She led me to a cold concrete room, it smelled of must, with a lumpy pillows and a bed like a brick.

at 5 in the morning I woke up to the bellowing cockles of the strong throated rooster literally right outside my door. Every minute for 2 hours. I resisted the urge to strangle it. As the coldness became slightly less cold, and the rain dripped, and the chickens scratched, and the must invaded my nostrils, and the cold shower waited, and I awoke watched by multiple jesuses. In the morning I discovered I lived with 1 rooster, 11 hens, a herd of guniea pigs, 1 scraggely jumpy white cat, all in a yard the size of my living room in Olympia. In her kitchen I discovered piles of herbs, baskets of bananas and potatoes, local dark and moist sugar, gigantic papayas and a place lovingly set for me.

after breakfast I set out for the English School I had told I was interested in volunteering. When I walked in I found out two teachers had decided to quit that day. They hired me on the spot and gave me three classes from 5 to 10pm every night, and one class in the afternoons. I started that day, after very little sleep, and absolutely no idea of what I was doing.

OK so here I am!

The teaching has been awesome, really empowering to be working with so many different ages. It is also fun to get to interact with so many chachapoyas. Some of the teaching has been downright magical, especially my work with 12 and 13 year olds. I love them! Some of the best and most fulfilling times of my trip so far have occured here teaching.

In addition to my formal job (which I get paid for) I befriended an English professor on the street. He invited me into his class13yearolds, I went and had incredible time joking, talking philosophically about relationships, and exchanging spanish and english. He introduced me to the class and then let me teach for an hour. Afterwords the whole class invited me to dinner on Saturday night to experience some local cuisine and hang out. The whole class!

My days consist of waking up, eating some delicious breakfast, then going to a cafe to prepare lesson plans for my classes or visit a local school where my friend teaches. Then I get a break, eat lunch (Eva ... you would love Enita´s cooking! It´s fresh, vegetable rich, quinoa, marinated figs, cilantro soups, squash) and finish my lesson plans. 3 days a week I have a conversation class with 2 teenage girls in the afternoon, the other days I take Spanish classes. I´m busy! it´s alot of work. At night I return, sleep, and am awoken at 4,5, or 6 in the morning and do it all over again. The weekends are free for exploring ancient ruins, gigantic waterfalls, and other intriguing sights.

That´s life for now.

2009-10-20T16:30:00.000-07:00

A couple of nights ago I went with two women whom I am staying with, Cecilia and Rosita, to a presentation of Peruvian dances of kids at a local school. Here are some pictures, I think you will enjoy:

Guadalupe has grown on me quickly. She has cupped my face in her desert palms and quietly relieved me of so much of the stress of living in the United States.

It so hard to describe life here, it feels perfectly normal and comfortable yet everything is different and I don´t speak the language (well). I live near the center of town, near the Plaza, in a two story house with Juana, Kevin, Chris, Rosita, Cecelia, Manolo. They are wonderful - hilarious, kind, and very helpful. Outside my door is a street market, baskets overflowing with fruits, grains, vegetables, coolers of delicious frozen homemade treats, men and women squeezing fresh orange juice on the streets. The city is abuzz with motorcycle taxi´s, many with pictures of che imblazoned on the side and loudly playing Bob Marley, Cumbia music, or other kinds lively music. Dogs wander the streets everywhere, apparently well accostumed to each other because I have yet to see a fight. The buildings are squeezed together, and all the blocks are a mixtures of small businesses and homes. On my roof lives a turkey that wakes me up everymorning with its gobbling laughter. I am being fattened up by the biggest plates of food I´ve come across yet - the food is delicious and whole, colorful. I´ve eaten more meat in the past week and half than I had in the past 2 months. Poor delicious animals!

I´ve started to volunteer slash observe in a couple of schools here. And I gave my first couple of English classes to adorable adorable 7, 8, 9 and 10 year old Peruana catholic school girls. And now I don´t want to leave. But Saturday I am off to Chachapoyas (the date keeps moving back), into the mountains, into the cloud forest, into a more serious volunteer position with an English language school.

The food is incredible. Ensalada above.

At every meal I´m welcomed with a fresh pitcher of homemade juice

First some photos

2009-10-13T10:06:00.000-07:00

First some photos:

Lima - Captures the Mood

The ex prez club

The rest of my time in Lima was tranquil. I visited Amanda, an former Evergreen student and had wonderful time eating delicious street food and enjoying good company.

When it came time to leave, Amanda called up her friend and taxi driver Diego, and he and I made good conversation (in spanish) all the way to the airport to fly to Chiclayo, and later drive to Guadalupe. He made a point though, and drove it home: be very, very careful in Chiclayo.

Chiclayo:

From the sky Chiclayo looks as if rose from the earth itself. The dusty bricks of the city look the same as the desert stretching all around. It is larger than I imagined: it is the fourth largest city in Peru and has a population one and a half times that of Seattle. Yet despite its size, the airport contained only one room for baggage and arrivals.

Grabbing my bags, this time I took an official taxi to a hostal where I was supposed to meet Homero and get a room. Driving in Peru is an adventure. Lanes are nebulous if they exist at all, there are very few traffic lights, and the ones that exist are often ignored. Peruvians drive with their horns and muscle cars through intersections.

At the hostel I was dumped with all my stuff. Inside I was told that Homero wasnt there and that the hostel was full. What luck! They pointed and mumbled something quickly, I nodded stupidly and set off in the direction of their finger. I found another hostel, much shabbier, and with lots of available rooms (not a good sign). But what was I supposed to do? I got a room on the very top floor and prayed that the earth deep underneath would not fight.

I set off to find Homero. I had gone no further than a few feet than a young man asked me what I was looking for. The city was bustling with taxis and motorcycles and storefronts. A phone, I told him. This way, he told me. We made it to a calling booths. Here, he said, let me take your bag.

I grab my bag tight, incredulous, yeah right! He asked and tried again, so I crammed myself in a booth gripping my back tight to my side. I couldnt believe hed be so bold and think I was so stupid.

Homero! Where are you? I kept thinking. After the bag incident, I had images of the door of my top floor room flinging open in the middle of the night by robbers.

He answered ¨Hola daniel, where are you?¨

I told him, he said he was in a plaza and to catch a taxi. I walked outside and realized he was across the street under four giant trees with white trunks. He stood in the midst of a well dressed gathering standing on marbled tiles, in front of a fountain. He introduced me to everyone: Poets from across the Americas.

Homero left for his hostel. I felt very lonely so I stood, listening to the melodic, passionate poetry and the honking of horns and the water.

______

The next morning was eye opening. ¨Welcome to the third world¨ Homero exclaimed as we jostled along the cities dirt roads, in the heat, in the absence of wealth, to drop off our stuff. I kept thinking how can there be such poverty in such a rich land? Not fair. Its one thing to know it, its another thing to see.

We took lunch at Homeros brothers house. I was fed! Watch out you all, if I come back a bowling ball sized belly, dont be surprised. I was fed cuy, fried guinea pig, bones and a little hair, crispy, gamey, and very rich. and soup with chicken. Plus another piece of fried chicken (because the mother thought I wouldnt like cuy), and rice, and avocados and yucca! I wasnt even hungry, so I was serious work to fit it all in my belly.

And hour later we visited another family. It was there time for almuerzo (lunch). Despite our meager protests they set the table for both me and Homero. I was fed Ceviche, rice, duck, and rice, and beans, and .. cake.

I havent been hungry since! But the food keeps coming.

the next day all of us (homero and friends) crammed into a car, and drove at 130 miles per hour down the Pan-American highway towards my new home: Guadalupe. A welcomed Oasis. I arrived yesterday and am in love with Rauls family already. Plus right outside the front door is a street market that puts the Olympia farmers market to shame. Bags of fresh ground grain, tropical fruit, potatoes of all sorts, giant purple corn, ladies making spicy pastes, fresh vegetable... everyday of the week. Its really wonderful. The women in the house are great cooks too!

Its great here, though I think I will leave in a week to Chachapoyas to teach English and visit a couple small towns in the mountains.

Love you all. Wish I could convey more in these writings, but I hope this suffices.

Daniel

Guadalupe..! I live out there in the middle of all the buildings. Behind the one with the tree that thats tall

News report of Presidents Meeting

2009-10-09T21:36:00.000-07:00

Ten former Latin American presidents warn against inequality and the arms race

By Agencia EFE - 6 hours ago

Lima, Oct 9 (EFE) .- Ten former Latin American presidents are members of the Global Center for Development and Democracy (CGDD) warned today in Lima against inequality, social exclusion and the arms race as the great continental problems.

The CGDD, promoted by the Peruvian Alejandro Toledo, agreed on a "social agenda for democracy in Latin America for the next twenty years", which will be promoted in Washington and Brussels before being presented to the next Ibero-American Summit to be held in November in Estoril (Portugal).

The fifteen recommendations contained in the agenda relating to tax reforms, measures to facilitate remittances, microenterprise development, improving education and health, food security, decent employment, access to drinking water, protection of indigenous people and reducing violence among others.

In this fifth Forum was invited to the CGDD American thinker Francis Fukuyama, who alerted to the fact that Latin America, despite the growth experienced in recent years, is the region with the greatest inequalities, and found that social exclusion is the seed of conflicts and populism.

In his closing remarks, Alejandro Toledo echoed some of the ideas repeated by their peers to end social exclusion brings stability, improves called "country risk", attracts investors and strengthen the institutional and democracy .

Toledo expressed his shock at the 45,000 billion which he said the region has been spent on armaments in the past twelve years, and regretted that this money has not been up schools, hospitals, power plants or other infrastructure.

Later, in the corridors, specifically criticized the government of Venezuela, whom he accused of being the one that is promoting this arms race in Latin America and warned of the alliance between the Venezuelan and Iranian government, and the risks of nuclearization of the continent .

The former presidents were present today in Lima, in addition to Toledo, Ernesto Samper of Colombia, Ecuadorian President Gustavo Noboa, the Bolivian President Carlos Mesa, Argentina's Fernando de la Rúa, the Honduran Ricardo Maduro, the Rodrigo Carazo of Costa Rica, Dominican Hipólito Mejía, Vinicio Cerezo, the Guatemalan and Panamanian Nicolas Ardito.

The CGDD also has among its members with Mexican President Vicente Fox and Brazilian President Fernando Enrique Cardoso, who were absent from the forum today in Lima but sent or prerecorded telephone interventions.

First Day: The President´s Club and New Opportunities

2009-10-09T17:42:00.000-07:00

It always seems like the beginning of adventures are magical. After 24 hours of flight and losing all my important papers in the process (minus my passport) I needed some. The night flight to Lima was wonderful: The turbulence of great updrafts of the equator, the low moon over the Andes, the outstretched clouds blanketing the desert from lima to the sierras. Even more wondrous was breaking through earth clinging clouds to discover the city´s industrial edge, along a river, whose banks were ablaze with a patchwork of fire.

The airport in Lima was less wonderful. It took two hours of waiting in labyrinthine lines to get past immigration. After 4 & 1/2 hrs of sleep and with gritted teeth I finally, at 1:30am I made it out to find Manolo, my professor´s brother in law, waiting for me.

We took a taxi through the empty streets of Lima, the dangerous edge of the airport, with blowing trash and occasional police lights flashing, into the safer barrios of San Isidro, and finally to Miraflores where my hostel was supposed to be. It was not. Fortunately, there was another down the street from where Manola was staying, and I didn´t feeling like searching anymore. At three in the morning I finally slept.

Not for long. Something told me I had to get up. Good thing I did! For those of you who don´t know I had been invited by my tio, Homero Oyarce, to a reunon (meeting) of expresidents of latin American countries. I had been told it was in the evening, and was looking forward to having a day to get ready (haircut, shower, shave, dressing.. etc) but lo! An email was waiting for me in my mail box. I opened it. ¨the event is at 1030 at the country club hotel, see you there¨

I had an hour to get dressed, shave, breakfast, and figure out where in the hell this lavish country club was in relation to my very modest hostel. Sweating (nervous) I left out the showering, the hair cut, and quickly rid myself of my facial scruff. Then I through on both of my cheap goodwill dress shirts, one on top of the other, and ran downstairs to ask the hostelera which one I should wear (she seemed like a woman who knows these things). I told her in my broken Spanish I was off to see the presidents, she smiled, picked a shirt, and with her approval I left the hostel.

I hailed a cab on the street, a dangerous thing to do. I had been warned by guidebooks, websites, hostels, friends, and the nice woman from Lima sitting next to me on the plane to be very careful. Apparently, there are many robberies executed by taxi cab drivers because taxi-ing is a wholly unregulated industry. It seems every third car has a half-arsed plastic taxi sign drilled into their roof. I had hailed the first one I saw. What luck - a portly and friendly peruano picked me up. He turned out to be from Chachapoyas and when I told him I´d be living there, his face lit. When he dropped me off at the country club he wrote me his number and told me to call him if I need to go anywhere ¨because catching taxi´s is dangerous¨

Homero, my tio met me at the door. After pleasantries we walked through the halls of the nicest hotel in Lima to a verdent and peaceful courtyard. I got my own pass that read ´agenda social para la democracia en America Latina´ - What was this all about?

There were maybe three hundred people seated in business suits, 20 camera crews, 10 expresidents seated on a stage, homero, and me in my untucked goodwill shirt and hand me down unkrinkleable pantalones. Fortunately, all eyes were on the presidents, who apparently, at the invitation and urging of former Peruvian president Alejandro Toledo (Homero´s friend), had been meeting for years to promote their form of democracy in Latin America.

Knowing a little South American political and economic history, I was immediately skeptical of the gathering. My sketicism grew markedly after the keynote speaker, Francis Fukuyama, gave his address.

First, a couple of sentences on this guy, courtesy of Wikipedia: ¨As a key Reagan Administration contributor to the formulation of the Reagan Doctrine¨¨Fukuyama is an important figure in the rise of neoconservatism.¨ ¨He was active in the Project for the New American Century think tank starting in 1997¨ ¨he co-signed a letter recommending that President Bill Clinton support Iraqi insurgencies in the overthrow of then-President of Iraq, Saddam Hussein.^{[2]
And the list goes on....}And the list goes on....

Intresenting enough, and most interesting in this gathering, was that he had in fact in many ways changed his mind. No longer was he a neoconservative, a movement he played a strong role in. He wasn´t there to recommend severe austerity measures but rather make the point that democracy is dependant on eradicating poverty, and that the great mistake of the IMF and Latin American governments was to impose austerity measures while ignoring social problems. The ideas he´s articulated and pushed have been responsible for the death and impovershiment of people across latin america - it was incredible to hear him articulate the mistakes of his ideology (though I would still disagree with him probably on a great many things) and be arguing for progressive taxation and social programs. I sign of just how far things have swung since the bush disaster.

The tone of the whole gathering was that in order to prevent ´authoritarian´ leftism that ´gives the poor a free handout and leads to an entitlement mentality´ is to create social programs. To create workable justice systems. To tax the wealthy. To create peaceful neighborhoods. Keynes.

I could say more but I wish to bore none!

0000000

Last update: After a lunch of green tamales, ceviche, checha (purple & white corn drink) fish, goat, yucca and corn with Homero and friends, I met with him two nice guys from the departmento (like State) of AMAZONAS, after laughing and talking I discover that one of the young men is the mayor of a small town in the bottom of a deep valley along the waters of one of the two great rivers that cross to form the beginning of Amazon. Homero tells me it is a place of great fruit: mango´s, oranges, papayas and others. The mayor invites me to visit. Then after talking about teaching, they have an idea: in exchange for food and a place to stay he will organize a english school for me to teach. There are other small cities in the amazon he thinks I could do the same.

The possibilities have just expanded - in one day!

Anyhow, Love you all so much!