As training continues, it has become more and more of a time management experiment. A great balance between spending time to learn and bond with my host family, studying and learning Spanish, spending time to relax with my fellow trainees, and taking time for myself to reconnect with friends and family back home, blogging/journaling or the rare but necessary alone time.
This great balancing act seemed to intensify in the training weeks following FBT. The highlights of my walking the tight rope of training in Weeks 7 & 8 follow.
Site Assignments
The Thursday following Field Based Training was Site Assignment Day - the day we find out the departments and communities we will call home and work with for the next 2 years. The training center staff like to get creative and have a game or activity to reveal sites. For my training class of Peru 21, they hung balloons across a clothes line. Each balloon had one of our pictures on it. Two at a time (one business trainee and one youth trainee) would pop our balloons to find the names of our site.
Following the reveal, we had meetings with our Regional Coordinators to learn more information about our departments and sites. I am excited to say I will be living in the department of Lambayeque - a region on the northern coast of Peru and the department I visited for FBT - in a small site called Mocupe. I will be a replacement volunteer for a youth development volunteer who recently finished her 2 years of service and returned home this summer. While I was given information about the town of Mocupe, my new host family, and the past volunteer's projects, I feel the true identity of Mocupe and the nature of my work will remain a mystery until I not just visit but move in and begin my life and service there.
Dinners with Host Families and Trainees in the Neighborhood
A definite highlight and favorite moment from the past two weeks was cooking dinner with host families. The night of site visit, I went to the host house of 2 trainees to cook tacos for their families. Getting to cook a tasty meal while spending time with friends and their families was a lot of fun.
Apparently that family had a great time, too because they told my host family how great it was leading my host family to invite the other volunteers over to cook at our house. At the request of my host sister, Sara, we prepared my mother's recipe (with a few Peruvian substitutions) of Lasagna. It was not only a fun. Igbo but really special to share a favorite home cooked meal with my trainee friends and my training host family.
Fiestas Patrias and Visit to Miraflores
On July 28, and the surrounding weekend, Peru celebrates it's independence or "Fiestas Patrias." One of my most exciting moments of the celebration was that it meant a day of from training! During the weekend, I traveled to visit Miraflores, a very nice area of Lima with two friends and my host family. It was pretty and felt eerily American-like with a Starbucks on every corner.
My host brother Samuel and my host sabrinas Ariana and Estephany in Miraflores
One of the coolest things on our Miraflores adventure was finding a Cuerpo de Paz connection in the artisan market. During Fiestas Patrias, artisans from all over Peru come to Lima to showcase and sell their works. This is what spurred my host family's trip because my host mom wanted to get a scarf from an artisan of her home town in the Sierra. While walking through the market, a friend of mine who is a business volunteer trainee spotted embroidered goods he recognized from some of the volunteers' current projects. Upon asking the ladies at the booth, we found out they were in fact artisans currently working with Peace Corps business volunteers and were artisans featured at the fashion show I attended during FBT. It was a neat experience to connect with local artisans and Cuerpo de Paz partners.
Looking Ahead
Next week I will travel to Lambayeque for orientation and site visit - which includes 3 days and nights in my new community of Mocupe. Following the week of site visit, I have one final week of training in Chaclacayo that includes my final language interview, celebration for our host families, and the ceremony to be sworn-in as a volunteer. Look in the next weeks for the final blogs about training and the beginning of my service as a Peace Corps Volunteer!
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