Today's Success Story

Homework is hard in any culture, in any language, in any family.  And my host family in Peru is no exception. The background sound to my house most school nights includes telenovelas on the tv, a few gossiping aunts, and my cousin or my aunt struggling with 8-year-old Valeria to understand and complete her homework for the night.  The homework usually continues past the gossiping and telenovelas and doesn't end until there are tears and yelling.  

A few times I have been asked to help with Valeria's homework, especially on nights before an English test.  One day Livia and Valeria asked me to help her study for her test on electronic vocabulary and on the verb "to have."  It didn't take me more than a few minutes to feel the frustration my aunt and cousin have when trying to help Valeria with homework.  The only teaching style used in Peru is lecture and copy which is not conducive to critical thinking, understating, or comprehending.  But even without the comprehension the material continues on.  So the students, such as Valeria, do not understand the basics and yet are working on my advanced worked.  As I felt my and Valeria's frustrations levels rising, I said we had to take a 2 hour break and come back just after dinner.  2 hours later we sat back down both with better attitudes, Valeria with a little more understanding, and me with more hands-on teaching ideas starting with the basics.  

That night homework ended with smiles, high fives and hugs.  And I got to go to bed to the noise of tv instead of crying and yelling.  I was already satisfied as a success. 

Then today I returned home from almost 2 weeks of vacation and was greeted by Valeria after school with the exciting news that she received "una nota de 20" - the equivalent of getting a 100 on a test in America - on that English test and asked if we could study together again tomorrow for a test on Wednesday. 

Selfishly I enjoy a little more peace and quiet in the house but even more its exciting to see homework being a more positive experience for Valeria. This is just one day and one test but hoping it continues, at least for the next little bit. 

One day working on a presentation on the classification of plants with Valeria. 

An Ancash Thanksgiving

This year I had my first Thanksgiving in Peru and certainly did it in style.  I traveled with other Peace Corps friends to the department of Ancash in the Andes Mountains to spend our holiday with Rebecca and Regan who are volunteers there from our training group.

DD and I took a bus Wednesday afternoon from Lambayeque to Trujillo in the department of La Libertad where we met up with a group of volunteers for dinner.  We had some awesome ribs and then hopped on another 8 hour bus to the capital city of Huaraz in Ancash.   

We arrived in Huaraz around 4:00am and rode around in circles with a taxi who did not know where our hostal was even though he so confidently told us he did beforehand.  After reaching Hostal Cayesh and catching a few more hours of sleep, we met up with everyone and explored Huaraz.  Huaraz is smaller city catered to all the tourist that visit Ancash.  Though in Peru, we spent Thanksgiving with hours of cooking, skyping with families, and being generally low-key as we adjusted to the altitude. So more or less a typical Thanksgiving. That night we went to Sierra Andina - a microbrewery owned by an ex-pat from Maryland.  We relaxed while playing cards and trying the 4 different brews.  Other Americans later showed up to stream a football game.  Drinking craft beers to the background of NFL football was a pretty great way to end Thanksgiving. 

Instead of having to bare the frightening display of consumerism on Black Friday, I spent this Black Friday on an amazing hike up to ruins and a waterfall in the countryside of Ancash near a fellow volunteers site. Regan lives about an hour up from Huaraz in a small, traditional, rural sierra town.  The women and even young girls were all dressed in the traditional polleras (skirts), colorful sweaters, tights, hair in two braids, and tall wide brimmed hats.  As neighbors chatted, you could hear the musical rhythm of the Quechua language. We went up through chakras to see ruins from the Wari and Incan cultures and then a beautiful waterfall.  It was mind-blowing to be in a place with such ancient roots and stand in a structure that was built and used thousands of years ago. We ended our hike with me slightly twisting my ankle and being herded by two dogs as they were not happy with how close we got to their chakras. 

My Ancash adventure continued Saturday with nothing short of the most hilarious adventure yet. DD and I got up bright and early to go back to Rebecca's site with her and deal with her lost/stolen wallet.  It was fun to meet her host family and see her community. After going back down to Huaraz and meeting up with the rest of the group, we all took a combi (bus - I will one day do a blog post about the types of transportation we have here) to the community of Marcara to go to their thermal baths.   Arriving at the Baños termales, we decided to pay the 5 soles to get two private caves.  The idea was pretty cool - the execution left a lot to be desired.  After waiting our turn, DD, Rebecca and I went into the cave first.  There is a small room for changing and then a door that opens into the mountain.  The second room is literally in the side of the mountain with a sauna and a natural hot spring heating the room at the end.  Sounds cool, right?  Unfortunately, the entire room smelled liked 100 years of heated urine.  We held our noses while snapping a few pictures and then ran out to let Marvin, Regan, and Amy do the same.  After our moments in the pee-cave, we got in the outdoor pool but the damage was done.  We then felt like we were swimming in pee and couldn't get over the young Peruvian boys climbing the walls the place to see the gringos swimming.  After recovering from the hilarious and disastrous pee cave, we stopped just outside of the Baños Termales to eat pachamanca - a traditional Peruvian dish especially in the Sierra made with sweat potato, potato, choclo (a type of corn), and various meats all traditionally cooked in a hole in the ground. 

Needless to say our first priority after leaving Marcara was to take showers.  We all had buses leaving Huaraz that night around 10:00 so we spent the last few hours eating pizza and drinking Sierra Andina beers.  We were also luckily enough to have wi-fi in the tourist spots of Huaraz so I could follow the Clemson vs USC game (Go cocks!). We made our way to the bus station, said a few good-byes, and then DD, Rebecca, Regan and I got on our bus to head to Lima for a week of training. 

I did miss the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and my mama's Pecan Pies, but Ancash with great volunteer friends was a pretty awesome way to spend Thanksgiving! 

*As always, there are more pictures from my Ancash adventure on Facebook.  Enjoy!