Home Away from Home

I’ve realized that after almost 2 years in Peru, I haven’t mentioned my family once. So I figured it’s better now than never.

Peace Corps volunteers in Peru are required to live with host families for the full two years, something my mother was very happy to learn about. Don’t get me wrong, it has been great living with a family, but it definitely has had its ups and downs. Ups: I get served my meals, I’m never alone, and they help me acustumbrar faster to the culture here.  Downs: Pretty much all the same things except the last one.

But when it comes down to it, I’m very grateful for my host family, and a family, they have really become. We joke and laugh with each other, they’ve seen me cry, and have stood up for me in the community. Not many volunteers are as lucky as I am to have such a great host family. 

So let me introduce them to you:

Host Mom Adela: She’s in her 30’s, so I’ve always considered her more of my friend than host mom. She’s a stout woman who always has a smile on her face. At first I thought her to be serious and shy, but that was just because we didn’t know each other. Whenever I go on trips, she always tells me how lucky I am to travel and to be single. Over these years, I’ve gotten to know a little bit about her history. She’s from Bambamarca, the bigger city below and got married and pregnant really early in life, at around 21 years old. Her spouse is from San Juan de Lacamaca, which is where I live, so she upped and moved her life to the campo. She has a hard life, as most women do in the campo, as I see her constantly working through the day while my host dad is off drinking. She washes the clothes (even mine!), cooks and cleans, takes care of the animals, and does all the shopping. Because of that, she can never be gone for too long. So if she has to go to another community for whatever reason, she wakes up before sunrise to cook breakfast and lunch and go on her way in time to get back to make dinner. She’s quite the jokester, and we both have bonded over making fun of my host dad. She only has a primary school education, but she’s a quick learner. I teach her how to make different cakes and dishes from time to time. What’s frustrating to me is that even though she works so much, she has a low self-esteem, something very common among women. So I do all that I can to boost her self-esteem and show her how much she is valued. 

Host Dad Belermino: Ooohh my host dad. Again, he’s around the same age as Adela, so I call him by his first name or by his nickname Belacho. By trade he is a painter, artist, and teacher, but by day he works in the municipality (the only worker) and is the president of the Ronda Campesinas, both of which he started just recently. Before he had odd painting jobs and taught literacy to a group of moms. Like I said above, he likes to drink, which is what most men do here. I’ve never been around alcoholics, but I would say that he is one, as when he drinks, he doesn’t come back until the wee mornings and can barely walk. But with that said, he’s harmless, which is why Adela and I make fun of him. I think he is also ashamed of his drinking because often times after he goes out drinking, I don’t see him for days on end, as he doesn’t want me to see him, which I think is kind of funny. But all and all, he’s a good guy and has got my back. He heard some bad gossip about me from this person around town and he told them off, which I was glad to hear. 

Host Brother Gian Carlos: It took me a good couple weeks to finally figure out what my host brother’s name was as my family calls him Kalin (Ka-leen) and his school calls him Gian (Gsh-ean). He just turned 13 the day after Christmas, but he is still a little kid at heart. I’ve never had a little sibling, as I am the youngest in my family, so it has been interesting dealing with that. He used to always come into my room and ask me what I was doing, so I had to learn boundaries pretty quick. He’s my biggest helper in town. If I need some eggs from the neighbor or need to put up a sign at school, I will just give the job to him, and he’s only too happy to do it for me. I’ve tried to give him as many opportunities to grow as I can while I am here by inviting him to our Camp VALOR and to participate in my youth health promoters club. He’s okay at school, but really wants to become a priest when he grows up, something that I have never heard a kid say before.

The days are counting down and I’ve already been thinking about how I’m going to say goodbye. My host mom used to cry when I gave her rent or if I went on vacation, so I can only imagine. They all don’t want me to leave, and in a perfect world, I wouldn’t, but that is just how things go. I came crying to Peace Corps and I will leave crying. 

Host Grandma: Oh mi abuelita, also known as Doña Leja (Le-ha). I call her abuela and every time I am greeted with a smile and a laughter, so I think she likes it :-) She is the mother of my host father, and lives next door to us. She is a widow and has 8 kids that live in Lima, Chiclayo, and Cajamarca. She's in her 70's but is truckin' it with the best of them. She owns three cows, so is constantly taking care of them, which means milking them twice a day and finding them grass, which is sometimes in the jalca or high up in the mountains. It's a good hour walk up the mountain to where she keeps her cows, which means twice a day, she goes up and down to milk them. I don't know how she does it, as I can't even do that once without stopping at least a couple time to catch my breath. And she does it while crocheting to boot!

Tiempo

Time is a fickle. The seconds may be ticking away like agorrobino during the day, and yet weeks and months disappear without you knowing where they went. I’m coming up to my 2 years in Peru on September 11^th, and it feels like just yesterday I was scrambling to fit everything I would need for two years in my three bags.

Time is discernible. I’ve been in Peru for the planting and harvesting of two corn seasons, two potato seasons, two pea seasons. I’ve been here for two town festivals, for two rainy seasons. I’ve gotten paint thrown in my face for two carnival celebrations, and have my favorite students graduate to the next grade twice. I’ve witnessed three generations of pigs being born. I’ve seen a once pregnant woman now help your son walk.

Time is biased. When I first got to Peru, I was couldn’t wait for the weeks to be over. It took all my strength to leave my room during the day and talk to people in my bumbling Spanish and try to figure out what exactly I was supposed to be doing. The only way to get through that loneliness and confusion was to have something schedule in the coming weeks so that I could countdown the days. But now, I am wishing time would go in reverse. I find that my days are slipping away before me and I can’t do anything to stop it.

Soy mujer, escucha el rugido!

Being a girl has its perks. We get to wear makeup, have giggle/tickle fests, openly cry in public, and give birth, among many. 

And while in the states, women’s rights have come a long way thanks to our sisters before us, the rest of the world is still catching up, including Peru. 

Many people still can’t read and the majority is women. Women are expected to stay at home, cook, clean, and take care of the children, but to NOT get an education. And this isn’t something of the past; it is still going on today. My host mom’s father has another family, in which he has 3 young kids, and she recently told me that he is making the one girl stay at home, even though she really wants to go on to high school. He wants her to take care of the house with her mom. I was livid when she told me this and had half a mind to go find him and make him explain to me why she can’t go to school. 

Many studies have shown that when more women are educated in a society, the overall development improves.  So what’s the deal? 

Being a woman in Peru is tough because machismo is alive and well. Men are the ones who are offered food first at the table, men are the ones that get recognition in the community meanwhile women are looked upon as sex objects, whistled at constantly, and not given any respect. 

[Side story: Just the other day, I was walking around in the plaza when a bunch of teenage boys were whistling at me. As usual, I ignored them and went on my way. But the whistling got louder and then they started following me. “The nerve”, I thought. But again, I just ignored them and continued on my errands. I slipped into a store, where the boys were outside still yelling and whistling at me. “I’m going to give them a piece of my mind,” I thought, and then all the sudden, I actually listened to what they were saying. They were trying to tell me that I dropped something, so I looked in my pockets, and yes, I had lost my wallet! So I finally turn around and go up to them, and they explained that my wallet had fallen out and a man had taken it, and they were just trying to let me know. Ooooh, was I mad. I told them, the next time they are trying to get a girls attention, DO NOT WHISTLE AT THEM. Okay, back to my original blog....]

And being a foreigner and the self-titled-feminist that I am, it has been quite the experience so far. 

In my youth health promoter club, we’ve done some workshops on sex and gender, where I say a statement, such as “Women are supposed to stay at home and take care of the kids” or “Men are allowed to have sex before marriage and women are not” kind of statements, and the kids have to decide whether they agree or disagree with the statement. Because Peru has such gender divides, a lot of the boys, and even girls, agreed to those statements. When I asked them to explain why, they couldn’t really explain it, “it is just the way it is” they said.

In another activity, I handed out words, such as strong, sports, drinking, weak, cooking, taking care of babies, etc., and they had to put the words underneath “Man” or “Woman.” Of course, drinking, sports, and strong were put under “Man”, while weak, cooking, and taking care of babies was put under “Woman.” When I asked them to explain their reasoning, again, they couldn’t answer why. So then I said, “If a woman cooks, cleans, and takes care of the children, is she weak?” “No,” they answered, and then a light bulb went off in their little heads, and they started to realize that all of those words can apply to both men AND women. Hooray for small wins! 

So as a foreigner here in Peru, I’ve gotten to experience how a woman might have felt a century or even, 30 years ago! 

When I hear girls here saying they can’t do this or are not allowed to do that, my chest puffs up, and I give them my spiel: Just because you are a girl, doesn’t mean you aren’t as strong or smart as men. You can do whatever you put your mind to! 

And it makes me smile when I see girls doing just that when they graduate high school and go to the big cities to continue their educations. It’s like I can hear them saying, “Soy mujer, escucha el rugido (I am woman, hear me roar).”

Crazy Talk

I think Peace Corps has officially made me insane. Two years of living in a place where you don’t speak the language, know neither the culture nor the people, and are doing things you have never thought you would do in your lifetime. It’s an adventure, that’s for sure. 

I’ve come to the point in my service where I’ve done as much as I can, experienced all I can, and now is time to wrap things up. I have four months left and am left more confused about things than when I came.

First of all, what have I accomplished in my two years of Peace Corps service?  And could I have done more? Will I be remembered? Or was it all worth it?

And now all those things that have annoyed me in the past 2 years, such as the questions “Te enseñas?” (Have you taught yourself?), “Has engordado?” (You’ve gotten fatter?), “Vas a llover” (It’s going to rain)…I’m strangely going to miss it all. 

This has been a roller coaster of a ride and I’m on the last descent, and now I’m wishing that instead of the time going fast, that it slowed down just a bit longer so that I could take everything in.  But of course, that is not possible, so instead I’m just taking a little bit longer walking in the campo, passing that warm bottle of beer, or watching the sunsets on the pampa. 

The only question now is which roller coaster will I jump on to next?

Ole! Ole!

There is nothing more attractive than a man in a sequin outfit with pink socks. Bull fighters, ladies and gentlemen. It’s all about the bull fighters. 

For those that have not witnessed a bull fight before, it may appear to be unjust and barbaric, and I admit, that I was one of those people. But once I saw my first bull fight last year and saw that it was not just a killing spree, but a dramatic, man vs bull fight to the death, well then, I was hooked.

Bull fighting is alive and well in Peru, as well as other Latin American countries, like Columbia, Ecuador, and Mexico. There countries, including Peru, take after the style of bull fighting from their mother land of Spain, among many other aspects of the Latin American culture. 

But sticking to bull fighting…Each bull fight traditionally has three bull fighters or torero (also known as matador), each of which fights two bulls each. Each torero has a team that includes two picadores (“lancers on horseback”), three banderilleros (“dancers with sticks”), and a mozo de espadas (“sword page”).  This cuadrilla or entourage work together to kill a bull the quickest and most humane way possible.

Now on to the costumes. Torero costumes are easily called traje de luces or “suits of lights” because of all the sequins lining their outfits. The pants come way above the waist and are accompanied by a small matching jacket. Hats are optional, not all bull fighters wear them, but they bare a vague resemblance between Disneyland Mickey Mouse ears and Princess Lea’s hair-do. And who can forget the pink socks, which I might add, give a little something extra to the costumes. And last but not least, black ballet flats as the bull fighters fight on just sand, although from the last bull fight I saw, shoes appear to be optional.  

Each bull fight has three distinct stages or tercios (“thirds”), which are announced by the sound of a bugle. I know, very middle ages. First the bull fighting teams enter the arena in a parade to salute the crowd, and more importantly the presiding dignitary and judges, who decide who wins the bull fights because yes, it is a competition. Next, the bull enters the ring to be tested by the toreros and banderilleros for its behavior and quirks. They test the bull by using a capote or “cape” of gold on one side and magenta on the other.  This stage is called the tercio de varas or “The lancing third.” Next comes out the picadores or the lancers on horseback. The goal is for the picador to stab the bull just behind the neck of the bull to weaken the neck muscles, preparing it for the later stages. If the picador is successful, the bull will hold its head and horns slightly lower during the following stages of the fight lessening its chances of injuring the bull fighter. However in the bulls standpoint, seeing a man on a horse pointing a sharp stick at itself doesn’t exactly sit well for the bull, so the bull usually charges at the horse. But don’t worry; the horse is wearing a protective padding, as is the picador. Apparently prior to 1930, horses did not wear any protection and there were usually more horses killed in a bull fight than bulls. 

At this point of the bull fight, if the bull proves to be too small or too smart as to attack the picador, it can be “pardoned” by the judge and the people. I say the people because bull fights are very much democratic in that the audience goes very Roman on the judge and bull fighters, often times booing and throwing trash at the arena. You don’t want to mess with a bull fighting crowd, as they are very volatile. If the bull is pardoned, then it gets to return to where he came from and enjoy the rest of his life as a stud. Happily ever after.

In the next stage, called the tercio de banderillas (“the third of banderillas”), the three banderilleros attempt to plant two banderillas, sharp barbed sticks, into the bulls’ shoulders. This stage is by far my favorite as the banderilleros could double as ballerinas at the next opening of Swan Lake. They often start by standing on their tippy toes with their arms in the air with the banderillas pointing straight at the bull about 20 feet away. The take a little hop and then run head on to the bull and do a perfectly timed jump and stick the banderillas in the bull’s back, and then runs like hell. This, for obvious reason, often infuriates the bull and makes them more bravo or dangerous. Sometimes a torero likes to plant his own banderillas, and in the case of the bull fight I watched, the torero did all 6 banderillas by himself, barefoot. Seriously, bull fighting is anything but dramatic. 

The third stage called the tercio de muerte (“the third of death”) is obviously the last stage of a bull fight. In this stage, the torero enters the arena with a muleta or red cape and a small sword. The torero uses his cape to attract the bull in a series of passes which serve the dual purpose of wearing the animal down for the kill and producing a beautiful display or faena, or what I like to call the full cockiness of the bull fighter. In the bull fights that I have seen, the bull fighters try to demonstrate his dominance over the bull by trying to get close to his body and at times touching the horns and tail. I’ve also seen bull fighters straight up lunge right in front of the bull and stare him in the eye. If and when this happens, a loud scream thought to come from a 16 year old will most likely slip out of my mouth. When the torero does his series of passes, the crowd usually shouts “Ole” with each pass, not unlike the soccer “ole,” but a bit slower. This stage ends with the bull fighter hopefully tiring out the bull so that he can stab the bull between the shoulder blades and if done correctly, straight through the aorta of the heart. This is the main goal, but unfortunately, does not happen every time, which is when I admit that is when bull fighting gets cruel. But when done correctly, the bull falls down immediately. 

After the bull has died comes the ruling from the crowd and the judge. If the torero has done an exceptional job, the crowd waves their white pañuelos or handkerchiefs meanwhile screaming dos orejas or two ears. Ears are awarded to bull fighters who do outstandingly well.  Apparently the tail of the bull can be rewarded as well, but I have yet to see that. 

So there you have it folks, a good old fashion afternoon entertainment. I know that there are many people against such an event, but to me, it is something that I truly enjoy and will miss the coming year as this year was my last Chota Fest for a while. 

So I invite all of you, if you ever get a chance, to see a bull fight in person, and if you don’t want to see a bull killed than at the very least, just come for the bull fighters…