Sunday, June 26, 2011

"often the deep valleys of our present will be understood only by looking back from the mountains of our future experience." -Pres. Uchtdorf

6/22-6/25
So I found that our “house” is serviceless (of the internet) which is why there is a delay in posting … nonetheless there has been so much to document… sometimes it is overwhelming and I want to capture every moment and every name, but most of the time I can’t even remember their names (or understand them) after I ask them. And there have been a LOT of names. So it is the same with this journal documentation… so I am trying to remember details so it can come alive for everyone. Even though you read names, just know that each name has a life, he/she lives and breathes… just different air and in different places. We are all existing. That is what I love most about the world… even if you are far away from someone, you know they are living at the very moment you are… and life goes on for everyone. (Piura, Peru starts on day 3)

So lets start at day 1… in the airport. I went to the airport with mom because she was going to Nebraska. It was so nice to be in the airport with a familiar face. However, while in the airport, I made a grandma (friend) (from the lima flight), an anxious friend who popped out a pink vodka bottle to calm her nerves, one going to argentina to study while culturally immersed (both of these from Miami flight), someone from Peru and London (from lima airport). My favorite was Victoria, the grandma friend. She told me to focus on the moms in all projects because they are the driving force to the kids. She helped me fill out customs and other forms and told me to put on my seatbelt. She also helped me to practice Spanish… which inspired me to study espanol until it got dark (an hour or two)… it helped the most because it made me realize how much I don’t know… and so gave motivation to study hard and consistently. So I am making a goal to study an hour every day. Because I really want to understand the kids. I can survive without being able to express myself, but to not understand por poco me mata. Getting off the plane was the most extraordinary breath of freshness and simply peru smell. I was surprised because I was expecting mountains and there are none. It is more desert-like because there is lots of sand…which I love, except when it gets in your eyes. Speaking of eyes I woke up with one contact in and one contact out… it was confusing to wake up and halfway see. Just saying. So day 1 and 2 converged because I pulled almost an all nighter in the airport in Lima. But its okay because all nighters have good memories… it was just tiring. That’s where I met the London and Peru friend. Actually it was really strange. I put my head down on my hand. When I put it down there was a woman sitting next to me and when I sat up there was a man… I think I looked alarmed because he did. It was one of those it feels like you just slept for a couple of minutes but was more like a half an hour or so. This was the second time I realized… man I don’t speak or understand much espanol. The one from London recognized Brigham Young University in Utah because Brigham young is obviously from Utah… and I was impressed. So I sat in that chair for 5 hours (to space out my time because of a really long layover). Then checked in my bag and then I FOUND A SLEEPING AREA. We learn from experience and since I will be going back to peru, next time I will check in much much sooner and go to the sleeping area and sleep. So I pulled out a really good devotional to read, but my eyes soon became oh so droopy. And I said a silent prayer I would wake up in an hour and not miss my plane. I woke up half a hour later and couldn’t wake up and said another prayer that I wouldn’t oversleep and then I woke up in another half an hour. Ps. Prayers are heard and answered…evidence: tender mercies along the way. Then I went through security. And someone talked to me in Spanish and I only had to ask que once! That was a proud moment. Victoria’s teaching paid off. Then I was in and out of sleep on a couple of chairs in gate 16 while my contacts blurred when I woke up to lots of people waiting for the Piura flight. Well, I pulled my stuff together and only used one chair (the one I was sitting on)… and the ones around me were quickly filled. Then I sat on the second to last seat from the back and was out for most of the time but luckily woke up right as snacks were coming around. I heard the shuffle of wrappers. And good thing because there was 2 chocolate treats and some ritz bits. Then Ashlee picked me up and we rode in a moto to the green house (which is where we live). It is three stories high. On the first floor is the bottom of the stairs to walk up to the second floor. On the second floor is a hallway of bedrooms. Normally this house is to house university students, but we claimed it for the summer… sort of like the efy kids in provo. I share a bedroom with a girl named Katie who is awesome. The room reminds me of my Romania room because dust collects so, so quickly and it is a double bed with a smelly pipe bathroom. Luckily, we have these cute organizer things to put our clothes in so it is staying organized. And my favorite… there is a fan! There are huge windows so everyone bought bedsheets and hooks to cover them. Then the next floor up is our sitting area where we have meetings, Spanish lessons, and movie nights… also with some bedrooms.

So anyways… DAY 3… lets just say. Ashlee (our country director picked me up) and we dropped my stuff of at the house and went to the grocery store to buy sheets, a pillow, and a towel. There we met a family who are members who were extremely sweet. Big shock: everyone is so friendly I can hardly believe it. I keep expecting cold faces like Romania but instead I get toothy smiles… and I definitely cannot say I don’t appreciate because many a times it has made me very happy. The whistling is not appreciated… but Ashlee talked to the workers outside our house. They apparently do it as a compliment… but we interpret it differently… and so once explained… they stopped. One example of cross-cultural differences. So we went shopping, then I unpacked and rested for a little. Then went to the roof! Which is where we hang our clothes and look at the city. You can see so much. And it made me wish that every house could have an open roof. One of the girls explained to me about all the projects that are going on. There have been a lot of different things… and about the politics and administration end. Because Peru is a new country, our job is to make the contacts, meet people and know the city. One successful project has been the futbol league. The intention was to give kids who don’t have a chance on being on a team (because it is something you have to pay for… and everyone is crazy about futbol… and very involved) to be on a team and receive lessons (por ejemplo hygiene). However, only three people signed up so they had to seek out people who already have organized teams to join. It begins next week for the rest of the summer and at the end 15 scholarships will be awarded, which were donated by a local NGO for vocational, academic university for full tuition for 2 years. It is amazing. Another project is going to a preschool and teaching lessons. Preschool is really big thing here so a lot of kids participate. The one they go to though is run from someone’s backyard so some of the girls wrote a proposal to build a school, but we don’t have enough funding. But we are still putting together lessons for the preschool. Another project is teaching English at secondary school. Another project is planting medicinal trees from a micro-finance business started by a local lady. Another project is an elderly outreach, youth outreach, rehabilitation something, hospital something, and different ones that they had done before. There are two local men in particular that have been golden instruments in making connections. Other times some team members have been walking by, checked something out, went inside and started up a project or volunteer opportunity. Like with the private school, two of the girls were walking by, stopped in and talked with the principal. From there, because the school had Japan or German (I can’t remember) volunteers come before they were extremely welcoming to us volunteering. Then at 3:30 we went to an orphanage with 150 girls. 150 CHICAS! We were warmly welcomed and all of our hands were held on each side and we were swarmed. Talk about loving and loving and never stopping to love. They toured us through their orphanage. Some nuns run it. First we went to the iglesia, then the cocina, comedor, sala, a room where they sewed/knitted lots of cute things like baby dresses, pillows, door stoppers, and bracelets. Then we went to the performance area where they performed a couple traditional dances and a shakira dance. Then we danced with them. I ran into the school building to get the girls inside to dance. Once you invited them or told them to come they danced with you. There was one girl who was an extremely awesome helper. She had such a beautiful smile. We went through all the conversations of what is your favorite… One cute small girl, really small, liked when she was twirled. We got into a circle and copied each other’s dance moves. Holy cow, I loved it there. Some of the girls aren’t all orphans. Some are from families from who are not financially stable to support their children. So the orphanage is also like a boarding school. And there the girls receive an education. When they were dancing, I thought of how wonderful dance is. When you feel the music running through, it takes away the worries and fears of the world. It takes away hardship and lets you be free. When the started sweating, I thought I wonder what kind of emotions they must deal with. I really can’t imagine living with 150 other girls (they were older… I would say 10-12 until 14-16. And living with girls right when you are in the growing up, figuring out your identity period… like that is middle school age. And the girls didn’t seem catty to each other. Also we only saw them for an hour or so, but I felt genuinity from them. In that way, I was amazed at their good-heartedness to us but mostly to each other. At the end, I didn’t want to go and was the last one to hop in the truck. But they ran with us and reached out their hands. I feel like they are trained for volunteers… to hold our hands and ask our names when we come then follow us out with waving hands. It makes me glad that they know the routine and can still find so much joy in it, but sad at the same time because I don’t know where they go after they leave the orphanage or if it prevents them from forming lasting relationships… which then changes their mindset. It made me realize though how different environments are. To visit an orphanage is one thing, but to live that lifestyle is totally different. I sort of feel like I have a glimpse of it by living in the Sunflower (the orphanage in Peru) and after 2 weeks I saw personalities open up and the reality of having many “brothers” and “sisters” with a caretaker who cares for you because they are paid… seemed really raw. So it makes me question their true happiness and inner emotions. One girl had the biggest smile, and it made me laugh when she cracked one. What makes me happy: when people smile at me because something I did or even didn’t do. We taught the Kotniejoe to Justin Beiber’s Baby. If only Justin knew his song was a hit in an orphange in Piura… the girls knew the words… it was great. I always feel bad visiting orphanages because I feel like they should think… they have so much and come and go…they can go back to life with all their things and families but we can’t… they don’t understand… they can do whatever they want… but I am learning that I can’t dwell or even think about what other people might be thinking because sometimes it isn’t true and so I can’t suppose false assumptions.  And because it hinders interaction. And when I am under the obligation to give and give I don’t want any hindrances. Those girls really made my day. I left with a smile and a giddy feeling I couldn’t shake off. There is a special feeling inside the orphanages that I’ve experienced… and I hope its because there are angels filling in the missing gaps. We went to dinner after. Our cook… is the bomb. She is the second nicest person I have ever, ever met. She gives so freely and I really admire that. She made a delicious pollo y arroz meal with pie for dessert and gave me the most wonderful back scratching. She makes me laugh. She is a chicken killer though with a de-feather machine with fat chickens in her “backyard” area. Her picture frames angle out of the wall… and she is a member of the church so she has lots of pictures of Christ and the prophets/apostles. A 2 year old came by with his mom and he quickly warmed up and made my night. He had cute dimples and the funniest laugh. He liked surprise tickles and slapping the computer. We also had a meeting last night where we talked about projects… and new one will hopefully be curriculum creation for ESL (English as a second language) for young adults of the community…. Because that has been a need voiced lots of times. Then I was out and didn’t even hear the fireworks which supposedly vibrated our house.

DAY 4 In the morning after dreaming about my sunflower kids, I was not in the mood to wake up, but we always walk (7-8 minute walk) to the hermana (the cocinera’s) house for breakfast which we eat at 7:30. Talk about early. It was deliciously crepes. So amazing. With miel or honey. And a fruity drink. Then we cleaned the house with nifty supplies and cloths (from pillowcases). Then I went with 2 of the girls to the private school to help teach English. In the first classroom, was first grade. We talked about the different uses of the verb tener, have/has… so we split into groups of 3 and we went around the group saying and repeating how many siblings each student has. Some were quick at it and others were slower even after multiple tries. Then second classroom was the same except I got better at explaining and instructing. The kids… I am learning Spanish for them because I just want to know what they are saying… their questions and all. They were extremely friendly… some more than others but again I was surprised by their warmth. The lesson always ended in asking me questions though. At the end we talked with the teacher and the principal to learn the lesson plans for the next couple of days so we can be more effective in contextualizing and planned activities. They had a science fair going on so lots of kids were below displaying their projects… with clever ideas. The last grade we went to… was the 14-15 year olds, who were extremely noisy. This lesson was less structured because we went around helping them to understand their workbooks. There were 2 girls who kept laughing and laughing so at the end I tried talking to them… and they kept laughing… making me feel self conscious about what I was saying. Then I remembered that girls giggle and it wasn’t so much about me as about they were just having a good time giggling and being amused. Well then a little groupy formed…and they told me that I should be in a relationship with one of the boys there (he was saying it too)! And I was like what he is younger than me. Well they didn’t care that he was 2 years younger. Then they started going around saying who is with who and who should be with who… and I thought oh man typical teenagers, which made me realize how similar people are to each other even when we speak different languages. Well then the whole group started talking to me, which was so intimidating because it was extra pressure to understand what they were saying… but also it has motivated me to learn Spanish… and keep, keep practicing. Those giggling girls came to the house so we could play volleyball, but unfortunately they arrived on Peruvian time…. later than planned so we couldn’t because there wasn’t enough time… so on Tuesday hopefully it will work out so we can play volleyball. They were cute. I love the cheek kissing. Then we ate a spaghetti looking dinner and went to a young singles adult stake activity… there was a couple of us who went and it was a total blast. It was so typical because we walked in and there was no one on the dance floor and everyone sitting in the surrounding chairs. I sat next to this girl with brilliant blue eye shadow surrounding her eye… it was intriguing. Then we began the dancing…. Which was completely and utterly amuzing… because on top of not being able to hear, I was trying to concentrate on the steps and couldn’t talk and dance at the same time, plus not understanding espanol, plus everyone in the chairs watching. At first it was way awkward but then my dancing partner was twirling me around and I didn’t care that I couldn’t really dance like how I was supposed to. Luckily for latin dancing training a couple of weeks before, it wasn’t foreign. Once the guy (I am so, so bad at remembering Peruvian names) dancing with me warmed up he was singing and moving to the beat. However, the songs like never end and even when they do, you don’t find a new dancing buddy. But nonetheless (there is a moth that is very attracted to my computer screen and fluttering across the keyboard… gross), the dancing… so fun. Unfortunately we had a 9 3o clock curfew so we had to leave…so we went to the young women’s activity in the court outside the chapel and found tons of cute girls who liked to shake our hands and give kisses and hugs. ADORABLE! One kept running after me and wrapping her arms and hanging on by my neck… sort of like those monkeys with the really long arms that have Velcro hands. She made my night. Tomorrow we are waking up super early to go to the beach for the day. Except we have no water so I couldn’t shower or shave… not good. The showers are cold… breathtaking. So it wasn’t a huge loss but now my hair is greasy… gross. 

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