Late last week I began a three-day journey from my site in Southern Peru to Peace Crops Early In Service Training in a central Peruvian department called Ancash. 5 buses, one break down, 10 hours of sleep, 4 meals, and three days later we arrived at our conference center in Yangay, a small city just outside of Huaraz. Google it, and goodle Huascaran. I traveled with another volunteer for safety reasons, and instead of sleeping we were both quite literally jaw dropped and staring out the windows as we wove through the mountains of Ancash. Above the young cornfields the setting Sun colored the snow-peaks with an orange glow that made the clouds look purple and spurious.
The clouds were so low and dense that evening we had no idea we were in the foothills of the infamous Huascaran. The following morning, with a slight lift of the nose, the double peaks of Huascaran revealed themselves.
Otherwise, this week has been uninteresting in every aspect of the word. Quite literally locked up in this rural conference center with extremely limited hot water, internet, and electricity, we have been bombarded with lecture after lecture on how to plan and implament sustainable projects for the year to come. My mental escape was gifted to me through the eyes and arms of a 5-year-old, “Maju”, the daughter of the cook for the center we are staying in. I delighted her and her cousin when we first met with the games my father used to play with me when I was little (“spidy” hands tickling and counting your ribs, letting the kids fly around the yard in your arms, and even little hints of “doctor dangerous”), and now she rushes to my side when she gets home from kindergarten. If I am in a lecture she is set up with crayons and paper and every five minutes she patiently lifts her drawing to show me the progress and receive a smile. Her little hand, longing for affection, in my hand that never felt so large, follows me around the compound every evening. I can’t get enough of it. Turning everything I am doing into a learning experience for her keeps my heart in the game while Peace Coros pumps up my brain.
It has been a delight to see the other volunteers I was trained with after our first three months at site. Everyone the same, but everyone different. What we have learned in such a short time is distinct in our eyes and our thoughts. Leaving training three months ago we were all close, but now that we are experiencing together, we have become a family; comfortable, and dependent on each other.
But, the gossip, “oh, my lord!” I can’t handle the wispers about who isn’t doing enough work at their site and who has gained wait. So judgey. We really are a true family.
Tomorrow we depart to return to our sites. I am going to stop in Lima on the return to Ancash and visit my host family from training. A good friend of mine that is a volunteer is having a surgery on Monday so I will be her chaperone for the remainder of the journey back to Arequipa. Here we go… back on busses.
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