My entire life everyone is always telling me I have lost weight.
The funny thing is since puberty finished I haven’t wondered from 116 lbs.
But, since these bouts of sickness I have felt skinnier, and my Peruvian friends and family have actively become concerned for how much weight they believe I have lost.
I went to weigh myself this morning at the health post.
52 kilos
or 115lbs.
Ha!
Helena Norberg-Hodge
“It may seem absurd to believe that a “primitive” culture in the Himalaya has anything to teach our industrialized society. But our search for a future that works keeps spiraling back to an ancient connection between ourselves and the Earth, an interconnectedness that ancient cultures have never abandoned.”
“I used to assume that the direction of ‘progress’ was somehow inevitable, not to be questioned, I passively accepted a new road through the middle of the park, a steel-and-glass bank where a 200-year-old church had stood… and the fact that life seemed to get harder and faster with each day. I do not anymore. In Ladakh I have learned that there is more than one path into the future and I have had the privilege to witness another, saner, way of life—a pattern of existence based on the coevolution between human beings and the Earth.”
Shaikh Abu Saeed Abil Kheir, aka Nobody, Son of Nobody
“Let sorrowful longing dwell in your heart. Never give up, never loss hope.
Allah says, ‘The broken ones are my beloved.’
Crush your heart. Be broken.”
Rabindranath Tagore
“Not hammer-strokes, but dance of the water, sings the pebbles into perfection.”
Tiffyn Cvejanovich and myself hashing out some thoughts
“god is within yourself and everyone else. The connection is strength. But, there are more connections outside of those you touch. Those external connections are and always will be stronger than you. Nothing can ever develop or change without a huge part of the web working together.”
I believe I made a grave error today.
Having not washed my sleeping bag sense winter season started, I decided to do so today.
It is now 10pm and my sleeping bag isn’t dry. As it is close to freezing in my bedroom, I started piling every warm clothing item I own on me because only one alpaca blanket won’t do.
The list:
Three pairs of socks
Warm leggings
Leg warmers
Fleece pajama pants
t-shirt
under armor
hoodie
wool sweater
wool hat
scarf
mittens
It won’t be a dangerously cold evening, but probably an uncomfortable one.
It doesn’t help that I am watching season one of BBc’s Planet Earth and tonight is “ice worlds”… I think we might have to skip to deserts for this evening.
I ate lunch with the teachers again today, then headed off to begin painting the world map in the primary school. Two little guys on bicycles way to big for their bodies hurried up to my side, hopped off their bikes and offered to help me carry the supplies. They had arrived early.
Over the next 10 minutes about 20 students appeared and slid the leftover dentist scrubs over their clothes overly excited to paint.
My hands are still ocean blue.
Last night while I was running around looking for a social counterpart to bring to training I ran into some primary school students that wanted me to check the posters they were working on for the parade in the morning.
“Cigar is spelled c-i-g-a-r not s-i-g-a-r, but everything else looks great.”
I assumed it was an anti-drug parade the primary school was doing. When I heard them marching this morning I ran outside to take pictures. It was an anti-drug and alcohol campaign not for the students, but for their parents.
This past weekend after the festivities of San Isidro the drunkenness in the streets was rampant. You can imagine that if the drunk adults scare me, they certainly scare these little ones. Proudly they walked through the plaza chanting and carrying signs…
“Please, Mr. Alcohol, I ask you with all my heart to leave my village, far from my family.”
“Daddy, please, I ask you not to drink alcohol.”
And the killer… “The beer that you drink is the bread that I lack.”
Next week the volunteers from my training group have In-service Training in Lima. Angelica (who went with me to the last training and is a great counterpart and good friend), recommended a man who lives in Madrigal that used to be a teacher to go with me. When we knocked on his door last week his toddler and 6-year-old answered. As they ran to get their dad we could hear his voice over the tin scrap door. Before seeing him I was filled with soothing hope. He spoke to his children so kind and attentively (not the norm here) I had a quick vision of him and I developing the library space together over the next year. His compassionate face lit up when Angelica and I explained our plans for the after-school program and library. He was delighted with the idea of working with kids again instead of construction. We told him to talk to his boss and wife about going to the Peace Corps training with me and would come back this weekend for his confirmation.
I was bubbly with the idea of working with an individual so perfect for the position of counselor/librarian.
Upon returning to site today I received notice from Angelica that Hermes’ wife had told her Hermes had to go to Chivay to look for work. Not only would he not be able to attend the training because the family could not afford to lose a week’s worth of income, but he might not be returning to Madrigal for a while as this job in Chivay was higher paying than what he had previously.
What broke my heart more than anything was that such an affectionate father was being pulled away from his children.
I set out on a quest to find someone to go with me. The first primary school teacher I talked to is a little, smart 4th grade teacher. She clapped her hands and jumped a little at the thought as her husband said over her shoulder, “She doesn’t like to travel”. Her energy died and she tried to help me think of other people I could invite. I went to the preschool principal and she said she can’t leave her cows or her son for a week. I went to the woman who teaches carpentry and sewing and she said the Ministry of education won’t let her take more than two days off at a time. I went to another Primary school teacher and she asked an aunt to take care of her 10-year-old son for the week and the aunt said she was going to be in Chivay one of those days and couldn’t. I asked another primary school teacher and she said she was already traveling to Lima that week for an important doctor’s appointment that could not be rescheduled. Now, I was in a quandary. The training is in a week, and Peace Corps needed the name by today. I asked Hirma again if her doctor’s appointment could be pushed back a day and Peace Corps would be paying her transportation to Lima. “Perhaps,” but she had already booked her flight for Wednesday and the training started Tuesday. She called her husband who lives in the city to see if he could sign online and change her flight. He did it in less than five minutes and Angelica and I were dancing around the room.
What a long day.
Something weird is happening. Somehow, not only do I see a circle of my very own Peruvian friends forming, but, ‘Stability’ has become my middle name (go figure, I know).
A small group of educated women that are teachers in the schools has invited me to join their cooking circle. It almost feels like my life in Austin doing round-robin potlucks, which I love.
I have been so busy I haven’t had time to get lost in my head. I have a set schedule materializing and a rhythm that feels good.
Today Rocio, Edgar and I organized a meeting for the greenhouse project. Rocio heads this project and has organized it amazingly well.
The meeting ended up being invigorating for all of us. It isn’t just a charity that Rocio is organizing, but a 6 month series of workshops that train each potential greenhouse recipient on how to grow organically and how to cook nutritiously. The community members themselves provide all of the labor to build the greenhouses, but the materials are coming from a grant application to the regional government. Basically, it is the perfect example of Peace Corps supplying human resources to use the local resources optimally. I am honored and excited to be helping her with such great justice work.
Of the 32 expected to attend, 21 showed up, which is a HUGE percentage here in Peru. When I made 20 copies of everything everyone thought I was being overly optimistic. The most beautiful part of the meeting today was the excitement in the community members’ eyes. We really focused on emphasizing the fact that this is their project, and it can only be successful if they stand up as leaders and responsible members of their representative towns. I think they all walked away with a sense of ownership in the project. It was truly beautiful.
Of the 9 towns involved in the project 7 individuals (33%) are coming from Madrigal. I am SO proud of them for making this project a priority. I am also very pleased to know that my knocking on doors and ear pulling is being appreciated instead of found annoying.
