Una Blusa Lila

I’m sorry. In retrospect, I guess it was a slightly misleading to call something the “first update on my new life in Peru” when, in reality, the post contained next to no actual information about that new life.  Instead, I gave you a long, incoherent list of Spanglish words and phrases and left you to your own devices to decipher how they might relate to my first few weeks in Lobitos.  Hopefully the next few posts will shed a little light on, at least, some of them.  Let’s start with una blusa lila; a lavender blouse.

I arrived to Lobitos at mid-morning on Monday and started work on Tuesday.  The old secondary school English teacher had quit abruptly which is why everything turned around so quickly. 

The timing was a bit strange really.  Coincidently, Kate had contacted me about the available position the day before the shit hit the fan with the mine in Chile.  After we spoke, I walked away from the conversation feeling really bummed about missing out on the spot, the surf and the organization; all three of which Kate had been raving about literally every time I’d talked to her for the previous seven months since she left Iquique.

When the mining job was suddenly pulled out from underneath me, my initial response (as you may have read about in this post) was utter disbelief followed my blinding rage, waterworks, feeling totally directionless and confused about the next step to take and a long rant-tastic blog post.  Essentially, I worked my way through something roughly resembling the five stages of grief… in the span of about an hour.  I was literally still walking home; with red cheeks and puffy eyes when I remembered about the job in Lobitos.  I think I actually might have jumped off the ground a little, I was so excited about the idea.  I ran home and sent Kate about a million messages via facebook and skype telling her to get in touch with me ASAeffingP.  28 days, and way too many travel hours later, I was here.

They kids were already three weeks into the school year when I arrived because of my little detour back to North America so I hit the ground running; no time to lose.  First thing Tuesday morning, I went to talk to the directora of secondary school.  I was terrified.  I had already heard that she was a little "complicated" (a euphemism Spanish-speakers commonly use to avoid directly calling someone a bitch) so I was trying to make a good impression by dressing professional for our meeting, sitting up straight and minding my ps and qs.  I have never been looked up and down so hard by an authority figure in my entire life. 

 My outfit got the thumbs-up from my co-workers but was I still scolded profusely.  She explained the exact uniform I should be wearing (speaking slowly and annunciating to make sure I understood); looooseeellllyyyyyy fiiiittttiinnnnggg bbllllaaacccckkkkk slllaaccckkkkks, bbbbllllaaccckkkkkkkk cccccllloooooooseeeee-ttttoooooooooeeeeedddddd ssshhhoooeeeesssss aaaaannnnnddddd aaaa llllaaaavvveeeennnndddarrrr bbbbbllllouuuuussssseee.  Then, to make sure I really got it, she explained it three more times.

The first two weeks were rough.  The kids were awesome, a bit hard-to-manage at times, but overall engaged, fun and a pleasure to work with.  When I was in the classroom, I was happy but the administrative side of things was driving me nuts.  

Every day, I showed up to the directora's office where she scrutinized my outfits and threw together an arbitrary schedule for my day.  Then I would run home (luckily, just across the street) and scramble to get things prepared before running back to school.  It was chaos and would likely have continued this way up until now if the organization where I work hadn 't put their very influencial foot down.  All it took was one stern phone call simply stating that, unless I was given an actual schedule, I would not be returning to teach English; which we provide to the school free of charge (and they are required by law to teach).

The directora cracked instantly.  She immediately put together the schedule which was communicated by phone and handed to me on the Monday of my third week.  I haven 't seen her once since then.  She hasn 't even popped into one of my classes to tell me how to manage it or to snap at one of my students for looking at her (not joking...we 're talking Cruella Deville here).  

I never did buy the outfit she so slowly and clearly communicated to me during our first meeting.  It wasn 't part of the power struggle, they just don 't happen to sell those things in the one store I frequent, 20 minutes away in Talara (there isn 't even a grocery store in our town lady...give me a break).  I have, however, found somewhat of a compromise: a lavendar shirt with a black skirt and close-toed shoes.  So far it seems to keep her appeased at least enough to let me do my job in peace.  Which is great, because I love my job.