To Everything, There is a Season...

Today´s post goes out to Nicholas Michael Bourassa: a good friend and neighbor who left us six months ago today.  

It was already a heavy week when the news of his death reached me.  The aunt of one of my best friends in Peru had recently been killed and I had spent the majority of the week prior in Talara sitting through burial preparations, family arrivals from Lima and all of the various stages and formalities of a Catholic funeral.  I mostly just lingered around waiting for Luchito to have a spare second when we could steal him away from the sadness for a few moments of laughter and an empanada or two.  Later, he would thank us for being the only glimmers of hope and happiness in the wake of the most shocking and traumatic loss his family had ever suffered.

 On that particular day, I had spent the majority of my afternoon running around Talara trying to hunt down lice shampoo and popcorn kernals in 100-degree weather.  Nico texted me to tell me that he and Emi had nabbed the last two spots in the combi so I knew I´d be cutting it close in terms of getting back to Lobitos before the kids´ film festival.  Somewhere between my lice treatment and running down to L.C.P. headquarters to make palomitas for 100 kids in a pan that was comically small, I checked into my facebook and found a message from Jeff.  He had sent me a link to an article in an Orange County newspaper.  I clicked it to read a vague description of a young man who was fatally injured after being hit by a car on the freeway.  I barely had time to process it between the ticking clock and my itchy head so I shouted goodbye to Mari and ran out the door to find Emi and get ready for the event.

As we stood over the tiny gas stove in her kitchen, already popping batch five or six out of a dozen or so pans of popcorn, I told Emi that I had recently gotten word that a good friend from college had passed away.  Her shock overshadowed mine.  Between scratching our heads and finding the humor in the horror of having contracted head lice for the first time in our adults lives, we shared a somber moment for sad news sent from far away…a reality we both know all too well.

The film festival was a hit.  As usual, any stress or sadness I was feeling was squeezed out of my lungs by the hugs of many beautiful little friends.  All mental energy was channeled into entertaining them, distributing snacks and preventing the event from erupting into total and complete chaos.  An impromptu game of duck, duck goose (pato, pato, ganso) kept them entertained long enough to clean up after the event and we even managed to keep them (mostly) quiet long enough for Nico to introduce the videos.

When the crowd thinned out, I headed up to La Casona where my girlfriends had gathered to have a few beers.  I wasn´t up for it.  I hadn´t eaten all day and hunger and sadness were starting to creep in.  I snuck off towards the only store that was still open to buy a massive bag of fried banana chips.  As the grease settled into my stomach, I stomped on thorns and wandered in the direction of the sea.  I kicked off my flip-flops and let my feet carry me to the water.  I flopped down to my knees at the shoreline and let myself cry.  I gave myself up to whatever it was that I was feeling: confusion, anger, hunger and overwhelming loss. 

Everything felt surreal; I had never felt the presence of death all around me as much as I did during those weeks.  It seemed like all of my expat girlfriends had also gotten unexpected news of freak deaths from home.  One of the sweetest men I know had recently run over and killed my best friend's puppy after a particularly rowdy Corrazón Serrano concert and, back in Lakeside, my own family was torn up after the sudden death of my nephew's 20 year-old cousin who was killed in a car crash in Hemit just ten days before.

I looked up at the gorgeous night sky at a billion stars that stared down at me, unpolluted by city lights.  I gave myself the time to think about Nick and our big back porch at Gustafson apartments. There, we shared war stories and confessions over Sierra Nevada Pale Ales.  The porch connected our two little apartments which we shared with our respective partners. We wandered out when we needed to and sat on the steps for fresh air, perspective and cigarettes.  The back yard was filled with raccoons, the smell of orange blossoms and ferel cats.  Though we were a strange little community, we always had each other’s backs. 

Together, we protected our apartment bike rack from theft (the number one crime in Chico, California).  Joe's moms warded off the evil spirits with some kind of séance ritual, the smoke of which was visible from our perch on the porch steps.  Mattie did his part to feed Orangey who had been abandoned by her alcoholic mother Paula when she was dragged off to rehab.  Being the nurturing soul he was, he felt it was only fair after he had lucked out and scored an apartment so close to two of his best friends.

Nick and I kept our cats (Nico and Gizmo) indoors in our respective apartments, away from the perils of Chico alley cat life.  When I shipped out to Chile, I left Jeff in Nick's care.  They became gym buddies, pizza partners and eventually, best friends.

Nick was no stranger to death.  After serving in Iraq, he knew it well.  He showed me the scars left on his flesh by roadside bombs and talked about the deaths of his comrades casually.  The only thing that really got him teary-eyed was talking about his little girl Melanie, who he didn't get to see as often as he would have liked to.  He was honest and sincere, tough but not too tough to admit his mistakes and ask for forgiveness.  Ironically our friendship actually began with an apology.

A few days ago, I found a photo of the program from his funeral on his facebook.  It reads, 

"To everything there is a season 
and a time to every purpose under heaven.  
A time to be born and a time to die."

 Be it a hard pill to swallow that a twenty-five year old veteran’s “time to die” was on the side of an Orange County freeway, crushed by a reckless driver, fairness was never something that death took into consideration.  Be it by way of cancer, stroke, shark attack, old age, parachutes that don't open or grenades thrown through bedroom windows, death isn't something that is earned or deserved.  It just is.

As you may have noticed, I am on a bit of a Passenger kick these days and I thought today would be a good day to dedicate this song to Nick, a man who understood that life is for living.  I hope you will all take five minutes to listen to the lyrics of this song and let them sink in.  At the risk of sounding both morbid and cliché, we really don't know which day will be our last so make sure you're doing things right, saying what you need to say and living and loving with all you've got.  Do it for the ones that aren't here anymore to do it themselves.  

RIP Nicky boy, we love you man.  

 

"Well grey clouds wrapped round the town like elastic 

Cars stood like toys made of Taiwanese plastic 

The boy laughed and danced around in the rain 

While laundrettes cleaned clothes, high heals rub toes 

Puddles splashed huddles of bus stop crows 

Dressed in their suits and their boots, they all look the same 

I took myself down to the cafe to find all the boys lost in books and crackling vinyl 

And I carved out a poem above the urinal that read: 

Don’t you cry for the lost 

Smile for the living 

Get what you need and give what you’re given 

Life’s for the living so live it..."

Brujo

I didn´t believe in messages from the universe in the same gentle, curious way that she did.  Still, in that moment, I tried to listen for one.  My devout agnosticism allowed for neither belief nor disbelief in anything.  Sometimes I was smug about it; feeling exalted above the need for false security and “absolute truth”.  Sometimes, it was exhausting.

“El universo es sabio,” my expat girlfriends told me borrowing from a variety of different clichés and languages -- the universe is wise.  “Everything happens for a reason.”

Perhaps it was a chink in my armor that allowed me to entertain the idea.  I try not to linger too long near the doors of churches in moments like these.  There is something about the things you allow to touch you when your guard is down.

My incredulousness wasn´t reserved for conversations on religion.  It also extended to modern medicine as a whole and, with more tangible reason, to the medical system in the small Peruvian village where I´d chosen to carve out a home.  The pain was bad, but the nearest clinic was not only a hassle to get to, but offered little hope of resolution. I ruled it out almost immediately though I was vaguely enticed by the promise of strong, easily-accessible painkillers, illegal in the country I had left behind.

Later, a friend from Lima would laugh at me over cervezas and ceviche about the route that I had chosen to take.  “Fucking gringos,” he would say if though my decision was typical of my kind.  His reaction was fair enough, I suppose.  I couldn´t keep a straight face through the story myself and as soon as the word “brujo” (shaman or wizard) escaped my lips, the table erupted into laughter. 

As I walked home from dinner through the chilly desert night, I thought back to the so-called “brujo” who had pushed on the back of my head in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.  In my mind, I had neatly labeled him as a chiropractor.  Still, in his own, the work he did was irrevocably tied to God´s.   It made it hard to maintain the secular little bubble I so wished to confine him to. 

After a few minutes of pressing his fingers deep into my shoulder blade, he paused.   He left his hand cupped a few inches from my head, presumably to stop my soul from spilling over.  Moving his hands over a few inches, he went back to work.  Something cracked deep in my neck and a gaggle of goose bumps flew south down my spine.  He slipped softly from the room.  I could hear his kind voice from the other side of the door.  “Está durmiendo,” he said—she´s sleeping.  I wasn´t. 

Her voice softened to meet his and their conversation slid under the door into the tiny room which was barely wider than the cot that supported my wilted body. 

She had come to the brujo with burdens of her own and her hopes that he could help her seemed to be higher than my own faith that he would put an end to my two weeks of migraines.  Her man, she said, could not be brought to God.  I wondered if the problem was really his lack of faith or its perceived connection to his lack of faithfulness.

Familiar with the machismo reality in which we existed, the latter seemed, to me, the most probable.  I understood her desperation intimately.  I did know a few honest men who had seemingly been kept honest by religion here.  Far more common, however, were contradictions definitively not unique to this corner of the world.  Splattered across the windows of every motorcycle taxi and family restaurant in town, God was flaunted ostentatiously but seemingly absent from day-to-day dealings.   The incessant cycle of sin, repent, sin, repent was as deeply ingrained as the other rituals rarely questioned in Catholic country. It dribbled out of the churches and into the Peruvian men we were trying so hard to love, or not to.

Hold him, that was his answer for her; simple and precise.  Instead, she held me.  Tiptoeing into the room where I lay, she hovered over me and draped her arms across my bare back.   Hot tears trickled from my pounding head into my ears and I wanted nothing more than to run.  I wanted to run to the place that felt closest to home here, so far from my own.  I longed to sit in his earthen-floored living room.  I ached for the familiar smell of his mother´s cooking and the resolute way his father talked about God.  I cautiously toyed with the notion of prayer and how nice it must be to have a one-size-fits-all remedy for everything.  I knew that I was playing with fire, even just  thinking it.

The next day, the migraine intensified, just as the brujo said it would.  The world around me blurred and pulsed to the rhythm of my beating head.  I strained my eyes trying to find beauty in the reality I had chosen.  The distinct life I had carved out on this seemingly randomly selected speck on the map made increasingly less sense.  At the end of a long day, I collapsed into a puddle of pain, exhaustion and doubt.

In the morning, the clouds parted.  Once again, I had the necessary headspace to grapple with the uncertainty of the unknowable.  Once again, everything was equally as likely as it was unlikely.  God was everywhere, and nowhere.  The pain was gone.

I didn´t believe in messages from the universe in the same gentle, curious way that she did.  Still, in that moment, I tried to listen for one.

Here, Nostalgia is an Illusion

Photo by: Aino Huotari

Silhouetted by the skeletons of old fishing boats, now put out to pasture, gulls squawk and ferrell dogs scrounge for breakfast through the heaps of garbage that line the coast. The sun is  rising on Talara; a city of few charms.

Thirty minutes down a long dirt road from home in Lobitos, Talara houses the only large, "Western" (for lack of a better word) grocery store in the area as well as an expansive fruit/vegetable market, bus station and my preferred internet café. With time, I have come to view my frequent visits as a necessary annoyance.  The burden can usually be softened with some special treats from Plaza Vea, fun school supplies for my English classes and perhaps a tamale and beer from Cocoro's.  Today's trip affords no such luxuries.

Sandwiched between a sleepless night and a full day of teaching, a six am drop-off at Talara's EPPO Station was less than ideal. Regardless, when Moises brought the car around to pick him up, I couldn´t say goodbye. Instead, I threw myself in the back seat like an extra piece of luggage.  

"You've never seen this place without Jackson, have you?" Seth had asked me a few days before.  I hadn't.

"To be honest," he said, "it's exactly the same.  People come for a while and then they fuck off.  You'll get used to it."


I was only a third of the way through my one-year work contract then and Seth was just a few months shy of finishing his. Jackson had just completed the longest volunteer stay in the history of the development organization we worked for; six months in total. Over the last four, he had become one of my best friends and an integral part of my life in Lobitos.  It was the first, but not last, significant goodbye I would have to say in this town. 

Seth wasn't wrong.  Here, “despedidas” come in such abundance that they rarely mean much anymore.  At the time, I couldn´t imagine my Lobitos life without one of the people who had become so ingrained in it.  Now, the constant shuffle of employees and volunteers that have come in to and out of my life over the past year is a virtual blur.  I´ve seen four members of our tiny team arrive and four others leave, abruptly.  With less than one year in Peru, I am currently the longest-standing international staff member on site. 

I've seen well over a hundred volunteers pass through the organization.  I've lived with them, cooked with them, dined with them, worked with them, surfed with them and said goodbye to them.  Each time, the deck is shuffled again and a new hand of friends is dealt.  With it, comes a new soundtrack, a new routine, new recipes, new jokes and new values. 

The last few months have been sprinkled with a handful of goodbyes that were particularly hard to swallow. Tied to fond memories and paths that vow to cross again, they protrude from a bleak backdrop of a dozen meaningless ones.  A fresh batch under my belt, I am reminded of another conversation that I had with Seth, many months later.

“Here, nostalgia is an illusion,” he interrupted as I started to wax poetic about some false notion of the “good old days”.  We were sharing a few beers on the tree swing at La Casona and looking out over the ocean.  Life here, he reminded me, has always been a constant cycle of adjusting, recalculating and scrambling to pick up the pieces. 

In the span of six months, I watched every member of the staff that received me upon my arrival to Lobitos as they packed up and left town.  Between the four of them, they had taught me almost all of the simple, but important, things about daily life here.  They taught me when to take public transportation, how to pump water and where the vicious street dogs hang out.  They taught me how to avoid being eaten alive by mosquitos, how to light the oven and how to coax coffee out of a particularly fickle espresso machine.  They taught me a lot of the big things too.  It was largely through my conversations with them that I came to understand what we were moving towards, what we were fighting for. 

At times, I still find myself clinging to the memory, though perhaps partially flawed, of a team that marched together triumphantly towards a common set of goals.  I remember each individual blow as that train was repeatedly derailed by one unexpected despedida after another.   As the cliché goes, the only thing that has been constant is change.  Ironically, it can also be summarized succinctly with a classic Tali-ism: adapt or die.   There were times when the latter seemed all but inevitable.

Now I find that reminiscence comes in a variety of flavors.  Sometimes it curls up the hole left by a particular person´s departure.  It's the caffeine headache around noon because your standing coffee date is gone now.  It's the lazy feeling of rolling out of bed late now that your solid dawn patrol crew has been broken up.  It's the guitar collecting dust now that Tom isn't there to play Shins covers, Seth isn't singing Bob Dylan songs and Jackson isn't incessantly strumming the four chords that make up the chorus of “Fast Car”.

There are times when I miss the naivety that once allowed me to feel like I was part of something solid; secure, stable.  Luckily stability comes from other sources.  I find it in the tranquility of small-town life.  I find it in my relationships with the amazing people here and even long-distance from loved ones elsewhere.  I find beauty in a lifestyle that allows for days filled with surfing, ceviche, sunsets, good chats with Zoe and hugs from small children.  I find comfort in feeling one step closer to finally figuring out what I want to be when I grow up.  I find hope in the knowledge that dovetailing interests and paralleling good intentions will continue to spark group synergy.  Wonderful people will continue to find their way here and happy things will continue to happen.

Coming Home to Lobitos

“Are we there yet?” I said to no one. 

No, we weren´t.  In fact, only two hours had passed since I had silently asked my imaginary travel companion the same question. I was anxious; squirming in my luxurious 160º reclining Exclusiva bus seat. I wanted to be home.  Fourteen hours and seven “are we there yet?”s later, I finally was.   My twenty-hour bus ride from Lima was followed by a quick moto-taxi transfer and thirty minute combi which finally dropped me at my door.

The house was in virtual shambles. The long, white tiled hallway was caked with mud and every dish in the entire kitchen appeared to be dirty and piled by the sink. “You must be Alicia,” said the unfamiliar face at the table. She was Michelle; one of the new staff that started during my three-week vacation to the states.

“We´re out of water,” she informed me. I smiled, settling back into the realities of life in Lobitos. She also told me that all of the other volunteers and staff were down at the point, doing the last of the winter vacation kids‘ surf classes.  I was off.   I kicked my shoes into my room which was exactly how I´d left it, only covered with a thick layer of fresh dirt.  I dashed down to the beach, taking full advantage of the carefully cultivated callouses that now cover and protect my feet after four mostly-barefoot months in this town.

“Miss Aliiiiiiiiiiiiicccccccccccciiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!” Half a dozen wetsuited children swarmed me the instant my toes hit the sand.  Their tiny arms latched onto my legs and soon I was enveloped in a big, wet group hug.  The water was filled with familiar faces; coworkers, long-term volunteers, Lobiteño friends and all of the usual surf class kiddos. 

The little ones were taking off on considerably bigger waves then I´d ever seen them catch before. A stupid grin plastered to my face, I even let the kids talk me into jumping in for a (fully dressed) swim.  I figured it was the closest I was going to get to a shower after a long day of travel, considering our current water situation back at the house.   

Before I knew it, I had been roped into playing personal assistant to Adriana; a sassy seven year-old with a healthy fear of the ocean.  It was her first surf class and she was clinging on to my neck for dear life.  We soon had our routine worked out. I would crouch down in the water so that we were both up to our chins then spring to my feet each time a small wave rolled in towards us. She would shriek, presumably in some combination of delight and terror.  Then, after the wave had safely passed by, we would burst into laughter and nestle down into the calm waters again.

I had allotted myself a few days in Lima prior to my arrival in Lobitos.  My hope was that this pitstop would lighten the load of the fourty-three hours of travel from Los Angeles to Lobitos and provide for a bit of time and space to process a heavy trip home. It didn´t.  The first twenty-three-hour leg of the journey had wiped me out pretty bad and melancholy backdrop of a Limanean winter didn´t do much for lifting my spirits. That isn´t to say that it was all bad. I had a chance to meet up with a few different friends during my short stay and chat to some interesting people in the hostel. I wandered through city streets, spent lots of time snuggled up in the kid´s section of bookstores (for research purposes) and met up with an old co-worker for the first night of his Peruvian despedida. 

“VAMOS NIÑOS!” Surf class was over. Seth´s voice barreled down the beach, “A LA CASA!” Heeding the words of their beloved surf instructor, the “niños” ran to shore and climbed in the back of the trusty burro (the trailer towed by the WAVES´ motorcycle). I stayed back for a moment, watching the chaos from afar. The warm Lobitos sun on my face, I lowered my head back into the cool water and smiled, looking up at the perfect, cloudless sky.  It´s good to be home.

My Little Mocos

“Red, Rojo

Red, Rojo

Verde, Green

Verde, Green

Amarillo, Yellow

Amarillo, Yellow

Azul, Blue

Azul, Blue”

The singing voices of twenty-five small children fill the dimly lit classroom.  Most of the kids are holding hands in a large circle.  They are jumping up and down wildly and chanting the new rhyme that they have learned in today’s English class.

“Reeeed, Rojo

Reeeeeeeed, Rojo

Verde, Greeeeeeen

Verde, Greeeeeeeeeeen

Amarillo, YEH-LOW

Amarillo, YEH-LOW

Azul, Bluuuuuuuue

Azul, Bluuuuuuuuuuue”

With each repetition of the song, I change things up and try to make it even more fun and ridiculous than the last version.  The students started the class sitting at their tables (which are conveniently painted to match the four colors mentioned in the song) and touching each color as we sang about it.  Then, we got to our feet and sang along to a little dance that involves lots of clapping, drumming on our legs and shaking our heads around like lunatics (the latter is obviously their favorite).  Now we’ve moved up to the front of the class to form our big group circle.  Holding hands seems to be helping keep the kids together and minimizing the chaos.

In the three-year-old room, keeping everyone engaged and on task is no easy feat.  Not only is this only our third English class of the year, but they also lack general experience in the classroom since it is just their second month of school.  Despite my best efforts to round everyone up, there are still a few kids who haven’t quite made it yet.

Luckily, I have the help of a WAVES volunteer, as well as the students’ regular teacher during my two weekly classes.  This gives me the freedom to concentrate on the students who are on task while my helpers work on integrating the stragglers into the larger group or working with them individually, if needed.

Kristin, my volunteer for the day, also helps me later in the class when we go around the room and evaluate the students individually.  They are very excited because, after correctly identifying the color of each item, each child is given a paper bracelet, some stickers and a small piece of candy.

Sometimes, the rewards for repeating a word or arriving at a correct answer are even more simple.  Although, like any group of three year olds, they spend a good part of their day playing in the dirt and picking their noses, handshakes have become a staple in the classroom.  When I saw how much excitement this simple gesture evoked during our first few class, I put aside my urges to dip the kids in a large vat of Lysol and started using handshakes as one of our primary sources of positive reinforcement.  Pair that with a few simple words of affirmation (in English) and you're golden...germs be damned! 

Although I have quite a bit of experience with kids, this is the youngest group I've ever worked with and it continues to present new challenges and personal learning opportunities.  Their unbridled enthusiasm and endless energy make them a pleasure to work with and the fact that they're just stinking adorable doesn't hurt either.

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.

¡Qué sorpresa!

Lobitos, Peru

A few of you may have caught my last post (please excuse my weak attempt at being enigmatic there).  “Some airport somewhere” (if you even care at this point), happened to be LAS; Mccarran International Airport in Las Vegas.  About a dozen hours deep into almost exactly three solid days of traveling back down south, the photo resembles something between a mug shot and a PSA for sleep deprivation. 

My master plan was to maintain a little ambiguity about my current whereabouts until I finished off the pile of half-finished posts about Chile that have been collecting dust in my drafts folder.  After that, I would release the news that SURPRISE, I live in Peru now.  Unfortunately, I frankly just don’t have the patience for that and I’m terrible at keeping secrets.

In fact, I’m amazed that I was actually able to keep my last minute trip to the states a surprise from my family for as long as I did.  I freaked the ba’jesus out of my sister and dad during two separate but equally wonderful surprise attacks and made a few, less successful, attempts to surprise my friends, who already had their suspicions about me coming up.

The ten days at home were (at the risk of sounding cliché) just what the doctor ordered.  Though chaotic and exhausting, I can’t even articulate how wonderful it was to have the time with Jeff and to see so many fabulous people that I have been missing so much.  

My journey started with a 5.5-hour bus from Iquique to Arica, followed by a quick 45-minute taxi across the border at Tacna and a (not-so-quick) twenty-hour bus to Lima (23 hours).  At the Cruz del Sur station, I touched base with a couch surfer friend in Mira Flores and caught a taxi straight to his house for a (much needed) shower and some lunch.  He showed me around the neighborhood a bit (beautiful by the way) and I set off for an unnecessarily long triple-layover flight through Huston, Vegas and, finally, LA. 

After my awesome little ten-day vay-cay, I retraced my steps back through LA, Vegas and Huston.  However, instead of busing back down south to Chile upon my arrival to Lima, I spent one night there before embarking on a different twenty-hour busing adventure (note the sarcasm in my voice).  Hopefully my last all-day bus ride for a while, this trip brought me to Talara.  Once there, a “moto” (motercycle with a little car for passengers built around it) carried me to a “combi” (a van used for transfers between Talara and Lobitos) where my luggage was tied to the roof while I crammed myself inside with fifteen Peruvians.  Twenty minutes down a dusty desert road and I was finally home.

Now I’ve been in Lobitos for about two weeks.  Things have been a bit rocky here and there but overall, I am having a wonderful time.  I feel like there are a million and one things I want to update you on  but, frankly, my blogging stamana is down after a few weeks of not writing and I feel a little overwhelmed.  Instead, I will just try to capture the highlights with this thirty word summary and elaborate later....

Waves. 
Water.

Thorns. 

Girls. 
Calluses.

Mosquitos. 

Ceviche. 

Cera. 

Rum. 

Coke. 

Shortcut. 

Vomit. 

ER. 

Mermaid Cast.   

Sunsets. 

Chifles. 

Mocos. 

Miss Alicia. 

Una Blusa Lila. 

Hello, Hello, Hello. 

¿Puedo Salir A Toser? 

Cumple doble en Peru

Oh heyyyy there, guess who just back from 2 weeks in Peru and is ready to tell you alllll about it?  Sit tight, this could be a long one.  Let´s just say our "cumpleaños doble" in Peru was a huge success (with a few minor hiccups along the way).  What hiccups?  Well, for starters my camera got stolen...at Machu Picchu...on the LAST day of our trek...before I uploaded a single pic on my camera.  Boo.  Luckily, I´ve scrapped together a few pictures and we didn´t let that ruin our experience in Peru.  

Ok, now let´s rewind back to the beginning of the trip.  We set sail (so to speak) on Saturday, October 13th in the wee hours of the morning.  We took a bus from Iquique to Arica, a taxi from Arica to Tacna and another bus from Tacna to Arequipa.  Simple, right?  Should have been but sadly, it was not.  When we got to Arica, a man working at a (reputable) bus company offered us a ticket to Arequipa for 18,000 pesos (about 40 bucks give or take) which seemed pretty legit considering we´d done no research into the prices.  We figured we skip the step of going to Tacna, finding a bus etc etc.  Turns out, the guy just taxied us over the border, walked to the ticket booth with us and bought us a 5,000-peso ticket to Arequipa.  Since the taxi ride across the bored is usually about 3-4,000 pesos, we basically paid $20 each to get our hand held to the ticket counter of a crappy bus company.  We ended up not even using the tickets because we weren´t familiar with the brand and really wanted something we knew was reliable/safe.  Ooops, rookie mistakes that someone who has been in South America for NINE months really shouldn´t be making...but C'est la vie.  

Finally, 6ish hours after we boarded a nice, SAFE (you're welcome mom and dad) bus, we arrived in Arequipa.  We were given a hostel recommendation from a friend and we really loved where we stayed.  We spent Jeff´s birthday doing a mountain biking tour of the Arequipeañan countryside (of which, no photos remain), exploring downtown and noming on all kinds of good (and super cheap) food.  For dinner we had some Peruvian delicacies.  Jeff tried llama (I, of course, refrained) and I had some delicious ceviche.  That night we had a few beers with some new friends at the hostel and the next morning we checked out of our hostel and did some river rafting.  

Later that night, we set off  to Cusco which was about nine hours by bus.  We arrived at 6:30 am which wasn't exactly ideal since we couldn't check into our hostel until 1:00 pm...but we made the best of it.  We wandered around the Plaza de Armas and the local market, ate a delicious breakfast and drank some coca tea while we waited to take a hot shower and a quick power nap and head out again.  Our few days in Cusco were great, complete with horse-back riding, rock-climbing and some lovely little strolls around the city.  After four days, we set off on our trek to Machu Picchu, the best part of our trip.

 

Day one of the trip, included a fairly-long ride in a van after meeting up with the rest of our group (13 in total).  I got pretty car sick while we were heading up a long and windy road into the mountains but was fine as soon as we got out and got some fresh air.  We did a four-hour bike ride (all downhill) through some gorgeous landscapes and then grabbed some lunch at a local restaurant.  Some of the group went to go river rafting but we sat it out since we had already gone once on the trip and wanted to save a little bit of cash.  As a group, we decided to mix up the regular plan of the trip and stay at a residencial family house in the mountains instead of the hostel in Santa Maria. Those of us who opted to the skip the rafting, hiked up to the house after lunch and the others came after their rafting trip.  The house was called La Casa del Mono (and yes, they had a pet monkey) and it was kind of a make-shift hostel/organic farm/educational station where they show the process of making chocolate and coffee.  There was an AMAZING view and it cut a few hours off our hiking for the next day.  

Day two was still a hike-all-day kinda day.  We had a few little stops along the way, including a dip in a river and crossing the rapids in a "cable car" (aka a 2x4' scrap of metal attached to a cable that goes over a river...eeek).  Our day ended in a trip to the hot springs in Santa Teresa (fabulous), dinner in the town afterwards and crashing out in our hostel to get up bring and early the next morning for zip-lining!  

Zip-lining was great and our hike (walk really) on day three was absolutely beautiful.  We walked about three hours to Aguas Callientes where we had our own room in the hostel and a hot shower for the first time in three days (yesss!)  

Day four was (of course) the most amazing view of all, Machu Picchu!  We got up at 4 am, hiked up (and I mean straight up) for a little less than an hour over about 2,000 stairs (not exaggerating) and finally we were there.  The ruins were covered with fog and it was an awesome (although partially obscured) view.  Eventually the fog burned off and we were able to explore MP with our trusty guide, Yawer who was really great the whole trip.  Unfortunately that is where my camera got snagged but we tried to make the best of things and thoroughly enjoy one of the Seven Wonders of The Modern World.  After we returned to Aguas Callientes, we grabbed some pizza and beers with a few friends and hopped on a train back to Cusco.

Day One

 

Day Two

 

 Day Three

Day Four!

Back in Cusco, we wrapped up the trip by buying a few souvenirs and grabbing some drinks with the friends from our trek before starting our long series of bus rides back to Iquique.  Thanks for such a great time Peru, it won't soon be forgotten. 

Feliz Cumpleaños a Mi Querido Chile

Cumpleaños feliz
Te deseamos a ti
Feliz cumpleaños Chile
Que los cumplas feliz

 Just ten days after Chile's celebration of 202 years of independence, I celebrated my monthaversary with Chile once again.  I'm up to eight now and my passport now has six Chile stamps for the cops at the border-crossing in Peru to eyeball suspiciously (much like they did last night).  I'm just a tourist, I swear!  

For el dieciocho (Independence day), Jeff and I had three days of vacation from work so we decided to chill in Iquique for the weekend and hit up a few asados with friends.  Then on Monday, we headed up north to Arica in hopes of visiting Lauca National Park  and popping into Bolivia to do a little visa renewing.  Unfortunately the tours were closed for the holiday.  I couldn't bring myself to go to Tacna yet again so we stayed in Arica and tried to make the best of it by exploring some different areas, vising the Fondas and day drinking on the beach (pictured below).

This weekend we returned to Arica with the same intentions but once again plans fell through.  We ended up crossing back into Tacna, Peru for a few hours and then going to Arica for the night.  We decided to forfeit the other half of our flight and took a bus down this morning.  Overall it was pretty disappointing considering the money we spent on the both trips and the fact that we still haven't seen Lake Chungara or anything else in Lauca.  We're thinking about hitting it on our way down from Machu Picchu at the end of October (which by the way is this month...can you believe it?!) if we can swing it.  

On the home-front not much has changed.  I'm still really liking my job although I'm getting considerably fewer hours which is a little worrisome financially.  Our lease is up on the 13th of this month and after that our living plans are still a little up in the air.  We're planning to store our luggage at a friend's house while we're on our trip and move into a new apartment on November 1st.  We have a place in mind but we still have to check it out and figure out the details with our friend who is the owner.  Meanwhile, I'm going a little stir-crazy in Iquique and have recently been thinking about moving back to Santiago.  As I've mentioned before though (and as Jeff loves to remind me) I change my mind and thus my plans a lot so don't hold me two it.  For now, I'm here in Iquique and trying to focus on the short-term plans: get the apartment cleaned up and moved out, find a new place to live and have the most amazing trip/birthday ever. Beyond that, vamos a ver.  Happy October everybody!     

Diga Ahhhhh

After 5 months of (almost) perfect health in Chile, I can now officially say that I have been sick in a foreign country; navigated my way through Chilean laboratories, a lime-green doctor's office and a crappy 24-hour clinic;  been pricked by Chilean needles and peed in Chilean cups (well ok, just one of those).  Although none of these things were necessarily on my South America bucket list, I have crossed them all off nonetheless and come out on the other side, relatively  unscathed.

It all started about three weeks ago when I suddenly felt nauseous and lightheaded in the middle of one of my classes and had to leave work early.  When I got home, I promptly went to bed and knocked out for 16 hours.  In the morning I felt a little out of it, but overall okay.  For the most part I was functioning alright at that point although I had a few more weird dizzy spells over the next few days. Then on Saturday, when I was walking home from work, I started to get a pain in my right side that felt like a cramp from running.  After a few hours, it went away and I forgot about it until it came back with a vengeance Tuesday morning at 4 am.  I woke up freezing with an extremely intense pain on my right side.  I spent almost the whole next day in bed and finally caved and went to urgent care the day after that.  A few hours and 20 thousand pesos later, I had a prescription for pain medication and an appointment for an echogram a week later.

Luckily my boss was not too stoked about the idea of me waiting a week to know what was going on and immediately made me an appointment with his doctor.  I went the next day and was recommended for 8 diagnostic tests.  48 hours later I had the results to all of them (drum roll please).  Turns out it was salmonella, e. coli AND a kidney infection.  The dynamic trio had me completely out of commission for about a week total but now I'm pretty much back in action.  I finished up with my cocktail of antibiotics and alphabet soup (pictured above) on Monday and tomorrow I'll retake the e. coli test.  Once I'm sure all of the bacteria is gone, I can finally get back in the water after 3 weeks of not surfing. 

The recovery process has been kind of lengthy but after a few days of antibiotics, pain killers and fever reducers, I started to feel much better and went back to work.  In the midst of my recovery, Jeff and I made a quick trip up to Arica/Tacna to renew our tourist visas last weekend.  Like I've said before, Tacna is nothing to write home about but Jeff was excited to get his first taste of Peru (in the form of fast food pizza and tocino del cielo no less) and spend some more time in Arica.  We had a nice time but I'm hoping my next border hopping mission will be something new and a little more exciting.