Thursday, July 29, 2010

Update on Huacarpay

It seems that God is answering prayers as far as Huacarpay is concerned.
After the flooding in Huacarpay in January, the government had promised land and houses to the residents of Huacarpay. They were very happy, until they learned that the government planned on taking away the land that they did have already. Huacarpay is a good location for the plaster business in which much of the town is employed. Plus, many of the people have significant plots of land in the town and that would be a major loss for them economically.
However, just in the past few days, I learned from my friend Juana, whose family lost their house in the flood, that the government has now retracted that statement and are planning on allowing those of the townspeople who would like to stay in their houses, to do so. This is a big answer to prayer. I am just continuing to hope and pray that the government doesn't go back on their promise and their word again. Praise God for this development!
A continued prayer request would be people's economy, which has been seriously affected by this flood and the aftermath. Families have lost crops and possessions and now are just beginning to work on rebuilding their houses with better materials which cost money. Others have lost businesses and sources of income. It is a difficult time for many families. Please continue to pray for God's provision for them during this time.
Thank you for your prayers!

Sunday, July 18, 2010

The adventures of getting to church

Getting to church in the States is not a big deal. You leave your house, hop in your car, and appear minutes later at the door of your church, ready to walk in and worship. It's not quite the same for me here in Peru...Maybe you should just come along with me and you'll see what I mean. Ready? Let's go!
It's a beautiful Saturday afternoon and I'm standing outside my front door. One hand grabs my violin and over the opposite shoulder, I carry a small tote bag containing all the stuff I'll need to stay overnight and go to church the next day. I usually stay overnight in Huacarpay because often there's something going on on Saturday night and it's just easier (and more practical) for me to stay overnight with my pastor's family than go out, come home and go out again. So here we are outside my house on a Saturday afternoon, waiting for the bus that will take us to Huacarpay. This bus goes on an approximately hour-and-a-half long route between Cusco and Urcos, another city located about half an hour past Huacarpay. Thankfully, because of where I live now, the bus is usually about as full as it's going to get when I get on, so I can stand pretty close to the door. So we stand outside and wait for about 10 minutes till the bus comes. Oh wait, there it is! We stick our hands out and wave them determinedly to let them know we seriously want them to stop. They saw us and they're stopping. It's always easier to get them to stop when, like today, they're not coming behind a line of combis and taxis and they know it's them we're signaling to.
We get on and, as usual, there are no seats. The bus is made to hold about 35 people, but it's holding approximately 45 now. We're not shoved smack up against anyone else, but it's a little full. Are you still okay? The upside to the full bus is that you won't get cold! We climb up the stairs and find a space to grab hold of the handrail attached to the bus roof. The bus is already going again and if we don't hold on, we'll probably lose our balance. Once we get out of the city on to the long, straight road, the bus likes to pass any other vehicles it can. Many times, the driver will start passing someone and then see another car coming toward him so he brakes to get back in his place. Or he passes one car but doesn't have time to pass two, so he brakes to slip into the space in front of the car he just passed. If he brakes hard, we really have to grab on tight to keep from falling as the person behind us tries to keep falling on us. It becomes a giant domino effect pretty quickly. My violin is on the floor in front of me, standing up. It is at these moments when I am glad for two things. First of all, my violin case is HARD. So I don't have to worry about it getting squished. Second of all, I can't smell. I can't imagine that these buses smell very appealing, but, since I can't smell, it doesn't bother me! There are some advantages to this defect. :)
So now we're in for about a 20-minute ride. If your arm gets tired from holding on to the handrail, switch hands. There's not much to do. Just look out the window at the beautiful mountain scenery or try to make some random baby in front of you smile (that's fun!). On the other hand, if there is a spoiled rotten kid in front of you, that makes the trip not so fun. It's also fun to watch people sleeping on the bus. Lots of people take advantage of the long trip to catch a little shut-eye. We pass Peaje, where several of my friends live, the old abandoned hacienda, and, at long last, bump over the railroad tracks into Saylla. Saylla is known for its chicharrones. Chicharrones are pork that is first boiled, then fried to a slight crisp. Not exactly the healthiest food known to man, but yummy nonetheless. Chicharron restaurants line the road on both sides. Sometimes, you can see big swaths of pig fat hanging up to dry on clotheslines, in order to be turned into tocto, fried pork rinds. We pass Saylla and head on toward Tipon. In between, however, the bus turns into the gas station along the side of the road. The driver and the fare collector jump out and, leaving the engine RUNNING with 45 people inside, fill up the tank (this doesn't always happen, but it is always a bit disconcerting for me when it does and I'm always glad when it's done and we're safely on our way again). Tipon is known for its guinea pig (cuy) and, lining both sides of the road are restaurants with big round adobe ovens in which the cuy is baked. Here, more people want to get on the bus, so the door is opened and we all shove a little farther back so they can get on. We're now about a third of the way back the bus and I begin to wonder what it's going to be like to get off. 7 more passengers were added in Tipon and we're on our way again. The fare collector begins his collecting, squeezing his way past women in big skirts and hats, people's bundles, men with backpacks, kids, and me with my violin. The fare for this trip for us is 1 sol, approximately $.28. For those going the entire route it's 2 soles. He somehow makes his way back to the back of the bus by the time we get to Oropesa. And then someone else wants to get on. And someone else wants to buy the chuta bread that Oropesa is famous for. So they lean out the window and one of the vendors lined up along the street by the bus stop hurries to hand them a bag. Since the fare collector is at the back of the bus now and his route to the door is blocked by 15 people standing in the aisle, he asks the person nearest the door to open the door so the new passenger can get on. This completed, we all shove a little farther back in the bus. The next town is Huacarpay, coming up in about 3 minutes. The fare collector comes back through and then we begin our journey to the front of the bus. It involves a lot of "Excuse mes" and "I'm sorrys", squeezing between people and trying not to step on anyone's toes with either our feet or my violin. In the meantime, the fare collector calls out "Huacarpay!", to which we respond "Baja" (getting off). At last, the mountains level off to a small plain and the brown adobe village of Huacarpay gets closer and closer. We're behind someone else now who also is planning on getting off in Huacarpay. The bus stops, the door opens, two people get off the bus so those getting off in Huacarpay can get off, we squeeze past more people and then we're free! We've made it!
Thanks for coming along with me as I headed out to Huacarpay. I hope you enjoyed the trip. I do (about 90% of the time). Now it's time for youth group or kids club in Huayllar, another nearby town, or worship team practice. Ready?

Sunday, July 4, 2010

My Blanky and Me

In Peru, one very common way to carry things is in a blanket on one's back. This can include anything from children to food to....well, pretty much, you name it and it's carried this way. The Quechua word for this blanket is q'eperina, which literally means "a thing for carrying stuff on your back". (I can't take credit for this picture, unfortunately. I found it on the Internet.) You must keep in mind that this is a very traditional Andean way of doing things. It is not generally used by anyone except traditional Andean people. So when I asked for a q'eperina for Christmas the other year, I knew I'd get some strange looks when I used it. And I have. I've gotten the whole gamut of reactions, from people laughing outright to others saying that I look beautiful to people remarking to other people on the bus about the gringa with her q'eperina to the beginning of conversations to people just looking at me funny. It can be rather uncomfortable, so I don't make a daily habit out of making a spectacle of myself in this manner. I have, however, done it a number of times now. I've also realized that there are some distinct advantages to carrying things in this manner. The most exciting one is that it keeps your upper arms warm. Since this is the first part of my body that usually gets cold, it's perfect for me. :) It's also easier to carry things on your back than in your arms and you can carry a whole lot (like an entire wheelbarrow full of grass....yup, been there done that) or carry stuff that melts (like ice) without it melting all over the place (been there done that too). Furthermore, it's safer. I've never heard of q'eperina slashing or of q'eperina pickpocketing, but purses are another story. Yeah, it's a handy thing. So here are some funny stories from some of my q'eperina adventures, just to lighten your day a bit.

Bolivia, January 2009
Okay, so I'm in the middle of nowhere between Cochabamba and Santa Cruz, Bolivia with my friend Mari, going to visit her brother. And there's this big landslide and the road is blocked. So we have to walk for about two hours with all our stuff to get to the other side of the landslide and continue our journey in bus. She's got wheels on her suitcase, but I am not that technologically advanced. I have a full backpack and a duffel bag. So she suggests that we wrap everything up in my fleece blanket and put it on my back. This sounds like an excellent idea to me (keeping in mind that it's easier to carry things on one's back than in one's arms). So we stop right in front of a group of people from the country who were laughing at us throughout this entire process because neither of us know what we're doing. We arrange things about 3 times in the blanket till we finally get it right. So finally we get it and between the two of us, we heave the bundle onto my back. I'm really excited about it at this point. I tie it around my shoulders and we begin to walk. I quickly realize that fleece is stretchier than I ever realized. The blanket starts stretching and streeeeetching and streeeeeeeeeeeeeetching and soon I am doubled over walking and the bundle is wanting to shift down to about my knees (this is no longer the genius idea it once seemed). After about 50 feet of this, I turn to my friend and we mutually decide to go back to square one and keep walking like we were before. It gave us a good laugh though.

Joint worship service, November 2009
A little-known advantage of a q'eperina is that if you have food in it, it's like a ready-made picnic. Open the blanket and spread it on the ground, put the food on top of it, and voila! So for the joint worship service with all the Mennonite churches, I brought lunch in my q'eperina. (It also is handy for keeping things warm). I had my backpack with some things in it, as well. After the service, as I was getting ready to go, it began to rain. Juggling an umbrella, a backpack, a q'eperina and someone's left-behind big blanket was not working and the idea of a 20-minute trek like this was not so promising. So I put my backpack on, put the q'eperina around my shoulders on top of the backpack, put up my umbrella, and lugged the blanket in my arms. It looked rather ridiculous and made my roommate and I laugh, but it worked!

Huancaro Fair, June 2010
Every year in Cusco, there is a big fair called the Huancaro Fair. It's a lot like the small-town ag fairs in PA, just bigger and with different kinds of food and animals (you never saw a guinea pig farm with a stand at the Lampeter Fair, did you?) Becca (one of the other English teachers) and I went with our friend Pilar, one of the teachers at school on Cusco Day, June 24, since we had off school. (The picture is of Pilar and I). I took my q'eperina folded up in my purse, mainly for sitting purposes. Then Pilar decided she wanted to buy oranges and a papaya. We were lugging them around in plastic grocery bags for a while before it occurred to me that I was in possession of an easier way to carry these things. So we found a space, spread the q'eperina out and put everything in it. I then put it on my back and we continued enjoying the fair. I was nice and toasty and carrying the fruit and all our stuff was easier, so, aside from some funny looks, it was great! Then Pilar and Becca needed to go to the bathroom. I had soap with me, but of course it was in the q'eperina. So I took it off, gave them the soap and then had to re-form the bundle and put it back on my back. I put everything in the middle, wrapped the q'eperina around it, grabbed the two free corners and swung it onto my back, just like I've seen Andean ladies do hundreds of times. Unfortunately, I am not an Andean lady and I don't have the skill that they do. For whatever unknown reason, the papaya, the bag of oranges, my purse and the water bottle from my q'eperina all fell out in quick succession on the ground. Several women walking by saw and started laughing as I assessed the situation with "Well, that didn't work!" They kept going, then came back and said, "No, señorita, that's not how you do it. Here, let me help you." So one of them put all the stuff in a pile in the middle of the blanket, knotted two of the corners, then said, "Now you can put it on". So I did and it worked. I was laughing to myself at the ridiculousness of the situation and shared the laughter with Becca and Pilar when I told them what had happened. We then left the fair to go home and, waiting to cross the street, stood right beside a police officer. He looked over at me, grinned and said "How's your baby?" (since a lot of times people carry babies in this fashion. Playing right along, I grinned back and said "Fine". We all had a good laugh; then we crossed the street and got on a bus that would take us home. There was no room on the bus so we had to stand and we were standing for about 45 minutes during the drive home. I couldn't sit down to open the bundle and give Pilar her fruit when she had to get off, so I pulled it around my body so it was in front and she pulled her stuff out. Then I put it under my arm so it was crossing my body and stayed with it like that till I got home. At one point, nearing home, someone vacated a seat and a man standing near me said "Señorita, sit down". I don't mind standing on buses, but I didn't argue. As I sat down, he looked over at me shoving my water bottle farther into my bundle and said, "Oh, I thought that was a baby!" I laughed at that one. (Nursing babies here is not a private ordeal. You're on a bus and your baby's screaming because it's hungry. So you turn your q'eperina around and start nursing your baby, no covering required. My q'eperina was in perfect nursing position and, looking at it later, it really did look like a baby.)

So those are my most memorable q'eperina stories. It's always an adventure trying to mix cultures and never more than when I'm carrying stuff on my back. They laugh at me, but I think they like it. So I'll keep having adventures with my q'eperina and let them laugh.