And that's the way life goes...

Think fall into winter, think spicy gingerbread in the oven, filling the whole house with its delicious aroma and hot apple cider in warm mugs clutched by cold hands...
Yeah, my mouth is watering too. So when my support team (MST) decided to have a skype virtual meeting tonight and mentioned bringing those snacks on their end, I thought it would be fun and delicious to have them on my end also! So why am I still sitting here with a watering mouth and not rolling and cutting out stacks of gingerbread cookies or nursing my second mug of hot apple cider? Glad you asked! Let me explain what it takes to make these two simple treats in Peru.
Gingerbread is not that complicated. There's only one problem, technically. The molasses. Molasses, as far as I know experientially, does not exist in Cusco. So getting molasses for cookies means going to the Wanchaq market (a 45-minute ride one way in public transportation) and paying about $4.00 for a 1/2 liter bottle of algarrobina syrup from one of the women who sells juice in the market. This syrup comes from a tree and has a taste that approximates molasses. Days slip by in a blur of school, schoolwork, church, school trip, emailing, creating dramas for school, etc. And before I know it, I no longer have time to take said 45-minute trip downtown to purchase my bottle of algarrobina syrup. Save the gingerbread for another day. It would have taken forever to cool the dough in my fridge anyway. My fridge is, I'm suspecting, on its last of over 20 years of legs and is not refrigerating the way it should be. And then, as I'm looking for a substitute recipe for chocolate chip cookies, I find it! The answer to my sticky molasses dilemma! Chancaca syrup! Cha-what?! Chancaca syrup. Chancaca is a sugar cane product. The best way I can describe it is to call it burnt sugar made into balls and sold in the market. According to my favorite Andean, high-altitude cookbook, a molasses-like product can be made with chancaca balls boiled and dissolved in water. Make a mental note: I have to try that! And as I begin to measure out flour and soften butter to make my chocolate chip substitutes for spicy gingerbread goodness, the guy comes with the gas can that will make my oven work. Great! Except not. Apparently, the valve that connects the hose to the gas can has somehow broken. The gas delivery guy doesn't have another one. Making my oven work again will require a trip downtown to a hardware store to buy another hose and valve combination, apparently. And who knows how to put one of those on a stove? Not me!
Mission postponed. The great chancaca syrup and gingerbread experiment will have to wait for another day. :( My mouth is still watering...
The other part of my idea was hot apple cider. Sounds WONDERFUL! I think it's been about 3 years since I've had any of that warm, sticky goodness. My stomach is happy with just the thought of it. But...there is no apple cider in Peru. I look online. The Wiki community, that source of free information on just about anything, comes to the rescue. WikiHow contains easy instructions to make apple cider with apples, a blender and cheesecloth (I think I can substitute a strainer). Then just boil it with the spices and voila! If I can't have my gingerbread, at least maybe the apple cider will come through for me.
Oh right. Except I have no gas. I can't boil the apple cider. That would be a problem.
I am not a missionary for nothing, however. It is not that easy to make me give up. I've got the idea. My mouth is watering. Now it's just a question of a new gas valve, chancaca, and time. One of these days, hopefully, I'll be able to write part 2 of this story, while savoring my tasty fall goodness.
I love Peru, but, yes, that IS the way life goes...