(The title has nothing to do with the content of this entry, it's just the theme song of Decisiones Extremas, a TV show I like to watch on Saturdays.)
13-11-12
Today was one of the roughest days ever. I started out getting ready on time for once,
but then my water bucket’s spigot broke and made me late trying to fill my
water bottle by pouring water out of a 16L bucket. Then my bike seat broke for the umpteenth
time on the way to Oxahuay and, having not slept well last night because we had
coffee and crackers for dinner, broke down a bit on the side of the road. I saw someone coming so I pulled myself back
together and this someone turned out to be a dirty old (like senior citizen
old) man who proposed that since I don’t have a boyfriend I should go to the
woods with him and he would give me money for implied sexual acts. Ew.
Then he followed me all the way back to Sicchez where I had to go buy a
wrench at my least favorite store, which is my least favorite because every
time I go there I either get a remark about how fat I am (surprisingly not
today) or a smirk and an air of superiority because I’m a woman buying tools. Then as I was fixing the bike outside the
store, some drunk man insisted on helping me but he couldn’t even understand
how the parts fit together and him and the store owner kept taking over even
though I knew perfectly well how to fix the seat – the parts were just so
crappy that I ended up buying new ones from the bike mechanic in Oxahuay after
the seat broke again when I got there.
So anyway I missed teaching computers in Oxahuay although no
one seems to have remembered it was computers day. While I was in Sicchez and not going to
teach, I went to talk to the mayor to see if I could get another project
coordinator since the other one got married and left. Turns out he actually had no idea she left and her husband also left without
telling anyone, leaving the municipality without a treasurer or a procurement
person or an office of disabilities person and leaving me f’ed, as they
say. Whatever, at least I’m supposed to
get another project coordinator.
After that the bike seat fell off again, I arrived at the
Health Post and couldn’t print anything because the electricity went out as
soon as I opened my documents. Then I
was late to the secondary school because I was contemplating how in the world
almost none of the kids in my nutrition project grew last month. The last meeting with my peer educators
turned out to be a complete disaster since my focus group idea crashed and
burned because they were all so concerned about going home that no one wanted
to talk about any of my questions, and the schedule for doing replicas has completely
not been discussed among the professors even though I’ve requested it 3 times
in the past week. At least we came up
with some topics and have a plan to practice on Friday.
After that I was in a rush to get lunch since the lunch people
were leaving for Sicchez on the first combi so I had to walk all the way back
down to the bike mechanic after lunch and then missed the second combi and had
to bike home with a ton more weight than I came with. I was supposed to go to Guir Guir, but it
wasn’t critical and my knees hurt from the previous day’s hike and I had all
that weight and a headache and a short temper so I decided it would be better
not to go. Instead I stopped at a
friend’s to chat a minute and then made my way home.
Home at least was good. We had a delicious soup with celery and
carrots and ginger (I think), with plenty of potatoes and noodles of course,
served with bread and my favorite tea – hierba luisa. I also had put the 4th Harry
Potter movie on the TV while I was making flip chart notes before dinner and my
abuela was absolutely fascinated by it.
I’m pretty sure she did not understand a bit of what was happening but
she kept asking a bunch of questions and saying to my abuelo, asleep in his
chair, “Miguel! Miguel! Look!” Totally made up for the rest of my crappy
day.
16-11-12
Today I made baby food out of blood. And lentils, tomato, and onion. Yum!
Actually I made it yesterday too.
It’s not something I’d like to eat every day, but it wasn’t bad. I also got the blood for free, so making the
whole thing twice cost less than S/. 2!
I’m hoping the moms in my project liked the idea. The cooking for the charla did not go all
that smoothly, mostly because I was giving the charla and doing the cooking
mostly on my own – the moms had to bring their kids under 3 to the charla to
take a blood sample so I was pretty sure I wouldn’t get any volunteers with all
those little monsters running around.
But the charla part I think went well.
The moms should be able to explain complementary feeding and balanced
nutrition, if not practice what I taught them today. I am also lucky enough to have gotten help
from Felicita, the Vaso de Leche coordinator and my health promoters in doing
the charla and giving out the canastas.
That would have been a nightmare on my own. I still ended up cancelling on my PEPs
though, which I feel really crappy about.
We were supposed to finish the charla in 2 hours – one hour for the
charla, one hour to give out the stuff.
It turned out to be more like 2.5 hours and since it took an hour this
morning to figure out which of the pickup trucks parked outside the
Municipality with their drivers would be taking us to Oxahuay, we arrived
almost an hour and a half later than scheduled and started half an hour late. There is nothing more difficult than getting
transportation from the Municipality, no matter how many times you confirm it
ahead of time!
I’m so excited to be going on vacation next week! Five days for Thanksgiving. There are plans to get Starbucks and make turkey,
green beans, sweet potato something, stuffing, pie…yum! Shortly after that I’ll be in Lima for the
one-year training and medical exam. I
can’t believe it’s been a year! Sadly,
though, it looks like I’ll be missing prime chocolatada time in Sicchez
(chocolatadas are when some group gives out free panetón and hot
chocolate). Oh well. Because shortly after that I’m heading back
to the States for 10 days and some of you faithful followers will be
experiencing your own chocolatada!
That’s right. Get excited. J
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