Daphne, Maren, and I have just returned from a great vacation-trip to Cusco where I had no time to write an extensive blog. I thought, naively, that I would have loads of time to catch all of you up on the goings on of Chijnaya, seeing as we had free, more or less unlimited, internet access. I was quite wrong. We were too busy eating yummy things like Indian food (at the only Indian restaurant in Peru!), hamburgers (DELICIOUS), and bagels.
In any case, I am left with not as much time as I would like, so I will have to resort to telling you about Eli(zabeth)'s baptism/first communion/confirmation party. Normally I wouldn't write about drinking beer on a blog, but this party was just too great not to write about!
I woke up the morning after the party with, thankfully, no ill effects. This probably had something to do with the three pieces of bread I had before sleeping, and my middle of the night awakening, thanks to the resident mice. I made my way to the kitchen building (very small), where I found Paula cooking/making Quaker (oats). I asked her if she had heard Daphne playing her fiddle. She responded "Oh yes, I even tried it! Your friend plays beautifully. Me, not so much." Everything then came flooding back to me.
The party started off with a large lunch of delicious chicken and rice soup, followed by asado de alpaca on top of corn, salad, and potatoes. Having not finished all of this pile of food (despite the tastiness of the asado), Maren, Daphne, and I vacated the premises to teach English to the rapscallions at the school. Class finished quite early that day due to the almost combustible energy of the (almost exclusively) boys, so at five we left and went to try to chat with Veronica and Fortunato about our upcoming trip to Cusco. Fortun wasn't there, so we helped Veronica lug her pig's food over to the other family compound where her uncle lives. After watching the pig gobble down its food we returned to the school where we continued our pointless wait for adults to show up for class (no one showed up the entire week).
We finally returned at 6:00 to Eli's family compound, despite the tempting calls from the mass of children playing CTB *(for more on the goings on of the neighborhood children's obsession with Capture the Flag/Ball see below). Upon entering, I saw that I had guessed right--everyone was well on their way to being drunk, or "festive" (as Megan would say). We were herded in, sat down, given beer, and told that there was no electricity so we (lamentably) couldn't dance. Everyone looked so bummed about this that I suggested that we sing. Of course this "we" turned out to be us gringas. So Maren and I sung a couple of Christmas carols, while Daphne fetched her fiddle (after much prodding and encouragement from all of us). When she came back, we "performed" 'Orphan Girl', 'Wagon Wheel', and Daphne played a reel.
By that point the lights had come back on and Eli's padrino decided it was time to educate us about huayno. This lovely traditional Peruvian music, that dates back to the Incas, then began to blast from the speakers and the padrino (godfather) began telling us about more Peruvian traditions that are beginning to disappear; coincidentally one involves visiting your padrino and celebrating with him. We were soon drawn to our feet to learn how to dance huayno (basically involves moving your feet to the rhythm...quite difficult). This, of course, was quite the spectacle, and everyone got a good laugh, though I like to think I carried myself just fine. I danced with the rhythm, spun and was spun, acted silly, and thoroughly enjoyed myself.
At various points, Maren and I demonstrated swing dancing, "salsa" (with Daphne cutting in and showing us how to really do it), and the "waltz." I also danced with Chico (the 1.3 year old)--quite a highlight--who was absolutely thrilled with all the music. Daphne brought out her fiddle again and Maren and I again demonstrated "traditional dance" from the U.S./Ireland/our heads. We later learned that no one else wanted to dance because they couldn't "jump like us" (our interpretation of Irish step dancing). Paula told Cesar that he would need to "bajar de peso" if he ever wanted to dance like us.
After our dancing demonstrations Daphne's fiddle, inexplicably, began to be passed around the room. Nearly everyone tried it, much to the delight of everyone else. Daphne said that Paula looked like a natural, but compared to the rest of us (whose skill could be marked by the piercing squeaks of the fiddle and the laughter of everyone else), I'm not sure this is actually saying much.
Finally, after more drinking, a little more dancing,, and a good deal more conversation about I don't even know what, we went our separate ways. Apparently, though, Cesar and Paula went back after taking care of us kids...I guess Eli's father was insistent about needing to chat more with Cesar. Though I can't imagine either was comprehensible to the other.
Until next time, Cuidanse bien!
...
*On the morning of the 14th I woke up at 4:30AM to shouts of "Richard!" "Beto!" Apparently the kids actually got up at that horrid hour to play CTB!!! They were totally thrilled about it. What I love about CTB (and sports in general) is how it really brings out personalities. For example, there is Beto, who takes control in a fair manner and has a very mature overview of how things should be going (even though he has no faith in the skills of the girls); there is Livio who is dangerously fast, constantly has a cheeky smirk, and is totally concentrated on getting to the ball...though he tries to hard to be tricky; Livio's sister, Delia, also tries to be sneaky, and is very playful, but is most often found sprawled on the ground, looking up at the stars and singing to herself; Richard also tries a bit to hard to be sneaky--he is always strategizing (sometimes they work, usually they don't) and is always worried about justice; Jhoan (Johan), is the brother of Leidi (who is very fast and constantly takes advantage of being underestimated) is a tough little guy who is just out there to have fun, but sometimes gets his feelings hurt when the big boys tell him he isn't any good at running; then there is Umberto...he doesn't beat around the bush, he simply takes all. But he is actually sneaky about it. He doesn't try to hard to be sneaky, he just is, and he usually wins because of it. So yeah, CTB is pretty awesome.
Los Andes
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
¿Vamos a jugar?
So it's official. Capture the Flag has become the new obsession of the neighborhood kids.
But this needs a bit of explanation. Basically, it all began on the night before Halloween. Daphne, Maren, and I threw a slamming Halloween party in Daphne's room that day (it was a friday, so we had the party instead of class). All of the kids who came (mostly boys) were super pumped about bobbing for apples--from which they emerged like half drowned wet rats (according to Daphne)--thrilled about making masks, and off the wall about receiving candy. An overall great success. In fact, we had prepared for this party by holding a monster drawing session in class the day before; an activity that even drew some resident 15 yr old "punks". The results are fantastic. But anyway, as I was leaving the party (it was around 6:00 at this point) I was approached by five kids who seemed to have it in their heads that we were going trick-or-treating for "La Noche de la Bruja"...well they were mistaken, but they begged so desperately to do Something, that I just had to give in to them...But what were we to do? I asked myself. We'd already had a party, so what really was there left? Well, I responded to myself...there's always Ghosts in the Graveyard (which we had successfully played at the party). So I told the kids to meet back up the next night, the Real Halloween night, and we would play a scary game in the dark. Well, the next night came and at first it seemed that no one was going to show up (being that many were making T'anta Wawa --which Maren has written eloquently about--and the fact that the lights had all gone, inexplicably, out), but Beto, my host brother, was insistent that we get a game together. So he tore off on his bike to round kids up. Before I knew it, I was surrounded by 10 very eneretic children. It was at this point that the street lights came back on and I realized that Ghosts in the Graveyard, as great a game as it is, may not quench the thirst for an awesome game. It was at this point that I remembered Manhunt. Brilliant! I thought, and I lead them all to a section of street right before the chakras (fields of cultivation) begin where we could play in psuedo darkness (satisfying the scary requirement). As I began to explain it, though, I slowly realized that I didn't actually fully understand the point of Manhunt, so I quickly changed tack and started explaining Capture the Flag. Well it instantly took off and I had barely finished explaining the bit about jails when they started yelling about splitting into two teams and the game started. That first night everyone was still shaky on the rules, but we ended up playing for a good hour and a half-two hours (much to the chagrin, said Daphne, of her family, whose compound was right near by) despite the massive amounts of cheating going on. The next day about seven kids came up to me expressing an urgent desire to play again that night, so we did. The rules, such as having to walk back to your side after being liberated from the jail instead of dashing straight for the flag, began to get themselves sorted out, and everyone had a great time. One kid even got so into it he decided that hiding in the trash bin was a great tactic. He stayed in there a surprisingly long time, considering. On Monday, instead of playing at night, we played right after class on the soccer field--Maren had introduced the variation where you play with a ball that you can throw, so it worked well on the field. That was going great until the massive thunderheads started rolling in. The kids, of course, ignored them completely, but when a rather startling bolt of lightning zoomed down above a nearby cerro a 13 year old and I decided it was time to high-tail it back home. So, moral of the story is that Capture the Flag/Ball has successfully infected a heck of a lot of Chijnaya kids, for better or for worse.
...
Sorry for that flood of probably unecessary detail. Other things:
- The ovens that are used to make T'anta Wawa (baby bread) are only fired up once a year, so César had the brilliant idea of making use of the horno's heat for Pizza!!! So Maren, Daphne, César, and I rustled up some ingredients for pizza (we were sadly lacking in tomatoes), and threw together four Delicious "adobe-oven" pizzas! That was definitely a highlight of the week.
- Ralph's birthday celebration was quite a to-do. There was lots of dancing (organized), lots of speeches, and Lots of cake. Is it possible to have a sugar hangover? Well I think I had one, whatever the case. Some people of Chijnaya (including Paula and César) performed a dance based around the planting of the potato. It was really interesting to watch. All the men carried tools for digging holes and the women pretended to plant potatoes. There was one man running around with a whip who was the "hacendado"--representative of the time (in much to recent memory) when the campesinos had to work for a large plantation where they were basically enslaved--similar to serfdom. At one point everyone stopped dancing and rushed to the center...apparently for lunch. Then a woman started skipping around stuffing people's mouths with coca leaves...for energy? Once the "field work" was over, everyone rushed to various locations to drink chicha (corn beer)--a reward for a hard day's work. It was quite a sight to behold. Everyone was really into it, which was great.
- Maren is probably writing about this, but one day she, Daphne, and I were tossing the frisbee outside of Daphne's room. We decided that day that it would be fun to blast Totally Hits 2001 out of the window. Well, apparently some kids thought it was pretty cool too, so they joined us. For a little while they were watching us and throwing the disc a bit too, but then O-Town's "All or Nothing" started blasting. Apparently this song was just too good not to dance to, so two of the girls (Leidi and Delia) began doing some interpretaional dancing, inspired by ballet. There. In the middle of the street with the cows looking on. The twirling continued on for Usher's "U Remind Me." It was hard to control ourselves. Leidi asked for some music in Spanish, so I put on "Ganas de Llorar," which was equally well received. Totales son esos chicos.
Well, I think I've probably overloaded this particular blog, so ¡Hasta Pronto!
But this needs a bit of explanation. Basically, it all began on the night before Halloween. Daphne, Maren, and I threw a slamming Halloween party in Daphne's room that day (it was a friday, so we had the party instead of class). All of the kids who came (mostly boys) were super pumped about bobbing for apples--from which they emerged like half drowned wet rats (according to Daphne)--thrilled about making masks, and off the wall about receiving candy. An overall great success. In fact, we had prepared for this party by holding a monster drawing session in class the day before; an activity that even drew some resident 15 yr old "punks". The results are fantastic. But anyway, as I was leaving the party (it was around 6:00 at this point) I was approached by five kids who seemed to have it in their heads that we were going trick-or-treating for "La Noche de la Bruja"...well they were mistaken, but they begged so desperately to do Something, that I just had to give in to them...But what were we to do? I asked myself. We'd already had a party, so what really was there left? Well, I responded to myself...there's always Ghosts in the Graveyard (which we had successfully played at the party). So I told the kids to meet back up the next night, the Real Halloween night, and we would play a scary game in the dark. Well, the next night came and at first it seemed that no one was going to show up (being that many were making T'anta Wawa --which Maren has written eloquently about--and the fact that the lights had all gone, inexplicably, out), but Beto, my host brother, was insistent that we get a game together. So he tore off on his bike to round kids up. Before I knew it, I was surrounded by 10 very eneretic children. It was at this point that the street lights came back on and I realized that Ghosts in the Graveyard, as great a game as it is, may not quench the thirst for an awesome game. It was at this point that I remembered Manhunt. Brilliant! I thought, and I lead them all to a section of street right before the chakras (fields of cultivation) begin where we could play in psuedo darkness (satisfying the scary requirement). As I began to explain it, though, I slowly realized that I didn't actually fully understand the point of Manhunt, so I quickly changed tack and started explaining Capture the Flag. Well it instantly took off and I had barely finished explaining the bit about jails when they started yelling about splitting into two teams and the game started. That first night everyone was still shaky on the rules, but we ended up playing for a good hour and a half-two hours (much to the chagrin, said Daphne, of her family, whose compound was right near by) despite the massive amounts of cheating going on. The next day about seven kids came up to me expressing an urgent desire to play again that night, so we did. The rules, such as having to walk back to your side after being liberated from the jail instead of dashing straight for the flag, began to get themselves sorted out, and everyone had a great time. One kid even got so into it he decided that hiding in the trash bin was a great tactic. He stayed in there a surprisingly long time, considering. On Monday, instead of playing at night, we played right after class on the soccer field--Maren had introduced the variation where you play with a ball that you can throw, so it worked well on the field. That was going great until the massive thunderheads started rolling in. The kids, of course, ignored them completely, but when a rather startling bolt of lightning zoomed down above a nearby cerro a 13 year old and I decided it was time to high-tail it back home. So, moral of the story is that Capture the Flag/Ball has successfully infected a heck of a lot of Chijnaya kids, for better or for worse.
...
Sorry for that flood of probably unecessary detail. Other things:
- The ovens that are used to make T'anta Wawa (baby bread) are only fired up once a year, so César had the brilliant idea of making use of the horno's heat for Pizza!!! So Maren, Daphne, César, and I rustled up some ingredients for pizza (we were sadly lacking in tomatoes), and threw together four Delicious "adobe-oven" pizzas! That was definitely a highlight of the week.
- Ralph's birthday celebration was quite a to-do. There was lots of dancing (organized), lots of speeches, and Lots of cake. Is it possible to have a sugar hangover? Well I think I had one, whatever the case. Some people of Chijnaya (including Paula and César) performed a dance based around the planting of the potato. It was really interesting to watch. All the men carried tools for digging holes and the women pretended to plant potatoes. There was one man running around with a whip who was the "hacendado"--representative of the time (in much to recent memory) when the campesinos had to work for a large plantation where they were basically enslaved--similar to serfdom. At one point everyone stopped dancing and rushed to the center...apparently for lunch. Then a woman started skipping around stuffing people's mouths with coca leaves...for energy? Once the "field work" was over, everyone rushed to various locations to drink chicha (corn beer)--a reward for a hard day's work. It was quite a sight to behold. Everyone was really into it, which was great.
- Maren is probably writing about this, but one day she, Daphne, and I were tossing the frisbee outside of Daphne's room. We decided that day that it would be fun to blast Totally Hits 2001 out of the window. Well, apparently some kids thought it was pretty cool too, so they joined us. For a little while they were watching us and throwing the disc a bit too, but then O-Town's "All or Nothing" started blasting. Apparently this song was just too good not to dance to, so two of the girls (Leidi and Delia) began doing some interpretaional dancing, inspired by ballet. There. In the middle of the street with the cows looking on. The twirling continued on for Usher's "U Remind Me." It was hard to control ourselves. Leidi asked for some music in Spanish, so I put on "Ganas de Llorar," which was equally well received. Totales son esos chicos.
Well, I think I've probably overloaded this particular blog, so ¡Hasta Pronto!
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
T'anta Wawa, Halloween, and Capture the Flag
Unfortunately I don't have enough time to write a full blog today to inform you all of the lovely goings on in Chijnaya around Todos los Santos. I PROMISE I will rectify this situation next week. There are lots of great moments to talk about.
In the meanwhile, check out my friend Maren's blog. There really isn't that much overlap, and she's a good writer. I've added a link on the right-hand side of this blog.
In the meanwhile, check out my friend Maren's blog. There really isn't that much overlap, and she's a good writer. I've added a link on the right-hand side of this blog.
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