The Puppies Post

The puppy pile outside my door.

As promised: puppies post. Let me preface this: if you don’t care about dogs, don’t bother reading this post. It is the ramblings of a dog obsessed woman. This is mainly written for my sister.

In general, Peru has a lot more dogs than the States. The main thing about the dogs, is that many of them live in the streets; which means either 1. They have no owner or 2. Their owner that leaves them outside for part/most/all of the day. This also results in the odd contradiction of people loving dogs, but also being afraid of them—because there are one or two mean dogs that roam the streets. When I was running in Callao, more than once I’ve had problems with dogs chasing me. And since coming to Huanaco, the smart thing to do sometimes is to walk around with a handful of rocks to scare away angry dogs.

Oso, King of the Hill.

From what I’ve seen, the pets here are also a little less spoiled. While there seem to be a lot of veterinary offices, I’ve never heard of someone actually taking their pet to the veterinarian. Consequently, I’ve yet to meet an animal that has been spayed or neutered.

 Another interesting thing is that people here generally don’t buy animals; animals are gifted to them. So, if someone has a dog that, like usual, isn’t fixed, that dog has a litter of puppies, generally the puppies are gifted out to their friends.

Another interesting tid bit is that the animals here don’t usually eat kibble or store bought food—they eat table scraps. Graceila’s cat, Tommy, would usually get our leftover in Callao, and the dogs in Huanaco get our table scraps as well.

Big ´ole Lucky.

The last thing before I jump into my beloved six dogs in Huanaco is names. I know that pet names in the United States are weird, but in Peru, I think they take the cake. Consuelo has two dogs named Poppy and Puppy (and with a Spanish accent, it’s impossible to tell the two names apart.) Graceila’s cat, Tommy, is about the fifth cat named Tommy the family has had. Marlene’s two dogs are named Paelo (which means ‘bald’) and Enano (which means ‘dwarf’). Naturally, she has one hairless dog and one dog that is very short.

Scottie the introvert.

Now—enough with the small talk—the Huanaco dogs. There are two kings of the hill: Oso and Lucky. Oso (which means ‘bear’ in Spanish) is who I affectionately call the Grumpy Old Man. He tends to trot around, guarding the castle and growling at the neighbor’s dogs, and occasionally calling the younger dogs of the house back into line. He’s got some type of Corgi in him, so he’s shaped like a twinkie. My favorite thing about Oso is that when you pet him, he sticks his teeth out into this glorious smile. Then there’s Lucky. Lucky is by far the biggest dog of the group and probably weighs a good 65 pounds. Lucky has a soft spot in my heart because he likes to accompany you when you leave the house and protect you from other dogs. And while I love little Oso, I feel a lot safer with big ole Lucky at my side.

Lil´ baby Hueso.

After the two top dogs, we have Scottie, who I’m guessing is about 2 or 3 years old. He’s the only dog in the group that’s timid, and in a dog-eat-dog world, that means that he gets the short end of the stick sometimes. For example, when Carolina takes out a dish of table scraps, I know Lucky and Oso always get their fair share—my guess is that Scottie, even though he’s bigger than most of the dogs, eats last. Scottie is what Katrina and I have dubbed the Introvert, because while he’s a bit of an outsider, he loves exploring and going on adventures just as much as anyone. Since I can relate to being an introvert, this makes Scottie my second favorite of the bunch.

Pom Pom the kitchen witch.

And then we have the puppies: Pom Pom, Mohada and Hueso. Pom  Pom and Mohada are pretty similar looking, and my guess is that they’re sisters that came from the same litter. They’re the only girls out of the six dogs. Pom Pom I have kindly dubbed the Kitchen Witch, because the first night we were here she bit Katrina’s ankles when she tried to walk in the kitchen. Pom Pom is also the only dog out of the six that likes to bark—but she barks enough for the six of them. Mohada is my favorite of the group because she is easily the most mischievous. She’ll eat your socks, jump on your back, pull your scarf off your neck, and when you bend over to steal your things back, she rolls on her stomach for belly rubs. She has easily stolen my heart. Finally, we have Hueso, who is the youngest of the group—and honestly, can’t be more than a month or two old. Hueso doesn’t have a ton of character yet, but right now he’s got that puppy like trait where he wants to be your shadow and follow you everywhere.

Mohada, the one that stole my heart.

And these are my six beloved puppies. While I love these dogs to death, sometimes I struggle with the cultural differences between pets in America and pets in Peru. For example, I fairly certain that at least Hueso, Oso and Lucky have fleas—and in all honesty, the others will probably have them soon if they don’t already. Unfortunately for the dogs, flea medicine is expensive here, so they won’t get any treatment. Another thing is that they’re country dogs—so they often come and go as they please. The other day Mohada went down to the river with Carolina to wash clothes, but Carolina couldn’t get Mohada to come back. Mohada was lost for more than 12 hours, but despite being just a puppy, managed to find her way home. I was sick to my stomach worrying about her and am more than thrilled to have her back.

And there you have it—the dogs of Huanaco. Of course, knowing me, I could go on and on, but I’ll leave you with this note—if I come back to the States for Christmas and I’m itching a lot, keep your distance: I’ve probably caught fleas from the dogs. I know I shouldn’t pet them since the flea problem is so bad—but I just can’t help myself.

Greetings from Huanuco

Greetings from Huanuco! I’ll warn you—I might not be able to upload pictures from here, so my apologies of the blog posts look a little boring. Regardless, let’s get to it.  

Wilfredo, Antonio, me and Mirtha at Manos Cruzados

Thursday we spent nearly the entire day in the car, roughing the 8-9 hour drive to Huanuco. It was Wilfredo’s first time driving to Huanuco and, quite impressively, he did the entire thing without using a map or GPS. Thank the Lord, I managed not to get carsick during our journey, but Mirtha got altitude sickness and ended up getting sick multiple times throughout the journey. At one point, we stopped for lunch and tried the infamous Mate de Cocoa, which is supposed to help with altitude sickness, but didn’t seem to help Mirtha one bit.  

Eventually we arrived in Huanuco. Now, I know I’ve described Huanuco in a past post, but let me refresh your memory. In Huanuco, we stay with Orlando and his wife Carolina and their family. Their house is split into two parts. The left part of the house is home to roughly 30 pigs, an assortment of chickens and guinea pigs. Members of Orlando’s family look after the animals and it’s not irregular for us to hear the squeals of pigs, day and night. The right part of the house is where we’re staying. The yard area is full of rooster and chickens, and a lot of baby chicks, and, most importantly, the family’s six dogs (don’t worry—I’m thinking about devoting an entire post to my obsession with the dogs here.) On this side, Carolina and Orlando share a room with their youngest son, Enore, 11, and Carolina’s nephew Fabriscio, 7. Carolina and Orlando’s oldest sons, Jimmy and Antonio, both in their mid-twenties, share a room as well.  This side is also home to the kitchen where we share all of our meals, and the living room where we hold all of our services.  

Friday, Wilfredo, Mirtha, Antonio, Katrina and I went to visit some local ruins called the Manos Cruzados (The crossed hands), then went to town to pick up a few Huanuco essentials: sunscreen, aloe and bug spray. The bugs here are thick, and I’ve learned the hard way to ALWAYS wear bug spray—I have upwards of twenty bug bites on my left leg.

Katrina and I checking out the ruins at Manos Cruzados

Saturday, we trekked into town again to eat fried trout at a fundraiser for Orlando’s school. Orlando is a Communications teacher in town and his son Enore attends the same school. After chowing we headed back to Orlando’s house to prepare for “Sunday School” (but, like Monte Sion, on Saturdays). Unfortunately, nobody showed up, so Sunday School turned into us watching two different Chuckie movies. I don’t know why, but Chuckie movies are somehow VERY popular in Peru. Don’t ask me why, but at least once every three days someone talks about Chuckie here.

And that brings us to yesterday. Every Sunday, Jimmy and Antonio go on a run. Katrina and I asked to tag along before we realized what time said run began—6 a.m. Thus, at 6, we groggily hiked down the little hill that we live on (me, slipping and falling down part of it) then began our LONG run through town. Antonio and Jimmy don’t kid around—we ran for roughly an hour. Did I mention the altitude is high here? Because it is. Needless to say, Katrina and I filled the roles of the out of shape Americans for the day.  Eventually, we finished our run in a park and got some fresh squeezed orange juice, which made the whole affair worth it.

Welp...looks like I´ve been spelling the city name wrong...

After we got back, Katrina, Carolina and I headed down to the river to do laundry. Unfortunately, water and power come and go in Huanaco—which means we hoard water here. The family has at least ten giant buckets that we fill with water (when it’s around) and that lasts us through the days when the water isn’t working. Unfortunately, laundry requires too much water for that—thus, when there’s no water, it’s to the river to wash clothes. Carolina is more effective than any washing machine in existence—she scrubbed every piece of laundry like it’s never been scrubbed before. Katrina and I took the role of washing the soap out of the laundry, which was surprisingly difficult. After about an hour and a half, we trekked back up the hill with a significantly heavier bucket of VERY clean laundry (or as a clean as river water can get things.)

Next, it was time for church. In Huanuco, two hours before the service, children come to play. This can mean playing cards, a game of volleyball, or just splashing in the river—and Sunday, we did a little of each. I was impressed with how many kids came—roughly 15. Afterwards, we began the service. Katrina and I led a song that we’ve been trying to launch in Monte Sion, to no avail. However, much to Katrina and I’s pleasure, it went over well here, and someone even asked if we could sing it again at the end of church, which basically made my day.

At the end of the night, we bid farewell to Mirtha and Wilfredo. They left around 5 a.m. this morning for Callao, so Katrina and I are now officially on our own in Huanaco. There are still one thousand other things I want to say about this place—the moonlight on the mountains, life without internet, the inevitability that I will get fleas here because I can’t help but pet all the dogs, the work ethic everyone has—but those will just have to wait for another day—this is already a small novel. Until then! 

A Few Leaps of Faith

Alright, we’ve got cookies in the oven, we’ve done our snack shopping for the road trip and we’ve (almost) got our bags packed—we’re just about ready for the big trip to Huánuco! We’ve been talking about going for so long, but somehow it didn’t feel real, like we were actually ever going to go there, until today.



Ladies and Gents: Turron.

First thing’s first though—the recap. We’ve been sort of doing a goodbye tour before heading to Huánuco, since we won’t see anyone in Callao again until late December. I don’t really know how we got so lucky—but a lot of our goodbye tour has included delicious food.

We started Sunday by walking to Consuelo’s house, where she served us up some aji de gallina, a traditional Peruvian dish with potatoes and hen. Afterwards, we had some turron, which is possibly the most ridiculous dessert ever. It’s this tan, crumbly stuff, kind of like a hard-ish cookie, with layers of honey with anis flavoring inside of it. The top of turron is covered with honey, then finished with rainbow sprinkles and candy stars. It’s ridiculous looking, and in all honesty, it’s not as delicious as other Peruvian desserts, but there’s something insanely cheery about it and it’s pretty darn tasty (how could it not be?)

After lunch, we headed to church. Eder, Consuelo’s son, delivered the sermon and it was a bit of an interesting experience—because multiple times throughout the sermon, Eder was interrupted by a few senior members of the congregation, voicing their contradicting interpretation of the scripture. Eder took the interruptions in stride and wasn’t flustered—which earns him a lot of respect in my book. It’s always good to have a variety of opinions and open discussion, but preaching is intimidating enough without the audience participation.

Moving on, Monday, as another part of the farewell tour, Wilfredo treated Katrina and I to some of his fantastic ceviche for the second time. You can check out my older post about ceviche for more details—but it’s basically very limey, very oniony fish dish and it is by far my favorite Peruvian food.

The tour continued in a bit more dramatic of a fashion when we ventured to Miraflores to finally try parpenting. Parapenting is basically like parasailing—minus one tiny detail—the string attach to a boat. You have a giant parachute/kite type thing attached to you and that’s it—the rest is up to the coastal winds around Miraflores. To start, you and your guide…driver…I’m not sure what the correct word is—casually jump off a cliff, the wind catches the parachute, and you take off. We sored over the city and horrifyingly close to a few buildings, but it was an amazing experience.

Nearly ¾ of Peru’s population lives around the Lima area; however, sometimes the city just doesn’t feel that big. Before I got here, I was imagining Lima to have New York City appearance, with skyscrapers everywhere; however, while parts of Lima that have that look, for the most part, Lima is a little more… subtle. In other words, it’s a not as tall as NYC; like some of the Peruvian people, it’s just a bit shorter. Because of this, Lima doesn’t always feel grand and expansive; however, when you’re in the sky over the city and you’re able to see all the large buildings, you realize that Lima goes on and on as far as the eye can see. I’m so thankful to have the new perspective on the city.

The parapenting ride ends with a few dips over the ocean, while waving at surfers and tour buses, followed by a skid landing back at the landing site. I’m thankful I took a motion sickness pill before the ride because the dips at the end were a bit dramatic—but I successfully made it back to earth without vomiting, the wind catching said vomit, and throwing it back in my face.. The whole experience was far scarier than I’d imagined it would be—but it was a great and, in all honesty, I wouldn’t mind doing it again.

Tuesday, Katrina and I cooked up some American chili and cornbread for the family, which is always a bit of an adventure. First, Graciela doesn’t own measuring cups. Second, Peru uses the metric system. Third, Peru doesn’t have the same baking supplies/ingredients in their stores as the United States. Fourth, their baking supplies are all, naturally, written in Spanish. And, last but not least, the oven here is a bit tricky. For example, our cornbread was supposed to take 25 minutes to cook at 200 degrees Celsius—it took 45 minutes at 255 degrees. All of that being said, Katrina and I managed to overcome and produce a decent dinner; however, in retrospect, loading everyone up with an excess of beans before we spend nine hours trapped in a car was probably a less than stellar idea.

And that brings us to today. We’ve spent most of the day watching all the Hulu we can before we lose a consistent internet connection, which means I’ve spent an embarrassing amount of time with Glee, Once Upon A Time and The Voice. I also went on an embarrassingly slow run, trekking my running route for the last time until January. I definitely have a lot more packing to do tonight, but all in all, I feel fairly prepared for tomorrow. I’m less than excited to have a day of being in a Dramamine coma and vomiting into a plastic bag, but at least I’ll be vomiting up delicious peanut butter cookies—I’d much rather barf that than, say, spaghetti noodles.

On that glamorous note—I’ll stop disgusting you and get to packing—we’ve got a big day ahead of us tomorrow! See you in Huánuco!

Volleyball, Talents Shows and Banana Pancakes

I’m sitting here listening to the Chiefs game online, slightly paranoid that I’m throwing off their mojo. I went to as many Chiefs game as I could last year and we had an abysmal record. Then I leave the country and the team starts out 5-0. Coincidence? Possibly. Possibly not. Regardless, the chances of me being able to listen to a game in Huánuco are slim to none, so I’m drinking in all the Chiefs I can before we leave.

But first thing’s first—I need to recap the week.

Last weekend, after church, I had my first Peruvian sleepover. Before I jump into that, I need to break down the Carlos family tree. At the top of the tree is the Carlos family—there’s Graciela (Carlos Paz), our host mom, Wilfredo (Carlos), the pastor in Peru, Consuelo (Carlos Yanqui) and Prudencio (Carlos). They’re all brothers/sisters and they’re all active in the church. We live with Graciela and her children, Wilfredo lives on his own (he’s unmarried and doesn’t have children), Consuelo lives with her two children and Prudencio lives with his wife Livia, and his two youngest children, while his older children share a separate apartment. Follow me? Eh… let’s move forward anyway.

So, all of the female Carlos family members were invited to our sleepover, and the turnout was pretty good—we had three of Prudencio’s daughters, Consuelo’s daughter, and of course, Katrina and I. Now, what does a Peruvian sleepover entail? Food, karaoke and dancing. Fortunately for me, we were a little too exhausted for the dancing, so we just ate a chicken dinner, did a little karaoke and hit the hay. It was a low-key, simple night, but it’s always heartwarming to see how close knit the Carlos family is and how they always make time to hang out with each other.

Tuesday was another great example of this—it was a federal holiday and everyone had the day off work. Nearly everyone in the Carlos family made the trek to a local park, where we spent the entire day playing soccer, volleyball, jump rope and tug of war. Perhaps my favorite part of the whole affair was the picnic; in Peru, they go all out. Cancha (it’s similar to popcorn), Chica Morada (a traditional Peruvian drink made from purple corn), shredded chicken, Chinese rice, beets, an assortment of fruit, rolls, and the list goes on. It was an interesting take on the holidays—yes, food was an important element, but it was also all about being active—and I mean everyone, 70 year old Prudencio included.

 

And speaking of food, Katrina and I tried our hand at cooking twice this week. Wednesday we headed over to Wilfredo’s house to break in his kitchen. Wilfredo moved into his house in July, but he eats nearly all of his meals in Graciela’s house; thus, Wilfredo has gone more than three months without using his brand new kitchen. So we served up some cilantro-lime rice, cooked veggies and fish, rounded out with some no-bake cookies and maracuya juice. Perhaps my favorite part of this whole experience was shopping at the market—buying cilantro at one booth, a mango at another, pepper at another, etc. The best part was picking out our fish—we had no idea what we were doing, so we just picked a big, healthy looking fish, and asked the woman running the booth to cut the scales and head off. All and all, the meal came out well.

This morning we tried our hand at cooking banana pancakes. We rounded out the meal with some fresh eggs, pineapple and sausage, and it was the perfect way to start the day. We were really hoping to find some chocolate chips to throw into our pancake batter, but, alas, we came up short. We might just have to bring some chocolate chips back with us when go home for Christmas.

This weekend was a big event in Monte Sion—a talent show and clothing donation. When the Ayers were here, they brought an entire suitcase of clothes to donate to the congregation in Monte Sion. We combined this clothes with some other clothing the Paz family had been collecting and ended up with a heaping amount to donate. The donations went over well—it was pretty much organized chaos—but by the end of the night, the families were able to walk away with at least 10 pieces of donated clothing.

The talent show was—well, interesting. With the allure of free clothing, we had a full house for the church service, which was great to see. The thing I didn’t expect was that there were twice as many children than as adults. This made the service slightly more chaotic; at all times, the noise level in the church was a dull roar, and there were at least three children running laps around the building (including running on the stage, in front of the person preaching.) Katrina and I had rehearsed a talent—singing “For Everyone Born” in Spanish—but we scrapped that idea to share something the children could enjoy a little more. We ended up singing “Cristo es la Roca para Mi” and, thankfully, the kids ate it up.

Today, we have a few more exciting things to do, including church in Filidelfia. We’re leaving for Huanaco on Wednesday and I’ll be sure to update the blog again before we head out.

Until then—I’ve got a Chiefs game to watch!   

"Embrague?" Surely that word isn't English OR Spanish.

Katrina and I started last week full of ambition.

After our crazy September, last week was a breath of fresh air. No early class, no packed combi rides, no homework. Starting out, Katrina and I assumed that we’d use our newfound free time to do everything we’d been slacking on; however, we assumed wrong. Time, once again, snuck away from us.

We did, however, managed to squeeze in some pretty notable things.

Celebrating my birthday Peruvian style!

First, we finally bought our plane tickets for Cusco. Cusco is the number one tourist site in Peru, because it’s just a few hours away from Machu Picchu—one of the Seven Wonders of the World. Machu Picchu is a 15^th century Inca site that’s often referred to as the “Lost City of the Incas” and is supposed to be absolutely breath taking. (If you want to know more about it…you can read Wikipedia just as easily as I can.) After a while of shopping around, Katrina and I have found the tourist package that we like, and we’re booking it tomorrow. We’re making the trip to Cusco in late December, right after we get back from Huánuco—a strategy that I hope will help us from getting altitude sickness. Machu Picchu is nearly 8,000 feet above sea level, which is…well, 8,000 feet above Lima/Callao. However, it’s only about 2,000 feet above Huánuco, and hopefully this means the change will be much less dramatic than it could be.

Speaking of Huánuco, we nailed down our schedule for that trip too. We’re leaving Oct. 16 (next Wednesday) and we’re coming back to Lima on Dec. 15, just in time for our trip to Machu Picchu. Now—you might recall my glorious tale of the vomiting in the bus on the way back from our last trip to Huánuco. Since Huánuco is in the mountains, it means that the road is pretty much constantly winding and twisting; and there’s also the change in altitude to deal with. The combination is simply too much for my Dramamine to overcome and thus, vomiting ensues. Not surprisingly, this makes me less than excited for the upcoming road trip to Huánuco. However, this time Wilfredo is driving us in his sweet new ride, and I’m hoping that will make the trek a little easier. If it doesn’t—hopefully it at least means we’ll be able to pull over and I can barf on the fresh mountain soil, as opposed to a plastic trash bag.

Moving on to more delightful things—I also had the pleasure of experiencing a birthday in a foreign country last week. Birthdays are a big deal in Peru—or at least in the Paz family. Katrina and I love going to the birthday parties of our extended host family; we especially enjoyed the food there. The birthday parties always have a special dinner that the host dishes up, followed by singing and a heaping plate full of cake from Tottus. My birthday was no exception—Graciela dished up some great eats, we had black forest cake and we spent the evening laughing and listening to music. I even got some earrings from my host family, which was super sweet of them. Perhaps the most interesting part of the evening came when the family began asking us about the government shut down and Obamacare—and let me tell you something—these things are difficult to explain in broken Spanish. So thank you, government.

 

My birthday also brought another adventure—my first driving lesson in Peru. Now let me start by saying this—if you’ve ever rode passenger side in my car, you know all too well that I have driving anxiety. Don’t get me wrong—I try not to let it prevent me from driving somewhere—I just FREAK OUT the entire time I’m driving. So—add that delight, to me learning stick for the first time in my life, to the fabulousness that is the old Daihatsu, to the fact that the only non-crowded place to practice driving that we knew about wasn’t actually roads—it was dirt and rocks and dogs and people wondering around. Did I mention Wilfredo’s lesson was in Spanish? The first time he told me to tap the “pisa embrague” I just looked at him like he was crazy. This led to Katrina telling me things in English, Wilfredo telling me things in Spanish, me sweating profusely, and an incredible paranoia that I would hit a dog and be traumatized for the rest of my life. Nonetheless, the lesson ensued, I killed the engine upwards of 10 times, successfully switched into first, second, and third gear, and managed to not kill us (or any dogs.) We even drove on a real road for a little bit.

Now—moving on to last weekend. The routine for leadership in Peru is generally to follow a monthly schedule that tells everyone who preaches and presides. Katrina and I both preaching and presiding once every three weeks. The schedule comes out at the beginning of every month; however, we hit a few snags with the October schedule and it came out at about 12:15 a.m. on Friday morning (aka after October had already started.) The good news? The schedule was finally out. The bad news? I was in charge of Saturday’s service and had less than 48 hours to plan. Katrina didn’t get off the hook easily either—she was given the Sunday service and less than 72 hours to prepare.

 

Katrina and I both decided it was a little too ridiculous to ask anyone to prepare a sermon on such short notice, and decided to lead testimony services. Now here’s something different about Peru—people are ready, willing and excited to give testimonies. Always. During my service, every single person in the church gave a testimony, which ended up making the service two hours long (sorry guys.) In the end, I think both services went well, especially considering the tight turn around.

As for the week ahead—Katrina and I are trying to get everything in order before we head out to Huánuco. We have some big events planned for church this weekend, including a talent show and a clothing donation, and I’m thinking I’ll definitely have some interesting things to write about. Talk to you then!