Hello again from Huanuco! Katrina and I are sitting on our
beds blogging while listening to the sounds of pig snores, which, surprisingly,
is new for the two of us.
Anyway—let’s recap the week, shall we? Our twist for the
week was that Jimmy was home. Jimmy, 24, is one of Orlando and Carolina’s sons.
He shares a room with his brother Antonio at the house, but spends a lot of time
travelling for work. His schedule seems fairly unpredictable, but with some
good fortune he got to spend most of the week relaxing with the family in
Huancachupa.
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| This would be the giant popcorn we destroyed. |
Actually—I should probably clarify that. I’m convinced that nobody
in Orlando and Carolina’s family truly knows what the word “relax” means. For
example, Carolina works six days a week, then spends a majority of her day off
washing the family’s clothes in the river, working around the house and serving
up a mean Sunday dinner. Like mother, like son, Jimmy isn’t a fan of relaxing
either. One day off work, he spent hours upon hours digging a giant hole in the
backyard, just to have another place to burn trash. And it wasn’t long before
he felt compelled to make a few trips to local gyms and luckily Katrina and I
were able to tag along.
Going to the gym in Huanuco like none of the gyms I’ve
experienced before. First, I’ve visited three different gyms here and none of
the them had more than two working pieces of cardio equipment; the gyms all primarily
centered around weightlifting. Second, the gyms all have free personal trainers
that follow you around and tell you what to do. At the first gym we went to,
the trainer very bluntly told Katrina and I that we were overweight and if we
signed up for his program, he could help us lose some of our belly fat. Why
thank you my good sir—but my belly fat and I are on a budget. Moving on—perhaps
the most glorious part of gyms here are that they’re more… relaxed. At the
second gym we went to, someone brought their Scottie dog with them, and between
sets I very happily petted it (amidst people staring at me like I was crazy.)
In the end, Katrina and I were both happy to get back into a workout routine;
although I do have to say, having jello legs makes the Hill of Death a very
interesting experience.
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| The river on a busy laundry day. |
Another highlight of
the week is that the two piggies that live in our backyard finally got names:
Melissa and Katrina. At first, I was slightly offended at having a pig named
after me, but I have to admit that I love the pigs. My favorite part of our
mornings here is when Carolina finishes cleaning out the pig pen and we get to
chase Melissa and Katrina around the yard until they run into their pen.
Another delightful part of having the pigs is that twice a day, I wander over
to their pen, stick my hand inside and get what I call “nose kisses” from
Melissa. I love it when she touches my hand with her little nose and wiggles
her tail and snorts! Sometimes Pom Pom sneaks up behind me while I’m doing
this, and barks and snaps at the pigs until they’re mortified. I don’t know
why, but Pom Pom highly delights in torturing the pigs.
Thursday, Katrina and I did something we’ve been planning
since we arrived in Huanuco: we saw the movie Catching Fire. We trekked to the
local mall and shamelessly bought the biggest popcorn the theatre offered to
split between the two of us. The movie was dubbed in Spanish, so we didn’t
necessarily understand every word, but we both left the theatre incredibly
happy (and jammed full of popcorn.)
After the movies, the weekend came upon us quickly. Saturday
morning, Katrina and I went “swimming” in the river with Eynor and Fabrizio. I
say swimming loosely because we’d had a particularly rainy week and the current
in the river was so strong that it took everything you had just to stand in it
without falling over. The horrifying part of this is that neither Eynor nor
Fabrizio are very strong swimmers, so Katrina and I spent most of our time
trying to make sure nobody washed down river. In the process, Katrina and I
both got ourselves washed downstream and we have a few scrapes to prove it. All
the same, our river adventure was still fun and I’m hoping we’ll do it again,
on a day with a little calmer water.
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| Fabrizio, Eynor and the hand turkeys. |
When Sunday fell upon us we were confronted with a slight
problem: our preacher, Jimmy, had to leave on business. Luckily, Orlando
stepped up to the plate and took over preaching. Katrina and I had a few of our
own things planned for the service. First, we led an activity making hand
turkeys to share a little bit of American Thanksgiving with the Peruvians.
Second, we played Kum Bai Ya on our flutes. I should note that I haven’t played
the flute since I was in eighth grade, so it was a bit rough; but when it comes
to World Service Corps in Peru, you never quite know what you’ll find yourself
doing. Every week I do something that I wouldn’t consider myself an “expert”
at, but every week I get through it and life goes on. I keep telling Katrina
that by the time I leave here, I will have no shame left in me.
As for this week, we’re already off to a running start. All
of the dogs got new flea baths today, Katrina and I both tried our hand at hair
dye in Peru and we have big plans to try to tickle the pigs this week—I’ll
explain the significance of that later. Until then, Happy early Thanksgiving
and eat some turkey for me!
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