Our Last Week: Sexual Pottery and the Fish Market

Folks, Katrina and I have had our last bible study, kid’s classes and services in both Monte Sion and Filadelfia—and still, none of it feels real. I don’t know if I can fully explain why, but here’s my attempt:

Museo Larco: Funeral Headress

When you go on vacation, the new place you’re in never feels like home. It never becomes your entire life, your daily, weekly and monthly routine. You never start calling someone your “Peruvian mother” or “Peruvian cousin,” make friends with the girl down the street while buying empanadas or discover that the best Peruvian coffee comes from Chanchamayo. You never forget that you’re going home at the end of all of this—because, in fact, you’re living out of your suitcase and you’re running seriously low on clean clothes and you kind of need to go home.

But for a year, Peru has been my life. Everything I do IS Peru. My year has seriously been devoted to existing in Peru and little more than that. It’s been devoted to acclimating as best I can, being a chameleon and blending into the church here, as if I had been here all along, you just didn’t notice. So then you tell me that I’m leaving here and it’s like your mom saying, “We’re selling the house you grew up in and we’re all moving to Canada.” You’re kind of like…no.

Museo Larco: Different Club Heads

But—believe it or not, the sand runs out and in less than 75 hours, we’ll be on a plane, headed to Honduras, with no real plans to return to Peru. I feel like it’s somewhat comparable to shaving my head. My hair is a somewhat essential part of who I am that, for some reason or another, I have to completely get rid of, and see what’s there afterwards. I’m hoping there aren’t any weird scars or lumps I didn’t know about.

But—enough of those confusing similes, I will have plenty of time later to ramble on about what goodbye to Peru really feels like in a later post—let’s recap.

Our last two weeks have mainly been devoted to rushing around and doing all of the things we’ve been saying we would do for ages now. This included, Monday, going to Larco Museum. Now, a museum is a museum, so I won’t go into too much detail on this, but I DO want to say that this was one of the first times that Katrina and I decided we wanted to go somewhere and found our way there by public transit, all by ourselves, without even telling anyone we were going. I feel like we should get some kind of, “You’re almost like real people now” medal for this.

Some of the delicious selections at the Pesquero. 

The other thing I have to say is that the Incans made a lot of sexual ceramics, for ceremonial/traditional/informative purposes. A lot of these relics didn’t survive the Spanish conquistadores because they were slightly mortified to find relics of anal sex sitting in the homes of the Incas; however, some artifacts did survive the colonization and Larco Museum has two entire rooms devoted to them. If, like me, you have somehow failed to develop any maturity whatsoever in your life, this room is both interesting and hilarious.

We finished up Monday by watching the USA v. Ghana game and I can officially say I now VERY much enjoy soccer and have completely lost control of my hands while watching it. Sometimes they fly up above my head and I find myself yelling, “GOOOOAAALLLLL!!!” and in other moments they clutch my face and I watch the game through my fingers, like Chuckie on the Rugrats. It’s slightly mortifying behavior, but I seriously have no ability to stop it and I’m not about to stop watching soccer—I just started liking it.

Apparently a lot of people like to buy seaweed. 

Tuesday was a big day for Katrina and I as we checked two things off our Peru list—both fish related. We started our morning at a sunny 5:30 a.m. and headed to the “pesquero” (fish market) with our host aunt, Consuelo. Consuelo goes to the fish market every morning, buys about 50 lbs of fish, then sells it at the local market here in Callao. Being from the Midwest, I’ve never been to anything remotely close to a fish market before, and it was fascinating. Perhaps my favorite thing was seeing all the massive swordfish laid out, then hacked into reasonable amounts of food. My least favorite part is that the men in the fish market act like they are sailors on shore leave (which, for all I know, they are) and the whistling is completely overwhelming. One of them sees us, realizes that Katrina and I are white and look awkwardly out of place, and thus somehow appealing (I don’t understand this logic) and commences whistling—and what follows is a chorus of whistling and clapping from at least 50 people, that lasts a mortifying full 30 seconds, while you drag a giant bag of dead fish through the market. I think Consuelo’s favorite part of the morning was when a very old man who couldn’t really walk anymore asked us if we were single, then told us he was single too.

Consuelo and Katrina outside the Pesquero. 

After that charming experience, we washed up and headed out to sushi with Wilfredo. Wilfredo loves sushi, but nobody else in his family does. Actually—Wilfredo loves a lot of things that it seems only Katrina and I happen to love. Anyway, since most of the time he has nobody to eat sushi with, we decided it was simply necessary that we go out to sushi with him.

Peru has the second largest Japanese population in Latin America (after Brazil) and was the first Latin American country to allow Japanese immigration. For that reason, about 0.3% of Peru’s population today is Japanese-Peruvian and there are few Japanese cultural centers sprinkled throughout Lima. What else does this mean? Let’s do some math:

Port City + Japanese Influence = Fantastic Sushi.

We went to a sushi spot called K’tana that was a fantastic mix of Peru and Japan. Perhaps my favorite part of the experience was the drinks—green tea mixed with orange and passion fruit—I am a complete sucker for delicious tea and this more than satisfied.

Japanese-Peruvian Sushi--Delicious. 

After Tuesday, our week trickled away, mainly due to the World Cup. My friends, Katrina and I have about a billion things to plan—IYF classes in Honduras, being a particularly large one—yet the World Cup has come in and obliterated any hopes I ever had at being productive. I have transformed into one of those large blow up men that flap around in the wind outside of businesses all crazy like to attract attention and bring in customers—expect I just flap around for no purpose at all, cheering for any team that speaks Spanish or has a remotely endearing quality.

However, my complete lack of self-discipline and work ethic did not slow the week down, and Friday was quickly upon us. It was my last turn teaching the adult bible study in Monte Sion. This week’s topic dealt with addressing conflicts in a marriage, but I quickly modified the theme to addressing conflicts in a family, since I am probably the worst person you could consult on marital issues. The class went well and it was particularly nice to have partner discussion and the opportunity to chat with Maria about her family. Maria’s family regularly attends church in Monte Sion and I adore her children—but I’ve never got to meet her husband, so it was nice to finally hear a little about what he was like (even if it was in the context of conflict.) We finished up class and rode in silence for a bit, knowing what was coming tomorrow—our very last day in Monte Sion.

Wilfredo and I enjoying some green tea! 

And on this note—I’m going to awkwardly and abruptly end this post—because I think our goodbye weekend justifies its own entry (and this post is already absurdly long…and the Uruguay v. Itay game is on.) My friends, I enjoy writing and I like to hear myself type, but I have to say capturing the sentiments of our goodbyes is a near impossible feat. Not only because of emotion behind it, but because I also feel like a dog that’s watching its owners pack up their suitcases—I know something big is happening, but I don’t really fully understand what; but I DO know that it means change and that makes me want to make high pitch whining noises that nobody particularly enjoys.

Does that make sense? I didn’t think so. Anyway—until next time.