After a jaunt to the beach...

So I arrived back in site yesterday morning after a brief trip to Tumbes, the most northern (and hottest) department in Peru. As I mentioned in my last post, we were heading out that way to see some of the projects that fellow volunteers have going concerning PEPFAR (Presidents Emergency Plan for Aids Relief). The volunteers in that area have done a great job coordinating with community members to form committees that are working with various activities to promote education about HIV/ADIS in the general population. This might involve working with youth groups that give educational sessions to other youth, radio spots (we were on the radio twice in three days, and I got the laugh track from the DJ after goofing on some spanish), parades, and even a graffiti mural contest. Tumbes is situated along the ecuadorian border of peru and is a hub for commerce and trade, sadly those locations are often hotbeds for STD's and other communicable diseases. Fortunately this area is a bit more open minded to talk of sexual education, which makes the work of these volunteers somewhat easier. Here in the sierra of Peru such educational tactics wouldn't be greeted so warmly by the general population, so us volunteers in the mountainous areas might have to be a little more tactful with our presentation of such ideas.

After 3 days of touring volunteers sites and chatting with health personnel in Tumbes I made a mad dash to get back to site to open the library during the town anniversary, yesterday the 17th of October. It took about two days to get home and I picked up the books (donated by the peruvian government) on the way back. As I hop off a truck, and finish the 20-hour trip back home, I walk straight into the whole municipality staff including the mayor as they are dressed very nicely and parading around the plaza. I on the other hand, looked very much as if I had just traveled 20 hours of buses over the last two days (with very little sleep). I was juggling various bags and boxes but I was able to snap a picture before scampering off to ditch my things in my room and set up the library for an opening ceremony that was going to take place that afternoon. A fellow volunteer James from a neighboring town came by to help me organize the library. We were able to get it done in time and set to waiting for people to show up, as I understood various important people from the community were going to show up as well as the mayor and a priest who was going to bless the books (something I never forget to do before reading my books :) ). The bummer of the deal is that I had to have a community member organize the ceremony while I was gone in Tumbes, community members aren't peace corps volunteers and usually have another job that takes up most of their time. This ceremony wasn't terribly well planned, the professor responsible for planning it showed up (after drinking a couple early afternoon beers), as well as a 2-3 other workers from the municipality but it was not enough to conduct the ceremony. So we're going to try again tomorrow afternoon and focus more on students than adults, the target population of the library is students anyways. I surprised myself by not really being that irritated that the ceremony fell through, I was actually relieved just to get the project finally (almost) completed. There has been rumors of repeating the project in a couple of the communities surrounding tacabamba, but we'll see if that actually comes together. I will hopefully have some pictures up of the completed library being used by students in the next few days. (Until then you guys can enjoy these wedding pics from a wedding I attended earlier this month.)

Today has been pretty calm, was able to clean up the room a bit as well as get some clothes washed that have been neglected for quite some time. Tomorrow will be quite a bit more busy, so I'm going to take advantage of the down time and knock out some reading.

Currently Reading: Crepúsculo (Twilight) By: Stephenine Meyer

Yep...same book...kinda sad...

So...guess it's been awhile

Well my last blog post was in July, and I've been quite a busy guy since then. Since my last post, I turned 24, ran my second marathon, passed our one year anniversary in Peru, attended two more bull fights, enjoyed my town party, as well as continued my work with hand washing education in town, self-esteem sessions in the elementary school, and very very slowly completing a library project.

Time has really been flying by but as much as I feel like I have grown accustomed to the life here I still have trouble with the slow pace of work here, this sentiment was recently exacerbated by the town party that we celebrated during the second week of september. This is the party that everyone has been talking about since I arrived in site (last december). It is officially to commemorate the town saint "Señor de la misericordia", but the manner in which they celebrate is drinking for about 6 days straight while holding rosaries and masses. There were also three days of bull fights and a concert by grupo 5 (one of the most famous music groups from peru). This coincided with my groups one year anniversary in peru and a few other volunteers came to my site to join in on the festivities. All in all it was really enjoyable, but it pretty much knocked out any possibility for work for about 3-4 weeks. In the week or so before the parties the whole town was occupied with preparations and any coordination that I had with the municipality (who organizes most of the fiesta) pretty much came to a halt. I was hoping to make house visits to a few families in the rural communities but I was told that they would not be home as it was sugar cane harvesting season, these families also wanted to take advantage of the town party to sell their sugar cane. Of course after the party the whole town took about a week to recover. I guess I'll know for next year, but it was still somewhat frustrating.

The good news is that things have been progressing quite well recently. The library is finally coming together. We have been working with a branch of the ministry of education that will provide us with the materials for a library (books, etc.) if we are able to find a space, equip it with tables and shelves, and find someone to attend to the library during working hours. Now this is something I have been working on for awhile now but that mainly involved listening to a carpenter give me various reasons why he couldn't finish the work. This carpenter kept blowing deadline after deadline but I couldn't feel like I could really get that angry because his name was jesus, and I think there is something wrong with yelling at jesus the carpenter. Eventually he finished the work and we were set to actually install them (nail them to the wall). I mosey on over to jesus' house to let him know we need his help, help that he agreed he would provide, to find that he had been drinking quite heavily and wouldn't be able to help us. Luckily the one other carpenter that I knew in town was able to throw in a hand and help us out. We're in the process of getting the last few things done and hopefully we will receive the materials from lima within a couple weeks.

In the next few months I will also be involved in a program called "familias saludables" (healthy families) which will be run in coordination with the health center. During the last two weeks we have been hiking out to the rural areas looking for families that want to participate. I found that it is much easier to go to the campo with the health center employees because I can fall back on them for explications if my spanish isn't doing all that hot that day. During these outings we have convinced about 15 families that they should participate in the program, it will involve a series of sessions addressing themes like hygiene (more hand washing!!), nutrition, and how to organize your house (to separate rooms, have soap at the ready, etc.)

I am quite content to be busy right now because I feel like I will be out of site for most of November as well as part of October. During the third week of October, a couple volunteers from the sierra will be traveling up to the costal department of Tumbes to visit some other volunteers and learn how to conduct sessions on HIV/AIDS education. Though the rate of AIDS prevalence is about on par with the United States, the knowledge of how STD's are transmitted is not as well understood here. For that reason Peru, and some Peace Corps Volunteers, have received funding from the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), a program that has been successful in many countries in Africa. Hopefully us mountain volunteers will be able to learn a few things to use in the sexual education sessions that many volunteers get involved in during their second year of service. The month of November seems to be already quite booked as well, between training a new group of volunteers, a leadership camp for adolescent males, medical checks in lima, and a trip to the southern peruvian city of Arequipa, I think I will be lucky to be in site for about a week in November. That'll be followed by a visit from the parents in December which I'm sure will be quite exciting, it'll be great to see some familiar faces and get out and enjoy the touristy side of Peru that us PCV's don't see too terribly often.

Alright, I think I'll wrap this up with my usual promise to start posting more and something new. I'm going to start including the current book that I'm reading on the bottom of each post. Hopefully this will encourage me to post more as well as read more, so that everyone doesn't think I have been reading Twilight for the last 3 months. I hope everyone is doing fantastic back in the states, enjoy ACL tomorrow if you're lucky enough to have gotten tickets.

Currently Reading: Crepúsculo (Twilight) By: Stephenine Meyer