Lewis and Clarking It

Friday August 28, 2015

We arrived in Lima around 9am and made our way back to the Dragonfly Hostel. Check in wasn't until 2pm so we set out for our adventure to Barranco, a small resort area of Lima.

Following suggestions from a Vive Peru staff member, we sought out the Burrito Bar which she highly recommended. En route, we walked the shoreline then found the main plaza of Barranco. Similar to the Plaza de Armas in Trujillo, the buildings were painted in bright yellows, reds and blues. We came upon "Iglesia La Ermita". According to a local legend, one night a group of fishermen were lost at sea in dense fog. They prayed for salvation and a luminous cross appeared, guiding them back to shore. The Ermita church was built on the site where the cross allegedly appeared and since then has become the preferred church for fishermen. Although the church was nearly completely destroyed by invading Chilean troops in 1881, is has been rebuilt and is an interesting site to see.

                           
                         

                                                                                       
Employing the help of some locals, we found the unmarked Burrito bar, but had to wait for it to open. We took the time to walk down to the beach and through the streets lined with restaurants. This area reminded me of the houses in Charleston, big buildings with a lot of cast iron details and railings.

The Burrito bar lived up to the high recommendation. They were as big as our heads and weighed about 5 lbs a piece (that is an exaggeration). They served as our lone meal for the day.




After lunch, we wandered in search of the Galleria de Lucia, a public art museum. We came across the Chocolate Museum and I couldn't help but stop in. We went on the tour that taught us the entire process of making chocolate from the tree to the finished chocolate bar. For my little brother who memorized the Magic School Bus episode about this process when he was four, it would have been an excellent review. We tasted the cocoa beans at several stages in the process, and I'm not sure how someone managed to realized that the very bitter starting point could be turned into such a delicious end result, but I'm glad they did.



 We happened to visit several other art museums before we found the Lucia. It houses modern art displays in a beautiful building with intricate tiles.

On our walk back to the hostel we saw several paragliders who use the cliffs along the coast as their launch sites. It is incredible to watch them flip, twirls and navigate over the shore.

The lack of sleep from our bus ride caught up to us around dinner time and we settled into our room as we prepared to say goodbye to MC. She headed off to the airport with a few other Vive Peru volunteers around 6pm. Los Cuatros Estados Unidos has been reduced to just tres and we're terribly sad to see her go.

The night at the hostel was spent catching up on reading, trying some of the Peruvian homebrews the owner of the hostel makes and getting to bed early. Off to Cuzco in the morning!

The Grand Finale

Thursday August 27, 2015

Today is our final day with Vive Peru and in Trujillo!

Merci went all out at breakfast and made chicken sandwiches, fried plantains, quinoa soup and eggs. Served of course with bread, jelly/butter and coffee.

We completed a record four classrooms this morning at the high school. These students were a little bit younger (maybe 5th grade age) and were enthusiastic about participating. In total we gave out over 300 pairs of earplugs and educated 13 classes about audiology, basic physics of sound, anatomy and conservation. 

 

                                               

For lunch, we had salad and a chicken stew with rice.



After lunch we headed to El Centro del Adulto Mayor, a community center near the Plaza de Armas. We presented an abbreviated version of the audiology seminar to approximately 50 senior citizens. We talked generally about audiology, then diagnostics, ear health care, tinnitus and communication strategies. The audience was very eager to ask questions, and was grateful that we came to speak to them.

With that presentation, we are finished with our work with Vive Peru. It's been a great two weeks teaching and learning from the people of Trujillo. We want to thank Rachel, the Vive Peru Staff (especially Claudia, Claudette and Diego) for their patience with our Spanish skills and for welcoming us with open arms. We can't wait to come back next year and watch this trip continue to grow!

Merci made lomo saltado (beef and veggies) for dinner and Pacho cut up fruit with honey for dessert. It has been a wonderful experience staying with such a caring and happy host family. We were so fortunate that they opened up their home to us.



We got packed up and MC and I built a water bottle tour with all the bottles we've been stashing in our bedrooms over the past two weeks. We are boarding a nine hour bus ride at 10:30pm. Tomorrow we will be back in Lima to bid farewell to MC and then we're off to Cuzco!

Peruvian Fiesta

Wednesday August 26, 2015

((Birthday shoutout to my dad! Love you!))

It's already our second last day with Vive Peru! Time flies when you're having fun. We headed over to the office to meet Claudia after breakfast.

  

We presented for three classrooms today. They were a bit challenging this morning; middle school students can get rather talkative (who knew!) but we ultimately got through everything!


 

           
                                                      


I've been meaning to try Alfajores, a classic Peruvian caramel cookie, so we stopped at the bakery up the street on our way home for lunch. The cookie itself is similar to a butter cookie, and the center is dulce de leche or caramel. Both components are not nearly as sweet as they would be in the United States. They sell a variety of desserts that while they look incredible, still leave something to be desired in the sweetness department.





Lunch was soup with rice, beef and a vegetable medley of onions, peppers, broccoli and carrots.


In the afternoon we went out into the Senor de Los Milagros community in Trujillo. Although it was only several kilometers from where we are staying, it was an entirely different side of Peru that we have yet to see. There aren't landfills here for the garbage and the further outside of the city you go the more trash there is accumulating on the side of the road. It is shocking and saddening to see this area where people live.

The children that we saw were an entirely different story. Donning their Mickey Mouse, Frozen and Red Bank Elementary shirts, they were all smiles (not that that shows in the picture of me with two kids below; I promise they were smiling!). We started with our presentation on hearing health and then the other volunteers taught the children about digestion and the importance of eating fruits and vegetables.




In the evening, Vive Peru hosted a farewell dinner for their summer session volunteers. The three host families cooked for everyone and they hired traditional Peruvian dancers as entertainment. There was a set of dancers from the Northern Highland Region and another set from the Amazonian Jungle Region. After dinner, they played salsa music and the four of us tried our best to keep up ;)


 
                     Merci's son, Eluid, came along!

Pisco Tastes Like Listerine

Tuesday August 25, 2015

We got back into Trujillo around 9am. Merci made us a lovely late breakfast of eggs, bread and fried plantains.

We unpacked, showered, ran, slept, etc until we headed back to the high school to give another presentation. Today went well, the students were engaged and happy to participate. Our presentation is starting to run like a well-oiled machine and it continues to be fun to educate the students.



                                        

                                              

                                                                           

After the school, we went over to the National University of Trujillo to admire the longest mosaic mural wall in the world! Erected in the 1980's to keep out thieves, the wall was covered in graffiti and political statements until 1992. At that time famous artist Rafael Hastings was hired and set out to cover the 3km wall with approximately 30 million (1cm x 1cm) tiles at a cost of roughly 2 million soles. Peruvian and Moche history is depicted throughout the mural.

               
          
                       
                                   

                              

                                                                                  

We stopped in to get ice cream. After several samples we decided on cookies 'n cream, chocolate fudge brownie, green tea and coffee with almonds. All were delicious! :)

Merci's husband, Pacho, cooked us dinner tonight. We had a potato egg casserole, salted cucumbers, omelets and rice. For dessert, he served cut up fruit with pisco (a liquor) and honey drizzled over the top.

After several hours of working, I'm caught up on the blog so this one is going to actually be posted on the correct day! Thanks for everyone who's been following along and for your patience over the past weekend when wifi access was limited!
-To answer one question: the high school is public, but they do wear uniforms!

Tomorrow holds more high school presentations in the morning, then we are heading out into the community to work with a younger population. Hasta mañana!