Hilarious

I was looking through my blog stats and one of the search terms used to find my blog was, "black roach beetles everywhere."

At the Hardware Store

Would you like to buy some nuts? bolts? washers? googly eyes?

How about some nails?  Or body perfumes marketed for tweens?  Or whatever it is in this discreet fuscia box that says “vibrating moments”?

Feels Like...

It`s incredible how evocative weather can be.  The temperature, the smells..  Last week, it felt just like a day to put on a sweater and go bike riding around Peace Valley, then go to Kohler farm to feed the goats and maybe buy some late plums.

Recently, it`s felt like the days before Christmas.  Bundly, cloudy, and a little wet, like it might snow in a few days.  The kind of day to go Christmas tree shopping and come home smelling like pine with resin on my hands.  Then watch a Charlie Brown Christmas with cocoa.  

Speaking of which, I`m already way too excited to come home for Christmas.  I`ll find myself fantasizing about it sometimes on long car rides.  All the warmth, family, food and traditions.  Making sugar cookies and being surly during the Christmas card picture.  It will be so wonderful.  And I`m already more than halfway there!  I`m excited to see all the things I can do here in Peru before then.

It may be a while until my next post.  Monday I leave for Huaraz in the mountains for In Service Training.  After that is a bicycle maintanence and then a cocinas mejoradas workshop.  I`m so excited to learn and work with my hands.  After all that, a handful of us are doing the famous Huayhuash trek in the Cordillera Blanca (if my vacation is approved).  It`s all going to be so great that I can hardly contain myself.  Then I can come back to site and get cracking on all the budding projects I have. 

This Evening

It started out with our regional meeting.  We're in Huancayo and all the volunteers from Junin, Pasco, and Yauyos get together.  We all sat down to talk drinking mediocre wine or worse beer.  The meeting lasted several hours and there were some tears this time.  It's incredible that we can feel so lonely and alienated at site and come to the meetings to find a group of people who understand completely and have had every feeling that I've had at one time or another.


We weren't done until late and finally headed out at 9 or so.  It turns out that it's Huancayo's anniversary, and we stumbled into a big crowd with a different band every 10 yards or so in the central plaza.  It was too late and rushed for a sit-down meal, so I had grilled beef heart on a stick with a potato on the end from a street vendor for dinner.  We watched real fireworks that were shot off way too close to the ground, occasionally ducking a smoldering bit of plastic or ash.  


Newly, proteined-up, it was time to hit the discoteca.  I danced cumbia and reggaeton with a few men my size and others who came up to my nose or chin.


"Hi Hector, my name is Beyonce.  Yes, I know I'm sweaty.  I am married, thanks for asking. My husband is a lumberjack and he lives in provencia with  me."  


Now it's 2:24 in the morning.  I promise I'm not drunk-blogging.  Any alcohol in my system was danced out several hours ago.  I was just thinking that if you asked me a year ago what my life in Peace Corps would be like, I would've gotten a few things right, but the picture would have lacked most of its depth and ridiculousness.