First Up: Tambogrande, Piura and a Smidge of Ecuador It continues to amaze me how diverse Peru is, within each of its regions; different forms of dress, language, physical features and customs. The first week of my vacation I was more than ready to jump on that 15-hour bus with Sister Maria Laura and my friend, Jeny, to Piura. How exciting- my first vacation! The ride wasn’t too bad, with its semi-cama seats, snacks, drinks, meals and videos. Throw in some time for sleeping and I was set! Luck have it, Sister Marleny arranged for us to get a ride to the house in Tambogrande. From our views from the car, we got to see what makes up the majority of Piura: the chakras and produce (and lots and lots of sacks of limes!) What a lovely change from the combis, gas and overall noise of Lima.
The Sisters’ house in Tambogrande is lovely, big with a garden in the center of the house where you can lounge in a hammock to take in the sun (it’s sunny everyday!) and with a huge backyard full of pomegranate, mango and lime trees. Though life there is much different than here; most of the time I spent in the house, I never saw any of the Sisters. They are busy running around and serving the community in all the different campos. The second day there, Sister Marleny took us to visit many of the Fe y Alegria schools in the countryside’s. In the car, we bounced like Conejos on the rough, dirt roads as we made our way up the mountain, seeing a dozen or so schools- ranging from basic one-brick buildings’ to schools that taught agriculture, complimented with organic plots, a part that created fertilized dirt, a system for irrigation to use less water for plants and even barn to raise cuy (guinea pig)! It was great seeing all the different schools and even meeting some students.
The views were amazing. I think I took pictures of almost every animal that we passed. We were invited to an all natural, home cooked lunch of mote con queso de cabra (corn with goat cheese).
After, as I took pictures of all their animals, they smiled and laughed at me as I used the excuse, “I’m like a Japanese tourist.” To me, donkeys pulling carts, herds of sheep and baby goats were exotic!
I loved Tambogrande, a small town where you could view the entire city from El Mirador, left to right, north to south. And I can’t complain about it being sunny all the time. I even got to experience the señor who has taken it onto himself to play his radio and make his announcement on speakerphone at around 6 every morning. I could imagine myself serving in Tambogrande, except for the crazy hot weather. Even in winter, the sun ironed down and we were sweating! I can’t imagine how it is in its warm season!
I loved Tambogrande, a small town where you could view the entire city from El Mirador, left to right, north to south. And I can’t complain about it being sunny all the time. I even got to experience the señor who has taken it onto himself to play his radio and make his announcement on speakerphone at around 6 every morning. I could imagine myself serving in Tambogrande, except for the crazy hot weather. Even in winter, the sun ironed down and we were sweating! I can’t imagine how it is in its warm season!
So my highlights and major happenings of this week were:
-Seeing the Fe y Alegrias in the beautiful campo settings, as well as the river house
-Trying the Algarrobina drink- yummy! (Algarrobina is a syrup like substance made from the Black Carob tree that people put in drinks). We also saw the oldest Algarrobina tree called “El Rey” that is 100 years old!
-Being called Keiko (past President Alberto Fujimori’s daughter, who is running for president for 2011)by everyone when we went to the market in Tambogrande
-The hours and hours spent on buses (seemed like 50% of our trip)
-Going to the border town of Macara, Ecuador and simply walking across the border, without showing anything, only answering “SI” when the guards asked us if we were “paseando” and later Loja, Ecuador. Only to be told when we tried to enter back into Peru that we had entered “illegally,” the first guards laughing at us, brushing it off because we girls were simply just silly and were not doing anything shady. We had no idea because when we walked past our first day, there was no office or anything we could see to get stamped. However, the second security threatening us that we did something terrible and threatening me, putting me on the “list” for if I did anything a second time. Apparently, it would have been ok if we had just stayed in Macara instead of going to Loja. Haha.
-The way that people spoke like they were singing their words in Piura.
-Trying the Algarrobina drink- yummy! (Algarrobina is a syrup like substance made from the Black Carob tree that people put in drinks). We also saw the oldest Algarrobina tree called “El Rey” that is 100 years old!
-Being called Keiko (past President Alberto Fujimori’s daughter, who is running for president for 2011)by everyone when we went to the market in Tambogrande
-The hours and hours spent on buses (seemed like 50% of our trip)
-Going to the border town of Macara, Ecuador and simply walking across the border, without showing anything, only answering “SI” when the guards asked us if we were “paseando” and later Loja, Ecuador. Only to be told when we tried to enter back into Peru that we had entered “illegally,” the first guards laughing at us, brushing it off because we girls were simply just silly and were not doing anything shady. We had no idea because when we walked past our first day, there was no office or anything we could see to get stamped. However, the second security threatening us that we did something terrible and threatening me, putting me on the “list” for if I did anything a second time. Apparently, it would have been ok if we had just stayed in Macara instead of going to Loja. Haha.
-The way that people spoke like they were singing their words in Piura.
Check out my pictures at: http://picasaweb.google.com/107425425446859607474/FirstWeekOfFiestasPatriasVacation?feat=directlink
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