I woke up, packed up all my stuff, and walked down to the school with Mishel. It was Mishel’s first day in my class and I was pretty curious how she would do, knowing how shy she is. At first, it was just Mishel, Samer, Lesly and Gladis. Gladis was new too, and Lorena was no where to be found. I was a little worried that my class was only going to have four people in it. We started out by going over what we’d already learned so the new people would at least have a little exposure. Mishel was so quiet and shy, that when I asked her to repeat something after me I couldn’t even hear her. I didn’t really know what to do about it.
I decided to make things fun that we would play musical chairs. The kid left standing had to answer a question, and if they got it wrong we removed a chair and they got to help me pick the color card to quiz the next “stander” on what it was called in English, I also let them push the space bar on my computer to stop the music. They had a lot of fun with the musical chairs game, and before we had even finished, three new boys I had never met before showed up. Darlyn, Hames, and José. Hames is the Peruvian version of James, which I find kind of strange. The three boys were rowdy, but also eager to participate, and given the amount of games we play in my class, their energy was a good thing when I managed to channel it.
We reviewed for the new boys and then went back to musical chairs for a while, which they loved, and it served a really effective game to teach everyone what we had already learned. We played the color wall game, except this time I turned it into a race, and the fast pace of it all was fun, entertaining, and also effective. They loved it and they learned a lot. We played the Knock game to review “What’s your name?” and “my name is ____.” They liked that too. We finished class by learning numbers 1-10.
I decided at the end of the class that if the three boys came back, my class was officially fun. They didn’t strike me as the kind of boys that would waste their time not having fun. As the boys walked up the hill to the main road, I heard them asking Samer, my star student, how to say “profesora” in Spanish, and then heard all four of them saying it out loud a bunch of times. I felt so warm and satisfied!
I walked to the health post after class and hung out for a little while, ate my lunch (peeled apple with peanut butter and a peach yogurt), and then Natalia and I went for a walk up towards the far district of Iraca Grande called Sacasacas. We dropped in to a few houses to do the surveys, or “encuestas”, that I designed. It was so much easier to have Natalia around. When I ask people the names of the people who live in their house, they spit them out SO fast, and it just sounds like balksdfkahbaljsfkj. I ask them to say it again, slower, and they say it at the same speed – awoeifjas;ldkjfaghalsdfj. Great. It’s usually something like Ismaiel Luzmenia Tarillo Vasquez or something ridiculous like that, because everyone has two last names, their Dad’s last name, and then their mom’s last name, and sometimes a middle name too. When Natalia is around, I ask for her help and she tells me slowly and clearly. It’s an incredible relief. Also, at the end of my survey I have a list of potential project ideas, and I have people rate their level of importance (not important, important, or very important) and let me know if they would be interested in participating. I figure it is a good way to start prioritizing project ideas, so I don’t get married to something early on and find out the community could care less. However, explaining things like self-esteem and environmental health on the spot to people who don’t know what they are is really hard. Having Natalia around to describe these things to people in terms they understand is so helpful and without a doubt is ensuring the success of my encuesta.
After visiting a few homes, we got three encuestas done and our socks and shoes soaking wet in the muddy fields we walked through. It was a seriously satisfying day in terms of progress. But, just to be a total show-off, I decided to wash my clothes when I got home. I felt significantly more proficient than the last time but still spent forever hand washing all my clothes. I hadn’t meant to leave so many clothes to be washed, but we hadn’t had water for three days before I left for Cajamarca, and it sort of piled up.
My host mom came home from a trip to Chota with a puppy, an adorable little sandy colored puppy with a black face. She was adorable, and had very clearly been abused. Apparently someone just gave her to Celina when she was in Chota. The puppy just sat between the door and the step of Celina and Samuel’s room and cowered anytime anyone came close to her. I gave her a bit of love, which she timidly accepted. Mishel decided to name her Chihuahua, which did not make me very happy. I’ve been calling her Chiquita because I can’t bring myself to call her Chihuaha. Chiquita just means “little girl”, but it’s better than nothing.
I did a survey that night with Celina, which was by far the easiest survey I’ve done because she magically understands me. It was great.
I felt like a really good Peace Corps volunteer.
Overall, a good day.
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