COUNTRY: Peru
PROGRAM: GapBreak
PROJECT: Teaching & Building
WRITTEN BY: Tricia Martin
People accounted for: 9
Clinic visits:3
Brownies consumed: 32ish
Llama jumpers bought: lots
Who would of thought that travelling half way around the world would result in us fitting so many job descriptions... We are teachers , students, plasters, tradesmen, travellers, daughters, sons, brothers, sisters,gringos/ targets and "ooo you are Australians? In that case 35 soles for the bag ..no less". With nearly 6 weeks under our belt it feels like Cusco and our town of San Jeronimo is gradually morphing into home. Creature comforts are slowly being uncovered such as heavenly vanilla milkshakes, hot showers, movie nights, alpaca slippers and the movie napoleon dynamite ... In Spanish.
We have begun a new teaching timetable in the past two weeks which have allowed more time for art and regrettably for the unfit (yours truly) PE . The kids have loved making crafts from colourful masks, caterpillars to Mother's Day cards! PE is a different story however.... Three Laps of the small soccer field and Leia, Nathan and I are lying on the floor gasping for air while the kids jump around happily shouting " football football football". Another successful lesson involved high jump which resulted in hoola hooping and pulling the kids as they layed on mattresses!
Construction was interesting when attempting plastering which pretty
much involved throwing white liquid at the roof( hoping for the best) only for it to fall back in our faces!
We have also fitted in some paintballing while we have been here just on the outskirts of Cusco! It was a nice break with highlights being Cat's army rolling and Alex's macho moves... Catching his army uniform on a nail and being flung backwards gun and all.
The most exciting event over the past two weeks has been out first travel adventure to Huacachina near Ica. Regrettably however we had to leave Marianna who was diagnosed with pretty everything under the sun... Doctor victor thought it was best that she rest up.
Some of us nearly ended up in the clinic after the bus ride from Cusco to Nazca which was interesting.... The only thing I could compare it to was the London bus off Harry potter 3 (minus the weird voodo head) twisting and swerving around every corner. At one point I swore we were going to tip over.
When we arrived in Nazca Alex once again demonstrated his skills as a human GPS indicating to the driver to go straight .... Even though there was only one long road ahead for about 5 km.
The oasis that we finally arrived at was beautiful! Surrounded by steep and endless dunes and some hot weather! The Saturday involved a sandduning tour where we swerved and boarded down the dunes. Both Nick and Nathan decided to risk the extreme option, sand boarding down the dunes. Although Nathan initially rolled down the slopes towards the end he swerved down them like extreme sports was his life purpose. Liz also participated in extreme 'duning' but in her own style, falling off
her board and executing 6 rolls perfectly - a 10/10 score in my books. As part of the tour we got to see the sun set over the desert where we seized the opportunity and made a remake of the Lion king which, for your pleasure, will be released in late 2013.
Sunday was cruise day which we were all keen for. We hopped on a bus wearing shorts and singlets arriving to cloudy skies, grey seas and cold weather ( lucky Freya had her sun hat to protect her from rain ). The cruise ( sitting in a speedboat) was improved by our friendly tour guide whose English was indistinguishable from Spanish. He took a liking to Alex however who was hanging his head over the boat, sea sick repeatedly asking him to pay attention and look
at the extraordinary bird with the "red beak !!"
Another fun fact that we learnt from the tour guide ( via an Irish guy who could speak Irish sounding Spanish) was that sea lions have Syphilis... Who knew?
After our cruise we were so cold that we undertook a search and destroy mission for hot chocolate which was a massive success for all involved. We were then loaded onto a bus travelling to the Reserva nacional de paracas....A spectacular expanse of red desert that met the coast (sort of the equivalent landscape to the 1970s version of planet of the apes. )Here we explored fossils ( Freya taking a liking to an otters skull that for some reason she still has), skipped stones on the beach and had lunch at a small fishing town.
As we missed two days of work from our trip we were keen to get back into construction and teaching. The highlight of the week however was the Mother's Day fete at the school with the madres of the students welcomed in with confetti and cheers .As part of the festivities we got
To watch the children dance, recite poetry and give hand made craft to their mums. We even got to do a performance which involved the nutbush, the lion sleeps tonight ( Alex and a little kindy who we have named " Dennis the menice" acting as sleeping lions) and finally the bush dance ( to a wiggles song) , the latter a major fail as we kept on bumping into each other and spinning the wrong way!
The day was made even more sweet with chocolate cake and traditionally cooked potatoes complete with grub insects that nico said enhanced the texture :S
On that note I would like to wish all our mothers a lovely and relaxed Mother's Day. We miss you a lot including your home cooking ( Liz's mum apparently makes the best Oreo cheesecake), laughs, hugs and kisses.
So there you have it we are alive, happy, and are officially Aussie cusquenians!!
Hasta la vista and llama love
Tricia. II
< • ) ( )-- II II
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