hasta the big city

After a long day of transit, we all finally arrived in Iquitos on Friday night. I stayed with the four girls from the NGO´s and the boys stayed at another hostel together since there wasn´t enough room at ours. Friday night we all went out to taste a bit of the nightlife in Iquito which was interesting. We even invited the tour guide, Wilder, to come out with us, but he didn´t last that long. Ryan and I passed the night debating in the discoteque with Flor, the extremely passionate Argentinian, about various political sentiments from South Americans towards people in the EE.UU...Wow. When you are so completely immersed in US culture it is almost impossible to view the states from an alternative perspective. And being a proclaimed liberal, it has been hard for me to find a sense of patriotism for my country as I travel abroad. We have met so many people that truly support and love their countries, but I often find it hard to defend and support the country I come from. For Ryan and I; we sometimes view ourselves as a reflection of our country, but we often times catch ourselves hoping that people think we are from somewhere else.Not that we travel as representatives, but we are from the states, and most people outside the US do not think highly of estadounidenses (people from the states - not Americans. American implies south and north.). But Flor reminded us both that night, not to worry about the perspective so much and focus rather on what we are doing here, now.


The next day, a group of us went to the mariposarillo, which is a refuge for animals and of course a sanitarium for butterflies. We walked around and the monkeys freely grab onto you or try to take off your earrings.The parrots squaked and we watched a leopard knaw away at some meat. There were some fiesty crocodiles, too. They rushed along our tour, since we had arrived at closing time and they were doing us a favor by even giving us the tour to begin with. So we headed back to our boat to head back to Iquitos. The driver of our thatched roof motor boat, told us about a serpentario, that he could take us to to see some anacondas, so we headed there. These animals, which looked like they were not as well kept as in the mariposarillo. Nonetheless, they were being fed and while they didn´t look content, at least I didn´t see any abusive behavior while we were there.... But we saw some amazing animals there - most of which I dont know the names of. But there were a bunch of monkeys flailing around, an anaconda, a boa constrictor, some turtles, the largest rat I have ever seen, an eel, an adorable sloth, and even a baby alligator that I got to hold. All in all, a pretty interesting day. We headed back to Iquitos for our last night before we would all fly into Lima.

Sunday, the boys and myself took a flight to Lima, Peru. Flor, had offered to let us crash at her house for as long as we wanted. She has a beautiful apartment in Miraflores - an upper class and super wealthy district of Lima, that borders the ocean. I´ve been staying at her place now for about three weeks. It is amazing how accomodating Flor has been to us all. She is unbelievably inspiring and passionate, and super easy going. So the fact that we all stayed at her place - doesnt bother her at all. Its great especially since Lima is much more expensive - being a big city and all.
So since we have been here, a lot has happened... Ryan took off for a week to go to visit is family in Buenos Aires for his grandmother´s 80th birthday. I stayed here with the two Israeli boys - Dennis went to Cuzco to do Machu Picchu before he ran out of time. We mostly just got to know the area of Miraflores. And one of the days, I went and stayed with Veronica (the peruvian who we met with Flor in the jungle). She is a preschool teacher at a private school and she took me with her when the class went on a fieldtrip to the zoo. Her class was adorable. She has about 10 students that are between the ages of 4 and 5. So helped out for the day as we scaled the zoo, which for Veronica and I, after just getting back from the jungle, was a little sad. The animals were all kept in small cages and seemed to be stuck out in the sun with very little food and water. It was pretty upsetting, so I mostly put my focus on the kids. Later that day, Veronica took me to La Universidad Catolica de Peru, which has a gorgeous campus- it´s private. It has an enormous amount of security, which was necessary after some horrible acts of terrorism a couple years back. But once you walk in, there are deer and ducks and birds, laying on the grass and sun tanning(the sun really never shines in Lima, it is cloudy almost every day)...The buildings are pristine and new and the class I went into with Veronica was great. We learned pantomime - something I never thought would be taught in a university class about education for children. But it was definitely fun, and it made me miss college in a way I didn´t think would happen just yet.

Otherwise, Ryan got back and for the past week, we´ve been getting to know Lima more and more. We spent a day at el museo de la nacion, which had an amazing exhibit called Yuyanapaq about the terrorism in Peru from the 1980´s until 2000. I learned about the exhibit in one of my classes, so I thought it would be a good experience to see it in person. And I really enjoyed it. Otherwise, Ryan and I did some shopping in the market Polvos Azules and the surrounding area of Ayucucho. So we´ve been spending a lot of time hanging around and going out with Flor and Veronica and their group of friends here - which are all amazing. Most of them are involved in the NGO with Flor, but they are work in separate apects of the organization.

Throughout last week, Ryan and I had been talking to Flor about possibly doing some work with Progressio, the NGO, while we are staying in Lima. So after she talked to her boss, and then we met with her boss, Ryan and I are now volunteering for Progressio. It is a UK based non-profit organization, that has sites throughout the world. We were lucky enough to stumble upon Flor, because she has definitely opened the doors to the world of NGO´s.
The site, which I advise you all to check out is this: www.progressio.org.uk
There is a part that talks about one organization in Lima called EDUCA. That is the specific organization that Ryan and I wil be working for and with.

The poorest district in all of Lima, San Juan de Lurigancho, houses the largest population of the city - one million. There, EDUCA has cooperatives with various projects. Ryan and I will be working with a cooperative named Diana who works with an amazing group of women. We went Friday to meet them and get to know them before we start our project. Nela, the head of Progressio, told us that she wants our help in terms of documenting the current projects. Ryan will be photographing and I am going to write some articles that hopefully will be published in their newsletter. There is no guarantee of anything right now, but I think Progressio is happy to have some volunteers in any case. And Ryan and I are ecstatic that we can finally use our talents or skills for something. Plus, I love the idea of having a job. In some weird way I was missing a bit of structure in my life. But either way, we will be doing something good for these women in the community of San Juan de Lurigancho, for Progressio and EDUCA, and also for ourselves. So I am definitely excited to start. I will write more when I know more about what we will be doing exactly - we are working every day this week so hopefully by the end of the week.

Otherwise, sorry for the short and choppy entry, but its been pretty hectic every since we got here. Hopefully, now with a bit of structure, I will get my bearings back - and maybe even my writing skills as well.... :)

Miss you all.