Camaron is spanish for SHRIMP

8 June Monday
Wake up! Wake up! It´s sunny. We can´t be late for our 8:30 am meeting with the mayor of Tambo de Mora. We arrive at 8:35am. Of course, no mayor – but there are already other people to see him. We wait awhile, then decide to visit the director of the school to see if we can´t schedule a time for our class. No director yet – but there are kids in the classrooms. Let´s try the mayor. Still no mayor – more people in line. So, we decided to track down ASPEm, an NGO that is one of the few that continues to maintain a presence in Tambo de Mora´s reconstruction. Giorgio, tall and amiable, answers the door, (Italian NGO) and offers us pizza. Not actually, instead he informs us that the more spanish-fluent bulk of the ASPEm team is arriving around 3pm. Cool.

Then, Josie (JOE - ZEE) calls. Josie (aka Jose Cano MIT ´09) is on his way to Chincha! Josie just graduated and will be joining us to help with the project and add another Spanish-speaking personality to our fun. Our fun. So now we have to go pick him up at the bus stop and buy him a bike. But not yet. Its only 11am. And everyone who is at work now takes a lunch break, which is interesting if you don´t arrive at work till after 11am...

Anyways, we decide to make our first self-made batch of quaker (quwah-kehr), the local name for a warm oatmeal drink, and eat a breakfast of 8 little breads, cheese, 2 bananas, and pecans. Including the quaker, the breakfast cost us around $1.

To make use of our trip to pick up Josie we decide to include stops at the school, the mayor´s, the newspaper shop, CARE, and FORSUR. First, the school. 5 minutes later we are certified 11th grade teachers with a class slot on Tuesday and on Friday for this week. Next, the mayor. 30 minutes later and we finally get to see him. He doesn´t mention standing us up this morning. Just a smile adorning a reassuring, yet political, face. He´s gone tomorrow. We reschedule for Wednesday morning at 9am. Likely story, but like we have a choice. Next stop is the newspaper shop. Our class is about Videographic Journalism – how to tell an informative story with video. The newspapers will serve as practice sources for their real assignment, which is to unveil a story from the community about reconstruction after the earthquake. 5 papers sound good. Look good. Ok.

Next and also least important stop is Josie. He has 2 bags. Both blue. He has a tent and a sleeping bag, though, so it seems he´s serious about this living with less thing. We take him to the bike shop and he gets a yellow and black bike. We buy starving Josie lunch. $5 meal – for all of us. Before leaving the big (23,000 people) we buy plantain, bread, bananas and cheese, affectionately known as ¨staples¨, at the market.

We stop by CARE, but they don´t love us. It seems NGOs, no organizations in general, don´t like us unless we have some relationship with the particular person we are talking to. Short story, no one answers at the office and even when a worker comes by they don´t know our CARE contact from Huancavelica so we get brushed off. Oh well, we´ll be back. FORSUR is even better. They are government, but so involved in the reconstruction (created to manage the reconstruction) and supposedly working really close with NGOs, etc, that we feel obligated to get as much info from them as possible. But no, we are informed that in order to meet with them we must have the interview approved by the communication branch in ICA. What they don´t know is that saying ¨no¨ to us makes us enjoy the ¨Ok, I give up. You win¨ all the more.

After returning, we head over to ASPEm and get to meet Rocio, Gina, and one other – all very nice people (kind of destroying our hypothesis that prior relationships are necessary). Within 10 minutes we are put on the phone with the director for the last two projects and schedule an appointment for Thursday 9am. We also set up a meeting with the director for the current project Tuesday at 2:30pm. This project involves 5 different distritos (municipalities).

Josie spends the afternoon fixing his new bike´s derailler tension rod. He may return it entirely tomorrow. Upon finishing, he rewards himself with 3 ice creams, 2 bags of chips, and a liter of coca-cola. After that our work for the day is done. Except for preparing for the class by making a sample of what we will ask the students to do. That will be done after dinner. Our goal is to not have chicken or french fries. Unfortunately our search produces nothing else substantial besides some rice to accompany the two staples. Josie is ok with it though – for now.

I hope tomorrow is sunny as well.


7 June Sunday
We tried to eat a small breakfast. The idea of a light meal just does not exist here. We ended up with an orange, two eggs, a platano, 3 rolls of bread, a cup of tea, and an avocado. EACH. This place is so ridiculous. The food blows me away every single day we're here. Our ride to Tambo de Mora is surprisingly easy despite our packs. Adam's backpack is huge. Mine is really tiny compared to his. But there's a rack on the back of my bike where we can fit extra stuff like blankets and smaller bags. Our bikes are holding up surprisingly well.

In Tambo de Mora, we scope out places to stay for the week. There's this elusive two story hotel that everyone keeps telling us about but we just can't find. One place doesn't have beds. The last one we look at (and we only look at two) is cheaper and seems much more homely. We end up with a small room whose floor space is 85% bed. There's hardly even a way to walk to the bathroom from the front door. But the sun outside is shining, the clotheslines are full, and the people are friendly about our week long stay. The streets outside are bubbling with kids. There are a couple of street food vendors too. We work on our curriculum more, firming up the details, and getting ready to propose our class to the school directors tomorrow.



6 June Saturday
Today we decide that it's time to move to Tambo de Mora in order to be closer to our work. We get all packed for tomorrow, think about our cirriculum for the school there, and tell our hosts. Instead of leaving today, we hang out a little bit with Choche and his family to show them our thanks. Intermittently, we work on the curriculum. Trying to teach takes a lot of planning. Thanks to all my teachers. What a chore. Geez. Anyways, we play some soccer, chat more with the fam, and finally turn in for our early start tomorrow.


5 June Friday
This morning with decided to go to Tambo de Mora to set up an appointment with the mayor. In the morning, we made platanos (again, oh sweet platanos) with some eggs. Yesterday, we made watermelon juice for our host family and picked up bread in the morning. The bakeries here are quality. It's really nice to wake up in the morning to buy bread that you know was made while you were still sleeping, all warm and fresh. We rode our bikes to Tambo de Mora from Sunampe through sand patches and piles of trash. The streets were almost entirely empty. The school looked abandoned. We rode through the town without encountering more than a handful of people. As we approached the municipal building, we heard a crowd. Then we realized that today was el Día de la Bandera (flag day). The schools all participated in a parade through their towns, marching proudly in really weird sweatsuits while the announcer kept shouting that this was the future of Peru. Right here, in front of our very eyes, passed the bright and shining days to come. This, he cried, is potential. This is our future! The mayor had told us to come at 10am to chat. At 9:45, he has just gone to mass. So we came back and here he was making a speech about the reconstruction that was going to take place soon in the main square. Apparently, he is a pretty busy guy. So we took him to the side after his speech and asked for an appointment on Monday at 9am. He agreed, so we sipped on some Inca Cola (bubble gum tasting soda that's the pride of Peru) and munched galletas on the side of the street as the future passed before our eyes. Again. As the teachers grouped together, we inch closer to their gossip circle. We interrupt to ask for a meeting with the director. They agree to meet with us this Monday morning.

ITDG was facilitating a meeting for the delegates of the El Carmen district at 3pm so we decided to attend the reunion to see exactly how it was done. The city was pretty far off the beaten path, and we rode for a good 40 minutes before we even got to see the town. Peruvian time is so off. The meeting started an hour after it was scheduled. So in the meantime, we surveyed the audience to see exactly how they had been invited. Most of the important people had been given paper invitations. These were the delegates of the region. Others ranged from word-of-mouth, overhearing it at a tienda, and just knowing through a flyer advertisement. The meeting was planned as an attempt to organize the priorities that the representatives presented to the mayor. This way they could decide on the common issues rather than fighting for money by region.

The meeting was much more quiet than ITDG had imagined it would be. Typically, there is a lot of fighting to get one opinion to sit higher than others. Sometimes there's pretty serious shouting. But this time, there is just passionate yelling that doesn't intend to cut others off but sometimes does by accident. Everyone spoke fairly articulately, sometimes meandering from the main point, but for the most part with focus and intent. The NGO is meant to act as a mediator, trying to help the representatives put their thoughts into a more organized matrix that can be easily communicated to others. The matrix includes “problem,” “organizations involved or capable of being involved,” “alternate options,” and “affected community.”This physical piece of paper is a good way for everyone to visualize and prioritize the community's needs.

The meeting involves a late dinner which helps to keep everyone in a good mood. ITDG is really good at hosting these things from what we've seen so far. It's going to be interesting to see how other NGOs conduct themselves.