piscopiscoPISCO

First off, here is that picture that wouldn't load last time.

Second off, here is a picture of the rickshaw. Yah, Suprio! Dhaval!
Here are some pictures to accompany the last post:


In other news, the documentary is starting to come together. It is in eight separate parts right now. Most of them (6/8) are done in their “long version.” Later, we will have to come back and really slice and dice it down.

The water tower is so that all the houses can finally have running water. Dishes, toilets, clothes... everything will be able to have a hook-up. Since our homestay family probably doesn´t have a land title for the property they are on, I doubt that they will have one. On Sunday, we moved in. Our homestay grandma told us that so long as she is alive, we will have a room to stay in. The house is really big, but I suppose that it should be expected when you have 12 children. Now they´re all grown and only Juan, Laura, and Celia are living here. Here is a new addition to the family:
In the picture below, Rosa and Marcela are making ¨olmita¨ which is this delicious mix of ground corn, sugar, cinnamon, clove, and some butter. Then they put it inside of cleaned corn husks and boil it in a large pot. We made up some corn shellers to aid in the process and realized some of their flaws and theorized how to make them better.

The texture changes from mushy baby food to tamale texture. It´s a great breakfast food with some steaming hot quaker (for those of you just tuning in, that´s like a really viscous oatmeal drink)

Brooke was down with a fever for a bit, but totally revived by some hot tea and rest for the morning. Meanwhile, Adam chopped up the tree in the front yard alongside Edwin. They are spiky trees.


Yesterday we worked in the casita all day long (10am until 8pm) with a short lunch break. During our lunch break, we showed Marcela and Juan how to work the drip irrigation kit that we struggled so hard to bring from India.

We showed the kids that dropped by what we were working on and some of their random videos. Afterwards, we gave them a compilation of all of their documentaries on DVDs. They gave us some nice feedback about how their NGOs came across (Henry Flores of the United Nations Program for Development was too ¨austere and mean looking¨) and what they thought was missing. There is a clip of Marcela (our homestay grandma) cutting apart a tree with a machete. The voice over says: ¨Our family woke up early and worked hard all day.¨ One of our students commented, ¨A lot of people get up much earlier and go work in the farm. And that´s hard work.¨ More than anything, they said that the culture just wasn´t there. So we lent them some flipcams for while we´re in Ecuador so they can record a short film of ¨the way of life¨ in Manco Capac is. But now, we´re packing and off....