A Trip Up North!

         Who would have thought that a trip to Ecuador would be so eventful?  It was one of the funnest, most random trips of my life and I learned a lot about Peru. Here are the first fifteen things I can think of that I learned on this trip. First, public bathrooms are very different here. They don’t have toilet paper, unless you want to pay, or toilet seats or soap. Second, you can wait in bus stations for hours and still find ways to entertain yourself. Third, granadillas look like alien eggs.

         Fourth unofficial buses have cockroaches and people sleeping in your seat. Fifth, Moncora has really cool hotels where you feel like you’re in a bungalow! 

         Sixth, they eat ceviche, raw fish, for breakfast and as a side for every other meal and they think it’s weird when you don’t like fish. Seventh, banana French fries are amazing! Eighth, we’re a lot closer to the sun so it’s entirely possible to burn every part of your body so you feel like every movement causes pain. Sunscreen lesson learned…I will always carry spf 50 with me from now on. Ninth, there is no border patrol between Ecuador and Peru you can just walk from the sign saying “thanks for visiting Peru” to “welcome to Ecuador” without anyone checking your passport. 

         Tenth, you can buy mini monkeys, puppies, goats, birds, or squirrels in the markets near the border. 

         Eleventh, when you say “welcome to the island” in Spanish for a commercial on a sinking island you get paid in free banana fries and Pepsi! Twelfth, Punta Sal is the prettiest beach I’ve ever been too even though waves unexpectedly came up and attacked us when we were eating lunch on the beach and carried our salad away.

          Thirteenth, Peruvian movies on cheap buses have really bad acting and are a little too dramatic. Fourteenth, this country was not made for tall people which is really unlucky for me. My legs seem to find the back of bus seats easily and my head likes to hit the roof of every combi or taxi I get in. 

          And finally, moto taxis are really as fun as they look! Thanks to the Castillos, we had an amazing trip and we got to see a whole different side of Peru!

Peace and Blessings…Peace and Blessings!- (high five for the first person to guess what that’s from)

Love always,

Carrie Ann

These are a few of my favorite things!

Yo quieres Jugamos- Katie : translation for those who don’t speak Spanish ( I you want we play).

This past week at the Aldea was really long and really short at the same time. We only spent three days at the Aldea because today we are leaving to travel up north to some beaches and also, cross your fingers, to Ecuador!!! Here are the best parts of this week in pictures: 

Maria Luisa wishing she was the one going to school

Jose: the boy that I'm stealing

Renzo on a good day

Natalie and Katie's birthday cake made by house 1. They got multiple eggs smashed on their heads and 2 cakes shoved in their faces.

Jenny's last day :(

I whip my hair back and forth P.S Julia my favorite intern cut my hair

Pocahontas and John Smith aka Carrie and Alfredo

Us with our blue princes!

Dina the Diva

"I'm flying!"-Antonina

*subtitles by Julia and Katie

Love always,

Carrie

Mi Corazon se encuentra en Peru

There is no fear in love but perfect love casteth out fear - 1 John 4:18

Peru Peru Peru, oh how I will miss you when I leave. Seriously I come home in like 3 and a half weeks…that’s CRAZY! I feel like I’ve learned so much in this country about myself and about how blessed I am with the life I have back in the states. I definitely won’t take some things for granted..especially: internet, toilet seats, hot water, being able to drink water out of the faucet, being able to make my own food, my family, my schooling, and the lack of cock roaches.  I feel like this experience has taught me a lot about patience I mean you have to have patience to go anywhere new really but especially with children and a country that runs an hour behind from when you say you’re going to leave or arrive to when you actually do. And even though it stinks still not knowing everything in Spanish, it’s been a good experience in teaching me patience and boy is it humbling. Let’s tack on that list learning how to stomach fish and other things I’d never eat in the states…like chicken gizzard, we are still mystified as to the purpose of this organ but maybe I’ll just wait until I get home to find out, when I’m safely away from having to eat it again. I find that’s how I am here I’ll try whatever and ask later, it’s better not to know sometimes. But in all seriousness I feel like the most important thing I’ve learned here is how to better love. I seriously love those children at the Aldea and they’ve made me realize how lucky I am to have a family who loves me and does so much for me. So family, I LOVE YOU and thanks for everything you have done for me and continue to do for me!

                This past week we started working in the office as secretaries, we basically just sort papers in the kid’s folders and sometimes you have to draw 180 pages worth of red lines a specific distance apart but that might have just been my experience. We’ve been able to learn a lot about the kids this way. Before I feel like we were almost naive in our view of why most of these kids were at the Aldea. We the thought that because a lot of the kids had visits that they were here simply because their families could no longer take care of them and so they had families that still wanted them but that had to save up money first. 

                 This however isn’t the case for most of the kids. A lot of the kids were abused and not by strangers but by their own families or neglected and left starving to take care of themselves. Others had to take over for their parents and act way older than their age to try to take care of younger siblings. Some had parents who left them in hospitals, some get taken away from their siblings, some had to work to make money at only 10 years old and some end up at the Aldea with no knowledge of their last name, their age, what year or month it is, or why those things are even important. Most of them wouldn’t ever tell you but they struggle each and every day with the idea that they are worth something more than what they’ve been through. 

               And most surprising to me is how much they want to return to those same situations, to parents who hit them or left them to starve when they’re the ones who are supposed to protect you from pain and sorrow and fear.  How many of the kids have tried to run away back to those situations or who talk about their parents coming to get them again like it’s the most important thing to them. I guess unconditional love is stronger than I thought and that’s what I think gives me some hope, the fact that those kids can go through so much and still love those who harmed them. If we had more people like them in this world maybe we’d all be a lot better off and maybe just maybe those people in the world who caused the harm would realize who they’re really hurting. I am so grateful for the hope you see in these kids and for how much they make me want to change to become better.

Love always,

Carrie

Estoy en Cajamarca!

So...we're in Cajamarca this weekend! After a six hour bus ride, living off candy for dinner, we made it to Cajamarca where we met up with the other volunteers from Southern Cross that are living at El Bichito. It's so pretty here! There are more mountains and green grass then I've seen so far in Peru and I love it. Also, the women here wear the traditional peruvian clothing with the skirts and the big hats and they walk their cows around on the streets. It's basically amazing and the other volunteers are lovely! I can't wait to travel up north more next week. Sorry but my blogs won't be very long if at all for the next little bit because I won't really have a computer to use, I'll be exploring! Here are some photos for you..

Love

This and That!

Izzy (to Jhonathan, a boy at the Aldea): stop playing with that bug how would you feel if a giant came and started playing with you?

Jhonathan: But how would you feel if a giant came up to you and started screaming and running away? That’s what you guys do.

*Moral: I’m pretty sure it’s quite clear, don’t run away from bugs you will hurt their feelings and make them feel fat.

 Hello from the sun! Especially to all you currently stuck in blizzards, I’ll try to send some warmth your way! I know I’m like a week behind…I always save my blog until late and then it ends up feeling like homework which of course I then procrastinate. But hey I’ll tell you about my life now..ok?

So last weekend when we went to get on the combi, we were bamboozled by 4 or 5 cameras which proceeded to take random pictures of us. I don’t think we’ll ever get really accustomed to feeling like celebrities/zoo animals but hey it kinda makes you feel important. Last weekend was a party! Not that every weekend isn’t a party but still. We went to a random party for a 13 year old, listened to our friend’s band play, went to a Peruvian equivalent of a waterpark, and piled 9 people in a 5 person taxi!

 I love Love LOVE Peruvian music. It’s so pretty and even better when you can understand what they are actually singing about! Also, I’ve come to appreciate how beautiful church hymns can be in Spanish too which I didn’t fully see before because I could only focus on how hard it was to sing them.

Ok, Mirador..The waterpark was perfect! 3 pools, a horse track, a 4-wheeler track, volleyball courts, soccer fields, playgrounds, a dancing gazebo, a mini zoo, a lookout point, and a restaurant what more could you ask for! We were all really excited for the zoo because we thought it would have something big and specific to Peru which I mean Alpacas are from Peru but the other big exhibits were: a squirrel, a peacock, and these chickens that looked like wooly mammoths! It did say Mini though haha.

Woolly Mammoth chicken!

In other news, we recently acquired 3 of the Harry Potter movies on loan to us from a Peace Core volunteer in a village nearby, we are becoming somewhat obsessed! And for those of you who were wondering snogging is really used in London, I thought it was just a term from Harry Potter but Allie ( our Londoninian helped me clear that up).

Week one, done! Now on to this past week!

Daniel, the happiest little boy ever!

This was the last week of summer for the kids at the Aldea. They start school on Tuesday which will mean more changes to our role at the Aldea! And because it was the last week the kids didn’t have any classes to go to or big activities so we got to play with them all day! A couple big things we did; played soccer Casa 3(all the volunteers) vs. Casa 5(all the older boys) they creamed us. My days of being a goalie are long past and it was obvious. We also did a self esteem activity with the kids where we stuck pieces of paper on everyone’s backs and then wrote nice things on them. It was really cute to see the kids writing nice things to each other! And you have to love compliments from them, they just seem so much more sincere. Accompanying our self esteem activity was a big game of ultimate Frisbee which began with kids present and ended way later with only volunteers. The finale of the week’s events was a big round of carnival games. Where we were attacked by hoses and water balloons!

Best moment of the weekend: my camera is fixed!!! Ok it wasn’t the best moment but it was up there seeing as I haven’t been able to take my own pictures for a really long time! This weekend was actually beyond wonderful in its entirety! Saturday we went shopping and then had a bonfire on the beach! Yes..A BONFIRE ON THE BEACH! I am going to miss Hunchaco so much when I’m gone, the sunsets are picture perfect and there’s so much to do and try there. I so want to take a ride in one of the old island canoes the Incans used, maybe one of these days I’ll do it. And to go with tradition, we had picarones on the beach. They’re these things that look like doughnuts but they taste a little bit like honey too and they are served with molasses syrup on them, so good! The bonfire was pretty similar to the ones we have in the U.S I mean marshmallows and hotdogs were both present but the marshmallows were colorful! If you ask me they were way better than any marshmallows I’ve ever had in the U.S J  Today, I had American food! We made dinner for the Castillos and so we tried to make something typical of the U.S. Any one have any guesses as to what we made?

Yep Pizza! And a pasta salad with orange juice to drink. Desert…are you ready for it, crepes! Not just your regular crepes either but crepes with butter, sugar, bananas, and ice cream on them. My stomach might explode from all the sugar but it was so worth it! Ok so one more random story. I’ve been working on planning my trip for my last week here in Peru and I was thinking I’d like to go to the jungle. One of tours includes a canoe trip through an black alligator, anaconda, and piranha filled lake; what do you guys think? I’m thinking yea it would be cool to say I’ve done it but I really like my limbs. Mom don’t worry I’ll be sure to tell you what I actually decide to do when I’m safely at home again! Which reminds me WELCOME HOME mom and Lindsey! I hope you had a fantastic trip. I love you all. Remember to smile J

Love always,

Carrie Ann

Pink Skies all around me

“Wherever you go, go with all your heart <3 “

One and all, I am sorry I didn’t have a blog last week. The internet is kinda sketchy here..I mean I am in Peru ok? Haha so please forgive me! Here are a few highlights from last week:

I got a package from my family which was AMAZING!! I’ve never been that excited to eat candy before..I will never take Hershey kisses and fun dips for granted ever again! And my fruit rollup craving was also quickly fixed J What can I say my family is the best and they know me oh so well.

The sky around the Aldea has become accustomed to turning pink at night, right after dinner time and before it goes black. In a way that makes everything also look pink, which is extremely pretty!

We handed out valentines to the kids for Valentine’s day aka el dia de amor( the day of love)! They were all so cute about getting a card, thanking us and smiling really big when they read the part that said “we love you”. I love these children. Look for yourself, how can your heart not melt when you see these:

Boys of Casa 2

Manuel! See we also got to go swimming :)

Anyli, Pelar, Renzo and Lucho!

Mother, if you’re reading this I’ve already decided not to ride on a motorcycle here. On the combi last week we saw a motorcycle with three adults on it. And not only that but a newborn baby as well. I think this is when we began to notice just how different Peru can be from the United States.

I got to try a Hamburger only here they serve them with French fries on them, lettuce, mayo (with lime in it of course), an egg, and tomatoes; talk about FANTASTIC! I’m never eating a plain old hamburger again.

I sang Justin Beiber and High School Musical with the other volunteers on a combi, upon request of a random little girl sitting next to me. I’m pretty sure I won’t be taking up a career as a Rock star or anything anytime soon but hey I’m never going to see some of these people again and think how much we brightened their day by giving them something to laugh about!

The Castillos got baby chickens...meet Pip!

We were able to participate in a good old fashioned sack race..I’m pretty sure I haven’t done that since I was like 3.

GIRLS NIGHT!!! We ordered pizza last Friday and watched a movie! Oh the simple pleasures in life J

Last week we also perfected the art of capturing cock roaches!

I got to visit Chan Chan..the ancient ruins near Hunchaco that were built by the Chimu people that were in Hunchaco before the Incans. We were able to tour one of the nine palaces, the only one that has been restored so far. It’s crazy to think of how different their lives were from ours and I can’t wait to one day know everything about how they lived and what they did.

And we had cow intestines on Friday, which meant we only had to have it once because we left for Trujillo for the weekend before dinner.

Tengo Hombre...Tengo Hambre

Knock Knock..Whose there?...Papa a la Huancaina-Kandy giving us a knock knock joke, she didn't understand how to do it haha

The weeks seem to fly by here, one minute I’m arriving at the Aldea and the next I’m packing up to leave for the weekend again. However, I feel like this week I got to really appreciate the natural beauty of Peru and develop an even deeper love for the people here. I was eating with house 4 this week, which is the house with the older boys but there is also a little baby there named Fabritzio. Fabritzio is 8 or 9 months old but he can’t yet hold up his own head or do the normal things he should be doing at this age because he was neglected for the first 4 months after he was born. I had the opportunity this week to spend some time helping with this sweet little boy. One night after dinner the Tia had me help her give him a haircut, I’ll put a picture up next week because he looks really cute now! I also got to rock him while being asked to sing in English at the same time by a boy named Jhonathan. I feel like all the kids want to hear us sing songs in English but it always turns out that my mind goes completely blank at that exact moment and I can’t remember any songs in English to save my life. This time, I was however able to remember the words to one song…any guesses as to what it was? I am a child of God, yes this was the only song that popped into my head but I’m grateful for that because it reminded me to stop and see these children in a different way than I had before. I was able to remember how much Heavenly Father loves each and every one of the kids at the Aldea and how they do have a purpose here even if at the moment it’s only to help me grow and become a better person. Another exciting thing happening at the Aldea is that a restaurant down the road is letting us swim in their big stone pool behind it. The Aldea in return had to buy and paint the pool for the restaurant and guess who got to help?!?!

Friday was also my birthday!! Yep I’m officially 21 J I must say this birthday was very different than my previous birthdays and not only because of the difference in physical location. I was woken up at 6 am by my roommates who proceeded to throw a water balloon at me, squirt me with a water gun and shout/sing happy birthday. It was quite the morning to say the least haha. Then I was woken up again by a knock on the door at 7 when I had just gotten back to sleep to be greeted by two of the boys from House 2: Alfredo and Jose Antonio, who said Happy Birthday and gave me big hugs. Needless to say I was ok with being woken up! I then found a tiny play dough birthday cake that Allie made for me..what can I say I have the best roommates! Seriously though I love these girls they are so sweet and so much fun. We’re always laughing and enjoying recognizing differences between what we (the Americans) say versus Allie’s London words. For example: Cheeky we would just say sassy or Knickers for underwear. I’m sure there are better ones but I’ll have to write them down because I’ve become accustomed to this other language and it’s harder to pick individual words out.

My massive Cake!

Trujillo from the roof!

When we got to the Castillos, we got to have a fiesta! The party had been planned by the young adults from Church and it was based on a dance that is typical in Peru, so everyone had to dress in all white! Peruvians love dancing which was proven even more by the fact that the party started at 9 and went until 6 am! We got to learn how to salsa and do some other Peruvian dances, with some Americano music thrown in to provide us with something we felt like we actually could be good at. The other people seemed to get a kick out of our random American dancing I don’t think they’ve ever seen the lawn mower, running man, or shopping cart but they have now. I’m sure they’ll try to incorporate it in all their upcoming parties! The Young adults here are so sweet and they helped to make my birthday one of my favorites!!

Everyone who made it all the way to the end!

"what? we're white? " everyone in Peru likes to point this out