Colca Canyon weekend

Last weekend I went to the Colca Canyon with a group of other volunteers.  This trip is included in everyone's GVI program, so there were 13 of us total.  But 7 people chose the trek and 6 of us chose the "lazy ladies" weekend.  It was absolutely fantastic - the scenery, the activities, the group and our guide.

Chivay is the jumping off point for everything Colca, and is a small town of 2000, but is bustling with tourists passing through.  Chivay is a 3 hour bus ride from Arequipa, and GVI had a project there last year, but was unable to continue it this school year.  We left Arequipa at 3:30am - yes, a.m. and arrived for a breakfast buffet early, after which we split from the trekking group.  After we checked into our hostal and had a bit of a rest, we were off for an hour walk to Inca ruins close by.  It was a beautiful sunny day with fantastic views and it wasn't long before the guide, Jessica, was joining in our fun of teasing each other and a lot of laughs. 

After our "strenuous" hike and a lunch, we were off to the hot springs located about 3km from town.  It was great to soak here, and the weather clouded over a bit, so it wasn't too hot to stay in the water for a long time.  I had the strangest "relaxing" massage here:  I'm glad I said not to be too hard, cause I can't imagine what it would have been like if she had continued the way she started!  This "massage" included very rapid hands going over my back, followed by slapping!  Yes, slapping!  It was anything but relaxing!

That night for dinner we went to a place that had traditional music and a dance show.  It was great to see the costumes and hear the stories behind the dances.  The women continue to wear their traditional dress on a daily basis, and if not the whole outfit, at least their hats.  There are two different indigenous groups from this region and their hats are quite different, indicating which group they are from.  Their outfits are beautiful skirts with a lot of embroirdery and ribbons, a blouse with an overvest, again highly embroirdered, and sometimes a shawl that is used to keep warm, carry things or carry kids. 

After dinner, we were off to the Irish pub!  That didn't last for more than a single nightcap, as we were exhausted from the early wake-up and activities of the day. 

Day 2 we were up fairly early and I was of course awake earlier than others.  So, I went wandering around town, and took a chance and ate from a street vendor.  My breakfast was alpaca meat with potatoes.  I sat and ate across from her and visited with her and her daughter who was also having breakfast.

After breakfast we headed out for another hike across the river and up on the hillside to some Incan Ruins.  Although most of this was uphill, we took our time and really enjoyed the walk up.  We played around at the ruins for some time, and came back down to a road and continued around in a loop back to the village.  This part of the walk seemed to drag on forever, ending with a 20 minute hike back up from river.  On the way we passed a very fancy resort and then the hotsprings we were to return to after lunch.  The hostal prepared lunch for us, and after a short rest, we were off to the hotsprings.  These hotsprings were right ont he river, and the pools were made from river stones -- nothing like the developed springs we had visited the day before.  This time, Jessica, our guide joined us in the water, and we had a great time singing different sounds in various languages.  Mariko, from Australia and of Japanese heritage, taught us a childrens song with hand movements (ok, so we were able to repeat after her -- I certainly don't remember the words now!), and then we sang "Brother John" in English, French and Spanish, and then sang two more Spanish songs to the same tune!  An Austrian couple joined us for a time, and we heard it in German too!

That night's dinner was at the hostal, and we started with kareoke!  What fun!  And the words to the songs were pretty funny, as even though they were in English, they obviously had not been written by an native English speaker.  We had a fun night of playing "spoons" and drinking wine.  This was a great group to be with and really made the weekend. 

On our last day we then headed up further along the canyon's edge to view the condors.  Some flew overhead and they were awesome looking, but, at their distance, it was hard to see that they were that much larger than eagles.  We met up with the other group who had hike back out of the canyon, and together we headed back to Cusco.

And the link to all the Colca Canyon photos:  http://picasaweb.google.com/margie510/ColcaWeekend#

My neighborhood

Two posts in one day...but I just feel like it!

I took some pics out my bedroom window the other day.  I am on the third floor of the house, facing the street.  My family's bedroom is on the same floor, with a window out the back.  Our house is one house from a corner.  The cross street gets a bit of traffic, which I can hear clearly from my room.  And, although this is a residential neighborhood, there are a couple of businesses on the street level of several of the homes. 

Across the street is a little tiendo, where my "mom" and many of the other neighbors go every morning to get bread.  Most of them go in their pajamas and bathrobes and slippers.  The people with this store also have two german shepards and another dog that live on their rooftop terrace and bark at every person, cat and dog that goes by. 

On the corner is an internet cafe which is open until 10 or so.  Also, on that corner, for some reason it seems to attract partiers and they sit around on the stoops and sidewalk drinking, talking, and laughing until the wee hours of the  morning. 

Someone regularly leaves their house in the middle of the night by taxi -- I often hear a taxi radio going off in the middle of the night.  The house next door is a small hostel, and this weekend, I noticed a sign up for lunch!  So now they are a restaurant too. All of this in a middle-class neighborhood. 

The best part of my window/neighborhood, is being able to see a volcano out my window each morning and colorful sunsets every evening.  Lately, the volcano has had snow on it.  By the afternoon, clouds are usually covering the top of the mountain.

Supposedly first week of school.

Another week gone by...it's going fast!  This past week was supposed to be the first week of school, and it was in some schools, but not in the one that I am working at!  Apparently, the registration period was extended a week, and many families took that to mean that school would be postponed a week as well.  So, we had very few students each day --- one day only five students!  There are 4 teachers at the school - one is also the director.  Two women and two men.  The women were there every day, the director there only one day, and the other man was there three of the four days we were there.  We did activities with the kids and helped clean the classrooms and wash down the furniture, etc.  We ended up only going until noon the first two days and then until 10:30-11 the other two days and did not have school on Friday.  There are 6 of us volunteers assigned to the school, so we are really hoping for a full turnout this coming week.  Apparently, many of the students we had over summer school are choosing to go to a different school nearby that is a better school.  We'll see who and how many show up on Monday!

One day after school last week, we went to a mineral bath swimming pool.  We thought it would be hot - a hot springs - but it wasn't!  I just sat on the edge and put my feet in, which was refreshing and the three guys all went swimming though.  Might return there another time as it is just down from the school and the water is supposed to be good for arthritis among other ailments.

Since there were so few kids, we didn't do school on Friday, but all the volunteers from my school got togethr for a french toast breakfast at the Casa (that we made) and then we went shopping for school supplies.  Spent quite a bit of money, but we feel we are set for basic school supplies and art activities and won't have to run to the market everyday to get basic supplies if we want to do an art project.  It was fun shopping as two of the volunteers hadn't been to this market before and they were just as thrilled by it as I was the first time I saw it.  Guess I should bring my camera next time to show what it is like!

This was my weekend for cooking!  After the breakfast, I made a potato salad for our weekly bbq.  It was interesting, as the volunteers from the US were happy to have it and the volunteers from Australia and England were suprised that a potato salad had eggs, pickles and onions in it!  It took me a long time to find the pickles at the store and then there was only one type; glad it was dill!  Quite a bit different from last year in Hungary where everything was pickled!  Yesterday then, I made a "typical American" dinner for my family.  I made meatloaf, mashed potatoes, green beans and a salad.  I found worshtershire sauce for the meatloaf, and Wishbone Italian dressing at the store.  Unfortunatley, no ranch or 1000 island dressing which would have been more "typical".  I used the dressing on the beans when I cooked them and on the salad, and it was a big hit.  Think they will easily use the rest of the bottle!

Last weekend my family made a special breakfast for me, so this was my pay back.  The breakfast was pork adobo soup with bread, followed by tea with anise liquor in it.   Apparently since the pork adobo is so rich, it's traditional to have the anise in the tea to help the digestive system!   LOVED the pork adobo. Isabelle's mother got about around 4am to make it!  Here is my host "dad", Cesar, with little Diego who is about 18-19 months old.

Diego is a lot of fun to have around.  One day this week when I got home, he toddled into the bedroom after me and started playing with my exercise mat.  So, I got him down on the floor with me and had him do some leg lifts. The next day when I got home, he started doing exercises as soon as he saw me!  What a hoot!  So, we have been playing around on the mat and trying to do some yoga poses as well. 

Another evening, my family needed diapers, so off we went to a market.  There is a supermarket close by, but we didn't go there, rather to another huge market with individual stalls.  There was everything that you could think of at this market: electronics, shoes and clothing, household items, school supplies and stationary, etc.  Think of a wal-mart, but rows and rows of booths, with a whole aisle of the same type of items.  Again, will have to get there again and take photos.  Cesar said it was the Peruvian answer to the American mall!

I had spanish classes three times this week and am really tryping to improve.  My focus is on conjugating my verbs for the past tense correctly.  It's good to talk with Isabelle, as she really doesn't know much English, and we have to work hard to communicate, which means I really have to focus on using the correct tense.  It was partially due to my not using the right tense that we had the mix-up about what I already had for lunch and what I wanted for dinner a few weeks ago. 

Think that's it for this week!