“I don’t wanna do a blog post”

Fine!
This all may seem a little confusing to any of my truly avid blogpost readers. Like, did I leave San Francisco yet, or what? Why am I all of a sudden around internet all the time instead of in a jungle? Actually, I will be leaving my assignment the 15th of December. Right now I am exploring other NGO’s in Peru to choose our counterpart for next year’s project! It’s really fun, I get to travel and test how long it takes different people to realize that Spanish isn’t my first language! I just spent a couple weeks working with an organization called Soluciones Prácticas in Cajamarca. Tomorrow I am going back to my beloved San Francisco for about a week before heading off again to Lima where I may get to visit my family before going to Huancayo to observe an organization called Expand Peru. Get it?

Cajamarca was unbelievable. The city is gorgeous with a lot of old architectural reminiscence and friendly people that welcome me with pleasant faces instead of frowning at me when I say hello (Piura). I stayed with these two awesome women named Irene and Kathy (eerehneh and kahtee) from Spain and Trujillo, respectively. For two weeks we were roommates in an apartment complex where a lot of volunteers lived. Some from Spain, some from Peru, and one from Portland! Weird! The first week we made dinners, went out at night, and explored all the city had to offer. Then the second week I got incredibly sick and did almost nothing but lay in bed and go to the Soluciones Prácticas office.

Luckily, I did manage to pull my body together for long enough to visit a couple communities and observe some pilot projects. In one of the communities they were creating an “escuela saludable” with potable water, trash separation, and hot-water showers. It gets pretty cold in the mountains so they hope these will inspire better hygiene practices. I sat in on a tooth-brushing refresher course. It was basically like a teeth cleaning dentist checkup for 50 kids at once. The dentist lectured for a bit and then had one of the students demonstrate proper tooth-brushing technique. Apparently you are supposed to brush the 16 sections of your teeth (think about it) 20 times each! So this girl stood in front of the class and did exactly that. By the time she was drooling blood I was staring open-mouthed at the dentist with a look of “is this really necessary?” but I don’t think he got it. Then he explained the reason she “bled a little” is because she needs to brush more. Good thing I didn’t say anything… that would have been embarrassing. (does anyone get these written sarcastic tones, or am I just really confusing all the time?)

The hot-water showers they are installing will be run by solar panels. I also visited a site where the whole community runs on hydro-power from the waterfall nearby! Aaand, I visited a site where they are testing two different kinds of biodigestors to figure out which design is most efficient. It is so incredible that even though we can create energy from water, wind, the sun, and literally our own excrement we will never stop using fossil fuels.

On the personal front: things feel different when I am alone. I thought I was alone before but I actually I still had Brent. Now that we are doing our own things, this whole new exciting stage of “see what loneliness brings” has started. It’s awesome! And yes, some of my actions have led to “consequences” but they have also led to pride and even self-actualization! No one can tell me how I am going to feel, I have to make mistakes and repeat the exact same stupid scenarios that humans have been reproducing since the beginning of time. Or maybe, like, the 1920’s.

Yesterday morning I got back to my home-base city, Piura. I was standing on the roof of my home-base hostel last night completing my tradition of drinking a beer, watching the sunset, and listening to Women Year sing the part of that song that goes “this feels. riiiiiiight.” I was looking down at the now familiar street, the taxis and motorcycles almost running into each other, and the guests of the more expensive hostel across the street which I steal internet from. Whatever I used to say about wanting to “live my own life” kind of started to come together last night. It came together the same way as in the isolation chamber in Venice Beach. Except instead of 1,000 pounds of salt and a leathery beach babe named Crash, it’s just me and this world. It was me and this world and I felt like everything and nothing!
Great news.

I’ll try to post more often from now on! I have to remember I made this thing to write down my travels and not forget where I’ve been.