Easter in Trujillo

Easter was spent by this girl in Trujillo, a beautiful city along the coast of Peru. A friend invited me to spend some days with her family, so I got to know some Peruvians from the coast and see how they live. I have to say the coast and the highlands seem like two worlds apart, on the coast they are more up to date, have more knowledge and they are also more wealthy. Well, Patricia showed me the Huacas de la Luna- which is a monument/building of barren (leire) which was built by the Moches, a culture that existed before the Incas. Very impressive- they made a lot of nice ceramics, I will try and bring one object to Norway. We took advantage of the sun and went to Huanchaco afterwards, which is the tourist beach of Trujillo, where there are a lot of “gringos” and they sell a lot of tempting art- bracelets, necklaces and earrings made of sea shells, beads and other things from the nature. And I got to try the “caballitos totoras”, which are fishing boats made from straw! What a pity I cant put out more pictures… The other day she took me to another city- Chiclayo- where we visited the royal tombs of Señor Sipan, who was the leader of another culture called the Chimus. So now I have gotten to know various of the Peruvian ancestors :)

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Kristin in Chota: Peruvian amigos

I have been staying in Peru for quite a time now, and its strange to recall what Norway is like. The people here are very poor compared to the ones over there, but I have been used to it and don’t think much about it anymore. What matters is what the people mean to you, the friendship you have, the good conversations. I have gotten “amigos” here that I will never forget. The Peruvians are so open, easy to get to know, its amazing. They give you everything as soon as you reach them your hand to greet them.

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Kristin in Chota: Delivering school materials

Yesterday we went to several communities in Tacabamba to deliver school material to the children in primary school, who just got back from vacation. It was such a blessing to see how they all appreciated their notebook, pencil and ruler. It was like party time as we arrived the schools, all the kids running and screaming all over the place before their teacher gave a signal and they all obediently lined up in rows of classes. Right before we left, they all raised their hands with their new things, and shouted alltogether: “Muchas gracias, Fundaciòn Stromme!!” (Thanks a lot, Stromme Foundation!)

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South America, Peru, Chota, Tacamba, CODE, English

Kristin in Chota: Traditional dance

Recently I started to take part in a course of tradicional peruvian dance with my colleague Mary. I wanted to learn after watching their anterior dance show. So now I will be jumping and waving with my arms and my head for the coming weekends, three hours every saturday and sunday!! Its a lot of fun, but indeed a whole lot of excercise. Among others we have learned the dance of the condor, which is from Puno and Lake Titicaca.

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Carnival in Cajamarca

This weekend we learned a new word: BULLA! (=noise). We went to Cajamarca, a city in the mountains, 6 hours away, which is well known in Peru for its carnaval. The moment we stepped out of the bus saturday evening, I got a bucket of dirty water from the streets in my face. Driving in a taxi to the hotel, we saw a terrible sight; all the cars, buildings, people, were painted (not voluntarily) in all kinds of colors... It appeared this was the entrance day of the carnavals, and the day for painting... So we went straight to the market to buy some clothes we could risk be painted.

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Kristin i Chota: Alfabetisering

Sammen med kollegaer fra bistandsorganisasjonen CODE drar vi ut på landsbygda i landrover-bilen vår, som er sterk og god å ha når regntida setter inn. Etter et kraftig regnskyll dagen før er veiene svært humpete. Vi møter på fullastede lastebiler som har kjørt seg fast i gjørmete veikanter, og kikker engstelig nedover åssiden, i håp om å slippe å skli utfor. Landskapet er frodig og grønt, og geitende, uforstyrrede kyr og sauer er å se på alle kanter. Mannfolkene er i ferd med å pløye åkrene sine med okser, kvinnene står og vever framfor et tre eller vasker klærne sine i bekken. Barna leker seg i enga med de viltre bikkjene. De smiler og ler mot oss i det vi passerer. I bakgrunnen ser vi ravende fjell og regnskyer som lurer. Vi kommer inn på en mindre og enda mer kronglete vei som fører oss fra landsbyen Chalamarca og oppover mot det lille samfunnet Miravalle. Omsider ankommer vi ”sentrum” av Miravalle, en fjelltopp hvor vi finner lokalet hvor alfabetiseringskurset foregår, ved siden av grunnskolebygget. Her er også den lokale kirken, en beskjeden bygning uten altfor mye utsmykning. Mot oss kommer tre blide mennesker- Ramiro, læreren på kurset, og en ung jente med en unge på armen.

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Om CODE

Kristin forteller fra arbeidet i CODE:

CODE (Cooperaciòn y Desarrollo) har svært mange forskjellige prosjekter, men det overordnede temaet er utdanning. De jobber hovedsakelig med barneskoler, grupper for voksne, verksted/diskusjonsgrupper for tenåringer, og med Rondagrupper. På barneskoler bidrar de blant annet med skrivebøker, pulter/stoler, flanelografer, kjøkkenutstyr, fotballer/volleyballer og kursing for lærerne. Barna har faddere i
Norge, og derfor hjelper vi til å ta bilder av ungene som sendes til Norge, og barna lager også julekort til fadderne sine. Kortene vitner om at barna er svært takknemlige for at et land langt borte som Norge gidder å bry seg om dem. Det er ikke mye midler å få fra den peruanske staten, hovedsakelig på grunn av den utbredte korrupsjonen. Hadde det ikke vært for CODE, hadde det ikke fantes pulter og stoler i klasserommene, og barna hadde heller ikke hatt råd til skrivebøker.

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Kristin in Chota: Bedbugs and education

Today we had to put a white powder on all the blankets and bed sheets and leave them in the terrace to get some air. Lately me and IM have gotten tons of "stikk" all over our bodies, and it turns out there are BUGS (lopper) in our beds. Like three weeks ago we had these parasites inside our bodies that made us have "stikk" all over our bodies as well, but the doctor gave us some medicine and the parasites left, thank goodness... "Sleep tight, dont let the bed bugs bite..."

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Kristin in Chota: Christmas preparations

Christmas in Peru is not like in Norway:

As there is nothing that reminds us of Christmas, IM and I created a Christmas calendar for the crew here in Chota. Now there are 24 gifts hanging on the wall (YES it is a bit late- I know its already the 3rd) ready to be opened. The days in the office are loooong, from 9-13 and after eating almuerzo, from 15-19! We asked our collegue Joel what he wanted for Christmas, and he answered "My job! It´s the most important thing I have. It makes me able to take care of my family, pay the rent and provide food to the table."

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Kristin in Chota: Church, spiders and confusion

The last week has gone by really fast. We start meeting people here in Chota and make some friends. On sunday we went to a small protestant church which I think we will be joining this year. It reminded me a little of the Norwegian "bedehus", but I think me and I.M. will like it there. Afterwards we started talking to a guy in a farmacy, who invited us to eat supper with he and some friends. It seemed the cook was french, and the food turned out delicious. Thank goodness we understand more and more spanish and are more able to communicate with people.

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Kristin in Chota: Rondas

Today we visited a community situated at 3500 metres above sealevel, called Moran Alto. Each community in the Andean mountains has it´s circle of "Rondas", which is like a rural police. About 20 years ago the farmers had to sleep besides their animals to make sure they were not stolen by robbers. The police didn´t engage in these problems, and this forced the farmers to take care of their security themselves. Nowadays each man has to spend 15 years in the local Ronda. This means that he, every 14 days, spends a night walking around in his community with his fellow men in the Ronda, making sure the robbers stay away from the caddle.

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Kristin in Chota: First field trip

This thursday started out early- we left at 7:30 and drove for 1,5 hours in the car before reaching Acabamba (I have no idea if that was correct), which is a small town faaaaaaaar out in the mountains. After eating breakfast in a local restaurant we headed further up in the mountains, passing by those scaaaary sites where you would like to stay on the road... Up there were super cute peruvian kids waiting for us in their primary school. CODE (and Stroemme) is giving support to this school when it comes to training of teachers, teaching material and facilities as chairs and buildings.

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Kristin in Chota: Finally arrived

When we arrived Cajamarca Joel and Theodoro picked us up on the airport rightaway- luckily their spanish was understandable and they seemed to be really nice. It was absolutely great to see mountains all over the place and meet a smaller place than Lima.

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Kristin and Bente in Lima: In the footsteps of Che Guevara

The period of language studies in Lima is over, and the South American Act Now-ers are ready to go their separate ways. Kristin writes:

Monday at dawn Inger Marie and I will take off for Chota and the mountains. We will fly to Cajamarca and have a 5 hour drive to Chota from there. After a meeting in the Stroemme office here in Lima with more information, I am eager to take part in the CODE project up in the "sierra".

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Bente observes:

I realized after reading the book (and watching the film) "The Motorcycle Diaries" that I´ll be following the footsteps of the heroic Argentinian revolutionary tomorrow. Ernesto ´Che´ Guevara made the same journey down the Ucayali River and to Iquitos when he was my age. He travelled by boat from Cuzco to volunteer at a leper colony in San Pablo, a city somewhere east of Iquitos. He liked to travel and sought adventures in this wonderful continent, at the same time as he believed in the South American people´s (or the Mestizo race, as he called them) ability to change their world.

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Kristin in Lima: Microfinance

Today we visited one of Stromme´s partners here in Lima called Asidme, which does micro finanze. Its about giving out small loans to persons that are so poor they are not given the possibility to loan from a bank etc. This loan will make them able to for instance buy equipment to produce things to sell.

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Kristin and Christina in Lima: Temblor..

Kristin writes:

The other day we visited the Center for young mothers here in Lima, ran by the Stroemme Foundation. Its located in the same district as I live. About 13 young girls (average age is maybe 14) are living in the centre, with their kids. Many of them have very tough experiences. Some of them have been raped by family members and therefore have to fight some serious psycological issues as well.

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Christina continues:

... Having been disgraced and therefore banned from their families, and often thrown onto the merciless streets of Lima, only the luckiest young mothers end up in this center. The Stromme Foundation helps run this center where the mothers learn to love and not hate their children, where they learn a useful trade such as sewing or hair-cutting, which can be used later in life when they are ready to move on from the center.

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Kristin in Lima: Cumpleaños de la sobrina

This weekend has been exciting. We went to a birthday (cumpleaños) party at Diana´s niese´s house, that is her family´s house. Here in Peru it seems kids live at their parent´s place until they marry. Diana´s sister has four daughters in their 20´s, who were really nice and funny.

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