Altiplano Summertime... Rain, Rain, Rain!

The Peruvian beaches are filled with summer vacationers and here in Cusco summertime means rain and that it is almost as cold as it is in the dry wintertime. The children are out of regular school, but most kids attend “vacaciones de utiles,”  “useful classes” such as English, computers, swimming, dancing, chess, public speaking, storytelling, hula-hooping, etc.  The classes start early in the day and the kids seem excited to attend. They don’t have to wear uniforms, so the hordes of students are really colorful.  Many have breakfast on the street, a cheese or avocado sandwich and some warm quinoa apple drink, or “papas ala huancaina” sliced boiled potatoes with a sliced boiled egg and a yummy pea nutty chili sauce all over the top. The corners of every street are nearly impossible to negotiate because of the “breakfast clubs.”

Of course not everyone attends summer school (it is not free) so many parents have their kids with them while they sell in the markets or on the streets or drive their taxis around.  We walk through a market every day and it’s so fun to see the kids’ creativity, playing while their parents work. Pieces of cardboard for a shield and empty water bottles with a hole poked in the lid to squirt water through seem to keep them happy for hours, the plots and scenarios change, but kids are kids the world over and we love their enthusiasm and joy.

We’re always finding new names that make us smile. The little store where we buy our latex gloves and masks for work is called simply, “Melvyn.”  Rich worked with a man several years ago named “Praxides Choquetico.” Choquetico is of Quechua origin, so when Rich got the nerve to ask him where his parents got the name Praxides, Praxides told Rich was, “he’s a character from the Peloponnesian Wars.” Neither of us remembers that name from reading the Peloponnesian Wars, but Praxides said his parents were big fans of the story.  Go figure!

Some names we came across this past week caught our interest, Dick Rogier, Alfonso Esprayndert, Lissbeet Sthepani, Ivosk’a Ingrid, Step Angel, and Miluvska Jhakelinne. These make Praxides sound positively pedestrian! In spite of taking time to marvel at the names we see, we were able to take nearly 7000 images. The names keep our work interesting.

We have been working on a body of death records. Julie came home and announced that she was no longer reading the records but just taking pictures. This was during the winter in the 60s and the records were filled with infant mortality after infant mortality. They all seemed to have died of bronchial pneumonia. Some adults even died of it. It gets a little overwhelming and it really is not necessary for us to read them. We take all of them regardless.

We attended the Inti Raymi Stake Conference Saturday and Sunday and heard wonderful talks. The choir sang one of our church hymns “We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet,” in Quechua, it was awesome, and they did a great job. We were actually home by 1pm, that hasn’t happened in months because we are usually coming back from Curahuasi or Izcuchaca.

Because of the rains, there has been more flooding. President Harbertson told us that two little branches of the church have been completely flooded and lost in Puerto Maldonado because the Madre de Dios River has over run its banks. People living there said that this type of flooding typically occurred about 3 times every 100 years, however, this has happened 3 times now, in the last 5 years. The government gave them high-ground land and money to rebuild the last time this happened. They did this for everyone on the river but most of them opted to sell the free land and stay down by the water.

We continue to enjoy our mission and we keep very busy with a lot of different activities. We cannot imagine much that we would rather be doing just now. Of course we miss our family but feel greatly supported by them and we visit with them every week.

 

Heavily laden

Colorful tourist market #1

Colorful tourist market #2

Woman from Chincheros in typical dress

A woman selling her habas (roasted fava beans)

Nuns coming from Mass

Bread sellers under the window of the telephone company

Random man

Woman preparing a tuna (cactus fruit) for us

 

Habas seller

Street vendor outside our work



Tuna Vendor

A cool Lliqlla (backpack, but not really)

Elderly blind woman we pass often

 

 

Little sisters sharing  an ice  cream cone

The gang

Little girls playing in the market

The roof cat

Random dog #1

 



Random dogs #2 &3

Random dog #4

Random dog #5 (He works at the gas station)

Random dogs #6 &7

Random dog #8

Random dog #9 (Rolling in the  garbage)

Random dog # 10 &11 (The little dog refuses to play with the bald dog, Rich really felt for the bald dog's rejection...)

Union meeting