So, How's the Corn?

Dear Mom:

I'm not surviving on corn. I promise. Really, you don't have to worry.

Ok, fine. You want to know what I'm eating. Here we go...

Beverages/ Bebidas

Inca Kola. Looks like yellow highlighter fluid, tastes like bubblegum. Everywhere.

Hot fish juice with lemon and herbs. Seems to be everywhere on the coast.
Yes, you read that right. Cheers!

Sweets/ Dulces

Shredded coconut fried in coconut oil and sprinkled with sugar. Outside Piura.

Lùcuma ice cream. Everywhere.

Grains/ Grano

Cancha. Dry roasted corn. See Maria's post. But I promise I'm not just eating corn and sweets, really! Found everywhere in every restaurant.

Corn, lima beans, peas, onions, and farmers' cheese salad. Huaraz.

Potatoes. Everywhere, especially Huaraz.

Kiwicha, a grain related to quinoa that looks like millet. Huaraz.

Rice and beans. Actually, I've only eaten this once so far.

Seafood/ Pescado y Mariscos

Andean trout, stuffed with cheese and served with potatoes. Huaraz.

Cebiche/ ceviche. Raw fish "cooked" by marination in lime juice. Found everywhere on the coast.

Various seafood... mariscos. This is battered and fried squid, octopus, and other seafoods. Found on the coast.

More seafood. Clams with red onions in their shells. Coast (Piura).

Octopus with olive sauce. Coast (Piura).

Tropical Fruits/ Frutas

I'm blanking on the name of this. It's good, whatever it is.

Mango ciruelo. A cross between a mango and an apple. Piura.

Coconut! Piura.

Again, I'm blanking on the name of this fruit. This was from Huaraz.

There are a lot of other amazing foods that I'm leaving out: ajì de gallina, papas a la huacaìna, chaufa de mariscos, and about 1,000 tropical fruits. But I'm not surviving on corn, I'm not starving, you don't need to mail me a care package. I promise.

Love

Nicole

The Plants of (Northern) Peru

Hello, world:

We're here in Piura, "the city of eternal heat." This is the closest that I've ever been to the equator, but the heat doesn't seem to be bothering me much. What is bothering me is my stomach. All of the octopus, guinea pig, and other exotic meats that I don't eat in the United States (oh yeah, and the beef, pork, and chicken, too) have finally caught up to me. Fortunately, my host family is taking very good care of me, with plenty of tea, soup, and Sportade (Peruvian Gatorade).

I think everyone else is feeling more or less ok, although some of us are starting to feel less rather than more. We are one day past the halfway point of the Rotary portion of our adventure. The two weeks we've been here feel like two months... or two years. Fortunately, we have this afternoon to rest and relax, so hopefully the other ladies will have time to chime in with their impressions.

One thing I've enjoyed greatly on this adventure is seeing and learning about plant and animal species native to Peru. I'd like to share some of the plants that exist here, but not in Ithaca. I'll start with some of the trees and succulents. I'll save the tropical fruits and animals of Peru for another post. :)

The tree of the guayanabana fruit is tall, with very large, egg-shaped leaves. The leaves are a lighter green with darker green blotches. The guayanabana fruit grows in a long, green pod; the flesh of th fruit is white, gently sweet, with large black seeds.

More so in Piura than elsewhere, there are a lot of palm trees. This picture is from Sullana, near Piura, I think.

The almendra tree (almond, right?) has light grey, smooth bark with bright green, medium sized, elliptical leaves. The fruit of the tree is small, orange-yellow, and American football shaped, with a large nut in the middle. This picture is from Piura.

The acacia tree has palm-like fronds and very large seed pods. During the summer, it blooms with brilliant red flowers. This picture is from Piura.
The floripondio tree is small, distinguished by large, white, trumpet-shaped flowers that hang downward. This picture is from Trujillo.
This isn't a tree, but I'll include it anyway. Sugar cane is an important crop here. We visited a sugar cane processing plant outside of Trujillo (I think... the days are starting to blur together!).
There are cactuses in the sierra (the mountainous region, such as near Huaraz), as well as the desert areas near the coast (such as Trujillo and Piura). Here is a typical cactus. I took this picture in Huaraz.

This succulent is known as tuna in Peruvian spanish. I believe that this is prickly pear, correct? Apparently, there is a little critter, which I think is the carmine beetle, that lives on this cactus and is used to made pigments, such as for lipstick. This picture is from Huaraz.

This succulent is known as penca or cabulla. These plants are shaped like our common aloe vera plant... on steriods. I've seen some specimens here that are probably as tall as I am! This picture is from Huaraz.

Finally, I'd like to conclude with a picture from a garden in Huaraz. "Vivir sin plantas es como no vivir." To live without plants isn't to live.

Onward to Piura!

This afternoon we depart for Piura, six hours north of Trujillo. This is the closest to the Equator that I´ve ever been... let´s see if I sweat un testiculo del pulpo, eh Maria?

A million thanks to our new friends in Trujillo! We love you!

Peruvian Time & Public Transit

We took an overnight bus from Huaraz to Trujillo, departing at 9:30 p.m. on Thursday and arriving at 8:30 a.m. on Friday. We arrived two hours late because the bus broke down on the side of the highway somewhere between Huaraz and Chimbote. I awoke out of a haze of barely sleep to clanging and shaking. I briefly considered whether we were being robbed before my TCAT brain kicked in and I realized that we were having a road call. I go 4,000 miles away, and I still can´t escape buses breaking down. Sigh.

Anyway, we arrived in Trujillo two hours late by American time and right on time by Peruvian time. Peruvian time is whatever time things end up happening. If you´re Rotary meeting is scheduled to begin at 8:30 p.m, there´s a small chance it might start at 8:30 p.m, but it´s just as likely that it will start at 9:00, 9:30, or even 10:00 p.m. This is completely normal and you should never waste energy stressing about it. The best approach is to get yourself ready for the published start time, then sleep/ journal/ blog/ read/ play with children/ walk around/ talk with Rotarians/ drink pisco sour as appropriate.

This flexibility of time has interesting implications for public transit.

There are generally two levels of Peruvian public transit: intercity and intracity. Intercity buses, run by companies like Cruz del Sur, Ormeño, and Movil Tours, run luxury, over-the-road (MCI-type) double-deck vehicles with passenger amenities like reclining seats, on-board snack service, movies, etc. I believe that there are also non-luxury versions of intercity transit, but I´ve heard that they are pretty unsafe, as drivers drive through the night with no rest, leading to accidents, drivers speed, leading to more accidents, and buses constantly break down, leading to still more accidents. These buses seem to generally depart on time, more or less, and arrive on time, more or less. Many times less rather than more.

There is also a smorgasbord of intracity transit:

• Microbuses or micros are approximately 25-30 feet long and look sort of like shorter school buses. They run like shuttles, without a schedule.
• I affectionately think of combis as the clown car of Peruvian public transit. Combis are approximately 10´vans with sliding doors in the middle into which you can stuff 15 or 16 people. They also run like a shuttle, without a schedule.
  
• Collectivos can be any type of vehicle. Collectivos depart from major destinations when full.
• Official taxis are always yellow cars. Taxi transport is extremely cheap, and taxis abound (at least in Huaraz and Trujillo).

None of the intracity transit has anything like a schedule. A few people have commented that public transit here needs more planning, but I´m not sure that´s the case. Imposing schedules on public transit in a country where time is always flexible and relative is impossible. What´s the point of a schedule if it´s not followed? As an outsider, it seems to me that Peruvian public transit is surprisingly efficient and culturally appropriate.

Let´s conclude with a photo of a market in Lima... taken our first day in country.

Two Photos From Huaraz

We will be taking an overnight bus tonight from Huaraz, in the Andes, to Trujillo, on the coast. Our time in Huaraz has been amazing, and I hope we can write more detailed posts in the future. In the mean time, here are two photos from our stay in Huaraz.

This is for my climbing friends:

Huascaran in the sunset

This is for my mother:

Peruvian gato

Vegetarians, Stop Reading

Before we embarked on this adventure, we all had rules that we wanted to follow. Don´t drink the tap water. Don´t eat fruit or vegetables that aren´t peeled or boiled. Wear a seatbelt. Things like that.

Personally, every rule that I set for myself was broken within 24 hours of arriving in Peru, including avoidance of meat. In the United States, I´m a vegetarian, as is Molly and Maria. Both Maria and I have broken down and eaten meat, although I think life-long vegetarian Molly is still going strong.

In the interests of experiencing the full culinary heritage of our host culture, Gabriella and I decided to try cuy for lunch today. (If you´re a vegetarian, here´s the part where you should stop reading.)

Cuy is guinea pig. Cuy is surprisingly delicious. Cuy is a traditional Andean meat. Yesterday, as we were touring some ruins, we saw two people bathing a large bag of cuy (you read that right). The meat tastes a little like chicken, but with more flavor. The texture is tender. It´s almost like combining the flavor of dark meat with the leanness of white meat. Our Rotarian host, Alfredo, told us that cuy are best when they´re young, around three months. After six months, they´re too tough.

Other traditional Andean foods include potatoes, corn (maiz), potatoes, trout, potatoes, cheese, potatoes, chicken, potatoes, eggs, and potatoes. We have been fortunate to eat in several Andean restaurants since we´ve arrived in order to sample all the local dishes. Peruvian food is delicious! Everything seems much fresher, with more flavor, than in the United States. I want to put a few chickens in my backpack to bring to the U.S. for their delicious eggs, but I think I might have a problem getting through customs...

EDIT (7 mayo 2009): I forgot to say that Nancy also tried the cuy! What adventurous ladies!

Repaso de español

Today, the 7170 team met at Ithaca College for a short Spanish review. Maria is a Spanish professor at Ithaca College, and she organized a session to review common vocabulary, expressions, and pronunciation. Her colleague, Sergio, graciously volunteered to help us out.¡Muchissimas gracias a Sergio y Maria!

Before we started our Spanish lesson, we got together to take a group portrait. Everyone wore black and white so we'd look cohesive as a team. The picture came out very nicely--and it sounds like it will appear in the District 7170 newsletter!

After we finished our Spanish lesson, we reviewed our presentation. All of the slides are coming together well, although we still have a little work to do.

Nineteen days until departure!