My Peruvian "family"--Part 2

My Lima life is coming to an end, at least for now. Who knows what the future will hold. In the meantime, there are a few more people I wanted to write about, since my people are pretty much my life here in Lima. (Aside from the food, that is, which has been a HUGE part of my life. Evident by my ever-expanding stomach...I definitely have some pounds to work off. Oh yeah, touring, here I come!)

Vanessa

Vanessa is one of the most laid-back girls I’ve ever met. She seems pretty unflappable, and she doesn’t do much of the whole girl drama thing. She’s lived in Lima for her entire life and has only gotten out as far as Chosica. Although she’s lived in Lima for her entire life, she would, in fact, like to travel, and we’re trying to figure out how she can come traveling with me in January or February. Her knowledge of Lima has been invaluable to me—she helped me find my Spanish school and then enroll, she came with me the first day of school to talk to the coordinator when I had missed a few days, she helped me learn how to use the public transportation (which is a little bit trickier than you might think)…she helps me with whatever I might need, from buying a cheap-o belt to buying a padlock for when my traveling commences. She was also the person to introduce most of the sweets that I’m now obsessed with, and for that I am very thankful to her. : ) Another favorite past-time of Vanessa’s, when she’s not acting as a personal guide to me, is her boy life, of course. : ) She’s dating this guy named Ricardo, who is absolutely hilarious, and on top of that is totally head over heels for her (yup, I may have mentioned this boy crazy-for-girl phenomenon previously). He speaks “gringo” Spanglish with me, which always makes for a fun conversation, and he’s the only other person besides Jill’s family who calls me “Tie-na” (although the Senor has also jumped on the Tie-na bandwagon). Oh the little things that make me feel at home… But it’s okay, because he’s short and I call him “Enano” which means “dwarf”. He even drives a little old VW bug—it’s so fitting. Vanessa and I talk about boys, ex-boyfriends, intrigues, and all of those things I’ve always talked to my friends about. I’m trying to think of more ways to describe her, but she fell into my life so naturally and easily that it’s a bit difficult to define her.

So instead, we’ll move on to descriptions of some of Vanessa’s (and now my) friends:

Dorita

(Did I mention that everything is diminutive here? –ito this, -ita that…everything is small, but it’s often a term of endearment.) Dora is totally one of my favorites here. The first time I met Dorita, she was wearing a scarf she had knit herself and we started talking about knitting and crocheting. Score. Then I found out that she studies languages, too…and, pretty much, we were instant friends. She’s studying to be a translator and she has a really good grasp on her English languageskillz. She’s always trying to learn more from me, which is fun because I’m able to teach her my kind of words (which also happen to be her kind of words--one of her favorite terms in English is “head over heels in love”—and why wouldn’t it be, it’s a great term!). In her English grammar class right now, she’s learning about the same kind of stuff I learned in my Intro to Linguistics class back at UW. This isn’t necessarily easy stuff, especially learning it in a non-native language. I love being able to talk language with somebody! We also quickly discovered that we were both Cancer crabs (cangrejas) and I have now added yet another important crab to my life. We also have very similar taste in music, and we’ve done some music sharing—she really liked Ingrid Michaelson, and I found sort of a Latin equivalent in her music, a singer named Julieta Venegas. And, of course, she's also my Peruvian concert-going friend, and at the Gianmarco concert, we were down on the field with the masses, dancing the whole time--awesome. Amongst all these other things, Dorita is also a cookie-making fool, just like myself, and we've made about four or five batches together. I LOVE her!

My dear Dorita is only 20 years old, but she doesn’t seem that young. She’s a smart, thoughtful girl, the kind of person who isn’t defined by her age. Dorita is also traveling to Pennsylvania in December for an exchange program…poor girl, she’s going to the states in winter when it’s bound to be freezing. She’ll also be there during Christmas. By the way, if anyone’s looking to send a care package of cookies or something of the sort to an adorable Peruvian girl working at a Holiday Inn in Granville, PA (seriously, where is Granville, PA???) during Christmas time, you should let me know. I mean, I’m just saying…Oh, this is also my friend that works at Starbucks, so I’ve spent a few of my nights using their wireless and guiltily enjoying some sugary Starbucks beverages (that are just as expensive here as they are at home, but the people are paid extravagantly less—less than $1.50 per hour!). Dorita’s boyfriend Hugo also works there, (Dorita is the only one of the girls who has an “official” boyfriend, by the way) and he’s a very nice guy. Dorita and Hugo are the only people who actually kiss someone on the cheek when they’re greeting. Let me also mention that Dorita is the only one of my Peruvian friends who gives me hugs. Yet again--I LOVE her!

Kelly

This lovely girl reminds me a bit of my best friend from middle school, Amber—but I mean that in a positive way, for those of you who know her. Kelly has really high energy and is always joking around, singing and dancing and in general being entertaining. She tells me that “La vida es una cancion.” (Life is a song.) How fitting. She’s also going to study to be a grade school teacher, which I think will be a perfect role for her. I can imagine her being one of the teachers that actually plays with the students during recess instead of just sitting and watching from the side. Kelly is dating (but is not officially together with) Angelo, who is this big, machisimo teddy bear who loves food and is studying to be a chef. He and Kelly made pancakes with manjarblanco and chocolate chip ice cream the other day…so, so good.

Malena

Malena is one of the two maids that work here at the house, and she pretty much lives here on a full-time basis. She is always smiling, and has a happy look on her face, despite the fact that she's working all day. She's going to go to school to learn English in the next year, so while I was learning Spanish and practicing my flashcards, we made some English flashcards for her to practice. It's kind of hilarious because there are certain sounds she can pronounce just fine--in the middle of a word. But when you take away the beginning and the ending of the word, she has amazing difficulty. We worked for probably 20 minutes, just trying to get her to pronounce "old" correctly. She kept on saying "ol-t".

"No, old, old."

"Olt. Ol-t."

"Ok, dice soldadero."

"Soldadero."

"Ok, ahora, oldadero."

"Oldadero."

"Ahora, old."

"Olt."

"No, OLD!"

"Ol-t."

And so it goes. But we would laugh through it the whole time anyway, and she'd make fun of me for saying and pronouncing things incorrectly as well. I keep on rolling my d's instead of pronouncing them fully, so when I pronounce "todo" I end up saying "toro." (todo=all, toro=bull. Uh, close, Tina, close.) I also taught her how to crochet, and she's was a really quick learner. I hardly had to teach her at all since she's quite proficient at knitting already. Oh fun, Tina is back at her old tricks, teaching people to crochet.

While I'm talking about Malena, I want to mention that I’m still struggling with the whole “household staff” thing, because it does seem elitist to me. Though I also understand that from the Peruvian perspective, it can be beneficial in that a person from a less advantaged background can work in somebody’s house and basically live there—they eat and sleep at the house and are there 24/6—and get paid at the same time, though I can’t imagine that the wage is much at all. From what I gather, the typical work week here consists of working 6 days per week—8 or 9 hours for five days and then up to 12 hours on day 6. For live-in staff, though, they work closer to 16-18 hours per day. Malena wakes up at 6:30 to start her work day, and goes to bed around 11:00 pm or midnight. Sunday is her day off and she gets up at the same time so she can take the hour-long bus ride to her aunt’s house where she helps with chores around her aunt’s house as well. On Monday mornings, she takes the bus back and returns to the house by 7:30-8:00 am so she can start her work week all over again. For your favorite sleep advocate, you can imagine how terribly agonizing this is for me to watch. Malena assures me that her body’s accustomed to it, but less than eight hours of sleep a night (plus the extravagance of sleeping in on the weekend) is just a hard concept for me to grasp. Malena and Irma do everything around the house—clean all of the rooms, empty the trash, cook lunch and dinner as well as serving food to everyone, cleaning up everyone’s rooms and making their beds, doing laundry…I feel like such a princess here. And not in a good way. When it’s just Malena and me, I jump in and try to serve her as well and make the whole service thing more 50/50. It’s small, I know, but I’m trying to tread lightly in this house where I’m a guest.

But back to my people here--when I’m traveling, I end up meeting all manner of people and connecting with people that I wouldn’t always take the time to connect with at home, when I’m in my sphere of comfort. This meeting of new people is one of the things I value most about traveling, because it allows me to get a new perspective on people I might normally just instantly stereotype and not give a second thought to. (I try not to do this, but of course it still happens.) Vanessa and Dorita, however, are just like my friends back at home. They’re totally my kind of people, which is something I didn’t even really think about before coming here. I figured that life would introduce to me whatever it was I needed in my life, and apparently it brought more of the same, wonderful kind of people I normally have brought into my life. Although I’m moving on from Lima, I definitely feel like I’ve put down some roots and have a family and friends and I’m very thankful for this sense of home that I found so immediately upon arrival. And I'm also really excited to get out to do some sight-seeing and to spend some time alone. :) Now, on to Trujillo and Huanchaco.