Reading Provence in Peru...

Happy Monday, dear friends!

Until about ten minutes ago, I thought that I was leaving for Urubamba today to help out at our other Peru office for three or four days, but I just found out that my presence isn’t required until tomorrow, which means that I have time to write a little blog entry!

I’m here in the office and dying a little bit inside because it smells AMAZING in the office kitchen right now and lunch isn’t for another hour. Irma, one of the office staff members and a lovely woman, is cooking something delectable as a celebratory lunch for Lauren, who is headed back to the US this week. It will be sad to see her go, both because she’s quite nice and because we’re going to be working extra hours until we find someone to take Lauren’s place. There are lots of students here right now, and so lots to be done in the way of airport pick-ups, dinner plans, project excursions, and participant check-ins. Somehow, we shall make it work! I’d describe what Irma is currently cooking, but as I’ve only smelled it, I’m really not quite sure. I know that it involves cilantro, though, and that alone makes me quite happy!

Yesterday was Sunday, and without the hullabaloo of the presidential elections, I was able to return to my usual mass at 11:30 AM at La Compania. Despite the end of the elections, the Plaza de Armas was still PACKED with people. It seems like every week there are more people than the week before, but I think it must be all in my head. Anyway, this week, there were huge groups of Cusco citizens, and each group was garbed in its own version of traditional attire. There were pants covered in colorful pompoms in one group, and elaborate, sparkly matching skirts and tops in another. There were also lots of men simply attired in black suits and looking kind of like secret service agents. It was a relief to make it through the masses and into the peaceful church sanctuary.

Yesterday was the celebration of Pentecost, the first day of the church year, and we heard a reading about the day when God sent the Holy Spirit to make all of His followers speak in different tongues so that they could spread the Gospel in different languages. The priest elaborated on the reading with an interesting analogy. Many divorced couples, he said, when asked for the reason for their divorce, will respond, “We just don’t understand each other anymore.” While these couples, for the most part, speak the same literal language, they have ceased to speak the language of Love, which is basically the language of God. What I guess I’m taking from this is that there is a language of the Holy Spirit that transcends our more traditional list of languages, and without this spiritual language, we won’t understand each other regardless of whether I speak Greek and you speak French or we both speak in perfect English. Something to think about…

Another interesting occurrence during the mass—while the priest was giving his homily, a man walked into the church and spoke to a woman in fairly loud whispers in the middle of the aisle, fairly close to the altar. He handed her a gold item that I couldn’t identify except to say that it looked like some sort of gilded item that an altar boy might carry into the church during the opening procession. I couldn’t hear exactly what the man and the woman were saying, but I gather that he somehow convinced her that she needed to go and place the item on the altar right away. So, while the priest is still delivering his (rather engaging) homily, the woman distracts everyone by walking up to the altar and placing this unknown “thing” up there and then genuflecting and returning to her seat. Here’s the amusing part: as she’s on her way back to her pew, the priest stops in the middle of his thought and says something like, “Stop. You didn’t need to do that in the middle of the mass,” and he looks pretty annoyed. While I agreed very much with his sentiments (the “thing” went untouched for the entirety of the mass, and I still have no clue what it was), I also felt sort of bad for the woman, who must have been embarrassed to have been singled out so obviously. The whole episode lasted only maybe five minutes, but it was highly intriguing to watch!

After church, I went to visit Dominga at the monastery, but she was M.I.A.! The doors to Santa Catalina were closed, and I’m hoping that she’s not sick. I will try to see her again next week.

My next order of business was to embark upon “The Great Hostal Search,” which really does merit its grand title! Trying to find places based on their street addresses can be rather difficult in Cusco. Even the cab drivers don’t often know street names—only neighborhoods. Before church, I had written down a list of four places I’d researched and wanted to see, and I headed in the direction of the first one, which appears to be nonexistent if it is indeed on the street that it claims to be on. In fact, of the four places I originally listed, I found—wait for it!—ZERO actual hostals. While maybe one fourth of this failure could be blamed on my directional faultiness, I would argue that in three of the four search situations, I walked down the advertised street in its entirety without finding any evidence of the place I sought. What ended up happening was that I found other nice-looking places that actually existed. I ended up making a whole new list based on my walking tour, and collecting lots of “listas de precios” and “tarifas” and such until I had a nice little page of possibilities. I ended up settling on a lovely place called Waka Punku Bed and Breakfast, which is in a pretty super great location, right in between the Plaza San Blas and the Plaza de Armas. I also got a discount simply by asking for it, which was pretty awesome! I think Paul and Eileen Whitman will be mightily pleased with their accommodations!
After my long search, I was pretty tired, but I decided to walk back to San Borga since it was so beautiful outside. I joined Laura at the office for a little while to check e-mail, and then the two of us took an outing to El Molino! I have heard much about El Molino, but yesterday was my first actual visit there. While it’s been referred to as Cusco’s “Black Market,” it didn’t strike me as such, and was almost more like a traditional market, except with clothes and electronics and kitchenware and DVDs rather than fruits and vegetables and meat. I found my long-desired hair dryer, which was super exciting (and which may need to double as a body heater since our apartment is so darned COLD) and Laura found her webcam, and we also bought some DVDs, which made us thoroughly excited being as we have no internet in our casa. Last night, I watched “Scent of a Woman,” which was pretty good, though I’m rather more excited for “The Last Samurai” and another movie that I bought about Tolstoy…I can’t remember what it’s called. I am hoping to go back soon because I want to buy a bath towel and a vegetable peeler and a backpack—all necessities, obviously. 

Back at the ranch, Laura and I made ourselves some dinner—some sort of pasta concoction for her and alphabet soup for me! I’ve been on this alphabet soup kick the last few days because my stomach hasn’t been feeling quite up to par, and I’m actually really enjoying it. And for those of you who would argue against the medicinal qualities of such stuff, here’s some fodder for thought: http://archives.cnn.com/2000/HEALTH/diet.fitness/10/17/chicken.soup.reut/.
After I finished up my evening movie, I read another chapter of my latest and greatest read, A Year in Provence, by Peter Mayle. May I just say that this book is FABULOUS? Even for those of us who do not dream of cheese and have not visited France, it’s very much a must-read! If you don’t have a copy, go and get one! A special thank you to the lovely and beautiful Meredith Rich, a dear Franklin & Marshall friend, who gave me the book as a bon voyage present. Meredith and I are both appreciators of the beautifully written word! Last week, I finished reading The Good Earth, which is a Pulitzer prize winner by Pearl S. Buck. I can’t recall whether I mentioned it in a previous blog entry, but if not, I would recommend it, but not as highly as A Year in Provence!

A final note of hilarity/disgust. Currently, there are very LOUD construction efforts taking place both in my apartment complex and directly next to my office, which means that I am constantly surrounded by such sights as a random man standing on some scaffolding outside my window, as well as bombarded with the most catastrophic of noises. Many moons ago, when I was deciding where to go to college, my dad would laugh at my serious aversion to construction, which actually caused me to eliminate certain colleges from my list. In retrospect, I should have eagerly jumped at the chance to go to a college overflowing with construction because that construction would have been a brand new building by the time I arrived as a freshman. Sadly, no one brought this to my attention, and I therefore endured construction at both my undergraduate and graduate institutions. Luckily, both schools made up for it with their awesomeness! Anyway, construction has always been a pet peeve of mine, despite its ultimate goal of progress, and it’s just kind of mean of Cusco to throw me into it full force! I have decided to view this as a test of my endurance, and I will—somehow—emerge victorious!

Hope all is well with you, lovely readers! Y’all are in my thoughts and prayers!