me duele la panza

translation: my tummy hurts. yes, i've been like this since friday when i ate some dubious-looking lettuce and tomatoes masquerading as a salad. so now i am taking cipro and spending a lot of time feeling tired and resting since i really don't feel good enough to go to the gym. it also sucks because the peruvian diet is not really so conducive to getting me the food i need to feel better. lots of oil and fried things. but i will survive. just trying to be optimistic...

bueno, in terms of the projects i've been spending my time on, i've got a few in-process.

(1) in the high school here, i'm trying to get a pen pal program going with peruvian 10- and 13-year-olds here and kids of the same ages from a bilingual school in d.c. turns out that the 5th grade teacher mentioned something about a trip to perú that the school is trying to orgranize -- not sure if it would be community service-ortiented or what but it would be awesome if we were able to get a written correspondence going. then when the kids from d.c. visited, they could meet the peruvians they'd been corresponding with.

(2) un club de carreras. i did a survey of kids in the last two grades of high school and it seems like there is a great lack of preparation for careers in that kids grow up without any real goals or plans. they leave high school and they don't know what to do or how to do it. basically with the career club, i want to teach kids to set goals, think about what kinds of careers they want, and finally achieve their goals and become, for example, a doctor or a lawyer. i'd like to start the club with about 25 students. i've been working with the english teacher at the high school (i'm also working with her on the pen pal project) and she seems really optimistic about both projects.

(3) this saturday i will be starting a boys club at the comedor here in grocio prado. kids 11 and up are invited to participate and my goal is to focus on getting the kids to talk, teach them leadership skills, talk to them about safe sex, controlling their anger, eating well, having goals and aspirations, etc. this saturday i am going to start with a "getting-to-know-you" thing and to try to develop some sort of trust. then, in future sessions, we can begin to talk about more serious temas. if anyone has recommendations for things i could do, please let me know!

(4) the artisan fair in lima. all of the sudden, prospects for the fair look pretty dim. i've just been informed that it doesn't look like we are going to be able to bring furniture into the embassy in lima. my star artisans are artisans of furniture made of wood and vegetable fibre -- think beach house stuff like chairs, mirrors, tables, etc. it's all really nice stuff but now the peace corps is telling me we can't bring it into the embassy. fock. so, i'm not really sure what i am going to tell the artisans. we have already started the capacitaciones and it would be a shame for them not to end up going. also, the other group of artisans i was going to take is not interested. after having told me that they were going to attend, they received another large order and said that they will have to spend their time filling that order rather than preparing for the fair. they also left me hanging today after having told me this morning that they would be attending my training session at 4 p.m. ¡qué boludo!


(5) other than that, i've started working with the owner of a restaurant close by with marketing. he is 23-years-old, just opened a restaurant in the center of town, and is a really nice guy. he moved back to grocio prado after having spent 4 years in Ica (the capital of my departamento, or state) and has a vision muy amplia for what his restaurant/hotel empire will eventally look like.

i've also started talking to people about a women's artisan group that would meet on wednesdays to talk about temas like marketing, pricing, costs, accounting, attending artisan fairs, etc.

i've got a lot of good ideas -- hopefully some of them actually come to fruition!

late peruvians

i love peru. the people are great (most of the time), the food is great, and things are always interesting. but i don't like lateness and i guess tonight i get a taste of my own medicine. i know that i haven't always been the most on-time of people and tonight i have to admit that it sucks. and the even more suckier thing is that there is probably a lot more of it to come.

basically, i was supposed to have a training session with two artisans that i am going to bring to lima for the peace corps artisan fair (this group makes some really cool chairs, mirrors, couch-type set-ups, etc.). they are 24- and 20-years-old and i guess the positive is that they are young enough that i can teach them to not keep me waiting!

the session was supposed to start at 6pm in the comedor. at 6.30pm i walked over to their taller and one of them was in the house and the other was in the taller or workshop. i asked them what the deal was, and they asked me if just alex (yes, one of their names is alex) could attend. i said no, that they should both come. we then settled to meet up at 9.00pm at the comedor.

i was at the comedor at 9pm en punto y nada... at 9.30pm i left the comedor to come back to my house. i'll deal with them tomorrow.

update: setbacks

just got back from the house of the artisans that i want to take to lima for the peace corps fair and i've somehow convinced them to come. crossing my fingers that everything works out!

setbacks

just got back from the house of a family of artisans i was working with. i was going to take them to the peace corps artisan fair in lima at the beginning of november. we were going to begin preparation for the feria on wednesday. i arrived and they told me that they couldn't go -- that they had just received an order that they had to have ready in 5 weeks and that they wouldn't have time. based on my calculations, they will be making 1.350 soles which is not a small sum. but the sad thing is that they are going to be working extremely hard for a month just to give the product to someone else who will be re-selling the product for two times the price she will have bought it for. i tried explaining to them that they have to be the ones selling their product to the final consumer but they are older and have little formal education and just don't get it. it's unfortunate and i am not giving up just yet, but it was hard news to hear. i was really excited about working with them but a little bit nervous about their lack of education. looks like i've got to look for some other artisans to take to the fair!