A full weeks work -well almost!

It´s now been 2 full weeks since I arrived in Peru, in some ways it feels more than 2 weeks since I was sobbing my heart out at Edinburgh airport! However when I think about what I´ve done and the people I´ve met in these past weeks I´m wondering how I´ve managed it in such a short time.

This past week has been much more settled for me. I feel I´ve got a bit of a routine and stucture to my day (you OT´s will know what I´m talking about!). Also I´m more relaxed with my family having worked out what stop feeeding me is in Spanish, "no poder mas gracias", if anyone needs it for future reference!

This week I´ve been working in the medical centre every morning, getting to know the patients and the other volunteers, Flora, Monique and Liza, although Flora and Monique have now left. In the afternoons I either have spanish lessons or head into the centre of Cusco to do some site-seeing and work out how to make video calls to my parents and Aly!

Last weekend, the daughter in the family took me out dancing! The danicing was great but the daughter and her friends are 17 and jeez I´m glad I´m not that age anymore! I forgot how everything is a huge trauma from what to wear, to boys to arguments with best friend over what club to go to! Does that mak me sound old?! Strangely enough Cusco is not disimilar to Edinburgh on a Saturday night, people drinking on street corners before going to a club, fights in the toilets or crying girls!

Sunday was a much more tranquil day. I headed into the centre again and sat about in one of the quiter plaza´s for a while people watching and reading my book. A peruvian guy sat next to me and started chatting away. His name was Manuel, he had been living in Holland for 3 years as a music producer and was visiting family. We sat and chatted for a good half hour then he took me round a few streets in Cusco before heading up to Saqsaywaman, and old incan fortress in the hills above Cusco. I practiced my Spanish and he practiced his English!
During the week I got talking to a street seller called Augosta, I´ll practice my spanish anywhere! We sat and chatted for a while, she makes various decorations and clothing by hand from alpaca. I didn´t have any money with me that day so I returned yesterday to meet her again and bought some presents.

I don´t know if it´s because I´m on my own that people start talking to me or i it´s because I´m on my own I´m more open tot alking to other people either way it´s nice to feel a bit more relaxed! Although the horror stories from my guidebooks and all the warnings from my volunteer co-ordinator still ring in my ear when someone approaches me and I´m convinced they want to steal everything I own and kidnap me for some ridculously small fee! A few more weeks and I´ll maybe have the right balance of openess and sceptiscim!

Anyway that´s all the time I have just now, and for any of you who are wondering, no I´ve not tried cuy/guinee pig yet. Maybe next week, the small village of Tipon, near my work is famous for it!

Cusco the first week and a new family!

I arrived in Cusco on Sunday by air, the views form the aeroplane were fantastic, mountain peaks as far as the eye could see an a very short descent. Cusco sits at about 3200m above sea level.

The family I am living with are very nice although i´m sure they are trying to over-feed me. I just hope its not to sacarfice me to some incan god!

Señora Maria-louisa is the mother and her 2 teenagers, Joanna and Andre also live in the house. The house is always busy with lots of friends and family coming and going. I had though Lima was noisey but Cusco is worse, not just in the centre but also the local neighbourhood where I´m staying.

My Spanish is coming on spectacularly well, after a shaky start at the beginning of the week, and a day or two of wishing I had gone to an English speaking country, I found myself sititng at lunch with the family today and actually understanding the conversations. Well the general topics anyway, it´s a start!

I started my volunteer Program on Tuesday. It´s not where I was supposed to have been but it turned out the local medical centre did not have anymore spaces for volunteers. The local centre, San Sebastian, was above a busy foodmarket in one of the deprived areas of the city.

The place I´m working at is a medical centre about 30 minutes bus ride away. It´s very different from where I should have been originally, the people who visit the centre appeared to be from relatively affluent backgrounds and either pay an outpatient fee or some of the more disabled people stay there until they have completed their rehabilitation. The centre is very well equiped and is a small town on the outskirts of Cusco, es muy tranquillo (very peaceful)and the views of the mountains are astounding.

My first day I was thrown in at the deep end. I am working with the physiotherapist,named Erick who assumes because I´m an OT I know what I´m doing in a physio gym! Luckily there are two Dutch physio students also volunteering who speak both nglish and spanish and have been helping me with my spanish medical speak and excercises for various conditions.

Unfortunately I have only worked two days this week as cusco has gone on strike! Thursday and Friday of this week hav seen huge protests against the govermnts plans to allow big buisnesses build very near to Machu Pichu, taking a lot of money away from Cusco and preventing locals from being able to build houses and farm the land. So the protests have meant that the centr of Cusco has been closed for two days and there are no buses or taxis running. Imagine all the shops and tourist attractions fom Newington to Stockbridge being closed and thats about the scale of it here.

It´s particulary strange bcuase the area I´m staying in is pretty busy but it turns out its only buses and taxis that are on the roads, becuase yesterday and today has been eerily quiet!

And of course her is the obligatory llama picture!

Im here!

Well i survived the flight and landed in Lima on Friday night (about 2am Saturday morning at home). I was stting next to a Peruvian who now lives in London who made sure i go through immigration and customs which helped to calm my nerves, and then I walked out into the arrivals area. WELCOME TO SOUTH AMERICA! Just as youd imagine a massive throng of relatives, friends, armed police, security, hotel pick ups and countless taxi drivers all trying to get your business and a huge amount of noise. Then the dawning realisation that after 24 hours of travelling my hostel didnt appear to be there to collect me - arghhhh! Never mind I overcame this first challenge and found a taxi driver who happend to speak English :)I was way too tired and slightly overwhelmed to even try to make myself understood in Sanish!
Then the most firghtening car journey of my life ensued. There doesnt seem to be any rules on the roads in Lima its crazy! Amazingly I arrived at the hostel in one piece and not even a scratch to the taxi.

Yesterday I met a few other folks from the hostel who had also just arrived in Lima so we all headed in the safety of the pack into central Lima. I was pleasantly surprised, its a strange mix of old brighlt coloured colonial buildings (although not original most were built after the earthquake and tsunami of 1746) and modern,ugly drab office blocks.

Plaza Mayor is pretty spectacular and is where the Presidents residence is along side the Catedral de Lima. Ironically just behind the palace and the facade of wealth and prosperity there is a perfect view of the shanty towns on the hills surrounding Lima. Although these too are brightly coloured.

We visited Monastario Francissco, one of the oldest monasatries in Lima which houses the Catacombes,

this was the first public burial area in Peru and tere are 25000 human remains there all catalougued by body parts, sections of femurs and tibias and fibulas. You get the picture!

The heat and humidity in Lima is immense and the silly Gringo that I am I managed to get some lovely sunburn on my forehead and nose, obvisouly forgot to put cream there!

So now im waiting for my flight to Cusco where ill meet my host family and the volunteer coordinator-cue the anxiety again!