Next entry I promise I will put pictures up.
What has been going on in good ole Batan Grande. Well, I have picked up gardening. I planted more then 100 seeds and three weeks later I think I have five plants. I am sure that I look like the ridiculous Gringa considering everybody in my community has farmland and I cannot even grow a vegetable garden. However, I am not ready to give up yet. I continue loving to teach the fifth and sixth graders in San Luis. They are awesome. We are going to do compost and vegetable gardens in the school. (Don´t worry, with the help of the professor.) We are doing compost in the vocational class in the highschool, the only problem is that the students have to bring livestock shit from their fields to put in the fertilizer, and none of them want to enter the school with a sack of shit. (can you blame them) This Sunday was the census. It was somewhat ridiculous. The whole country shut down, except the hospitals and public phones. No stores were open and the roads were closed. We were all expected to stay in our houses all day. However, living in a pueblo far away from the city these things are hard to control, so life pretty much went on as normal in Batan Grande.
One day I went to Chiclayo and a friend not knowing that I was in the city went to visit me in my site. My family asked her what religion she is. (surprisingly that is small talk and not offensive in Peru.) She said that she was raised protestant. I don´t know if that is true or not, but nobody would dare tell a Peruvian family in the village that they are agnostic or atheist. My host cousin lowered her voice and said, ¨Really Abby is Jewish¨ as if this statement was shocking enough to requiere the lowered voice. Hana my other friend, also Jewish, has many funny stories as well. One time she was hiking with some kids. They are short so they had to jump over a puddle, while she just had to step over it. One kid asked his friend why Hana did not jump. He said, Jews aren´t able to jump. I am not talking smack about these Peruvians because it is not prejudice but just lack of knowing. It is a very catholic nation and therefore there is not knowledge of other religions or the choice not to follow a religion simply is not even thought of as an option. Well, this is it. I should go to work.
What has been going on in good ole Batan Grande. Well, I have picked up gardening. I planted more then 100 seeds and three weeks later I think I have five plants. I am sure that I look like the ridiculous Gringa considering everybody in my community has farmland and I cannot even grow a vegetable garden. However, I am not ready to give up yet. I continue loving to teach the fifth and sixth graders in San Luis. They are awesome. We are going to do compost and vegetable gardens in the school. (Don´t worry, with the help of the professor.) We are doing compost in the vocational class in the highschool, the only problem is that the students have to bring livestock shit from their fields to put in the fertilizer, and none of them want to enter the school with a sack of shit. (can you blame them) This Sunday was the census. It was somewhat ridiculous. The whole country shut down, except the hospitals and public phones. No stores were open and the roads were closed. We were all expected to stay in our houses all day. However, living in a pueblo far away from the city these things are hard to control, so life pretty much went on as normal in Batan Grande.
One day I went to Chiclayo and a friend not knowing that I was in the city went to visit me in my site. My family asked her what religion she is. (surprisingly that is small talk and not offensive in Peru.) She said that she was raised protestant. I don´t know if that is true or not, but nobody would dare tell a Peruvian family in the village that they are agnostic or atheist. My host cousin lowered her voice and said, ¨Really Abby is Jewish¨ as if this statement was shocking enough to requiere the lowered voice. Hana my other friend, also Jewish, has many funny stories as well. One time she was hiking with some kids. They are short so they had to jump over a puddle, while she just had to step over it. One kid asked his friend why Hana did not jump. He said, Jews aren´t able to jump. I am not talking smack about these Peruvians because it is not prejudice but just lack of knowing. It is a very catholic nation and therefore there is not knowledge of other religions or the choice not to follow a religion simply is not even thought of as an option. Well, this is it. I should go to work.
posted by Princeton Tigers at 6:52 AM
1 Comments:
Those kids are right, Jews aren't able to jump.
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