Food, Friends, and Memories

Little Alfredo washing up after school, this kid is adorable. I bet you parents would love to not have to convince your seven-year-old to take a shower, let alone an icy-cold one, and have them smile about it!

At Azul Wasi there never seems to be a dull moment. In the mornings the younger kids are already up and off to school, and the older kids are doing chores, finishing a homework assignment or spending time with the volunteers. Around lunch time when the dull roar of everyone's stomachs starts to fill the air a hearty lunch is served and everyone gathers together to feast. Lunch always comprises of two things, a soup to start, usually a delicious vegetable-filled soup with potatoes. And then "segundos" is served, or the second course. This is usually rice served with some sort of stir-fried something, often fried potatoes with vegetables (very traditional for Cusco), fish, or some sort of other food/sauce that goes fairly well with rice.

Lunch time can never come too soon...

We are enjoying the variety of foods here. My personal favorite is ceviche. For those that don't know it's fresh raw fish marinated in citrus juice and spiced with hot peppers. Super good! You have to be careful where you get it from though. Some  places serve ceviche that gives you mysterious stomach problems such as I experienced yesterday. I ate a nice bowl of ceviche and a TON of deep fried calamari, soooo delicious; absolutely amazing. Vomiting it all up that night was so worth it. Today we made Spaghetti at the hotel. What a treat, I tell you. It's nice to have something familiar once in a while. I ate more food tonight than I have for a while, a lot more, but I guess that's what happens when you barf everything up the night before.

The source of both my ceviche/calamari dream-come-true, and my night of toilet-filling.

Our volunteers are great. We have such a good group of people working here with us. As far as semi-permanent volunteers go we are 7 in total right now. Dana and I, Julie from France, Gina (the kids call her China (chee-na)), Kaley (Kiwi), both from San Diego, Ana, originally from Brasil but lives in the States, and Dario, from Switzerland. We are all great friends, and it's so nice to be able to talk together about our experiences with the kids. It's amazing to see how the kids can love so many people the same.

Ana, another great volunteer. Evenings are always filled with sunshine and good times.

The other day we had a group of high school students come from the states to help with work at Azul Wasi. We had them build some great hydroponic tables that we'll use for growing lettuce. With the tables we should, in theory, have fresh lettuce every day and may even have some to spare to sell. This weekend we also had a family came from the states to help out with the construction of the new bathroom. They also went into town and bought a ton of groceries and other things we were running out of which was super helpful and appreciated. It's amazing how help seems to come right when it's needed.

Valerio, "hanging-out" at a park after a day at the fair with all the kids.

Ana-Rita, having fun at the fair in the bounce house. Ana-Rita is twelve and sometimes is left in charge of taking care of things at Azul Wasi when things need to get done.

There is something special about the children at Azul Wasi. Some of them come scared, alone, violent, aggressive, anti-social, and within a relatively short time they change into happy, smiley, caring, responsible, and fun kids. We love them all but one of our favorites is little Alfredo. He is the toughest, cutest little guy. He has the best little sense of humor and is always cracking jokes or pulling pranks, at least as much as a seven-year-old can. It really is an interesting thing to watch how he lives. He is so independent. Parents in Canada would die to have a child as well behaved, obedient, and responsible as him. He has a maturity far beyond his years, and he absolutely loves us all. All the boys are similar in that way I guess.

Always up for a fun time and a few memories.

This experience really has been both an eye-opening experience, and also a paradigm-shifting experience. I think I see the world differently now. I remember flying into Peru about a month ago and wondered if we were totally out of our minds. After all, we were so so much further from anything familiar than I have ever thought I'd be; the world is a very different place here. But I love it. I love seeing life from the perspective of these boys, and this culture in general. I feel privileged to be able to understand, to some degree, what normalcy is for a people who live on a very different side of the spectrum, far from what I thought was "normal". I wish I could somehow thank these kids for such a great gift. I wish I could take them all home with me!

A sheep from the neighbor's farm, just another detail to add to the simple beauty of this place.

I love the cool mornings, the daily ritual of saying hello to each one of the kids individually, giving them a hug, letting them know how well their doing, sitting with them and talking one-on-one, laughing with them, hearing their stories, learning about their strengths. I love the heat of the sun at noon, thawing everyone's bundled bodies, then gathering together for lunch, and later helping them learn about math and language. The wind comes in strong around 3pm, and by 5:30pm or so the sun begins to set, the world becomes calmer and quieter, life no longer seems so hard, and we watch the shadows mature into nighttime. We say goodbye for the day, hugs for everyone, and then the next day we do it all over again.

Playing a few tunes for the kids in the sunset before we call it a day.