Children Thrive and Parents Survive

It has been awhile since we have written so here is an update on life in Arequipa.

The girls continue with school, gymnastics and guitar; they also have play dates, school activities and birthday parties to attend.  I continue to do consulting work and Aileen is looking into volunteer opportunities.  Daily housekeeping, cooking, homework, etc. also take up a great deal of our time. As a result, weekdays are pretty busy for everyone.  

Life seems much more "normal" than it did in Nicaragua and I suppose that means more like the USA.  The most notable difference is that I only have to work 4 hours a day and we can still afford a nice apartment, private school and extra-curricular activities.  Come to think of it, that is more "normal" than the 70 hour work weeks and high cost of living in San Francisco.

Getting pointers from Jaime

Walking home from guitar

Emma and Hannah are doing amazingly well at school.  Emma is pretty close to fluent in Spanish and has a beautiful Peruvian accent.  We are not sure about Hannah's Spanish as she still does not speak the language in front of us.  However, Hannah's teacher says she is doing great which is really impressive given that she started in the middle of the school year with somewhat limited Spanish.  In any event, school ends mid-December and they will both advance to the second and fourth grades when it resumes in March.  

Emma and Hannah are also doing great socially and have made plenty of friends. The adults are not doing as well.  Peruvians are much more formal than Nicaraguans (and Americans) so it has taken some time to meet people.  There is very little opportunity to interact with parents at the school because most everyone sends their children in vans or taxis and there is no real parental involvement encouraged. However, slowly but surely the adults are making friends too.  We still keep in touch with our host family and the owner of the language school the girls attended when we first arrived. In addition we have become friendly with an American missionary, the family that transports the kids to school, and a young couple we met a few weeks ago.  We are also getting to know some of the families who send their kids to gymnastics and guitar, which makes sitting around during the lessons more enjoyable.  It does seem as if we are starting to build a community of friends, but it is slow going.  This really makes us appreciate all of our loved-ones back home!

We continue to find fun and interesting things to do on the weekends.  The last weekend in October there was an anniversary celebration and fundraiser at the girls' school.  Hannah performed in a dance with her class which was very charming (see video).  On this particular occasion, we got to hang out with some other parents, many of whom went out of their way to make us feel welcome. We had a great time and I have to say, it was more enjoyable than most of the school fundraisers I have attended; well, it was certainly more rowdy.  Parents sat around drinking lots of beer and watching a band perform (complete with half-naked dancers) on the school's outdoor stage while the kids were playing in jumpy houses.

The next weekend we took our first excursion out of town, travelling by bus to the Majes River Valley which is about three hours west of Arequipa.  We first visited an area in the desert known for its petroglyphs.  It is called Toro Muerto because ranchers used to lose many cattle there while driving their herds toward greener pastures.  Toro Muerto has over 5,000 rock drawings made by the Wari people over 1,000 years ago.  Nobody knows what they mean or why they chose to carve them in this dry area, especially when there is a beautiful river valley nearby.  That evening we stayed by the river at an interesting hotel where the owner makes his own wine and brandy that he is eager to share.  The next day we went white water rafting with a family we met at the hotel.  Everyone had a great time and we hope to do this again before the rains begin.

Other weekends have included concerts, Emma's first public guitar performance (see video), trips to the library, horseback riding with the folks we met on our rafting trip, and of course homework.  This weekend we a birthday party, breakfast with some friends, a play date, and yes, more homework to content with.  We are also busy planning a thanksgiving celebration and a few weeks later a birthday party for the girls. Next will be exams and before you know it, summer vacation starts.   Hopefully we will do a little travelling before returning to the USA in mid-January to visit family and friends.

In reading this over, life does not seem as exciting as it did in Nicaragua, and I suppose it isn't because we are not doing that much travelling.  We don't have a car and despite the low cost of living, we have to be thriftier this year since we were not expecting to live overseas for this long.  Also, the girls have lots of homework and activities and we cannot just leave town whenever we want.  While I miss that freedom, there is something about this place that makes life so darn enjoyable.  I just cannot put my finger on it (yet) but perhaps these pictures will shed some light.

Sunset at a plaza near our apartment

A 15 minute walk from our apartment

I almost forgot to mention that we also celebrated Aileen's birthday this month. There was lots of presents and Aileen also got to curl up in bed with a romantic comedy while the girls and I did the chores.  Here is our attempt at some Peruvian cuisine along with the wine we bought from the hotel in Majes River.