Back in the 'hood

I feel like I've been going between waking and dreaming for the past year or more--but I can't figure out which of my worlds is the dream and which one is real.

The change from Maryland to Lima is so fast and so complete that it really is like waking up and going to sleep. After a few hours of dozing on an airplane, EVERYTHING changes: the weather-- it's in the 80's and sunny in Lima right now; the landscape, dry and sandy with palm trees, brown hills covered in brown-orange brick houses one or two stories tall; the look of the people, short and black-haired and brown-eyed with skin anywhere from dark brown to light almond; the market, the buses, the ramshackle look of a city built up by its residents instead of by building companies. The noise: yesterday I knew I was in Peru again when I heard a guy driving slowly down the street shouting something unintelligible through a megaphone out the window, announcing something he's buying or selling. Very, very different. I was just getting used to my quiet suburban street in Howard County, with those incredibly tall and slender trees looking brittle in the winter; fresh cold air and bright sunlight at once; quiet, privately owned cars shusshing by on smooth paved roads with sidewalks and finished curbs; shopping at the mall, where it really didn't take long for me to swollow my aversion to American materialism and buy myself lots of new clothes; having a credit card and making good use of it to enjoy the marvellous comforts of America with my friends (if you have not been to The Melting Pot, go there, and then try to reconcile the utter heavenliness with the fact that you're spending more money on a meal than some people make in a month.)

And then beyond the environment, the mindset, at least mine, is worlds apart in the two cultures. In the US I found myself looking ahead to possibe Master's degrees and/or career paths and stressing out because, never having been the kind of person who knows what she wants to do with her life, I have many ideas but no set plan. There I feel an urgency to establish myself as something--which of course means to find a well-regarded job--to "get somewhere" at least mildly impressive, and then stay there. Very constricting. Here, in Peru, anything, and I mean anything, can happen (for example, the first indication I had that I was in Latin American culture again was on the plane, where a young woman comes on carrying this enormous, furry, floppy stuffed dog over her shoulder. Only in Peru do you see people hauling random, unweildy items half their own size onto public transportation and not expecting anyone to blink) and I can do anything I like that contributes to the school or the parish community. So despite the separation pains of leaving my home once again, it feels liberating to be here, ready to start some more adventures.

But what a difference between arriving last year and arriving this year! I got to Tupac at 1 in the morning and felt like, Oh good, somehow in all that traveling I wound up somewhere familiar... now I can crash for a while. It felt very surreal the first day, like I had gone back in time to visit friends from a long-gone era, and the next day I would wake up back in the real world again... My friend Sara came over for lunch with me and the sisters, and we went to the market to get a few things I needed, and in the evening there was Ash Wednesday mass, where I saw more of my friends and started to realize that maybe I was really in Peru. Last year feels very distant, like perhaps all that was a dream too, except that now I remember everything I see around here and I have friends hugging me and welcoming me back. And I'm even mentally prepared for Carnevales!

I have a lot of plans for this year that don't include English groups in the school. Heheh. I'm going to keep going with my singers from last year and start with another group of fourth graders; keep tutoring the most dedicated of Catherine's and my students from last year in English; keep singing in the church choir and the group that went to the competition (by the way, THANK YOU to everyone who bought CD's from me in the US! $7 per CD goes a long way here and we're planning to use the money to record an album all our own!); plus I'm going to look into being a catechist in the Confirmation program, maybe teach in the adult GED program IRFA like I always wanted to, except it moved at the beginning of last year and only just returned, and--my big idea of the year--I'd love to start a group of high school girls that would watch a movie together once in a while and use the movie to talk about girls'/women's issues, like respect, equality, careers, relationships, anything. Who knows. For now I'm just working on getting adjusted again; classes and all that will start up in March after I get back from Tony's, where I'm going on Monday.

My friend Adrian told me last night at church that it was like I'd never left, but I said, nooo, it's very different. Last year I had left my home for a strange world and hadn't been back since; now, I've been here, I've been there, I know I'll be back there again, but I also know my way around Lima and can relax a little and enjoy this world for another year before going back to that other life. My great dilemma will be finding something I can do in the States that will give me the same sense of community and purpose that I have here--the sense of just surrendering your life to the crazy forces of Life in general and giving whatever you have to offer to the people you find yourself near. Somehow, without really meaning to, I've become something between a Peace Corps worker and a nun.

Cool.