Mi Aventura Peruana

Urubamba

Two weekends ago, the director of my volunteer program Gabi (who is also a great friend!) took me with her on a day trip to a city close to Cusco called Urubamba. The town is about an hour or so from Cusco and we went to spend the day with her family and relatives that live there.

After wandering around the town and meandering through various markets, we took a taxi to the place where her family lives. We arrived at a large metal gate and my expectations weren't too high. I had seen many very humble homes and anticipated to find similar living conditions behind the gate. However, I was amazed when we entered into a vast expanse of land filled with beautiful gardens, homes, and other buildings. The property is owned by Gabi's family and many of her relatives live there. It was very interesting to walk along the paths that wind around the gardens because the homes are all constructed in a very interesting manner.

For instance, there was a round house...

A house that appeared to only be the roof and upper section of a cottage...

A pyramid house...

And more!

During our time in Urubamba, Gabi decided that she wanted to make pizza for dinner that evening. We bought the ingredients at the market and went to work making a caprese pizza with fresh basil, tomatoes, and mozzarella cheese. We cooked the pizza in the wood burning oven on the property and it turned out pretty well. Overall it was fun to spend time with Gabi and I really enjoyed visiting her family for the day!

Abancay

For Mother's Day, my host mom wanted to visit her family in the town where she grew up, so we all took a trip to Abancay for the weekend! We arrived at my host mom's father's home in time for lunch on Saturday after picking up my host brother from the airport in Cusco when he arrived to surprise my host mom for Mother's Day!

La Fruta

The home where we stayed was wonderful fun. In the middle of the house there was a garden/patio area that had several fruit trees. We spent time sitting in the shade in the patio enjoying the sun while picking fruit off the trees and eating it just moments after picking it. The fruit was unbelievably delicious and super fresh.

There was one tree that had "tomates del arbol" also known as "tamarillos," in addition to a lime tree, a fig tree, and a "granadilla" tree.

The children loved trying to find the ripe fruits and catch them as they knocked them from the tree. Our favorite fruit to pick and eat was definitely the granadilla. This is a type of fruit that is related to the passionfruit. It has a hard outer shell that can be broken open to reveal a soft white pulp. Inside the white skin are various sweet pockets of juice with little seeds. The seeds are crunchy and can be eaten, much like pomegranate seeds.

Additionally, there was also a plant with blackberries! For me, a huge fruit-lover, this place was paradise! We ate so much fruit on Saturday that I almost didn't want to eat any dinner. It was a wonderful, marvelous day.

El Puente

Additionally on Saturday, we went on a little outing to visit a beautiful bridge outside of Abancay. The countryside was stunning and it was fun to see a different part of Peru. I went with my whole host family including my host brother, whom I had never met before, and my host grandpa, who is quite the character.

Mother's Day

On Mother's Day we went to church early in the morning and went out for breakfast afterwards. For breakfast we all had "caldo de gallina," a type of soup with hen (not chicken...) rice, vegetables, and potatoes. It was quite tasty! After lunch we visited the cemetery in Abancay to visit my host mom's mother's grave. We brought flowers a spent a little bit of time there before moving on to our next event for the day.

After visiting the cemetery, we went to the home of some relatives to eat lunch and enjoy the company. For lunch we had "cuy," which is GUINEA PIG, served with a potato, salad, and pasta. I had tried a little bit of cuy in the first few weeks I was in Cusco, so it wasn't my first time eating it. I was actually somewhat surprised because not only did I not dislike the flavor, I actually enjoyed it! The meat was super tender and tasted a lot like the dark meat from a chicken or turkey. The piece of cuy that I was served was complete with a little paw attached.

After lunch, a few of the gentlemen at the gathering pulled out their instruments and played some music while everyone else danced! I love this aspect of the Peruvian culture. Everyone loves to have fun and dancing is a perfect way to enjoy the afternoon. I am often in awe of how the Peruvians can dance so naturally and with so much fluidity. It seems like the entire culture was born able to dance! I love it!

"My mouth is filled with your praise, and with your glory all the day."

Psalm 71:8

La Procession del Señor de los Temblores

The week before Easter is Semana Santa, or "Holy Week," and there were various events that went on throughout the week in commemoration of Jesus's death and resurrection. One of the events that I went to was the procession of the Señor de los Temblores on Monday of Holy Week. During this event, an image of Jesus Christ on the cross makes a 5 hour long procession around the historic district of the town carried by numerous people and escorted by a small group of others.

We arrived at the Plaza de Armas around 4:30pm along with a multitude of other people. This event was not my favorite of all time as it involved a lot of waiting. While the procession left the main cathedral at 2pm that afternoon, it was not scheduled to arrive back at the cathedral at 7pm, at which time the main blessing would take place. We basically had to wait in a very large crowd of people for a very long time to get even a small glimpse of the Christ statue from a distance.

The image above is of people who were tied outside a church along the route that the procession made. They carried a flower called ñucchu in the baskets to throw onto the procession as it passed. They are tied with ropes due to the fact that people had fallen in previous years while doing the same thing.

I went to the procession with my friend Nicole and her host mom Erika. We actually did have a good time despite all the waiting! As I mentioned before, there were a ton of people and the plaza was more packed than I had ever seen it before.

The Señor de los Temblores finally made it to the cathedral at around 8pm that night, one hour late due to heavy rains that fell earlier during the procession. When he was at the main door of the cathedral, he turned once to the left, once to the right, and once to the center to bless all the people in each direction. Overall it was a good experience and I'm glad that I went to experience this cultural event.

On Thursday of Holy Week, it is tradition to visit 7 different temples in the city of Cusco. I upheld this tradition with my friends Gabi, Nicole, Estefany, and Kalinka as we made the trek throughout the city to visit the different churches. Cusco has a large quantity of beautiful churches in the historic district of town so it did not take too long or require too much walking to make it to all 7 in a few hours. As this tradition is very popular among the Cusco residents, there were quite a few people also visiting each church. Additionally, there were people selling food and drinks in the streets as well as games, toys, and a wide variety of other things. In general, there was a carnival/street-fair sort of feel to it.

Paucartambo

On Friday and Saturday of Holy Week, I had the privilege of joining Norma, the physical therapist from the shelter for disabled children and adults where I am volunteering, to visit a town called Paucartambo with her family. We left on Friday in the late morning to take the bus to the town. The bus trip was quite interesting as the majority of the three hour journey was on a bumpy dirt road that wound its way through the mountains and hills until we arrived in the early afternoon.

The city itself of Paucartambo has a lot of colonial influence and history. Most of the buildings were painted white on the outside with blue door and it was really charming. It is set in a valley amongst the rolling green hills and mountains with a tranquil river that winds through the town.

Paucartambo is well known for this beautiful bridge made of solid stone constructed by Carlos III many years ago. The town was exceptionally peaceful and well maintained.

I visited various statues and sculptures and wandered around throughout the town with Norma and her son, nephew, and husband. We had an enjoyable time exploring all that the little town had to offer. There were various statues of Inkan people as well as dancers that are famous from the festival of the Virgen del Carmen that takes place every June.

Paucartambo is well known for the Virgen del Carmen and on Saturday morning the image made a procession throughout the town. On Friday night, we watched artists as they worked to create a carpet of colored sand in beautiful designs in front of the main chapel of Paucartambo. We also went into the church to see the image and I was surprised to see so many people also paying their respects.

From Friday to Sunday morning, there was a band of Paucartambo residents that played non-stop and paraded throughout the streets. I am not sure if they ever stopped to rest or were replaced by other band members at various time but I found it very entertaining whenever they walked by our house.

One of my favorite aspects about this trip was the fact that it was a purely authentic adventure as opposed to an organized touristic experience. I stayed with the family of my friend in their home. It was a modest home that consisted of just two rectangular rooms, one on the main level and the other directly above it on the second floor. The main floor room consisted of the kitchen corner, a bedroom corner, a bathroom corner (with walls and such, fortunately) and a table in the middle. The floor was concrete and the walls were adobe bricks covered with plaster. The upstairs room had three beds in three of the corners and a table in the middle with a wooden floor.

On Saturday morning, I helped prepare lunch for the day. One of the tasks that I helped with was grinding peanuts in the traditional method using two large, smooth rocks. Apparently this method of grinding gives the food a richer, more natural flavor than using an appliance like a food processor.

We made "tallarin al horno," "pollo al horno," and "papas al horno," which is baked pasta, baked chicken, and baked potatoes. They don't have an oven in their home so we took the food to a community oven to bake. The oven was a massive stone dome heated purely by firewood. There was a variety of many other food items also baking in the oven. It smelled absolutely amazing; the air was thick with the scent of burning firewood and roasting pork, chicken, and potatoes, among others.

One of the things that had cooked in the oven was a large pig cooked whole!

The food turned out delicious and we ate a ton! I had a wonderful adventure and am so grateful that my friend included me in her special family time. I loved getting to know her family and their way of life. It is definitely a different lifestyle than living in the city. It was so fun to have such an authentic experience and to get to participate in a different aspect of the Peruvian culture.