Random Musings on our First Four Days in La Merced (Kent)

We have experienced SOOO much in our first few days in La Merced.  So, I´m going to do this post with random bullet points that are ordered by what ever comes to my mind:

• Because there is no wifi in La Merced, we are unable to download any pictures onto the blog from our iPad.  When we return to Lima in 5 weeks, we will download as many of our La Merced pictures as possible.
• We are volunteering with the Peruvian National Police!  How did that happen?  In the U.S. it´s the parks and recs department that organize rec programs.  Here it´s the PNP.  Right now they run their summer vacation programs (vacaciones útiles), which are all sports, except for our music classes.
• The "vacaciones útiles" (literally "useful vacation") are very well organized, although there are always some glitches at the beginning of starting any program.  Our main glitch was that on the first day of classes (we are teaching 3), our third class had 50 students!  I had told them that my max was 25-30.  The advantage of having 4 of us teaching is that we can split the class into multiple groups.  Magdalena, Luisa and Teresa are all great group leaders, although Teresa´s groups somehow always get her sidetracked with conversation and questions, and then her groups get behind.  It´s really hard for a chaplain/pastor to cut people off and not listen to them. :)
• The majority of our classes are girls between the ages of 6-14.  I think it was kind of marketed that way.  We have them for 90 minutes each.  They are very enthusiastic and participate very well.  It might be because music education was eleminated from the public school curriculum years ago.
• At our initial meeting with our supervisor, tecnico Johnny Alata, he said that parents were wondering why volunteers from the U.S. weren´t teaching any English classes.  I was hesitant to say yes because I thought that four and a half hours of volunteer teaching were enough for one day.  However, Magdalena and Luisa got really excited about the idea and wanted to take charge of the planning.  So, starting Monday we will be teaching one hour of English classes to twenty-five 8-9 year olds (which probably means at least 25 children between the age of 6-14).
• Luis and Rosa are wonderful, hospitable and warm host parents and are great conversationalists.  However, I got "scolded" by Rosa for buying organic, local sugar because it´s very expensive by Peruvian standards.  For U.S. standards it was cheap--a little more than a dollar for a half pound.  
• We´re here in the rainy season.  It´s quite beautiful to be in a place that is surronded by lush green mountains that often have ground cover.  When we take a taxi from our house to town, we have to drive through a river.  All the taxis here are 3-wheeled moto-taxis and many don´t have doors, so when we go through a river we have to put our feet up so we don´t get wet.  This is especially tricky because usually Luisa is on my lap so that we can fit in a 3 person taxi.
• One culture shock here is that pictures of bikini-clad women adverstise nearly everything from organic coffee to car washes to spray paint to tours.
• We are in the coffee capital of Peru, which is a real treat, especially since the main coffee that people in Ecuador drink is Nescafe.  "Misha" coffee, which is named after the Coati animal (related to the raccoon) is billed as being the most expensive coffee in the world because it goes through a very complicated and unusual process.  The coati feeds only on coffee beans but can only digest the outer shell.  The excrement is then collected and the remaining shell is taken off.  Then it´s washed, roasted and processed.  Apparently it´s a very delicious coffee, but we will probably never know.  A very small bag costs approximately $35 U.S. 
• As a contrast, I bought 4 fresh bread rolls this morning for breakfast. The cost was 50 centimos, which comes out to 20 U.S. cents!
• The mayor of La Merced is Mario Jung, who was born in Korea and immigrated as an adult.
• This afternoon we hope to go to the Mariposario (butterfly park) and a small zoo which has regional animals.
• We all love it here in La Merced!  This is a very nice place to spend 5 weeks!  There are also some nice tours that we hope to do on some of our weekends.