I've spent a good deal of time and space -- too much time some might say -- explaining the Peruvian party system on this blog. I recently found myself at a victory party for a local mayorial candidate, camera in hand. It seemed the perfect time to visually document (and prove) everything I'd been saying. Thus, I present to you, loyal blog followers, a photo story of the generation of a typical Peruvian soiree. Consider yourselves enlightened.
First, everyone must sit awkwardly against the wall in a giant circle. There's no dancing, not much talking, just a lot of sitting and waiting.
Waiting for what, you might ask. For the beer to come out, duh. Here, Papy (far left, proudly wearing his Carolina hat!) and company demonstrate the practiced art of nonchalantly scoping the crowd while passing cervezas around the circle.
These ladies are old-hands. They know the drill: a little waiting, a little lunching, a lot of dancing. One of the best things about Peruvian parties is the fact that, eventually, everyone will be on the dance floor. There are no age limits on fun here.
Next, we see what I like to call the "early adopters." These are the first people on the dance floor. They hear a favorite song and they're ready to cut loose. They don't mind that the majority of the crowd is still awkwardly balancing their paper plate of rice and beans on their laps.
Here, the early adopters are joined by the crowd at large after the band calls them to the front to listen to the mayor's acceptance/thank you speech.
You can't keep them off the dance floor at this point. The band is pumping out one hit after another. The beer is flowing. The sun is setting. The party has officially (four hours later) started.
The true mark of success -- getting the gringa to dance in your cirlce. Here I demonstrate how to two-step your way to popularity. Clearly my dance partner is impressed.
The truly amazing thing is that every single party I've been to follows this exact same format. Even the meals are the same. At least I always know what to expect, and at this point, I am more than happy to join in on all the fun.
Here's hoping you're enjoying your own special dance party!
To those of you who follow this blog (all five of you), it will come as no surprise that Peruvians love any excuse for a party. Mother’s Day was no exception. Before I tell my tale, I would like to give a special shout out to my real mom – I wish I could have been with you on Mother’s Day. I miss you and I love you.
Mama numero uno, Liz.
Mama numero dos, Lucha.
Our celebration began on Friday with a trip to Saltur for the school’s Día de la Madre celebration. The show included a number of dances and performances, including poetry, by the students. But the big moment was when they handed out the canastas of prizes for a few lucky moms. Bryan’s mom Cinthya (my host sis) is now working in Chiclayo so she couldn’t make the party. Right before the drawing, Lucha (my host mom) had to duck out to attend an Avon conference. Papy leaned over and asked if I would escort Bryan if they called his name for anything. Not really sure what that meant, I of course said yes. Immediately after this mumbled conversation, we hear Cinthya’s name being called. Everyone around me starts shoving me and yelling for me to go up there. Turns out we won the goodie bucket and I had to go up and collect it, in front of everyone. Like several hundred people. There were a lot of confused people in attendance as Bryan and I sauntered up to collect the Mother’s Day prize. Skip to a few minutes later when there is another raffle for the moms. Lucha had handed me her ticket before she left asking me to collect the prize if she won. Well, guess what? We won. Back to the stage goes the gringa to collect her second Mother’s Day prize. Needless to say, my family got a big kick out of this. And several people asked me if I was Bryan’s mother. I’m still not sure if I should be insulted.
The stage where I received my prizes.
A portion of the entertainment.
After the show was over, and a very pleased Lucha returned to discover her loot, we headed to a restaurant (I know, crazy times) for a little snack. Papy then informed me that he had scored us invitations to the post-party luncheon for all the teachers. He’s the president of the PAFA (kind of like PTA), so he’s got friends in high places. On to our second lunch of the day! And I had been fed a sandwich at the school (only the moms got sandwiches -- I think Peru is trying to tell me something). Anyway, off we go to the private staff party. Papy was clearly disappointed by the lack of enthusiasm shown by the teachers, who were busily sucking down Pisco Sours and exchanging gifts, so he arranged for a little speech, as Papy is prone to do. His speech turned out to be an introduction of me, meaning I in turn had to make a little speech. I mumbled some variation of my usual “Hi, I’m Jessica. I live and work here. I also work for the U.S. government. Hopefully we can work together. Yes, I’m single. No, I don’t want to marry your son/cousin/nephew/brother/husband. Thank you so much for having me.” Business taken care of, we turned up the music and started dancing. I think I left the party with a few new friends, or at least I took it as a good sign when several teachers asked me when I was coming back.
Teachers fleeing after my ¨speech.¨
We had plans to leave bright and early Sunday morning for Pacherrez, where the majority of Lucha’s family lives. At dinner on Saturday night Lucha asked me what time I would be waking up the following morning. Unsure as to what was the correct response, I hesitantly said 8am. After a few whispered sentences, she and Papy decided I could come later, at 9am. Clearly this was going to be a big day.
I arrive around 10 the next morning with Pierre, Cinthya and some random dude with a car. The majority of the women were already in the back getting lunch ready. Luckily I got there just in time to participate in the killing of the three ducks. A quick snap of the neck, a precise knife strike to the jugular and the deed is done. My job consisted of de-feathering the steamed ducks. I lasted about 20 minutes before the elders decided that I was slowing them down. So I took up my usual spot, in the corner with the men, passing around a bottle. Despite my brief appearance, I’m pretty sure I made my grandmother’s month. She is incredibly old but surprisingly spritely. Every time I see her she grabs my cheeks and pets my hair and mutters incoherently about “mi gringita.” After the duck incident, she really took a shine to me and would turn and stare at me every so often and then burst out laughing about her crazy gringita. Everyone also got a big kick out of an uncle referring to Lucha as my mother-in-law. Apparently Pierre has been spreading the word around the family that we will soon be married. It’s the joke that will not die. Seriously, Peru what are you trying to say?
So basically the entire day consists of the women preparing an elaborate lunch while the men sit around getting drunk. Good to know that Mother’s Day doesn’t really change anything. Though I will say it was heartwarming to see so much of the family together. A few aunts, uncles and cousins had come up from Lima and everyone who lives in the Chiclayo area was there, probably close to 30 people in total. After stuffing ourselves silly with duck and more duck, I was finally invited to join the cool kids, i.e., all the twentysomething cousins. Usually I get stuck with the adults, which is fine, but I’d secretly been dying to be part of the hip group. Only took me nine months to get in. Who’s cooler than this girl? We hung out in the park, listening to American music, taking pictures and sending the younger kids to fetch more drinks. Out of nowhere the random dude with the car returned to drive us back to Huaca Rajada, where there was to be a baile. A baile just like any other baile – drinking circles and cumbia dancing. The band was a new group formed by some local Huaca Rajadeños, aptly called “Son del Barrio.” I think they still have a few kinks to work out since I heard them play exactly one song and the rest of the music came from a stereo. This serves as an appropriate metaphor for the town itself – we’re trying, sort of. Poco a poco...
I have attended more birthday parties in the past two months than I have in the past twelve years. Given the time of year, (hint, hint) I thought I’d take a moment to share some tidbits on the basics of celebrating a birthday Peruvian style. The following rules have proven true at all the parties I’ve attended, regardless of age, status or location. I went to one party during training, but was too new to the Peruvian party system to appreciate its intricacies. Now I’ve totally gotten the hang of it – and the parties are super fun! Take notes, I’ll expect this in 2011.
Rule #1: The party never ends. Just when you think you’ve survived the fifth hour of dancing, a new guest will arrive with a caja of cerveza. Said guest will greet everyone individually, open up a beer, crank up the tunes and the party starts anew. Seriously, I put in a good 10-hour day at one birthday party and was still bested by about 20 people. I’ve yet to see the end of a party, a decidedly un-Jesster-like move. Often there are shifts of partygoers, an afternoon crowd and an evening crowd. Only the truly diehards even attempt both shifts. I’m beginning to realize my family considers themselves diehards. Or maybe they just really like seeing me dance for hours upon hours. Either way, we’re a two-shift family.
Rule #2: The drinking circle. I’m sure I’ve mentioned this custom in passing in previous postings, but I don’t think I’ve actually explained the art form behind this magical circle. Beers are served in large bottles here (kind of like a 40 by U.S. standards). There is one glass for the entire circle. The bottle of beer and glass start with Person A. Person A pours a shot of beer into the glass and passes the bottle to Person B. Person B holds the bottle while Person A downs the shot. Person A passes the glass to Person B. Person B pours his glass and passes the bottle to Person C. You get the picture. At first I was slightly disgusted by sharing a glass with 20 strangers, but now I’m really into it; it’s a very communal and social way to drink. Plus there are all kinds of weird rules that are fun to discover. For example, when you’re the unlucky one to finish the bottle, not only do you have to find and open the next bottle, but you also have to pour in a sip from the new bottle to get rid of the bad luck. And it starts to get crazy when we introduce an extra glass and bottle going in the opposite direction. Par-tay! These circles are not just for birthday parties; they’re for everything. Soccer games, festivals, parades, cockfights, Sunday afternoons.
Rule #3: You will be fed at least twice. Most birthday parties start in the early afternoon. You arrive, take a seat in a large circle and wait for lunch to be served. Lunch is always served on Styrofoam plates with plastic silverware. Let me tell you, for the inexperienced, it is tough to cut goat with a plastic spoon. I held onto my manners as long as possible, but I finally caved and now eat Peruvian style – sucking the meat off the bone I’m holding in my filthy hands. A couple hours after lunch, you’re served a "snack", which is usually just smaller portions of what you ate for lunch. Although one time we had popcorn. That was pretty exciting and everyone was amazed that I’d eaten popcorn before. A few hours after the snack, you’re served dinner, which is a repeat of lunch and snack. It’s expensive for the hosts to feed everyone, which is why the most popular birthday gift is a caja of beer.
Rule #3b: No cake. This struck me as odd for awhile because Peruvians love their sugary snacks and drinks, but upon further investigation I’ve discovered that big, fancy cakes are a) very expensive or b) impossible to find out in the campo. Oh well, more room for three servings of rice! Extra carbs for extra dancing, which brings me to rule four...
Rule #4: Gringas are popular dance partners. I’m usually the first one on the dance floor and the last one to leave. Women don’t choose dance partners here; we sit demurely in our plastic chairs waiting for an invitation. You don’t stay on the “dance floor” between songs. Once the song ends, everyone goes back to their chairs. Thirty seconds later, everyone is out of their chairs dancing again. I’m still not sure why we have to sit down between songs because it’s not like people aren’t dancing to every song. My best guess is to ensure variety in partners. You also can’t say no to a dance invitation. That would be incredibly rude. Which is why I spent the majority of a recent afternoon dancing with a 75-year-old man who was at least a foot shorter than me. We took a lot of pictures. Granted, it was his birthday.
Rule #4b: Dancing does not start until after at least five spins around the drinking circle. The motivation behind this should be fairly obvious.
Rule #5: Peruvian women never have to use the bathroom. After a few turns around the drinking circle, nature calls for this gringa. Invariably I’m somewhere I’ve never been before, so my usual tactic is to turn to the closest female relative and ask quietly where I could use the bathroom. Now, I am extremely fortunate to have my own bathroom with a toilet. I’d venture to say that 95 percent of the population in this area does not have sewage services, so they use latrines. I’m aware of this fact and am becoming a very low-maintenance girl. I can squat with the best of them. However, no matter how many times I tell my family that I can go anywhere, my inquiries about a bathroom spot always lead to loud shouting across the patio roughly translated as, “hey, my gringa has to pee, but she’s used to a toilet. What should we do?” Slightly embarrassing when everyone turns to look at you. Luckily this only happens once, after being pointed in the right direction, I stick to my spot for the rest of the day. Oddly, no one else ever ventures near my spot. Must be all that weird water I drink. (My host brother is convinced my water is a secret potion that allows me to stay more sober than all the Peruvians. Amateurs.)
Hopefully in my next post I will be able to share some insight as to how it feels when the birthday is your own. At least I’ll know the drill when the “birthday” song comes on (no, not Happy Birthday, some cumbia song) and the guest of honor has to stand in the middle while everyone dances and claps in a circle around him/her.
I’m also happy to report that I finally bought a replacement camera (a little early birthday present to myself). I’m on my way back to site to take pictures of my family, town, house and friends. So stay tuned, This American Life is about to go visual.
As some of you might recall, I attempted a “Year of Yes” a couple years back. Admittedly this was more to improve my dating life than due to a renewed outlook on life, and it didn’t quite go as planned. Instead of meeting the love of my life and writing a best-selling book about my hilarious romantic adventures and life-altering realizations (by the way Jim Carrey, you’re welcome for the movie idea), I ended up in the Peace Corps. Life works in mysterious ways. Now that I’m in site, I’ve decided the best way to integrate is to say yes! to any and all invitations passed my way. I usually don’t understand what I’m agreeing to, but that makes it all the more fun. I am often confused and completely, conspicuously out of place…but hey, I think I’m developing a reputation as an easygoing, up-for-anything kind of girl.And I’ve had some interesting adventures. Read on for highlights from the first few weeks of my newly reinstated Year of Yes.
·Dead birthday party. I was resting in my room one Sunday afternoon (i.e., watching Arrested Development or Weeds on my laptop), when my host mom knocked on my door and asked me if I wanted to go to Pucula with her. Not sure what or where Pucula was, I readily accepted. I headed out the door in my typical Peace Corps-attire; dirty jeans, flip flops, messy braid and uber-cool Ray Bans, noticing after a few minutes that my mom was wearing her nice jeans and makeup. Slightly confused, I asked her where we were going. Pucula, she said, and pointed across the river. Ah, Pucula is a nearby town. We reached the river and everyone starts taking off their shoes and rolling up their pants. My mom hands me her jacket and purse, hoists her grandson on her hips and makes for the water. I follow and manage not to fall down, thankfully, since everyone had stopped what they were doing to watch the gringa cross. Safely across, if not slightly damp (I don’t know how I was the only one to get my pants wet seeing how I’m a good six inches taller. Practice, I guess), we forge ahead, picking up more family members along the way. I still have no idea where we’re going when we get into a moto taxi and head for the cemetery. Visiting dead relatives on Sundays is a very popular activity in Peru, so I figured we were probably just going to put some flowers on a grave. We get to the cemetery and follow a large number of people through the gates. I begin to suspect something different is going on when all the people are heading for the same gravesite. I didn’t think I’d heard that anyone died recently and I was praying (haha) that we weren’t headed for a funeral. Talk about awkward, and long. We join the back of the crowd circling the grave. Looking around, no one seems particularly sad or teary-eyed. I shrug and strike my “ah, this is interesting and I understand everything that’s happening” pose, punctuated by a thoughtful nod every few minutes. I was particularly entertained each time the leather jacket-wearing priest belted out some Peruvian Christian rock on the synthesized electric keyboard he’d brought along for the occasion. After about an hour we started singing Happy Birthday (in English and Spanish) and I finally figured out that today was the birthday of a recently deceased family member. A son got up and said some words and then we all took shots of rum and ate rum-soaked olives. We even got birthday presents – a framed picture of tía Rosa super-imposed over a celestial background. Obviously, this keepsake has a prime spot in my room. Then the whole gang trouped over to the family home for a birthday party, complete with dinner and drinking circles. No dancing though, that would just be disrespectful. It turned out to be a really fun evening and everyone kept joking how in the U.S. we bury our dead and then wipe our hands of them, but in Peru we’ll do anything for a party.
·Optometrist convention. I’ve latched on to one of my artisans, a 60-year-old woman named Maria who makes and sells algarroba (kind of like a mixture between honey and maple syrup) products. She’s slightly crazy and spends most days muttering to herself (perhaps I sense a kindred spirit), but she’s really sweet and lets me sit in her workshop for hours on end making (and tasting) toffees and cookies. I accompanied her to an artisan fair at a university about an hour away last week and I think she now sees me as her personal assistant. So she invited me to help her at an event at the “Casa de Sipan” last weekend. The Casa de Sipan is a house/farm on the river that hosts and caters private events, and the owners invited some of the artisans to set up tables and sell their goods throughout the event. None of the details were shared with me; I just knew we were supposed to be there around 11 (so, close to 1pm Peruvian time) to set up and there were to be about 400 people. I was blown away when I got there – the place is beautiful. It’s like out of a destination-wedding magazine, and it’s less than 5 minutes from my house (hint, hint all my engaged friends – if you want something totally unique and a chance to visit me too…I could probably hook you up. I’m kind of a big deal here.). The event turned out to be the wrap-up party of a three-day optometrist convention held in Chiclayo. It was an interesting paradox to see these well-off Peruvian doctors unload from their buses, start throwing back Pisco Sours and goat, and then look across the river to the shanties that are without power or running water. I also felt conflicted because it was proven again that no matter where I am or what I’m doing; I will always be given preferential treatment as a white foreigner. Sitting at the tables with my artisans, I was continually invited my some of the guests to have a drink and talk some more about my work, Peace Corps, etc. I mingled with a few drunken docs and somehow agreed to help one doctor with a cataract campaign in my town. How I am supposed to help, I have no idea. Total number of projects I’ve agreed to work on: approximately 17. Total number of projects I’ve agreed to work on for which I am absolutely unqualified: approximately 17.
·Baile popular. My host brother invited me to a party in a neighboring town, Saltur, last Saturday night. I figured this would be a typical Peruvian party: people sitting quietly in a drinking circle for the first hour, then cranking the music and dancing until 3am. Which is cool. I’ve perfected the art of the drinking circle and even know a few cumbia songs. But this was a different sort of party. We get to Saltur with a few of his friends and head for a basketball court where there is a live band set up. There’s a fence all around the court and no one is actually inside. We stand around outside the fence for a good 30 minutes and then make our way over to the entrance. Turns out you have to pay to get into the dancing area…even though you can see and hear the band perfectly fine from outside the gate. Whatever, just another custom that my US-grown brain will never comprehend. We go in and start dancing, a couple hours later I am suddenly overcome with the feeling that I am going to throw up. Whether is was from the shots of lukewarm beer, the mystery meat from dinner, the hours of dancing or some combination of the three, I don’t know, but I thought I was going to die. I sprinted from the court and sought solace on a pile of rocks around a corner. I’m sitting there gulping for air when my host bro and a friend come careening around the corner and start yelling at me for leaving without saying anything. Touched by their concern and too tired to try to explain myself in Spanish, I apologized and meekly followed them back. They were convinced that I would feel better if I just kept on dancing. Ugh. I tried, but then I had to explain that I really didn’t feel well. So they turned over the beer crate and made me sit in the middle of the circle while they continued dancing and drinking. Talk about feeling like an out-of-place loser. Luckily I started feeling a little better and found that incredibly, they were right; I did feel better if I moved around some. I found out on Monday that one of the hundred videos and/or pictures I posed for ended up on the local news. My sweet dance skills are slowly becoming a national phenomenon.
·Fun with farm animals. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been asked to stop by someone’s house or walk with them to their farm in order to conocer the town better. These walks usually lead to a lot of awkward chatter, lots of hugs, a piece of fruit and/or bread and an unwavering generosity from my neighbors. I’m also learning a lot about livestock. Last week, for instance, found me in the middle of a pen of guinea pigs learning how to check their sex by squeezing a certain way in a certain area. I think one of the male cuyes was coming on to me. I then had a long chat with the cuy owner about the tragedy that struck just a few days earlier – someone broke into his pen and stole two cuyes. The next day another neighbor suffered a similar theft. My host family was very concerned since we also raise cuyes. I also spent a very odd hour or two at the home of a family member of a woman who works with one of my artisans (got all that?). No one was there except for her five-year-old son. We fed some cows and some pigs. Then he told me to sit on a bench outside the house and wait. Sitting on that bench by myself in the middle of a farm with chickens literally pecking at my feet, I looked around and though for the hundredth time that day, “where the hell am I?” Then I left. I am still unsure what I was waiting for.
Despite all the above, one of the oddest things I’ve discovered in the past couple weeks is that my host mom is an Avon saleslady. This is so incongruous with her appearance and circumstance that I was positive I’d misunderstood until she proudly showed me all her Avon catalogs. Apparently she buys products from Chiclayo and then sells them out here in the campo. Not being familiar with the Avon pyramid structure, I don’t know if she makes an income or just gets free stuff after selling a certain value. I smell another potential project. The upshot of all this is that there’s now a poster of Patrick Dempsey (who is apparently a model for an Avon cologne) on the wall of the “kitchen,” right next to the creepy kitten calendar and Jesus watercolor. I can just see him winking at me as I choke down various entrails. Patrick is proud of me.
Suffice to say, the last few weeks have been entertaining and eye opening. I still have a long way to go to feeling comfortable in my role here, but I’m along for the ride. And it is quite a ride. Yes we can.
Mama numero uno, Liz.
