Press conference at Paucartambo city hall to introduce our presence: Capacitadores Norteamericanos Comienzan Trabajos de Asesoramiento en Laptops en el Valle Agricola e Hidroenergetico

http://www.munipaucartambopasco.gob.pe

A rest stop during Man and Brian’s bus ride from Lima to Paucartambo, Sunday June 28, 2009

Beautiful blue lagoons and white snow caps dotted the sceneries when we were among the peaks of the Andes

Arriving at Enersur’s residence compound Campamento Huallamayo late at night

The following day we were treated to sweet mountain air, fog draped green hills, and pristine gurgling brooks

While Alli Feldman, Rebecca Crabb, Sonia Rutherford, and Brian were picking up snacks at a local sundries store

The guys were on a mission to procure large volumes of Cusquena.  That’s just water, hop, malt, barley, stirred into a brew!

When you buy enough Cusquena, they throw in free delivery

Caution: frequent sheep crossing

In case of collision … cordero pachamanca!

Buen provecho!

Hydroelectric is big in Paucartambo and is iconically featured in the city square

Encountering a group of kids just off the city square. It wasn’t long before we joined them for some spirited soccer and volleyball.

Girls in Peru have taken on volleyball as THEIR ball game, versus soccer for boys.  The Peru women’s national volleyball team won Silver in the 1988 Olympics and is consistently a medalist in the South American Championship going back to the 1950′s. The girls and their volleyball have earned Peru many more international medals and fanfare than the boys with their soccer!

Someday, these girls might be movie stars, famous authors, singers, artists; famed volley ball players, renowned scientists; senators or presidents … and it will be Man’s turn to ask for THEIR autographs!

The classroom may be humming with XO laptops, radiating with Wi-Fi, and bringing to bear some of mankind’s most ingenious technological inventions but Faith is always front and center, ever present, enduring, remindful. Always vibrant and eminent in the public schools we visited.

Laptops, Internet, and Wikipedia below. God’s love above.

Above teacher’s instructions

Above math and fractions

Above Jefferson’s 6th birthday celebration

Above farewell message for Alex Fitch and Steven Conrad

Above all …

Christening ceremony for the school’s new juicer-blender machine

While laptops hum underneath

Answer reveals up above

After several weeks of living on the go, sleeping under tin roofs, sharing 1.5 bathrooms with ten people, warming the room with your own body heat, and trying to beat the 3-minute hot water timer in the shower …. we showed up at Campamento Huallamayo to find ourselves in the lap of luxury.

This compound provides residence for the professional staff of the EnerSur hydroelectric plant and offers creature comforts sufficient to help people endure their one- or two-year stays. That means single rooms with private baths, daily laundry service, a lounge area in each residence hall with TV & DVD, a canteen with table linen and wait staff, a recreation room with ping pong, pool, foosball, a bar; along with a workout room, sauna, soccer field, landscaping, and expansive mountain views!

For our now recalibrated standard of living, this was like finding ourselves at the steps of the … Ritz-Carlton.

Gate to the residence compound. Greeters standing by 24 hours a day. They just happen to also have guns.

But before you can get to the gate of the residence compound, you must first make it through the military checkpoint.

24 hours. Machine guns. Live ammo. Answer the question. Humor not appreciated.

On right: canteen & recreation building

Single rooms, tiled floor, window curtains, and a ceiling that’s not a tin roof.  Welcome to Ritz-Carlton!

Oh by the way … anything left on the bed in the morning will be washed and returned by 6 pm

Private bath? And a shower with seemingly unlimited hot water? I feel like a sheik.

Meeting up with (from left) Sonia Rutherford, Allison (Alli) Feldman, Rebecca Crabb

Breakfast before heading out to the schools. Notice table linen, china, flower vase, and a wait staff … can you spell luxury?!

Clockwise: Rebecca Crabb, Alli Feldman, William Marshall, Max Harleman, Bui father, Bui son

Socializing with Paulo the facility manager

If you’re going to be away from your family and stay here a year or two, you’ll rack up a lot of hours at this table.

Notice the bar in the background and the lanterns hanging off the ceiling. It’s home away from home for your sanity.

And let’s throw in a soccer field, BBQ area, a gym, and a sauna to boot!

Up the mountain from our residence compound is Institucion Educativa 34026 where Rebecca Crabb and Allison (Alli) Feldman are currently deployed. Brian joined Alli today in a 6th classroom while Man teamed up with Rebecca in a 5th grade classroom. The principal gave us rousing introductions to the classrooms and then set us free with the teachers and kids for the rest of the day.

Algrebraic sequence!

Some of these were tough, even Rebecca and Man had to confer on what the answers might be. The kids were surprisingly adept.

When the bell rang at the end of the school day, the students wouldn’t let us go alone. They tagged with us all the way out.

Goodbyes are never easy after you bonded with the kids.

Today we came to visit Max Harleman at his school, Institucion Educativa 34087 in the ACO village of Paucartambo. We spent the day in a “multi-grado” classroom of 3rd and 4th graders. The kids used the XOs to help them work through long division math problems. Later in the day when the teacher’s lesson plan turned to religion and the sacrament of baptism, Max showed the students how to leverage Wikipedia on the XOs to look up “bautizo” (Spanish for baptism) and use the information found to write their compositions on the topic.

After arriving last night in Huallatambo and settling into very comfortable quarters at the residence compound of the hydroelectric plant, today we accompanied Sonia Rutherford to Institucion Educativa 34089.  We were warmly welcomed by the principal, exchanged a good amount of pleasantries over coffee, and then headed for a 5th grade classroom to see the kids.

Brian … always popular with the girls

S

Sonia sharing some fancy XO moves with the teacher

Is going to school supposed to be this much fun?

Using the XO’s built-in camera, students took turns taking pictures of (and with) Sonia, Man, and Brian

Receso …. that’s recess and it’s play time

Brian joined the boys for soccer while Man put in some volleyball action with the girls

Leaving the lights of Lima behind, we now take on a 9-hour bus journey northeast, crossing the Andes yet once more, to the Pasco region of Peru. The bus will take us to the city of Carhuamayo. There we take a 1.5-hour car-hire eastward to the city of Paucartambo. And then another 20 minutes to the village of Huallamayo where there is a large hydro-electric plant and we get to stay in a very nice residence compound built for its staff.

On this bus map, Carhuamayo is between Cerro the Pasco to the north and Junin to the south

A 7-hour ride from Lima, northeastward

Once we’re done with the bus, it’s still another 1.5 hours by car-hire to Paucartambo, underlined on this map (below Cerro de Pasco)

But hold on … once in Paucartambo, it’s still another 20 minutes to the village of Huallamayo

Miles to go before we sleep. Who said that?

With our pick-up-and-go style of travel, we’ve learned to literally live out of the suitcase

Fluff’em, fold’em, but keep them in the suitcase and ready to zip up

Amazing how resourceful we become when we are far from the comfort of home

No washing machine?  … Hands

No clothes dryer? … Curtain rods

No laundry detergent?  … Hair shampoo (try it, clothes smell great!)

After sandboarding in Ica yesterday, we are now back in Lima for a layover before taking a 9-hour bus journey to our next destination in the Pasco region. With the help of our friends in the Ministry of Education, we took up a room at a hotel just two blocks from the glitzy beach strip of the Miraflores section of Lima. If not told, one could easily think this was Southern California or Miami Beach: surf, sand, palm trees, glitzy shops, pretty people, and … Hooters.

We succumbed to the lure of good ole American burgers and ribs. Stack’em up and pile’em high, baby.

The lights and glitz of Miraflores, apres dinner

Where are we … Lima or Florida?  Doesn’t matter. It’s a global village. Welcome home.

After saying farewell in Cordova, we took a 3-hour car ride westward, crossing the Andes, to the city of Ica for a little fun prior to heading north to Lima for our next leg of the journey to the Pasco region.  In Ica we joined up with Anthony Tijero, Steven Cymerman, Raul the principal, and his wife Rosa for a day of tourist fun. Two visits to the wineries for wine tasting and a briefing on the art of making Pisco, Peru’s famed and popular liquor.  But the adrenaline rush of the day was when the guys took up a 1.5-hour doonbuggy ride at Lake Huacachina that sped them across the sand, onto the vast sand dunes of Ica, and up the highest peaks for the most thrilling sandboarding any of the guys has ever experienced.

Getting sandboarding gears at Lake Huacachina

Riding the dunes in our buggy

Off the buggy and onto the slope

Brian waving from the bottom of the dune after his slide.

This was the easy one, for practice. The “oh my god” one is yet to come.

The three back spots on top of this “oh my god” dune: Brian Bui, Steven Cymerman, Anthony Tijero

Look very carefully and you’ll see a white spot sliding down the dune … that’s Brian!

After this knock-the-wind-out-of-me slide, Brian declared “Mi papa es el mejor padre”

Right in the middle of the desert and amidst the sand dunes is … a lush oasis

All nature, no man-made planting or irrigation

And far away on the horizon is the outline of the Andes 

Got the thirst from all that sandboarding?  …. Wine! 

Sadly, it was time to move on and today we said sweet goodbye to the new friends we made over the past week in Corbova.  It´s never easy and this one was even less so.

If there was a new soft spot in my heart, I found it.  I felt it.