This time on Oh Hey, Peru

• Field Based Training
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Field Based Training

Several weeks ago (about 6 I believe) all the programs had an event called Field Based Training.  This was an event that ranged from 4 days (for the Health Program) to 7 days (for the Water and Sanitation program).  Field Based Training is pretty much what it sounds like, training in the field.

The lucky WASH program piled onto a bus for a trip to the department of Ica.  Ica is in the coastal region of Peru and is home to grape fields as far as the eye can see.  In this department they make wine and Pisco.  The wine is sweeter than church wine (almost like cough syrup) and the Pisco is great.  If you’ve got some time on your hands learn how to make a Pisco Sour, it’s a delicious drink and based on the fact that eggs are involved, I believe it is healthy.  Besides the quality drink menu, Ica is home to some of the hottest weather and fiercest sun I remember being in, in my mind it is pretty much a huge desert.

Our first two nights were spent in Ica City.  This is a fairly large city with lots of attractions, including a pizza/ice cream restaurant that we discovered immediately.  If you want to see a feeding frenzy, simply load 16, 22-26 year olds onto a bus for 9 hours, feed them terrible vegetarian lasagna, the set them loose on a pizza/ice cream shop.  It’s impressive.  With our days choc full of activities starting at 7:30 am we did the most logical thing and drank a beers on the roof of our hostel.

 7:30 the next day we took a 20min cab ride to a small town called Santiago.  Here we listened to presentations for 6hours.  There is nothing exciting to report during this time except I ate about 17 popsicles.  The next two hours were spent preparing presentations about hand washing for children in the school the next morning.  After 6 hours of not thinking in any language it is hard to become creative in a language that is not your first, but I believe that my teaching partner, Brian, and I created a teaching plan that will forever be remembered.

Hand washing is a very important topic when it comes to public health, especially when it comes to children.  We were teaching children age 5-7, which I’m pretty sure is about 1^st or 2^nd grade.  What I have learned through my previous Peace Corps work at school is that teaching is a slippery slope.  If a lesson is boring, kids won’t pay attention and participate, if the lesson is too fun chaos will erupt in your classroom.  With this class, I think we fell in the too fun/chaos category. 

Brian entered the room and gave introductions, following which, I, dressed as a bandit in a straw hat, cape made of trash bags, and a mask made of trash bags storm into the room.  I was Senor German (pronounced Herman.  The Spanish word for germs is germens, thus I was Mr. Germ).  I announced that my goal was to infect every person in the world with illnesses, following which we had a hand washing race using Tippy-Taps (google it).  To make a long story short, chaos erupted, water was everywhere, and I was covered in glitter (representing germs).

Our next stop was a town called Palpa.  We stayed here for two nights, and I proceeded to eat 7 cheeseburgers.  While in this town we roamed through the dessert with 22 people in a van made for 15.  In this dessert, we toured a water system that was built about 30 years ago by the Canadians.  From what little I know about Canadians, the one thing I can say for certain is that they build hearty water supply systems in developing countries.  This system has never had a single problem since its construction during the mid ‘80s, quite impressive for a system in the middle of the dessert in a developing country.

Following our tour of the system we were instructed to give interviews about household water use.  The only problem with giving interviews in the middle of the dessert is that there are very few people, and on this occasion, the houses we found were severely lacking people.  Some interview groups spoke with 6 year olds, my group stopped a guy on a motorcycle who doesn’t even live in the area, other groups simply wandered down a dusty dirt road searching for people.  We arrived back to our hostel 3 hours later than scheduled, all hot, all sweaty, all tired, and all hungry.  It was a pretty terrible day. 

The following day we traveled further into the Ica heat for reservoir disinfection.  This proved much more entertaining than the previous day’s desert exploration.  Now, the protocol may differ in different countries, but to clean a reservoir in Peru you pretty much throw super concentrated chlorine on the walls and scrub them with a grubby broom.  Pretty fun stuff, but terribly hard on your clothes.  Every item of clothing I wore is now poka-dotted from chlorine splashing off the walls.

After several days in the hot desert sun, any good working crew would need a break.  We were lucky and were given the opportunity to visit an oasis, pretty much a pond in the dessert where you can swim and drink beer.  A great way to relax and a great way to get sunburned.  Following cheeseburgers, we were shown the town by the Peace Corps volunteer that lives there.  Significantly better than the previous day. 

The next two days consisted of traveling, sweating, and being spoken to.  Both were good days with plenty of learning experiences, however they seem to have escaped my memory at this moment in time.  I suppose that says something about our trip, and training in general.  The days are intense and filled with learning.  Like little sponges we try to soak up as much knowledge as we can, but like any sponge I have ever used, we are unable to retain all. 

Field based training was a super fun time in a place I don’t really intend to visit again.  Ica is a desert.  Deserts are not for me. 

Check out this sweet video about Peace Corps Peru 22 (my group)!

Coming Soon (I promise)

•   Site Visits
• Going Away Party
• Swearing in
• Post Swearing In
• First Week in Site