Knitting

My first attempt (that worked!) at the cable stitch. Learnt mostly by watching people.

El Alphabeto

For a couple of afternoons the older children coloured in these pictures for each letter of the alphabet that I had drawn. We stuck them up in the gordito's and pequeño's rooms. Here is a section of one set, with Sofia and Bridgit too.

Uh oh, up to no good!

Yusey and Sayda appear with mysterious bags...

It soon became apparent that we were in for a wet time (and time to put the camera away!)

Photos by Leydi

Four Adoptions and a Birthday

We've had several celebrations at Amantaní recently...

Barney came to visit the birthday party held for the babies and gorditos with birthdays between November and February.

Paloma (Isabelle Megan) with her Mommy and Daddy

Javier (Diego Alberto) with his new family from Lima (minus Rafa and Ingrid with the balloon)

Lourdes (Rosa Maria) has also moved to Malaga, Spain with her new parents, and Fabrizzio to Paris.

A couple more party pics:

Javier dressed up to the nines (curtesy of Bermuda Salvation Army Thrift Shop), celebrating his 1st birthday in style.

Let's make a teething club

At Amantaní, the babies are getting their first teeth, the gorditos and pequeños are getting the rest of them, the older children are losing their baby teeth and new ones are coming in from all angles in all sizes, and now it appears that volunteers are getting their wisdom teeth!

(Ingrid showing off her new teeth at a party)

Tribute to Peru and my jeans

My old jeans which served me well in Peru (and many other places too) reincarnated as future cushion covers showing the Southern Cross, an important symbol for Peruvians, and a patchwork using the Inca Wall and the 12 angled stone as inspiration.

Learning English

Over the past couple weeks I've been helping Helen, one of the girls at Amantaní with her English, and have begun to realise just what it must be like for foreigners to learn the weird quirks of the language!

For example, did you know that all regular verbs in the past tense can be grouped into three groups? As far as I was concerned, you just need to add -ed. Helen would promise you she wished it were that easy! Firstly, how do you describe the difference between 'miss' and 'missed'? Think about it, and you kind of add some sort of 't' to the end. So pretty much 'want' and 'wanted' should sound the same? Wrong of course! Now you need remember to pronounce that -ed as an -ed. But to make a rule about words ending in t's and not in t's would be too easy of course, whoever says 'I rest-ed last night'? Maybe the image of strict old English teacher, but in Helen's case, she needs to know to recognise 'I restid last night' as meaning 'I relaxed', which, it should be noted, will sound like 'relaxt'.

And then there's the other type of past tense - "Did you do it last night?", "Yes, I did it". I'll only confuse myself trying to think about which of the did's corresponds to the do's. Helen seems to have got the dids and dos sorted in her mind, she must be smarter than me...

Baby Lucy

Me with Baby Lucy, the smallest baby at Amantaní at the moment. Although named after me, she has also been given the nickname 'lenteja', as she has gained a reputation for her slowness at drinking her milk. (Lenteja 'lentil' sounds like the spanish word for 'slow', lento, and the L's and her small size makes Lentil suitable for her too.)

She is about to celebrate two months, and has just reached 2.5kilos. When she arrived about a month ago she was less than 2kilos! But she is so sweet and beautiful and despite her size, perfectly healthy.

Pisco Sour Day

In honour of 4th February, 'The Day of Pisco Sour', here is a recipe for Peru's famous cocktail.

2 oz Pisco (Peruvian brandy)
1 oz Lime juice
1-2 tbsp Sugar
1/2 Egg white
Dash of Angostura Bitters.

Shake vigourously with ice.
Strain into a cocktail glass.
Garnish with a dash of bitters.

Enjoy!

photo:www.go2peru.com

Carnaval de Tira Agua

Today isn't even 'Carnaval de Tira Agua' -Carnival of Throwing Water, the date is sometime later this month, though let me say I know what it's going to be like! Already today, just between walking back home for lunch from Amantaní I ended up with a wet butt! My second attack came less than two hours later, this time walking back to Amantaní. Luckily the guy (assuming women aren't that evil!) missed and I only ended up with a soaking sneaker! I then had my eyes peeled for more attacks, but realised they are hard to avoid, after watching a couple water balloons being catapulted over the 6 lane highway of Avenida de la Cultura!

Anyway, my fun for the day!

UPDATE: I must have a sign on my back saying 'Get me wet!' as today's hit is now the third time I've arrived somewhere wet! Here's my idea of a compromise with its inventors: Let everyone play around with water balloons as normal, but pay my bus fairs and throw in a gym membership for the time of carninval, as I can't trust a walk anywhere without ending up soaked at the door!

ANOTHER UPDATE: This afternoon I thwarted another water balloon attack, though it was mostly luck. Some boys with two huge water balloons managed to appear out of nowhere and taget me, but at that close range, the strong rubbered big balloon bounced off me and got the boy wet on the backsplash! I only heard the second balloon plop behind me as I ran away. Unfortunately I still have to get there and back from Amantaní again today!

18th FEBRUARY: I honestly would have thought the novelty of these waterbombs would have worn off by now. Apparently not, as you can see by the updated tally. The hit occurred as I was trying to negotiate crossing the street yesterday - unfair I thought! And the miss today was against Gaby and me, almost in exactly the same place. Also had a little boy manage to squirt his water pistol into a bag I was carrying, he seemed pretty impressed by his hit as I was surprised!

Current tally: 4 hits-3 misses