Direct from San Marcos!

Yay! I made it back to my site today! Even though the strange not quite El Niño not so much La Niña phenomenon that is ravaging the coast, making the department of Tumbes (on the border of Ecuador and Peru) in a state of emergency and limiting transportation to Cajamarca by destroying 900 mts. of highway is in full throttle, apparently in Ancash, everything is fine. We even made the trek from Huaraz to San Marcos in three hours. That, by the way, is record dry season the road is in tip top shape time. I just don’t know what this world is coming to..

So, when I arrived today my family was actually home and I received an enthusiastic hello, which is so much more fun than an empty house, and got a good old fashion lunch of beans, rice, and potatoes (with fideo soup, aka-lots of pasta). I was in my room before lunch when I heard my host-sister call me to come to the kitchen. My host-mom didn’t know what to do with some food but they were sure that I would know. As I follow Jessi to the kitchen I think, “Has my Spanish gotten that bad? My host-mom knows how to take a pig from the trough to the Christmas dinner table I can’t think of any food that I would know more about than her.. And if there was… why would she buy it?” When I walk into the kitchen, I spot the culprit: a can of beans. I look to my host-mom and she asks, “So, do I just put it in the pot?” Well, they got me there. If there’s one thing I may have the upper hand with, it’s the microwave dinner, top ramen, and canned bean world. So, I show her what any health conscious canned bean eater would do, we wash away the bean juice to get rid of the extra sodium and, um, yes, throw them in the pot. (It’s a rough life, using canned goods.)

Turns out she got them from some Italian nuns that live in a town a few hours down the road (lots of them around here, actually) and this progressed to a lively discussion on what she could possibly do with her two new cans of peeled tomatoes. :)