Getting lost in the Campo

   The Tuesday before I left for the states, I had a mission... There is a small community called Tanin that was excited to work with me and continue our previous work the year before. Last school year we worked on a school garden and did a nutrition course with the children and parents. It was a moderate success but the big turnout was for the construction of the garden itself. So, this year, after a little coordinating and some fun-time activities with the kiddos, we organized a "faena" which means "get everyone down to the school to help out!" to get the garden set up for the coming year. 

  It started at 8am, so really more like 9am. And with that, my stupidity began... I decided I didn't need to really be there at 8 because it wouldn't start until nine... But I was missing a key factor in Peruvian transportation: if you want to get to a random locale, go with the school teachers! At 6-8am in the mornings there is transportation anywhere.. The most random of towns has combis or taxis driving in, around, and through towns I've never heard of. After 8? Ha.

  So, yeah, I started my journey at 8:15am and hopped the combi to Chavin where upon I waited, waited, waited for a vehicle of any make or model to take me to the "cruce" (place in the highway where a footpath wanders off to said town: example, path goin

g to Tanin is "cruce de Tanin" see? simple!) When a bus headed to Lima finally rounded the corner, I jumped in a fit of joy and hopped on... The bus went about 200m and stopped at a restaurant on the side of the road and shouted, "Breakfast! Hour break!" Um, what? Could we just drive another 10 minutes? Please? I was so frustrated I got out and just started walking down the highway, thinking I'd flag down a taxi sooner or later...

  So, 45 minutes later I was kinda annoyed but found a path from the highway that looked like a "shortcut" I remembered to go to Tanin. So I took it! 20 minutes later when I reached the top of the hill and looked around, I realized I was very much in t

he wrong place. Oops. I kept walking and rounded some beautiful hills, even saw some snow-capped peaks! 

The view from some hilltop near where I was supposed to be going...

I finally approached the town from the opposite side after much time and a short chat with a man herding bulls ("Is Tanin over there?" "Yeah, it's WAY over there." "Awesome, thanks.") and entered the door of the elementary school an hour and 44 minutes late. Great.

  On the plus side, they had started the faena and were doing well and almost ready to plant the seeds!  All of the parents were working hard and were excited to see that the silly foreigner actually did pull through with her side of the deal and I was excited to see everyone working together! For the sake of the vegetables, no less! :)