Year two in Peru

Hello family and friends... 

I have discovered that I am horrible at trying to keep up this blog, so this is going to be another long one. We are back in Tarapoto for a second year. Spencer has been busy working in the garden and the yard. Max enjoys helping with all the chores, especially watering, raking, chasing the chickens back down the hill and feeding all the animals. 

Speaking of animals, our two cats are doing really well. They are super playful and VERY tolerant... They pretty much let Max do as he pleases and they just lovingly accept it all. 

Max enjoys helping out in the kitchen, especially when it involves a yummy treat. He is going to have to work on his sneakiness though. But who can resist Spencer's cakes?! They are delicious! 

For those of you that don't know, last year I contracted a tropical disease called leishmaniasis... Please don't google it! The form that I have is NOT life threatening and the spot that I had on my skin is completely gone. I do however still carry it in my bloodstream. The treatment is a 20 day course of IV antibiotics that make you quite ill. After weighing my options I have decided to wait until I am back in Canada as we live directly in the Leishmaniasis zone and I would be extremely ticked off if I contracted it again and had to endure the treatment twice. A couple that lives close to us has had it several times. The picture below was taken at the centre for tropical disease in town, the jars are filled with creatures and body parts. I felt like I was in a sci-fi movie... Not to mention the clinic was down a dusty dirt road in the middle of nowhere. 😳

While we are on the topic of scary things, we had a crazy wind storm that blew a neighbouring roof into our yard. It damaged several trees and severed our Internet cable. It was unbelievable how quickly the workers from the water plant came over and cleaned everything up. Can't say the same for the Internet... that took weeks to repair. 

Here is a picture of a travelling circus that was destroyed by the wind. 

Max had a little accident, he tripped and knocked his front tooth loose. I happened to have a book here called Moose's Loose Tooth, which I thought was completely appropriate for the occasion until I realized that the plot was Moose trying to get his loose tooth out of his mouth in order to collect the loot from the Tooth Fairy. Max quickly picked-up on this and got really excited to try and get his tooth to fall out. I convinced him that we could write a letter to the Tooth Fairy explaining that his tooth needed to stay-

put and thankfully the Tooth Fairy wrote a very nice note back and gave him a special coin to encourage him to keep his tooth in his head for a few more years. 😁😝

Max is extremely interested in making art these days. He loves the chalk that he got from his great grandparents in Edmonton this summer. He and his friends spend hours making grafitti all over the place. 

Spencer has devised a new way of knocking down coconuts, while it seems to be a little tedious and frustrating, it is effective and very entertaining to watch. 

Max continues to spend time with his friends, Amaru, Tala, and David. Amaru and Max enjoy running around like maniacs, Tala and Max enjoy exploring and drawing, while Max and David spend most their time making art. 

The two of them have created an art wall in our house which house many flags drawn by David... (Can you spot the North Korean one?!? 😳)

Max and Spencer went on a fishing trip to Rumizapa, which Max absolutely LOVED! They met Kristi, Rubén and Tala at a fishing pond for the day. Max spent weeks talking about and pretending to fish. He sure enjoys his Dada-Max time. 

I have been trying to tackle baking while I'm here which is ridiculous as it is about 35 degrees everyday and turning on an oven for more that 10 minutes is complete torture. One food that I have been missing more than anything is bagels, so after a friend of mine posted a recipe on her baking blog, I couldn't help but try.... They looked strange but they were delicious. Try them for yourself: http://www.bakingforfriends.com/hard-winter-bread-co/

I also baked a pumpkin pie for our Thanksgiving celebration with Kristi and Rubén. 

Speaking of Kristi and Rubén (our Canadian friends and social life-line here) they are leaving next week so we have been spending as much time with them as possible. We took a trip to a hidden hot springs that was a couple hour boat ride from Chazuta. 

This waterfall is scalding hot! 

Kristi dug up some clay and we turned this little getaway into a spa retreat.

Spencer brought an inflatable boat that was a big hit with the kids. 

This pool looked lovely but it was filled with tiny biting fish. 

It wasn't until we were back in the boat that Kristi mentioned the last time they saw water snakes in the waterways that we had to traverse through! 😫

A couple weeks later we took a trip to San Roque to visit friends of Kristi and Rubén's. Fanny and Benedicto have a farm that grows coffee, cocoa, and collect honey. This is a picture in front of their home and store. 

Benedicto cutting beeswax out of the box. These particular type of bees do not sting! 

Mmmm fresh honey! 

Kristi and her gaggle of children! 

Joel and Irwin enjoying Spencer's inflatable boat. 

Spencer was popular with the ladies at the Nayeli's 15th birthday party. 

Warning: any vegetarians and vegans should probably stop reading now! 

Fanny and Benedicto prepared a special breakfast for us... Cuy! Aka: Guinea pig

I know that we think of these cute and cuddly creatures as classroom pets from our childhood, but here they are a delicacy.

Don't believe me?! Check out this article from the BBC. 

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.bbc.com/news/amp/business-38857881

Another popular snack is roasted giant ants... 

Spencer quite liked them... Me? Not so much! 

Unfortunately, on the night we left, San Roque was hit with heavy rains that washed away bridges and flooded much of the town. Everyone is safe but many supplies were needed. Here are pictures of the bridge on Sunday. 

 The same bridge on Monday... Crazy!

We miss everyone, please come visit! 😁 I guess that's never going to happen after this blogpost! 😝

After a long hiatus

Hello Family and Friends,

I am so sorry that I have dropped the ball on blogging lately. It was a hard transition back here after being home for Christmas. I miss Canada very much and was feeling a bit “bah-humbug” about Peru. That being said, there have been many fun and wonderful experiences over the last few months that I would love to share. 

Unfortunately when we were Canada our cat Scratchy ran away. I still hope that she is going to randomly show up and every once and a while I run outside because think I hear her, but I’m starting to come to the realization that it’s not going to happen…  Max saw a pet that he liked at the market and it was only 3 soles, so we bought it... But it ran away too. 

How does a snail run away, you ask? You'd be shocked to see how far one can get in an hour. I think maybe we aren't meant to be "pet" people. 

We continue to have interesting creature encounters. Lots of little gecko’s, some toads and frogs, a group of tamarin monkeys that visit often for bananas, a beautiful toucan, a huge iguana, a small snake on our front step, and a couple extremely venomous spiders (one that was living in our bedroom!). 

Max and I went for a sleepover in Lamas with Kristy and Tala at the end of January. We had so much fun tending to the chickens, picking mangoes off the trees, playing on the abandoned mototaxi, reading stories, playing in the weavers workshop in Wayku. 

Feeding the chicken leftover organic quinoa! Best fed chickens ever! 

Max has started to help Spencer with the yard work, he is really great at filling the wheelbarrow with leaves, but his favourite part is getting the free ride back up the hill. 

After all this time living here we discovered a secret little food court downtown Tarapoto. Here is Max enjoying some jungle style entertainment while we ate breakfast. 

We have gone on a few day trips out of town to spend time in nature. The first to a beautiful spot on a river, the second to the biggest tourist spot in the area Ahuashiyacu waterfall, and the third a small jungle town called Chazuta. 

Eating a banana right off the tree after a failed attempt at a hike to a waterfall. 

You may spot a woman washing her dishes and laundry on the other river bank. 

Buying chocolate, which we later discovered the stuff we taste tested there was much better than the stuff we were sold. 

Buying handmade pottery

Spencer went on a trip to Lima for work so Max and I had a week to ourselves. We spent time with friends and went to see Max’s first movie in a theatre. We had the entire theatre to ourselves! We saw Rockdog, in Spanish, so I’m not totally clear on what exactly happened in the movie, but I think we both got the gist. Now Max falls asleep every night listening to the song from the movie. 

Max started to school and I somehow got roped into spending my time there helping to manage a bit of an unruly group. One of the teachers did not come back from summer break, so the director of the school is stuck scrambling for find someone. I spent two weeks basically chasing after one little tornado of a kiddo (who is very sweet, but loves to pull hair, knock down towers, randomly whack kids in the face, and attempt to run away every time the door is opened UGH!) It was a very exhausting two weeks. I am doing music and yoga classes at Max’s school and another school run by the same woman a few times a week. This was my first week and it was a little challenging to say the least, BUT everything gets easier with time, right?! I am enjoying being involved in school and feel like I have my own purpose here now. 

Sending love to all!

xoxo

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