What's New?

   Just two weeks ago, I woke up to the sounds of frogs croaking and the fresh scent of living plants carried in through the window by the breeze.  I went to bed in the heat shortly after the sun said goodnight.  Now I go to bed several hours after the sun, wearing long sleeves, with a few layers on the bed.  The window is cracked, but it lets in the drone of cars and the honking of their horns as they race along the Pan-American Highway.   When I look out the window, instead of being greeted by evergreen trees, green grass and cornfields, I see a few small banana trees, paved streets, and brick buildings that show evidence of having been constructed one room or floor at a time. 

   Some things seem so long ago and some things so recent.  At other times I wonder about things that have or haven’t changed.  Home always seems the same, although I know it too, like the people in it, are in constant evolution.  Our home here in Chiclayo has much of the same furniture in it, but we’ve made improvements such as installing warm water in the shower, fixing broken windows, and purchasing a table.  Outside too, the street is now paved and less dust bursts through the seams of the windows.   Some of the streets in the center of the city have also been paved and there seems to be more security. But as I flag down a Combi and am forced to jostle my way to the back and cram myself into a space too small for me to fit, I look out the window and see the same people who live in the streets- the woman who wears plastic sacks, an old man who packs his bags of possessions along and sleeps on the curbs, an elderly woman selling gum, a man playing a recorder waiting for alms in a can, and the money changers near the banks, I am reminded that perhaps not much has really changed.