Pumpkin Pie

During the firsr week of the month, I nabbed one of the leftover Halloween pumpkins that were being sold at a supermarket, since that is the only time pumpkins as we know them can be purchased.  With two private students, I'd discussed Halloween and Thanksgiving and food which of course included the traditional Thanksgiving pumpkin pie.  Although it isn't quite Thanksgiving, we celebrated early having English class in the kitchen and making a pumpkin pie together.  Iris also got in on the action.

Snippets of the past week

Over the weekend, Iris and I got together with a group of friends from the women's circle that we participate in.  We celebrated various talents that we have with some women making food to share, others teaching us how to make handcrafts, another teaching us a circular dance, one telling jokes to make us laugh, another singing and me playing my flute while Iris blew on her recorder.  We had a lovely evening spent with beautiful personalities.

October is the month of Señor de Los Milagros (Lord of the Miracles) in Peru.  Devout Peruvian Catholics dress in purple robes and adore the image of Christ that had been painted in Lima by an Angolan slave that had been brought to this country.  During the earthquake of 1655, the only thing left standing in the area with the mural of Jesus Christ and it was fully intact.  It was declared a miracle and to this day, large processions go on all over the country thoughout the month.  Featured below are a few pictures of a small procession that went by our house this week.   

Iris has loved shoes for months now.  It was one of her first words and her love for shoes has moved on to not only looking at and pointing out everyone's shoes, but also putting on any shoes or sandals of mine that are not put out of reach or out of sight.

the chaotic, busy, and sometimes tough life of Agoris

The past two months since we've been back in Peru have been chaotic, busy and at times overwhelming.    

Last weekend, Igor was able to come back to spend a few days with Iris and me and to attend his sister’s wedding.  We spent some much needed time together at the city playground, on the floor in our apartment littered with toys and animal flashcards, and running errands as a family.  After showing Igor about five minutes of resentment when he first arrived, Iris gave him love, kisses and laughter galore before he had to return to the rainforest.  The following day was hard on us all, especially Iris who found the shirt Igor had worn the day before and carried it around calling out for her papa. 

While Igor attends to numerous patients daily at his medical post, Iris keeps me on my toes as I constantly have to ask her to sit (not stand or jump) on furniture or not to climb onto the table.   In those rare moments when she decides to behave like a proper little lady and entertain herself in a not-so-dangerous fashion, I attempt to get housework done as well as do work for the online classes I teach for the university.  Much of those tasks must be completed after she goes to bed for the night.  

Those are our routines… or lack of them as we do what we can and know that time ticks by, changes occur, but it also brings us closer to the end of December when we’ll be together again, if only for a few days.  

her second year

Iris turned one this month and has started off her second year with a bang.  She keeps me busy as she likes climbing on everything, is very communicative, tests her boundaries and runs all over the place.

Snapshots Of Our Lives

While Igor practices as a licensed doctor in the Amazon Rainforest, 

putting on a smile despite the daily challenges, 

Iris and I have been enjoying time in peaceful, beautiful Nebraska with family.   

 Igor carries out programs for disease prevention and family health.

 Enjoying Grandma and Grandpa's flower garden.

Iris and I test-flying a plane at a park.

Life

I'm a little over halfway through the third decade of the time God has granted me on Earth. My life is better, worse and different than, yet the same as I had imagined or at least hoped that it would be.

My sophomore year of high school, I had an English teacher who asked us to write a letter to ourselves about where we would be and what we would be doing ten years from that moment. I don't remember what I wrote, but it was probably something generic about how I'd have graduated from college and have a normal job. A normal life, you know? Whatever normal is. All I know now, is that I certainly didn't write that I would be married to a romantic, outgoing, break-dancing doctor. And while that doctor saves lives in a remote village in the Amazon rainforest, I would be raising our daughter in a large city in a South American desert.

Another lesson in that English class taught me that “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” While we spend time doing certain jobs or internships or taking specific classes that are supposed to eventually help us get to where we want to be going, our path may not be straight and the destination we have in mind may not even exist. When I finished college, I was Kenya bound and then would travel to Peru for my year with a Fulbright Grant. Upon completion of that prestigious opportunity, I would return home and lead a normal life. Well, there you have it again. Normal. What's normal? Whatever it is, I didn't achieve the normal life in the Midwest that I had imagined.

Just in the past couple of weeks, the three of us each encountered something unexpected.

While returning to our house from a nearby bakery, I decided to cross the street with Iris to avoid an extremely low hanging live electrical wire. Paying little heed to the woman at the other end of the block who had her back turned to us, we naively continued on our way. Just before reaching the barefooted individual, a horrible stench reached our nostrils. Stepping out in the street to go around the alleged epicenter of the foul odor, we looked over to see the elderly woman churning the sewage below the sidewalk with a stick as if she were churning butter. Who would have thought? Why anyone would do such a thing is something I will likely never know and probably never want to know.

Meanwhile, Igor continued to survive the Amazon. What I'm about to tell you may make you chuckle, but it is no joke in jungle to encounter creatures when one has no idea as to whether or not they are venomous. Seated in his room, Igor saw his family of geckos getting their fill of insects near the window. He noticed something that he'd never seen before, just as it burst into his room and began to screech. Making an incredibly loud sound that he described as “the screeching of a bird”, the butterfly-like insect with a one foot long wingspan swooped around his room. Fearing the foreign critter, he covered himself in clothing to protect himself and went to battle with a bucket and broom. After five minutes, Igor won the war and threw the corpse outside. Igor learned about that creature as a few nearby boys began to howl with laughter that the doctor had been frightened by a giant cicada. One creature that wasn't dangerous. Hopefully the next one isn't either.

Iris, too, was startled by an insect. She normally is filled with curiosity about most things and tries to get her hands on everything, but a large tan-colored cricket flew onto her toys and the onto the wall next to her as she looked and let out a yelp hoping I would rescue her from the terrible thing. I did. She clung to me while we captured Señor Grillo (as we named him) and helped him out the window.

All of this is just to say that I have millions of ideas about what may happen in my life, yet little to no direction for the future and at this point couldn't even write a letter to myself about where I'll be in two years. My plans barely extend to next week when I intend to fly to another continent with a ten-month-old as my travel companion to watch my brother marry his best friend.

Life. Always an adventure.

I'd love to read a line or two from you in the comments section about how your life differs from what you may have previously planned or imagined!

Living Alone

“I know you'll like it. There are lots of trees. The people are friendly, but we'll have to adapt. There's nothing comfortable about this place...” said Igor just before the cell phone connection became too full of static to make out any intelligible conversation.

Since that first call, I've learned a bit more about the place Igor calls home and Iris and I, too, will call home in a few months. Ringed by mountains draped in tropical rainforest, lies the small village accessible only to those willing to leave the luxuries of modernization behind. Crossing streams and rivers and riding a rickety route, he arrived in a village in which indoor plumbing is non-existent and pit-latrines in scarce supply.

I only recently came to the realization that for the first time in his life, Igor is living on his own alone. He tells me he's suffering and I know that he is in some ways. Many anecdotes he has shared take me on a journey down memory lane to Kenya and the challenges life presented there. In many ways I would love to be in rural Bellavista with him. I would like to make him more comfortable, listen to him, and share our daughter with him. But then, in some ways perhaps this is a blessing in disguise. I wouldn't wish for anyone that they live alone all their lives. I know there are people who do truly enjoy the solitude and independence that such a lifestyle offers, but I simply can't fathom living that way forever. What I do believe though, is that living alone for a short time is an experience that everyone should have. It helps with introspection and also teaches a person to value what others contribute to the home.

While he lives in one small room without access to plumbing, he shares his habitat with a variety of critters mostly of the insect and arachnid sort. Just today I heard from Igor letting me know that in his window he found a spider the size of his hand. I pitied him, then begged him to do his best to get rid of such visitors before Iris and I arrive.

Iris and I continue to enjoy our lives of luxury in a cooler climate comparatively, without heavy rains and mud to wade through, low on unwanted pests, and safe from most tropical diseases. In one month we'll trade this life for the American one and then all too soon return for vaccinations and immigration paperwork before boarding various means of terrestrial transportation to take us to our final destination: a one or two room home deep in the jungle where we will keep Igor company and bring his many moons alone to an end.  

Dual Citizen

The first dual citizen in our family!

The Fight

“Let me go!”  “I‘ll kill you!”  “I dare you!”  “Don’t touch her!”  Those words, and many more, burst through the night into our open window. 

Iris, who had just fallen asleep, began to whimper.  Suddenly and silently, she bolted into a sitting position, eyes wide-open, looking at me, looking at the window.  Try as I might to lull her back to sleep, I could not.  She was concerned by the unusual sounds she was hearing. 

Glass shattered and more shouts split the darkness.  Igor, Iris and I looked out the window trying to see where the racket was coming from.  Our side of the street.  My father-in-law called up the stairwell to our apartment to ask if his second son was part of the ruckus.  We didn’t think so. 

We climbed the stairs to the roof to cool down, and if we’re honest, to be a bit snoopy.  We weren’t the only ones.  We laughed as we saw people sitting on nearly every rooftop for a block and a half, people in most of the windows, and others with their cellphones filming a few drunk couples’ foolish dispute that they’d taken to the street. 

The police, who rarely attend to any problems and often pick up and immediately hang up the phone when it rings for an emergency, happened to be driving by and decided to stop.  For Iris’s sake, we returned to the hot apartment so the little wiggle-worm could crawl.  We never did see if the officers took anyone away.  After about fifteen minutes inside the noise died down and the fight seemed to be over.

It isn’t often that we hear that sort of squabble, but with an eclectic group of neighbors, one never knows what nighttime will bring, or daytime for that matter.

Playful Crawler

Iris has begun crawling and is making me quickly learn to think like a mischievous baby ;)  

Since all of our floors are cement or tile, I sewed her some little knee pads.  

Igor's Graduation

Saturday evening we celebrated Igor's graduation.  

Here's how we cheered on the doctor:

Craziness

Craziness.  That's what it is (to me, a foreigner, at least).  Living in a large city in the desert, we were told this morning that there would be no water available today or for the next two days as there will be maintenance work done on water and sewage pipes.  Fortunately we have a tank on top of the house that stores water so haven't been without yet.  We have seen men, women and children carrying buckets of water from a school, which is not in session so isn't using the water in its tank, to their homes so that they will not be without when the current water runs out.  Just in case, we also harvested three buckets of water.  Igor did a nice job of covering them to keep the mosquitos from using the water as a breeding site.

The Hat

Little Miss Iris came upon a sun hat with a cheerful flowery print around its edges.  She patted it, tasted it, then thought it looked like just the right accessory for her outfit.  She tried it on, but it was a little bigger than she'd expected.  Peering out from below, it was hard to see the world, but that didn't matter.

After a few adjustments, she got it tilted back, but wasn't quite sure what she thought of it.  

Her mom brought her a mirror so she could see and she decided it fit just right.  

The hat was perfect.

Never Say Never

I did it.  I did what I said I’d never do.  I tried to wake my daughter up by singing “Rise and Shine.”  Now before you exclaim, “You did!?”, allow me to explain myself. 

Miss Iris is truly a terrible sleeper, granted it isn’t entirely her fault.  None of us sleep well with the heat under our mosquito nets and the distant whizzing sounds of those detestable insects.  Anyhow, after another sleepless night last night, Igor and I got up to do what we needed to—studying and house work.  Meanwhile, Iris thought she’d eat well and then go back to bed.  She seemed to think that the morning hours would be the perfect time to snooze.  At 10:15 her dad went in to wake her up to no avail.  With a glance at him, she rolled over and went back to sleep.  Fifteen minutes later, I went in and after two unsuccessful attempts, began to sing that all too cheery morning song. 

That’s when it hit me—I said I’d never sing cheery songs to my kids when they didn’t want to get out of bed.  Then as cognitive dissonance had set in, I quickly countered with “Oh, but I’m sure hearing a song is a nice way to wake up.”  Then I remembered that that’s probably what my own mom thought.  And well maybe she was right.  I used to wish she’d just turn on the light, but then I probably wouldn’t really have crawled out of my bed with just the light.  And in the long run.  It made memories.  I have several brothers and cousins with whom I could reminisce about the perils of waking to the peppy tune. 

That isn’t the only time in the nearly six months we’ve had with Iris that I’ve done something I didn’t think I would.  I let her chew on my chin once to keep her happy, just days after I said I never would.  Then I ask myself, how many more of those moment I’ll have and I’m sure they’ll be uncountable, but then they’re harmless.  I’m thankful for the wonderful parents I have and if I repeat things that they’ve done when raising my daughter, she’ll probably turn out all right.  

What if...

What if we lived in the countryside?  What if all our neighbors were to live in extreme poverty?  What if my husband, neighbors and I all have distinct native tongues?  What if there are terrifying crawling critters and winged things with which I must cross paths?

Life is certainly uncertain.  It always is.  Sometimes we just don’t realize it until we come to a definitive junction where great changes are inevitable.  That’s where we’ve come to now.

Igor is putting in long hours studying for his boards in a week.  Iris is wishing she could crawl, drooling over the food on her parents’ plates, and dreaming of all the mischievous things she will do when she’s just a little more coordinated.  I am researching possible locations for us to move to come May, wondering how many more hurdles we’ll come upon trying to take care of Iris and my immigration and nationalization paperwork, and often asking myself, “What if…?”

The aforementioned inquiries are all valid.  Peru has many indigenous languages.  One of Igor’s top priorities in selecting a sight for his rural medical service from those offered to him is that it be one of the poorest districts in the country.  The jungle lurks with unknown and venomous creatures and I haven’t the slightest idea what to consider about mountainous wildlife. 

Since resigning from my job and spending my time at home with Iris and Igor (while he studies), I’ve realized that I have less of a plan for the near future now that I’ve probably ever had.  As an individual with a Type A personality, I’ve always had a plan.  Elementary school.  Junior high and high school.  Then Germany and the back-up plan of college.  By the middle of my last year of college, Kenya was planned.  Then a Fulbright year, a wedding, and a job as an English teacher.  Now all I know is that my job is to be there for my family in this next year wherever it takes us—be that the desert, the Andes, or the Amazon Rainforest.  Will Iris become American?  Will I become Peruvian?  Will Igor become an English-speaking doctor? 

What if we could go back in time and re-do some things?  What if we could fast forward and see what lies ahead to ward off the concerns we are beset with?  What if we just take life one day at a time or even one hour or one minute at a time enjoy its simple moments and I remember just a little more often the blessing in disguise of living in a chaotic, inefficient, developing nation that doesn’t allow me to plan or at least dashes most of the ones that I make?  I’ll try just a little bit harder.