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View from Rachel´s flat
View over Tarapoto - this is the view from the flat! It is jungle as far as the eye can see! So I have started to settle in to life here in Peru, got my body clock sort of sorted out! Tarapoto is known as a jungle town and has really only become a safe place to be in the last 3 years. You can see how fast it is developing as it is only within the last year Rach has been here that cars have really appeared on the road - its all motorcycle taxis and motorbikes. Roads are mostly dirt tracks really, but they are trying to get concrete on them as quickly as possible. Food is as cheap as chips! just had dinner on the roadside - 3 of us for under 2 pounds. I had this rice and chicken thing, cooked on the BBQ wrapped in a big leaf (name escapes me). Also had some banana (not the kind we have, slightly different) that is baked, smashed up and rolled into balls with pig fat - also very nice! So I like Tarapoto. Incredibly noisy, music blasting at all hours, woken every morning by the many tweting birds... can´t complain!
On my first full day in Tarapoto Rachel and I went up to a lake (see picture)
Neighbours
Some of the posher houses in Tarapoto, traditionally half finished! just on the outskirts of the "city" (so they like to call it!), taking one of the motorbike taxis there and then walking back - much to the amazement of the locals who will take a taxi anywhere in order to not sweat! But the walk back was really quite wonderful as we got to walk back through all the other areas of Tarapoto and see the daily life of those who can´t afford to live in the centre. We were as much a tourist attraction to us as we were to them, and aside from the standard male perverted reception we had little kiddies saying ´hello!´to us and when we replied in English they all burst into giggles - very sweet!
At the lake we gate crashed a wedding reception. A´Gringo´ (an old American man!) was marrying one of the local girls - he looked lost as everyone danced around him at this reception where James Blunts ¨Your Beautiful ¨was played over and over again....
The weather is winter and so it is not too hot... I am still dying! Very humid. Not had much rain yet, but when it does rain apparently everything just grounds to
a stop as no one wants to get wet. So if Rachel turns up to teach at uni she will have an empty class room!!
I started working in the orphanage on Monday at 8am. It is a lovely orphange and although I have absolutely no idea what is doing on half the time it is fun. I spend my mornings there, working with the psychiatrist and we do singing (they love "If your happy and you know it clap your hands!) and colouring. We then play about and try and communicate, fun and challenging all roled in to one! I have fallen in love with lots of them, but my favorite is bebe (just called baby - in Peru no one bothers to use people names or even learn them, so in Rachels classes her pupils will refer to each other as "classmate" and other examples are fatty, thinny. There appears to be no boundaries and they have no concept of political correctness or maybe it is us Westerners who are too PC.....). So anyway, he is called "baby" as he is only 2 1/2. He arrived in the orphanage about 3 weeks ago, skin and bones and
The flat from the road
Rachs flat is on the right. You can hear everything at the neighbours as there is basically cardboard dividing us...!! totally malnourished. He is now plumb and gorgeous! after only 1 day when i arrived the next day the kids fetched him saying "Senora is here" and when he saw me came running! he wouldn´t leave my side, just gorgeous! Also lunch time, quite a sight. I have never seen a such competent 2 1/2 year old! he had his chicken foot in one hand, chomping away, whilst he spoons up his rice quite competently in the other! and its all gone!
Also helping at Rachels english lessons at the uni - teaching in the these half built buildings, as typical to Peru they ran out of money and so just stopped building!! So that is fun, watching Rach teach and generally having the control of a class room of people!!
Other fun things, eaten lots of yummy food - although these days not hungry due to the heat and was a bit sick after we had this massive meal at the resto owned by Rachels local boyfriends parents. Think they over piled our plates with amazing amounts of meat, but left me a little sick in the night... Also been to a swimming pool on the outskirts
Lake just outside Tarapoto
Spent the day at this lake, gatecashing a wedding! It is beautiful! to make the most of the sun - taxi out and managed to hitch hike back of one of the few cars on the road.
Attended 3 fund raising BBQs in one day on Sunday, you stand in long queues get piles of meat (gave most of ours to homeless on the street!) and usually bumb into all the same people at each one. It is a big thing here, done for schools, trips, people who are ill, etc. They have never heard of the old sponsored walk apparently!!
Just a few pictures, takes a while to upload but don´t worry will add more!!Hope you all well! hugs and love becca xxx
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bri
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is booooooooooooooooooootiful