The last two weeks have been a blur. Last week was spent completing Jordan’s Bucket List and having despedida (farewell) dinners and parties for Jordan before he left on Tuesday. Friday night before he left we went to a “first Friday” – in Bolivia they have big parties the first Friday of every month because they have made fresh batches of chichi (an alcoholic drink made from corn) and you drink it out of a big jug with a little bowl. You dip the bowl in the jug, invite someone else to drink by saying “te invito” (I invite you), you drink the bowl, then fill it up and pass it to them. For those of you who are familiar with one of my favorite past times, “Drink, Okay”, it’s a much cooler/classier version of that game because when someone invites you to drink you can’t say no. But it was really cool because they had a big fire outside and a band came to play some traditional music. Overall a very cool experience.
Saturday Jordan and I went to Nazareth for his last Saturday lunch of Sopa de Mani. I gave the boys my camera to take a bunch of pictures for Jordan and ended up with about 150 pictures of them (and random things around the house – such as the garden, the floor, a random bush, etc). After that we went downtown because there was an entrada (parade) for the university students which was a lot like the first weekend I was here and we went to Urkupina, but all of the people dancing were students and really enthusiastic. That night we had a little going away party for Jordan at a friend’s house too.
Sunday we went to a pueblo outside of Cochabamba called Tiataco for a festival that was to celebrate the end of Dia de los Muertos and Dia de los Santos where they send all of the spirits back to the afteworld. It was really cool because one of the traditions at this festival is that traditional Bolivian women (called Cholitas) have to swing and sing a song and when they’re done singing the song they try to grab a basket from a line of baskets up in the tree with their feet. Nowadays pretty much anyone can swing if you pay the 30-40b’s to do it (and you get to keep the basket that you catch) – but when the tradition originated the cholitas would pick a basket and in the basket would be a boys name and then that would be the boy that they were supposed to date. I really wanted to swing, but I didn’t know that anyone could do it so unfortunately I was not appropriately dressed and was wearing a dress – and since I didn’t want to scare any Bolivians I decided I would spare them from being flashed by a gringa on a swing.
Monday they had a going away dinner for Jordan at Nazareth where all of the boys went around and thanked him for his work and he gave them all little sacks of candy and toys that he’d bought for them at the Cancha (and I’m sure their teachers were all super excited about it the next day seeing as about ¾ of them ate all of their candy at once). Afterwards we had a few people over to say final goodbyes to Jordan and, because I can’t do anything the boring way, I made him do a scavenger hunt through the apartment to get his farewell card and presents.
Tuesday morning Hanne and I woke up bright and early to help Tom take Jordan to the airport at 6am. It was nice to get to see him off at the airport and I think made the goodbye a little easier because I was too tired to really comprehend what was going on. I was struggling when I arrived at work on Tuesday morning, but it’s impossible to remain tired or sad for too long when you arrive to 25 little people fully of smiles, laughs, and my daily besos (kisses) on the way out of the bathroom.
Probably my highlight of the week came from our favorite chivalrous knight, Gonzolo. On Tuesday when we were out for our daily pasear (walk) in the park Maria Leonore didn’t want to come out of the Sala to come for the walk and I was calling to her “Maria Leonore, ven! Vamos a caminar! Ven!” (Come Maria Leonore! Let’s go! Come!”) and she wasn’t budging. So Gonzolo waddled/ran, in the way that only he can, from my side to the gate of the Sala, pushed it open, did the hand motion for “Ven!” to Maria L, looked at me, looked back at her, did it again, and when he realized she still wasn’t going anywhere I told him not to worry and just come back with me – so he waddled/ran back over to me and I made sure to say gracias for his help. Times like that that I really wish I had a TV man following me around at all times at work – to catch the little nuances and personalities of the kids that are impossible to express in words.
I even improved my relationship with Albertina a little this week when we did a special lunch on Wednesday that involved Albertina bringing in boiled eggs, Maria Luz bringing in potatoes, and me bringing ensalada (salad) to make our own little lunch. It was a nice, basic, meal – BUT they didn’t tell me that it is actually prohibited for us to bring in our own food, so when we were done we had to bring our plates out for the lunch they were serving because they couldn’t know that we’d eaten in the Sala. So I had to eat TWO lunches on Wednesday and thought I was going to explode because another Bolivian rule is that you HAVE to finish your plate or else they think you’re wasteful and impolite. Good thing lunch was just a few French Fries and a tomato/cucumber salad.
Other than that things have been fairly uneventful. Hanne and I did a big clean of the apartment all day on Saturday afternoon for like five hours. I know it sounds like a lot and that we probably had never cleaned before, but I promise we had. Not quite to the extent that we cleaned on Saturday, but the dust here makes it impossible for anything to stay really clean for too long. It was a long afternoon, but it’s definitely really nice to have a spic and span apartment.
I guess it’s about time that I start looking at flights to come home in May and finally pick a day. It’s weird to think about leaving. For how homesick I get sometimes and jealous that I’m missing ND reunions and family holidays – I really am happy here. The people are all so nice and the culture is just amazing. I can’t believe I’ve already been here for 3 of my 9 months. I can’t wait to see what the next 6 months bring.
