Happy Anniversary to Us!

I have been meaning to put up a little post in celebration of Marco and my wedding anniversary. We celebrate a monthly anniversary on the 12th because were married in our civil ceremony on the 12th of October 2012. Our religious wedding, however, took place a year later on the 18th of October 2013. We love having reasons to celebrate so we celebrated both weekends with a little something.

There was a wedding of a colleague of Marco's on the 11th at the same church where we were married on the villa militar. It was super nice and the same priest married them as well. When he spotted us he motioned to his belly and smiled at us. It was super cute. He was a great person to preside over our wedding. I really enjoyed his speech. Marco did the sword tunnel and we went to the reception right around the corner at the circulo militar. The reception was a blast and we danced up a storm. There was a waitress who couldn't stop smiling while watching us dance. It isn't every day that you see pregnant ladies rocking out on the dance floor and we were having a great time.

The following weekend we celebrated by going out to lunch at Kuo Wha, a delicious Chinese buffet restaurant with a beautiful garden as you enter. We stuffed ourselves and then took a nice long nap. When we got up we went out to Plaza Lima Sur to eat and see if we couldn't get massages. Unfortunately, the massage place didn't have a chair for pregnant ladies so we had to skip out on that. We did see a movie though. Dracula, the Untold Story. It was quite good.

We didn't exchange gifts or anything like that and it was so nice. Honestly, I am so happy to spend every day with this man that sometimes random days feel like anniversaries. I hope to keep it that way.

Here is to 2 years with my amazing husband and to many many many many more to come!

These kinds of photos of Marco are rare but I love them because they show how happy he is. :)

Dia Villamariano

Yesterday was my school's carnival and it was really really fun. On Friday we spent the afternoon setting up tables and chairs and making sure everyone knew what her job was. I had the pleasure of selling tickets for the Tombola which is more or less an "everybody wins" carnival attraction. Basically you buy a ticket for 5 soles and it either has a number or a letter on it with the number corresponding to a better prize. I bought two tickets with the carnival money I received from the school and I got a bottle of shampoo and a headband. Not bad. The Tombola had prizes from snickers bars to kitchenware to a playstation 4. No matter what you get something which is fun.

What I really lucked out with was the Gran Rifa. Marco bought 5 tickets and I bought 1 and out of the thousands that were purchased, one of our tickets was chosen for the dinner for 6 at a Chinese restaurant prize. How cool is that? There were some fantastic prizes including the grand prize of having a years scholarship to the school. There were a couple of Scotiabank 1,000 USD and 1,500 USD bank credits too.

Setting up by pulling legs apart.

The final outcome. I unfortunately didn't get a picture of the day of.

The idea behind the carnival day is to raise money for the school as well as charity programs. It is a Catholic school so they do a lot of work with other schools that need funds and food in the Lima area. I couldn't help but notice the onslaught of advertising done. The chairs and tables were from Coca-Cola, the stage had huge Movistar banners on it and all of the booths in the main patio were restaurants like Bembos, Pizza Hut, Dunkin Donuts, ChinaWok and D'Nofrio ice cream. I am pretty sure at my school's carnival days the food was made by parent volunteers and there were always tons of grills going. Hotdogs and hamburgers were the main food. I will say that it was nice to have some variety for lunch. Julie and I couldn't help but wonder how much more money could have been raised if more parents volunteered instead of having vendors come in. I don't know the breakdown nor do I know if the vendors give some percentage to the school.

I found some super cute stickers that could be personalized and bought them for my two nieces. Julie and I took pictures in a photo booth and I enjoyed watching all the teachers do their dance at the end. This year's theme for Teacher's Day was Disney so they extended it to make it the theme of the carnival as well since they already had all the props and costumes. Disney got plenty of free advertising this year at school. If you can't read it in the photo, the quote comes from Walt Disney: "If you can dream it, you can do it.". It's a good quote no matter who it came from.

Overall, it was a super fun day and it got me super excited about the future because I can imagine Marco and me along with Leah at an event of this nature when she is in school.

Ley Seca (Dry Law)

It's that time of year again when the toilet paper gets piled up in front of the liquor section in Metro due to dry law. Whenever there are elections, everyone is prohibited from selling liquor during the weekend of said elections.

Dry law is hilarious to me. No one is supposed to sell alcohol during the weekend of elections. Has no one learned from the United States' attempt to prohibit alcohol? (It didn't work.) Supposedly the law is in place to help ensure that people make better electoral decisions. Oh if only that were true. I am pretty sure that there was an election of some sort going on last year around the time we got married because I went to buy alcohol with my brother and sister in law and the guy at the gas station didn't want to sell us anything. After some pleading we were able to get a few beers. I know, bad us. But hey, we are foreigners so we don't vote. Bottoms up!

For anyone interest in who won the Lima mayor position it was Luis Castañeda. He implemented the Metropolitano during his last term as mayor. We will see what exciting plans he has for this term. I am intrigued.

The Post Office Affair

I don´t think I have ever experienced anything quite like what has happened with the post office here in Lima. In the past two weeks I have been there 5 times. Let me give you the low down because it seems kind of hard to believe that it would take this long for me to get a package. Not to worry. This story ends on a good note even though the process was a bit frustrating. This is Peru after all and after a certain amount of time all you can do is laugh at the ridiculousness because getting upset gets you no where.

The first trip. I got the tracking number from my father and checked online to see if it had arrived and apparently it was in Lince. I headed over only to find out that I couldn´t pick it up because my last name was marked as Zamudio. (I found out today that is actually said Amy Brown de Zamudio on it which is absurd that wouldn´t allow me to pick it up because my husband´s name was at the end.) Since it said Amy Zamudio on my slip I couldn´t pick it up because it didn´t match my carnet. I talked to various people and got the papers I needed to fill out in order to get the name changed. I went home and my dad wrote a letter and I got a copy of the receipt for the package from his end. I made sure to ask two times if I needed to get anything legalized. I have been in Peru long enough to know that pretty much anything with any possibility of being an important document has to be notarized. I was told no.

The second trip. I brought my papers ready to pick up my package. I was told that I was missing the letter from me that also needed to be notarized. Off I went to do that.

The third trip. I brought all the papers including the notarized letter signed by me (10 soles) and paid 36 more soles to have my name changed on the computer. I was then told it would be three days until it was processed and ready to go. Fine. A little more waiting won´t hurt. At least the package is there right?

In between the third and fourth trip I received a call from a woman at Serpost asking me to write a declaratory letter stating exactly why my father got my last name wrong. I also had to justify why my home address did not match up to the address my father used. I am a part of the SAE club and use their address because packages either go directly there to Miraflores or to the post office in Lince. I could never use my address because it would never get to me on the villa. I also sent a copy of my army ID showing that I am in fact married to a Zamudio and that is why my name was wrong. They would call me when everything was in the system.

The fourth trip. I made two copies of my carnet and had my receipt in hand. I got to the customs window to open the package and the man who was attending me told me I would have to pay 38 dollars in taxes because the package was valued at 250 dollars. WHAT?! You have got to be kidding me. No one could let me know that I would have to pay a tax at some point? Fortunately, the guy was nice and told me that since I had traveled to the United States and this was coming from the United States and it arrived within a week of me getting back into Peru, I could bring my passport and it would waive the tax because the package could be considered luggage. 

The fifth trip. With copies of my passport, my entry and exit stamps and all my paperwork I headed back to Serpost one more time. I was given preferential treatment due to a law here that states if you are pregnant, with a child, elderly or disable, you get preferential treatment in public establishments. Works for me! Anyway, I had to fill out one more form declaring the package was extra luggage but it was fast. The lady who opened the package with me told me that I would have to pay 30 dollars because even though it was considered luggage, it wasn't something like clothing or personal items. What? Why had the other guy told me I would be fine with my passport? Fortunately, he was working that day and he hooked it up and made sure that I didn't have to pay anything. Thank you kind customs sir. You made my day much better and have kept my faith in the postal service here in Peru.

Lessons learned: Never address anything to me using my husband´s last name. Never declare any package to be worth more than 100 dollars.

Without further ado. The photo in its rightful place in our living room!

And as per my father's excellent suggestion, here is a picture of us holding it to give you an idea of its size.

No More Hanging Clothes to Dry

So the exciting news of the day is that we got a dryer!! I am so excited and I was a little nervous because when they guys brought it in it looked enormous. It is enormous when you compare it to the 7.5 kilo washing machine we have. This thing is a 12 kilo dryer. I did some calculations though and it will fit through the door. I had to unhinge the swivel door in the kitchen but it will get into the back laundry room eventually.

I have to say that I am super happy that Sagafalabella was able to deliver it to us. They didn't have a pick up option and practically none of the Sagas sell the dryer in their stores. We said we lived in Surco, which is more like a white lie than anything because technically we live right across the street from Surco. I got about 5 calls from a lady from Saga asking me for more specific directions and finally they had the actually driver of the truck call me so he could get the directions. You think they would have just done that in the first place. Oh well.  In the end it all worked out and they delivered on the day they said they would.

I felt like a dummy because the guys asked if they could have something to drink and I totally forgot that it is custom to offer something to drink to anyone who helps move stuff. The two guys, sweating after hauling the thing up three flights asked if I had anything to drink. I only had water since we don't keep pop in the house. They were happy to have it.

I had to take a selfie with the dryer. I am just that happy about it.

Now, let's hope that we can install the thing. I noticed that there isn't any tubing that came with it and that is absolutely necessary to send out the hot air. I also don't see a connecting cable to plug it in. I think we might have to call an electrician. Hmm. I will keep you updated.

Here's to 4 Years in Peru!

It has been 4 years since I packed my bags and left for my great Peruvian adventure. Little did I know at the time that I would meet the love of my life and decide to settle in this Andean country. I had no set plans when I decided on Peru. All I knew is that I was going to do the Inca Trail to Macchu Picchu and work as an English teacher for 6 months at Maximo Nivel in Cusco. I had 6 months set up and I would take it from there. There is something so wonderful about leaving things open ended. The first thing is that there are no expectations to live up to and everything is an adventure. I can't tell you how much more interesting my life has been since I decided to stop trying to control everything. As soon as you realize that so much of our lives is out of our control, the happier you will be. When it comes down to it, the only thing we really can control is how we view things. If I decide to look negatively at something, it will be negative and bring me down. If I decide to be optimistic and let things go, I find that I have so much more energy for things that really need it.

Living in Peru over the past four years has forced me to let go of control in so many ways and I can honestly say that I am happier and healthier because of it. Fear is not on my mind anymore because it is a waste and life is bound to bring us difficult situations. Nothing is set in stone and change is unavoidable. I really like the metaphor that life is a series of waves and each person is a surfer who either decides how he or she is going to ride the wave or let it take him or her under. Of course, with any sport, there has to be a few crashes in order for one to get good at it. I, for one, am a terrible surfer in real life but I like to think that my metaphorical surfing skills have improved over the past four years. I have been put to the test with various circumstances while living here including testing my own identity and who I think (or thought) I am (was).

No matter what, I am so grateful for all of the events that have happened since leaving the United States. I have learned and grown and made so many connections. I spend my time with wonderful people and I have multiple jobs that are really fulfilling and I have the most important job of being a mom starting in a few months. I am somewhat nervous but more excited than anything. There are so many adventures to come with raising kids and it is so thrilling to be starting a new chapter in the cycle of my life.

With new beginnings in mind, I am thinking of either re-working this blog into one that is more focused on being a mom and an expat in Peru or taking my blogging skills over to wordpress and seeing what I can do in a new platform. I have started following some great Peruvian parents who blog and it is really nice to read their advice and anecdotes. I have also joined a group called Miramoms that is an expat group of ladies with kids mostly under the age of 6. I am going to a chat about giving birth in Peru in a few weeks and I look forward to meeting other expectant moms. I am looking forward to this new social group especially since non-baby having friends, while they will bear with a few minutes of baby talk, eventually want to talk about things that pertain to them as well. I completely understand having been there myself.

So, as the new adventures begin, happy 4 year Peruvian anniversary to me and may there be many many more to come!

Santa Rosa de Lima

Today we celebrated Santa Rosa de Lima or Saint Rose of Lima (April 20, 1586 - August 24, 1617). She was a Spanish colonist in Peru and she spent her life helping those in need throughout Lima. She is the patron saint of the police, nurses, the Philippines, and the Americas among others. According to wikipedia she was a religious extremest and it was not accepted by her family who wanted her to marry. She was very young when she died and I have to say, it doesn't seem like she lived a very happy life with all the penance. However, she did help a lot of people in need so I am sure she felt fulfilled.

There is a tradition here that involves writing down your wishes and prayers and throwing them into her well at her church in the center of Lima. The girls did a really cute play today and paid homage to her with a song that is quite fun. I enjoy watching the girls act out different stories from the bible and local Catholic culture. Fortunately, the severe penance was not discussed in the play. I may not agree with some of the doctrine of the Christian church but I like that there is always time to reflect and remind ourselves that we are a part of something much bigger and that is what Villa Maria provides for its students and teachers.

This evening I was passing through the Barranco plaza and the Police band was serenading everyone in the park. The actual day of Santa Rosa de Lima is the 30th but they started the celebrations tonight! It was great. One of the many things I love about Peru. Have a wonderful weekend everyone!