Finally...Cookies!

So for any of you who really know me, you know that I LOVE to bake cookies! Well, when I found out that my new apartment had an oven, I was delighted to think that possibly I could do one of the things I love to do the most. This weekend I made my first batch of peanut butter cookies and they came out great! But let me tell you about the round about way that I had to take to arrive at my final destination.

First, I had to find a cookie sheet to buy--not easy. The one I found cost me almost $10.00--but what are you going to do? Then mixing bowls, measuring cups and measuring spoons, all of which added up to quite a bit of money for something so simple. Next, as I've told you before, finding ingredients to prepare anything familiar to me is often a challenge in the stores here. Another challenge has been the fact that everything is in metric so I'm dealing with grams, liters, etc. I was able to go on-line and find recipes that will convert from Imperial to Metric so that that was a start. Anyway, to make cookies you need flour, sugar, butter, salt and then baking soda or baking powder, minimally to start. Well interestingly, I found baking powder (although I didn't know it at the time) but I couldn't find baking soda in the market. Turns out you have to go the pharmacy for this sort of thing. What they offer is the tiniest box of baking soda (maybe 1/4 cup) and it cost 2 soles (about 60 cents). Doesn't sound like much but think about what a big box of Arm & Hammer baking soda costs--maybe 79 cents!? And think about how much baking soda we all go through for one thing and another? I had been worried the butter and other ingredients were going to be very expensive but it turns out to be something so basic to us as baking soda! Anyway, finally I got all the parts to make my first masterpiece. It was only this week that I figured out how to light my stove (with a match) and because there’s no temperature control, I had to wing it there. I think on maximum, the temperature is about 375 degrees which is just about right for cookies (when I come back to the States, I will need to buy an oven thermometer to be a little more accurate). My stove is a LP gas with the tank is under the sink. It's great and very hot but it often runs out at the most inopportund time. I was concerned that my gas would run out in the middle of baking as it usually takes a day or two to get another tank from the landlord. But the stars were in my favor and I completed my baking with no trouble. Instead, the power went out for awhile as I was baking but with gas, no worries--I only lost my radio. I completed 5 dozen peanut butter cookies and they were a work of art! I did have to quickly bag them, though, because as they were cooling, the ants were marching right in!

I took them to the office the next day and, needless to say, they were devoured. Good quality baked goods, especially cookies, are rare here due to the humidity so it was really a treat. This weekend I am shooting for oatmeal-raisin cookies or Snickerdoodles. Unfortunately, I can't buy chocolate chips here but when I go back to the States in the fall, I will buy some and bring them back. If anyone is ever heading this way, a bag or two of Tollhouse chocolate chips would be great! One thing that is curious here, and I think thought-provoking, is the fact that everything in the grocery stores come in plastic bags or boxes, even things like milk and mayonnaise. The only things you find in cans or glass jars are imported items from the States or Europe. The point being that things in bags and boxes pack much tighter and weigh less, thereby using less space and energy to pack and ship. However, I can't speak to how much energy it takes to create all this plastic??

Let’s see…what else is new? Well, you may remember me lamenting about my IPOD that got stuck on pause and that I was having withdraw pains for over a month? Well, long story short, I was able to reset it and now I'm back in business. I finally bought my "mesedora" or Peruvian rocking chair. It's difficult to describe but tacky comes to mind. However, it's cool and comfortable and perfect for this part of the world. Now, how to get it in my suitcase when I come home?? For those of you who are on Facebook, you can check out my photos of the rocking chair and me sitting in it listening to my working IPOD, too!

Not much is happening at work these days. I think it's the calm before the storm as Adopt-A-School will be heating up soon and then there will be no time to think! Next month a group of high school students are coming from Michigan (Sacred Heart in Bloomfield Hills). They will be helping me pack a couple hundred large rice bags filled with school supplies, so that begins the start of the action. We will have a larger number of volunteers here this year for AAS, as one week will be for deliveries and one week for service projects. Conapac and Explorama won an award this past week ($1000) from the Board of Responsible Tourism for its work in the area of environmental sustainable and all they are doing in the rainforest. I have submitted another grant proposal for three new mini-water treatment plants to provide clean drinking water to the remote villages we work with, plus some educational workshops to go along with the new water plants. Keep your fingers crossed for me and the program!!

As you know, I have been trying to find a Spanish class or tutor to work with here but with no luck. And although there are opportunities to speak with any number of people, it's not the same as having a regular date to practice and discuss questions. One of the guides at Explorama has a daughter who is studying English. Her name is Wendy, she's about 23 years old, a college student, and wants to practice English with someone. So we've met and agreed to meet once a week for practice in both languages. I have also found a very nice cultural center that has a reading program each evening for street children. I plan to go once a week to listen to the stories and to take the opportunity to read more books in Spanish. Little by little, I WILL conquer this new language :)

People often ask me what I miss while living here? Besides the obvious of family and good friends, I can't say there's much. But right now, I'd love to have a weekly news magazine (Time, Newsweek or US News & World Report) delivered each week; I definitely miss chips and salsa; and since we're so close to the Equator, there are no intense, lingering sunsets--I'd like to linger over one very soon! Thanks, again, for all of who are following my blog. And if you're not on Facebook, consider giving it a try! I'd love to have more friends!

¡Sies meses más!

Well, my most current news is that I have just returned from the Peruvian border with Colombia and Brazil. It was an interesting trip, to say the least. I went with two of Pam's daughters, Gina, who speaks no English and Arianna, who is bi-lingual, but we had a great time together despite the usual struggle to communicate. We started on a transport boat (like a Greyhound bus) about 5:30 AM and headed down river. The trip took 10 hours but it wasn't too bad of a ride, with breakfast and lunch served on board. The ride back was 12 hours as we were coming up river but that boat was a little nicer--it had drop down video screens which played a lot of 80´s American music videos! Made me want to peg my pants, grow some Farrah Fawcett hair, and get up and dance! The food wasn't bad but the usual fare of chicken and rice for breakfast and lunch. We did have to share our space with a few cockroaches but none in my food--at least that I found!

Getting where we needed to go was interesting. We landed in a small village in Peru, found the immigration office, got our passports stamped, and then took a small, wooden boat across the Amazon to a town called Tabatinga in Brazil. There we had to walk to the border town of Leticia in Columbia and find the airport (about 5 miles away) to have our passports stamped that we were entering another country. (Tabatinga does not have a customs office) It's all quite informal as no one looked at or checked any bags coming or going. Then we had to have money exchanged. I had with me dollars and soles but in Brazil its reales and in Colombia its pesos. Each has a different exchange rate and some places took one thing and some took the other, etc. It was all very confusing and I never really could figure it all out. I just know how much money we went with and what we had when we returned. We had to stay four days because there was no boat back to Iquitos right away. Not much to do but we walked a lot, bought some shoes and ate out, although the food was not great. One day we found a moto-taxi and drove out to the "beach" which turned out to be something more like a watering hole. But it was cold and clean and 90-something degrees out so it wasn't a bad diversion. We took the closest thing to what I've seen here as a highway and actually, it was in pretty good shape--probably about 7-8 miles from Leticia so it was a nice ride. There is quite a large, attractive and well-built military base in this town in Colombia. It's the nicest facility of any kind I've seen here. As everyone knows there is a huge American presence in Colombia it made me wonder whose tax dollars paid for this base?? I will say though, that Colombia is a nice place and I think it's not as scary as it sounds from the States.

The boat back to Iquitos was leaving at 4 AM. We got up at 2:30, in the rain and dark, crossed the river again in a small boat, loaded with people and cargo, to reach the loading dock. It was pitch dark and no lights as we headed back up to the immigration building. We knocked on the door and clearly the guy was still sleeping so we waited while he dressed. By candle light he stamped our passports and asked me how many days I wanted? I said 90 at first (which is supposed to be the maximum) but then Gina piped up and asked if I could have more? He shrugged and then gave me 180 days!! I'm not sure why--maybe he's unhappy with his superiors because he's stuck in this border town in the middle of nowhere!? All I know is I got out of there ASAP and got on the boat before something changed. Who knows what will happen when I get to Lima in July but I suppose they'll let me out of the country, so no worries!

Lots of work at the office with much catching up to do. I've starting researching and writing for grant possibilities for CONAPC. I'm finding that I rather like grant writing and I hope to pull in more money this year from alternative sources for the programs CONAPAC is doing. I was asked to do the voice-overs for a promotional video that Explorama produced to be used for travel agents and other interested groups. It's about a 12-minute video of all the lodges and other sights in the Amazon region. They have two versions, one in Spanish and one in English. It was kind of fun to do but I kept tripping over the pronunciations of the words that are common to both languages. I hope to bring a copy or two of the video home with me in the summer to share a little more about the place I now work and live.

I had a few more animal encounters this past week. I have found several interesting toads and tree frogs in my apartment plus some rather humongous moths and spiders. One morning I got up and was finishing some dishes I had left in the sink overnight. They were soaking and as I scooped out the final pieces of silverware, I also found in my hand a dead mouse! Apparently he had drowned overnight. I felt bad for him but what an interesting way to catch mice--less messy than a trap. Later that same day, I was at work and out of the corner of my eye, I saw movement in the tall waste basket under the desk. There was this mouse jumping up and down trying to get out of the bin! He was exactly the same size, type and color as the one I found earlier in the day. It was a little eerie, like my morning mouse had been reincarnated! Alex, in the office, took him outside and let him go but a couple of days later, he returned again. This time Pam was alone in the office and she had to handle it. Oh, well. I've been trying to buy a mousetrap here. Apparently they have them but so far I haven't found a store that carries them. I finally got some screening up on one of my windows so now at night I can leave one large window open and that should keep any unwanted guests out.

I've had a lot of opportunities to speak in Spanish and I continue to work on it daily. I have several books (novels and non-fiction) that I am plowing through. They are at about the 3rd grade level and I'm finding them extremely difficult. I guess a third grader can read a lot more than I remember! I've done a bit of entertaining this week with several local friends. All of them primarily speak Spanish so it's very helpful to just have casual conversation about everyday things to pick up useful vocabulary--and, of course, some more slang :) Scroll down to the bottom of this site as I posted a new photo. This was from last month as I was coming or going from some village. It's a great way to commute. I know many of you who follow my blog are also on Facebook. I am going to start posting more photos on that site rather than this one for ease and accessibility. For those of you not yet on Facebook, you really should try it. It's tons of fun and quite additive but a great way to stay connected with family and friends, especially when you are many miles apart. Saludos de Iquitos!