Life on La Ninita

La Ninita, a two story barge complete with bunk beds, a kitchen, and a roof for jumping off into the turbid waters below. For ten days we ate, slept and made merry aboard this vessel, as we traveled up and down the lengths of two large tributaries branching from the grande Amazon River. Breakfast was at 7 30 am, with endless amounts of fresh pressed fruit juice from any number of strange local fruits. Camu camu, monkey brains, mango, pinneapple, and gigantic passion fruit. YUM!

A soft bump heralded our arrival at every village, as the boat came sidling right up to the shore, along with the high pitched voices of children drifting hither tither through the windows. Our welcoming committee. The boat would dock right against the muddy bank and everyone would scramble off, stethescopes swinging.

The medical students and crew would set up shop in the school. A large concrete block building with filled with tiny desk and chairs. Large tupperwares of boxes filled with Tylenol, permetherin cream, and various other drugs served as the pharmacy. The doctors worked in teams of two and saw every single person that came, which ended up being about 150 people per village (aka EVERY SINGLE INHABITANT). Frances and I sat and listened to the translators as they described the various ailments of every patient. Headaches, stomach aches, and flu. Lots of the smaller children had scabes, and were rubbed down liberally with permetherin cream.

I watched as someone demonstrated how to put on a condom with his thumb to a thirteen year old girl, nursing her first child. Her eyes were wide as she took the proffered prevention, a look of tredeptation on her face. I wonder how many of those will be made into to balloon animals after we leave.

There were so many sick people that the doctors couldn´t treat. A tube of antifungal cream and some tylenol only goes so far. I spoke with several of the medical students during the trip, and while they expressed some feeling of accomplishment at being there, doing something, they felt useless too. Before we arrived at the first village, I helped fill plastic sacks with Flinstones vitamins, which were essentially a placebo. When villagers come to the doctors, they don´t want to leave empty handed, so Flinstones vitamins are given to everyone. Here, take your animal shaped vitamins, FEEL BETTER.

The people suffer daily with ailments that would incapacite me, yet they go out and work for 8 hours in the sun, tambien. Talk about relativity.

Around midday, when the sun is at its zenith, the earth steams. Time for a swim! The water, though completely opaque with floating particulate, feels amazing. From the top of the boat, two stories above the rush of the current, you can see into the canopy of the forest. Strange birds swoop in and out of the dense foliage, and bright blue butterflies the size of dinner plates waft lazily on the breeze, dipping and glinting in the wide shafts of light coming through the leaves. A bird call like the sound of water dripping from a pipe into a metal basin followed by three short chirps, the hum of a billion insects, the distance cry of some unnamed creature. Monkeys swing through the tree tops, chattering happily amongst themselves. The smell of sun warmed earth, sticky ripe fruit and flora makes for a heady scent, unlike anything I have ever smelled before. You stand and take it all in as the sun heats reflects white light from the fiberglass of the boat. Looking down, the water streams in whirls around the hull, continuing its swift passage downstream. Close your eyes and jump. The air whips past cooling damp skin, and your stomach drops. A large splash announces your arrival at the surface and you plummet into the cool depths. All of your senses are obliterated for those few seconds before you surface, take a gulp of air, and wiggle your toes hopping the pirhanas have had their fill of lunch today.

Carnival!

The sun is hot, and it beats down on our pale, t-shirt covered backsides like a blistering hammer. Today is Carnival and there is a hush about the streets as we walk along the dusty road, the heat coming off the ground in heavy waves. Frances and I are going to lunch with our new friend, Christian. The restaurant is called the Arena, and we order sour cerviche, which is a sort of seafood salad. It is delicious, the tangy lemon taste brings tears to the eyes, and it is spicy too.

After lunch, we head to la casa de Chrisitan. It is still incredibly toasty outside, and I am glad I applied a layer of sunscreen before departing. Stools are presented to us, and we sit on the vacated street that has been blocked off on either side by a line of motor-carros and wooden benches. Little girls, their clothes already dripping, are filling multi colored water balloons. They smile and giggle at us as we take our positions. The two white gringo girls.

Christian takes up a water gun, aims, and fires. I cover my eyes and cower for a moment, but it feels so good that I eventually relent to the onslaught. The cool liquid drips off of my face, and I can but relish the feeling. The heat is inescapable, but this in one way to flee from its grasp for an instant.

Moments later, I am filling my own water balloons from a bucket of murky water, and stacking a reserve on my lap.

Ammo.

Frances is doing the same, and the little girls are helping us. Between each balloon that is filled, we are splashed with water, our clothes becoming drenched and heavy from the weight of it. Soon, we forgo balloons and resort to dumping the buckets on our foes. There still that small part of you that wants to flee, but really you just stand still and wait for the onslaught that shocks your system, and cools it, leaving you feeling FRESCA and happy.

We drink small plastic cups of cerveza, mostly foam and water from the balloons. Then they break out the clay. It is yellow and sticky, and we smear in on our faces. It dries into a stiff mask that loosens after every balloon, leaving a new mask; the mask of a warrior.

Vamanos! It is about three in the afternoon and Christian leads us down the street to a stage. Workers on spindly ladders are hoisting speakers with chains, and a line of hombres are carrying four foot blocks of ice on their bare shoulders to the tubs that cool the bottles of beer, breaking them into bits with a hammer.

A group of boys, hands covered in sticky yellow clay and purple dye, spy our entrance. We duck and cover, but the chase it on. A short sprint down the street and we are caught, yellow and orange clay-covered hands plaster our faces, fingers leaving brighly colored tracks across our cheeks. We emerge filthy, yet decorated, bent over with laughter. Carnival! Awaiting our reprieve are buckets of cool water that redrench our already sopping clothing and track smears down our painted faces. The smell of fresh clay and river water runs into my nose and I smile with unadulterated joy.

I wish we had holidays like this in the United States.

Pure, city-wide fun. We were definitly a sight to see, to say the least. A pair of gringo girls, out to experience Carnival. Esta bien!

Brigitte

Plasic Bags

Hokay, I am here to tell you about shopping for supplies in Iquitos. Let me tell you, it´s nuts! As you followers know, Brigitte and I were on a mission to find plastic bags that would hold the off-gas from the decomposing material. From my last experience of supply shopping in Iquitos, I knew it would be difficult so we had enough forethought to bring our new friend, Christian along with us. So with our choppy Spanish and our wits about us, we embarked.

First we were offered bags that were used to hold large amounts of grain and would obviously not hold any methane in it. As a side note, did you know that there is a whole block of stores in Iquitos that only sell chickens and chicken eggs. I´ve never seen so many eggs in a single place...and boy did it smell! After Christian finally understood plastic bag vs burlap sack, we were getting closer when we went into hardware stores to find big rolls of plastic...yet no sacks. Finally, we came upon a store that solely sold plastic bags. (well, they also had ice cream available which I was tempted to get since it was so hot even at 5 in the evening) Finally! What we were looking for!

The search lasted about two hours...one less item to get! Hopefully the rest will not take so long. But since we´ve gotten those sacks, we can now do the educational model. More later about how that progresses.

Frances

Las plantes medicanales

Oi, Frances y yo went to a research station outside of Iquitos con nuestros nuevo amigo Rudolph, who is starting an ecotourism buiness in Peru. Esta un amigo muy bueno! We partook in a guided tour of the reserve surrounding the station and learned A LOT about plants.

We set out on the trail at 10 in the morning, sunscreened, bug offed, con mucha aqua. It is muy caliente in la selva, or jungle. Pero, in the shade, it is much cooler. There is so much verde all around, large vines snake through the canopy, a close reminder of the real thing. There is one vine that is as thick as an anaconda, and a dard orange red. If you are lost in la selva, try to find it. Tiene mas agua that is clean and parasite free.

The guide picked a small yellow flower from some low laying plants and crushed it between his fingers before lifting them to his mouth. He mimed tasting it and pointed towards the ground. I bent low and picked one of the small cushy amarillo buds and bit down on its furry head. The taste was mild and unremarkable, so I frowned, ¨Esta para que?"
He pointed towards his mouth and said nothing, all the while looking at me expectantly. Gradually, my tongue began to sting and develop a slight burning sensation. Not unpleasant, but very strange. I ran ma lengue around my mouth and realized I was starting to lose feeling where the flower had touch my gums. The guide pointed towards the sign, which read something along the lines of anaesthetic locales. Mes ojos widened and I licked my lips, to which a throaty chuckle was his only response.

I took pictures of everything. My favorites were of mushrooms and various slime molds that seeped from the soft crumbly logs, droplets of moisture clinging to their spongy surfaces. Our guide pointed out a small rojo cosa on the ground and I bent down, my camera a lista. It moved, jumping about three inches away from the lens and I leaned closer to realize it was a TINY TINY frog!!! Five minutes of chasing it about, the guide and our friends trying to trap it in their grasp, and I only got three shaky pictures of a red dot!!! Que devertido!

Rubbery spinned seed pods, filled with bright red seeds that burst when you pinch them and leave a thick opaque residue on your fingers, perfect for face painting.

Trees that extrete a viscous milky juice that can be used to set a cast, like plaster. Others that when cut, bleed a dark red liquid, called sanga, the spanish word for blood. Appropriately, this can be applied to cuts, because it has antiseptic properties.

Hallucinogenic vines, magic plants and various aphrodesiacs galore!

Basically, we learned mucho, and bebemos mucha agua. Antonces, vamos a el bano....

Muchas mas tardes,

Brigitte

Educational Digester Model

Hi All!

I suppose some of you readers are wondering what we are actually doing down here. Well, let me tell you! Our main goal for this three month stint is to build and test a biogas digester. Other objectives will be to do a needs assessment and plan next steps on how we can best use our skills on following trips to the area.

But first, let me tell you more about this super cool digester we will be building. It will provide a way for users dispose of their organic waste without polluting the surrounding area. When users put the waste into the digester, the food will decompose off gasing methane that can then be used for fuel for cooking, the remaining decomposed sluge is high in nutrients and can be used as fertilizer for farming crops or fish providing further food sources.

From there, we can set-up educational session so that community members in the area can see the benefits in action and will have the opportunity learn about how it works and the methods for maintaining the digester so that they too can build and operate one in their own home. The idea is that if locals learn about the process and make it their own the new system is more likely to be sustained than be a temporary fix.

Our first steps will be to create a small educational mock-up version. We plan to do this with a couple of water jugs, cardboard and aplastic bag. We will let it sit and decompose while we are on our 10 day trip on the medical boat, when we will reture, we can assess the success of the tiny system!

now, off to find an methane gas imperveous bag!

-Frances

When it rains....

Iquitos is a city of water. Thirty feet from the entrance of our hotel, La Pascana, the sidewalk drops away and you find yourself standing on the brink of the river basin. It stretches as far as the eye can see, the water glinting in patches between submerged trees and lush flora. Long shallow boats inch along in the distance, their captains about their days work.

It is the rainy season.

Every night it rains, and it pours. The fall of the water on the tin roof sounds like a stampede of minitature elephants. But, after a while, it blends into the background, and lulls you to sleep.

We´ve walk around town everyday and try our best not to look conspicious. This is difficult, as we are generally much taller than everyone, and very blonde. But, we haven´t had any issues. Except, Frances was hit by a water balloon from a moving motocarro. Surpressa!

My only thought was; it could have been worse.

There are a lot of people associated with Project Amazonas staying at our hotel. We´ve met and talked to many of them. What we have learned about the up and coming boat trìp has us very excited. It sounds like we are going to get to help with the medical expedition, and maybe even pull some teeth!

Off to find supplies for our educational biogas digester.

Buenas tardes,

Brigitte

Voracious ATM

Hola amigos!

We landed in Lima at midnight, after about sixteen hours of travel. Both of us were exhausted and running on third and fourth winds, so we decided to scope out a hotel in the area before booking our flights to Iquitos. After finding a handy dandy atm, we extracted some soles, but in the process of stowing the cash we accidentally left the card hanging out in the slot for too long.

MUNCH!

After much ado, and an extended period of sleeping to recoup, we have a plan. Looks like we´ll be seeing some of Lima, and scoping out supplies for building the biogas digester.

This city is much larger than Iquitos, and is more likely to have some of the things we need, like tephlon tape and bug off.

I got to practice my paltry spanish with the taxi driver, much to his amusement. He was very helpful, and more than happy to speak slowly and sound things out for us. Yay for practice!

It is warm and sunny here. The hotel we found is in a pretty safe neighborhood with a grocery store and a bank. Excellent!

The Pacific Ocean tosses its monstrous head a short distance from our place of rest, and there are palm trees and flowers dotting the green spaces outside. The smell of exhaust crowds my nostrils as I write this, and through the glass panes of the door the cars are whizzing by, horns blaring occaisonally. Welcome to the city. Bien venidos a Peru!

Won´t be long until we venture into deepest darkest, so stay tuned.

Hasta luego.

Brigitte