December 30th, 2006- Another holiday season ends

Well, as I sit here listening to Wham´s ¨Last Christmas,¨it becomes clear that once again, I am having trouble letting go of the Christmas season. I spent the last few months dreading a quiet and different holiday, but my friends, host family, and I joined forces rather successfully to combat that preconceived notion of mine. In fact, we succeeded so wholeheartedly that the end of our festivities brought me great sadness, so much so that I am thinking that a more serenely spent holiday may have been easier to recover from. The only things that are keeping me afloat right now are the six Christmas cd´s that my mom mailed to me (which I plan to listen to continuously until next Christmas, or at least until my host family pilfers and burns them. After all, what depression can survive the Chipmunks Christmas Compilation?) and the package of my grandmom´s icebox fruitcake that is lost somewhere in snailmail space, hopefully inching its way towards me. While the lot of you may cringe when thinking of fruitcake (arguably the worlds most loathsome gastronomical entity), let me assure you that Lucy Light defies every fruitcake stereotype with that delectable aforementioned treat. I´ll let you know how it tastes when it arrives stale sometime early next year.

So, Christmas in Peru. Do you want to hear about it? Well, do you? Since it is no skin off my back reliving it, I suppose I´ll tell you ALL of the details. First off, it is worth mentioning that with the start of December came my perpetual desire to transform myself into a Christmas elf. If Peru wasn’t going to paint itself red, white, and green (with gold and silver accents), the responsibility would lay in the hands of no one other than Lindsay Jean Buck. Since it proved impossible to find a stocking that would endure being stuffed with anything heavier than a grain of salt, I made stockings for everyone I know here. Some choice adornments were glitter glue, buttons, Christmas-printed ribbon, you know, the whole sha-bang. My family especially appreciated these, considering the only decoration they brought to the table was an empty cake box that we hung festively on the ceiling. I don´t have too many complaints about this makeshift ornament, considering it was reddish and had a bough of holly painted on it. Christmas is all about improvising, especially when living away from home. By the way, just to keep you updated and in the holiday spirit, I am now listening to Elvis´ ¨Blue Christmas,¨an oldie but goodie.

Many of my friends happened to be celebrating Christmas in my regional city, a mere 15 minutes away from me. This meant that I had access to the best of two worlds. I was able to witness Peruvian traditions while enjoying the company of fellow volunteers, so I had very little to complain about. Preparations began by helping a friend decorate his hotel room with holiday cheer, which this year encompassed red and white musical lights, a colorful array of garland, a huge red bell, and approximately 30 handcrafted snowflakes (I´m sure this was all particularly pleasant for his cleaning lady to walk in to). Perhaps the only disheartening aspect of Christmas was realizing that I, Ms. Crafty herself, am snowflake challenged. Snowflakes are supposed to be uniquely exquisite and pleasing to the eye, but all of mine turned out uniform and choppy. Harumph. Some people involved turned it into a contest, but only after they realized how awful I was at it. I feel like that is comparable to betting money on a game that is already over, so I refuse to accept the title of loser. Better luck next year, suckers.

Peruvians celebrate on Christmas Eve (La noche buena) at midnight with a turkey dinner, paneton (a huge muffin-looking fruitcake) and hot chocolate. Two of my friends joined my family for this celebration, but unfortunately we had to tweak the tradition a bit because the turkey that we raised from an infant and planned to eat was stolen by a family member and sold on the Christmas Eve Turkey Black Market for a large sum of money. This was a big deal, since turkey is super expensive and therefore only enjoyed once a year. And oh, what a handsome turkey he was! This whole debacle resulted in my friends and I picking up a fastfood order of chicken, french fries and wilted salad for my family to enjoy on Christmas Eve. This was supplemented by cookies, paneton, wine, and some deliciously rich hocho (hot chocolate) made with our own cows milk. The highlight of the evening was sharing marshmallow fluff that my friend brought from the states. Most of us chose to put it in our hot chocolate, but my 24 year old host sister, who apparently didn´t get the memo, took a heaping spoonful and motioned to plop it on her chicken and fries. Whoa! Easy there, Maribel!! As if the chicken wasn´t displeasing enough on its own. While it probably would have been the right thing to do to let my host family have the remaining fluff, I surreptitiously shoveled it into my purse after supper. Number of fluffernutter sandwiches enjoyed since that fated moment: 9 ½. You can appreciate that, dad (the only person over 10 years old who regularly purchases marshmallow fluff).

Christmas tune currently playing: ¨Merry Christmas, Baby,¨ by Bruce Springsteen, his only redeeming musical ensemble (Blake, it´s time you learned the truth about him). Well, this next holiday memory is a tad emotional for me. A friend and I went to great lengths to make a Christmas day dinner reservation at the nicest hotel/restaurant in Cajamarca city. Two weeks before the event, they promised us a holiday buffet of hundreds of mouthwatering delicacies, none of which were potatoes or rice, our regular fare. In our excitement, we even encouraged some of our friends to change their holiday plans to join us for what was sure to be a spectacular feast. As the ten of us strolled into the restaurant for our 7pm reservation, I heard some brave and perceptive soul whisper, ¨Where is the buffet?¨ After asking the management that exact question, we were told that we were one day late for the buffet. I am still unsure how this miscommunication occurred, considering the man who took our reservation spoke perfect English and clearly said to us, ¨We´ll be awaiting your arrival on the 25th. Here is the list of all of the delicious foods the buffet will include.¨ Let´s just say that I was more devastated by the lack of buffet and mediocre dinner that followed than I was when I learned that Santa didn´t exist. I guess not all was lost though, because we made a pretty awesome batch of eggnog. It´s funny that some of us managed to convince ourselves that Christmas was not Christmas without making eggnog. I am pretty sure that none of us had ever made it before, but gosh, what is Christmas without making eggnog? I can´t believe that we drank it after seeing what goes in it. It would be more appropriately named Salmonella Cesspool with how many raw eggs are included. But oh what a treat it was!

So here I sit in my bed on the day before the very last day of 2006! 2006 was a year of many big changes, but I remain satisfied with how I rang it in and how I am ending it. I am celebrating tomorrow night with my host family, and am excited about all of the new traditions they are going to introduce me to. At midnight, everyone eats 12 grapes and makes a wish with each, each grape representing a month of the new year. Some families also pack their bags and go traipsing around the neighborhood, but I have yet to figure out what that signifies. I hope we don’t do that because my suitcase has a lot of junk in it and the ground is supremely muddy. Some people make little yellow sachets of rice and lentils and some money to save for next year. The most common tradition is making life-sized dolls out of old clothing and burning them at midnight to symbolize out with the old and in with the new. I hope I don’t have to do this though either because I only have about six outfits here.

Well, one thing that is guaranteed is that I will be thinking about all of you as I ring in the new year and hoping that all of you are in wonderful company and enjoying yourselves. Happy 2007 with much love from me!