Brent, Brenna, & Lincoln

Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Moray & Salineras

Last week Brent and I had a free day, so we decided to see some nearby ruins. Here's the account according to Brent: We caught 2 taxis to some ruins (Moray) kinda near by. But we had to really haggle w- them.. The ruins are concentric circle terraces where they experimented with different ecosystems in each, because the climates change as you go up in altitude. Then we did the unthinkable: we walked from that ruin to another that the taxitsta assured us was 70 km away. Bull. Took us 2 hours. But we were out on our own, (it was a fodor´s guidebook recommendation to walk between) and we didn’t see another human for the entire time. We were walking through high altitude wheat fields, and I grabbed a bunch of it and crunched it in my hands and separated the wheat from the chafe like Brian Dilley (Brenna's cuz) taught me to on his farm in Pasco, WA last summer. We had the best conversation in that 2 hours about where we want to travel, friends, literature, immigration, etc. it was a perfect hike! Also, it lead us to a secret path across a wide ravine (we had to zigzag a lot up and down the mountain and dodge cliffs and stumble and avoid cactus, and huge spiders---which Brenna really didn't do) but we arrived w-o having to pay at the place! The Salineras, where they mine salt on huge terraces was pretty incredible. It was just like looking at rice terraces on steel mountainsides, but weird colors and whatnot from evaporation of salt. We got to see people taking out their own salt. I asked them how much they had to pay to get it....you can walk away from the place with 50 kilos of salt for a few bucks. We then walked from there back to the main highway and caught lunch/dinner at a place called Arco Iris (rainbow) that spans the Urubamba river. The food was great and the presentation was fun, as we ate in a green tropical place under a grass hut overlooking the river with great eats. A cat joined us and ate Brenna's fish skin, and we reminisced over DaVinci...the furry one, that is.

Sunday, June 28, 2009

A little Cusco

Here are some pictures from a couple days in Cuzco. We still have a LOT more to see there, so there will be more photos coming, but here's a start. We were visiting during a fun time...winter solstice here is one of the biggest festivals in all of Peru---Inti Raymi. There were parades and stuff going on for a week. We also were able to witness a demonstration by the agricultural workers (most of the indigenous population). They were peacefully protesting unfair wages and prices and whatnot. The bathtub picture with Brent was a wild restaurant that we went to. Our table was a bathtub filled with fish, covered by a glass rectangle. The whole place was pretty outlandish. We also visited Qoricancha, the "loins" of the Incan empire and what used to be a temple completely gilded in gold. The Spanish had their way with that building and build a monastery/church over top of it. Typical.

The enormous stone walls you see below are original Incan walls tediously placed together with no mortar.

Monday, June 22, 2009

A Couple Days in Lima

Purple Corn in the Market---Used for making Chicha Morada---Yum!

Different kinds of sauces for yummy food!

Brent & I in the Parque Del Amor (Park of Love) in Miraflores...a park entirely dedicated to LOVERS! We loved it! The mosaic-tiled benches are reminiscent of Gaudi's Parque Guell in Barcelona, Spain.

A statue of a couple in a "lewd embrace" stands at the center of Love Park...a big controversy.

We can't resist original artwork! This painting has cost us more than a little trouble. Ask us for the story later.

Brent was just dying to paraglide on the coast. He had such a blast!

The Perro Peruano is about the ugliest dog I've ever seen, but nevertheless a protected dog in Peru, indigenous to the area, and they have a body temp. of about 100 degrees just on the skin.

Brent and I at the ruins of the Lima civilization (Pre-Inca) in the middle of a sweet neighboorhood in Miraflores. The "hill" was once used for motorcrossing because no one had discovered them. It's a working archeological site. Their clever building-technique helped the structure to withstand the earthquakes common to the area.

You can't talk about Peru without the Llama being mentioned. Even Frank Sinatra sings about them "Come Fly With Me, We'll float down to Peru, In Llama-land there's a one-man band, and he'll toot his flute for you."

Urubamba Life

The Pro Peru Offices

Volunteers creating water filters of clay...kneading with their FEET!

The red wall with the brown door is the entrance to Pro Peru offices where we live.

El Templo de Torrechayoc...the church just a stone's throw away from where we live. I go in there to think sometimes.

An indigenous woman walking down the main market street. Where those top hats came from I'll never understand. Notice the legwarmers. It's not as warm as you might think.

The church adjacent to the main plaza in the center of Urubamba.

View of our little house (shared) and the shop where the filters are made behind. The house is made of adobe, with a cement floor, and tile roof...living in style.

Brent on our first day here with a bowl of soup at a restaurant. Here, lunch is the biggest meal of the day, generally starting with a big veggie soup, and then a main dish of potatoes and meat or beans and rice, etc. All of that, plus some chicha morada (purple corn juice) will cost 4-5 soles (a buck and a half or so).

Here I am at the same restaurant. We like to eat upstairs and have a view of the main plaza and church.

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Children's Show

Well, I'm done with theatre for a little while. Last week, I took a troupe of 14 kids on tour with two one-act spoofs of classic Shakespearean shows. It was a blast. We took the shows to elementary and middle schools, and they just loved it! My kids had a blast entertaining and relating with the little ones. We also had two evening performances which were relatively well-attended considering that the Nuggets were playing the Lakers on Saturday night. When that was mentioned as a possible factor in lowering our audience numbers, I said "Who watches hockey anyway?" They got a kick out of my ignorance. More pics to come.

Friday, May 15, 2009

Elphaba For A Day...

I've always wanted to play the role of Elphaba, so when the French National Honor's Society at our school announced their "Have A Laugh And Help Sudan" fundraiser (embarrassing teachers for certain quantities of money donated), I was all over it. We have a sister school in Sudan where, a few years ago, no girls attended school at all. Now there are 600 of them! Throughout the year, we've had various fundraisers and drives----everything going strait to that little village. A brilliant Social Studies teacher at our school runs the foundation and goes there every year. We raised about 3,500 dollars with this fundraiser and 9,000 or so with a 5k walk in the fall. For $950, I was willing (okay...I was excited) to paint myself green for a day. I ended up having far more fun that I could have imagined...especially when I got to scare the Little Raptors (a preschool on campus for teachers' kids). They squealed and screamed and probably had bad dreams last night! Here are some pics...

Here I am with Martha Riley, the Social Studies Teacher who runs the project for our school. She wore her wedding dress from 30-something years ago for the occasion! See http://www.projecteducationsudan.org/ for more information on the project.

Kelly Snell, the Dance Teacher/Performing Arts Chair/Student Council Advisor and I went in on this together. She dressed as Glinda, the Good Witch...complete with bubbles and whatnot, while I acted her counterpart. She and I are both obsessed with WICKED and already have tickets to see the touring company when they come to Denver in October.

Several of my theatre kids stopped by my Spanish classes that day because they heard about what I looked like and just had to see it! Taylor, a very talented Junior, was one of them. She was our lead in "Thoroughly Modern Millie" and plays prominent roles in the children's show I'm directing now.

I tried casting a spell on Jacob...it didn't work. I'm not so sure my students were able to take me very seriouly during class that day. I mean, would you respond to a green-skinned witch if she asked you to start conjugating stem-chaning verbs?

I carried a broom around all day...naturally.

I experimented a lot with my witchy hand movements...for when I get to actually play that role. You know, character exploration...

While this is a hideous picture of me, I felt it necessary to give credit to my makeup artist. Brandon Bill is the theatre teacher at our school and he and I have worked together to direct all the shows this year. He's brilliant in all aspects of the craft, and particularly good at makeup. We got to school at 6:15 so he could help me become convincingly green!