Happy late Easter to all!
I was not nearly as exciting this holiday as I have been for past holidays.
In Bolivia, Semana Santa is a big deal and involves a lot of exciting stuff. Thursday night everyone visits twelve churches and eats a mountain of api (sweet hot drink made from maize, it´s purple and white, very pretty) and pasteles (fried dough with cheese inside and powdered sugar on top). Friday, there are twelve traditional dishes which get cooked up in a frenzy that takes almost all day and then are eaten to the point of making people sick. Saturday there are these processions all over the place, the one I saw was in Villa Tunari in the Chapare, everyone walks a few minutes and then stops and the priest does a station of the cross and everyone starts walking again. Full band, very loud. Then there´s SUNDAY itself. Actually, not much in particular seems to happen on Sunday, roast lamb is traditional for lunch and I suppose people sometimes go to church, but I was out and about Sunday and not much of anything seemed to have been happening. I guess everyone had feasted and prayed and processed themselves out. All of these things happen and I did exactly none of them. My largest Bolivian experience during all of this was being denied a beer in a restuarant because serving alcohol was prohibido. Oops.
I did, however, run away to the jungle for a day with my friend Meghan, we swam and ate fish, and slept and got eaten alive by mosquitos. No creatures jumped on my head and I only got a little sunburned. It was a great get away for a night.
On Sunday I went to visit my Bolivian family and was force fed salteñas for a couple of hours. It was very nice to see them. Then off with my housemate Steve to the Shermans´ easter egg hunt party. I can´t remember if I´ve talked about the Shermans before. Becky and Joe are a lovely couple with two lovely children who are in Cochabamba as Maryknoll missioners. We are connected by a sort of family relationship and they have taken amazing care of me since I got here, from taking me to lunch during my first week here, to Halloween, to sending me to Steve when I was about to go crazy with the family, and most recently, inviting me for Easter at their house. It was a great event with more gringos than I ever see in one place and lots of little kids running around. Bonus was that Becky´s aunt and mom were in visiting and it was lovely to see her mom again having met her before right before I left the states.
I was not nearly as exciting this holiday as I have been for past holidays.
In Bolivia, Semana Santa is a big deal and involves a lot of exciting stuff. Thursday night everyone visits twelve churches and eats a mountain of api (sweet hot drink made from maize, it´s purple and white, very pretty) and pasteles (fried dough with cheese inside and powdered sugar on top). Friday, there are twelve traditional dishes which get cooked up in a frenzy that takes almost all day and then are eaten to the point of making people sick. Saturday there are these processions all over the place, the one I saw was in Villa Tunari in the Chapare, everyone walks a few minutes and then stops and the priest does a station of the cross and everyone starts walking again. Full band, very loud. Then there´s SUNDAY itself. Actually, not much in particular seems to happen on Sunday, roast lamb is traditional for lunch and I suppose people sometimes go to church, but I was out and about Sunday and not much of anything seemed to have been happening. I guess everyone had feasted and prayed and processed themselves out. All of these things happen and I did exactly none of them. My largest Bolivian experience during all of this was being denied a beer in a restuarant because serving alcohol was prohibido. Oops.
I did, however, run away to the jungle for a day with my friend Meghan, we swam and ate fish, and slept and got eaten alive by mosquitos. No creatures jumped on my head and I only got a little sunburned. It was a great get away for a night.
On Sunday I went to visit my Bolivian family and was force fed salteñas for a couple of hours. It was very nice to see them. Then off with my housemate Steve to the Shermans´ easter egg hunt party. I can´t remember if I´ve talked about the Shermans before. Becky and Joe are a lovely couple with two lovely children who are in Cochabamba as Maryknoll missioners. We are connected by a sort of family relationship and they have taken amazing care of me since I got here, from taking me to lunch during my first week here, to Halloween, to sending me to Steve when I was about to go crazy with the family, and most recently, inviting me for Easter at their house. It was a great event with more gringos than I ever see in one place and lots of little kids running around. Bonus was that Becky´s aunt and mom were in visiting and it was lovely to see her mom again having met her before right before I left the states.
On Monday night some friends of mine had a Seder, which was really exciting for me, Catholic girl that I am. As the youngest of the group I got to open the door for Elijah and participated in the non-jewish contingent's plot to steal the matzoh, the plot was successful. Thank you to everyone who educated me up through high school, I was very helpful describing the plagues. The event was great and my friends did a great job setting it up. Bolivia is not the easiest place on earth to try to put together a Jewish holiday.
In other news, the looming problem of my future was solved last week when I got hired by the American Refugee Committee to work with their brand new microenterprise development program with women and youth in camps along the Thai-Myanmar border. Now I will be home in early July and off again for a whole new adventure at the beginning of August. If anyone knows anyone in Thailand or, you know, anything about Thailand, let me know. I can find it on a map and I like pad thai but that´s about it in the way of my knowledge. An extra-big thank you to those who were pulling for me and offering support in the way of references, prayers, and happy thoughts.
So, yes, I hope you all had great Easters with lots of joy and chocolate and everything else. I hope everyone is doing well. I miss you all, and that´s true because I reviewed my email list yesterday. Write when you can and know someone in Bolivia is thinking of you!
LOVE!
Mollie
In other news, the looming problem of my future was solved last week when I got hired by the American Refugee Committee to work with their brand new microenterprise development program with women and youth in camps along the Thai-Myanmar border. Now I will be home in early July and off again for a whole new adventure at the beginning of August. If anyone knows anyone in Thailand or, you know, anything about Thailand, let me know. I can find it on a map and I like pad thai but that´s about it in the way of my knowledge. An extra-big thank you to those who were pulling for me and offering support in the way of references, prayers, and happy thoughts.
So, yes, I hope you all had great Easters with lots of joy and chocolate and everything else. I hope everyone is doing well. I miss you all, and that´s true because I reviewed my email list yesterday. Write when you can and know someone in Bolivia is thinking of you!
LOVE!
Mollie
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