Hello everyone! It's been a while, and I definitely have some things to say, stories to tell, etc.

I guess I will start with the fact that classes are completely over for me now, and we have the next week-ish to get ready to turn in our proposals for independent investigations - I have already started my investigation, etc. so I'm a bit ahead of other folks, which feels really good... I am sure that a lot of people are going to be really stressed out Tuesday night (we have our ethics proposal to turn in on Weds) and Wednesday night as well (our overall proposal for the project is due on Thursday...

Thursday night I'll be moving into my apartment that I've rented with three other students for the duration of the independent investigation (ISP). I will be traveling for some of that time, but not the majority of it like some people... which I'm pretty glad for, I actually didn't think it would end up that way at first... but my project has changed so many times (should be done changing now haha) that it was hard to tell where I'd be at the beginning of the semester...

So, I'll be living in Cusco and then traveling to the selva (the jungle) to visit with some amazonian communities, their leaders, etc. to talk about bilingual education in their communities: what are the benefits, problems, etc. how does diglosia fit into the picture?and so on...

So a few days ago we got back from Iquitos which is the northern jungle (the Amazon, pretty much) and had quite an adventure there as a group, but it appears that we all kept our wits about us, which was really nice to see and helped to keep everyone relaxed, I think. So... what happened? Alright so we woke up our second morning in Iquitos to leave our hostel at 530 am (quick breakfast at 5am) and took a two hour bus ride to Nauta (port town near this community we were going to - 2 Mayo) from there, we were to have a "two hour" boat ride to the community... We started out on four boats (our group on three and some folks accompanying us on a fourth boat). I was on a boat with 9 other women students and one of the Assistant Directors - Donaldo. Our driver was the owner of all the boats, and the other boats' motors kept breaking down, so they would basically trade parts between motors and make them work again... pretty amazing mechanically speaking, but it also meant that our boat had to turn around quite a few times and by the time we'd been on the boat already 3 hours, some of my boat mates really had to pee, so we pulled over to a bank for them to pee and as they all got back on the boat, we realized that the motor wouldn't start again...

So... for the next 2 and a half or 3 hours, our group was sitting in muggy heat under the sun with no food, not much water, and all getting a bit hungry and tired... After three hours of making jokes, telling stories and the like, our wonderful driver got the motor started again and we were off! Problem was... neither our driver nor his assistant had any idea of where the hell we were supposed to be going!!! So, we drove around in circles, basically, and then we ran out of gas... so our driver and his assistant tied our boat to a very small stick stuck into the bank of the river and literally TOOK OFF. Then the waves of mosquitoes started attacking us. You know in cartoons when some dummie hits the bee hive and they all come out of the hive and chase the dummie and attack him? Well, imagine that, but with mosquitoes... you could literally see them there we so many. So what did we do? Well of course, we started stripping off our clothes rapidly and all jumped in the river!

The water felt incredible and cooled down our dehydrated bodies for sure, and helped the mosquitoes stay away... while we were in the water, some people saw the famous amazonian dolphins! I didn't see them, since I'd been wearing my glasses from having an eye infection and left them on the boat so that I didn't lose them in the murky brown water... This also means that I didn't see the croc that slid down the bank and into the water - another student saw this and didn't tell us for a little while so we didn't all freak out - which I'm sure we would have but you could warn a girl! Especially when she's blind!

In any case, we all got back out of the water without anyone getting attacked like an antelope, being made love to by the pink amazonian dolphins (there are myths about this because they apparently have the same sex organs as humans and so there are some crazy stories haha), or get any leeches anywhere they hoped not to (one person saw a leech and so we all checked ourselves VERY thoroughly when we got out... By the time we got out, a huge rainstorm was coming our way and fast. It started to rain and a man with a motorized canoe came by and attached himself to our boat. This is as we are all putting our clothes back on, of course. Then about two minutes later, another boat pulled up alongside us and tied themselves to our boat as well and just started driving us away from where we were tied up. Mind you, none of us had any idea who any of these young and old men were and it was a bit nerve-wracking to just be swept away by a bunch of folks you don't know to who knows where when the rest of our group had been waiting for us for HOURS.

These nice fellows took us to their community, which was not the community we were supposed to go to, but here's what happened... and I'll try to keep this explanation simple. Basically, there had been an agreement between the community we were going to visit and three other allied communities not to let any tourists into their communities. This is because of the huge problem with oil companies in the area. It is impossible to tell who is friend and who is foe for them, including within their own communities. Oil companies are bribing community leaders to have a soft conscious and not fight the oil companies, but sort of let them do whatever they want. The president of these communities had invited us to visit to start the process of creating international allies and having students who could benefit from first-hand experience and knowledge of how this process is affecting their communities.

So basically, when this community we were taken to (Bagaza) saw the two other boats pass by (oh - one boat had broken down completely, so two boats had to combine), they got pretty angry and shut down the canal into the area where these four communities are (it's a sort of lake area) as a result. This is why we couldn't find the community we had as a destination, in part... but so when they saw us frolicking in the water, they decided to bring us back to their community until they could figure out what the hell was going on. To be honest, I don't blame them at all... But anyway, once we got to the community, we were mostly greeted with hardened faces and crossed arms and some harsh words. Our driver said that we were students, tourists, not doing any observations or anything (to convince the community that we were not from an oil company)... but the whole calling us tourists thing didn't go over very well with the community, and there was a bit of a conflict between our driver and the community since he was the owner of the boats that had already passed through.

So, since it was starting to rain pretty hard, they took us to the second floor of a house and had us sit there as they discussed what was going to happen with us in a bit of a community meeting. Luckily, they had called the community where we were supposed to go, and had the president of the communities come over - as well as our academic director. Luckily, they were mostly angry about the lack of communication and eventually let us go back to the boat and leave with our group - but this took at LEAST an hour of conversation between the communities, etc. then we had to get our other classmates from 2 Mayo over to us in Bagaza and by this time it was really dark and so it took them a really long time to be able to figure out exactly how to get to Bagaza.

The community of Bagaza was incredibly kind to us once they realized that we were students and not trying to extract information or resources from them, and said that we would be welcome to come back whenever, as long as there is communication beforehand. So then we had to get back on the boats and start the "two hour" boat ride back in the dark... Which took 6 hours in the dark or something like that - had to stop to get gas once, stop to change gas once after that, and it was only safe because it is the rainy season. There is one section of the river that we crossed over that has a bunch of trees sticking up in the middle of the river basically (trunks, etc.) and usually, they are not submerged, but during the rainy season they are... we still hit a couple with the bottom of our boat, though... that was a little scary because if it had hit the motor, it would have completely taken out the motor...

So... basically, it's the most adventurous thing, by far, that has happened since I've bee in Peru and it was a really valuable experience to get to start to understand the realities of how oil companies and the Peruvian state's policies surrounding them, is actually changing the environment in these communities from one of trust and friendship between them to one of "every man for himself" and mistrust. That on top of the environmental problems that these communities are having as a result of the drilling is just flabbergasting in some ways - there was an oil spill a year and a half ago and the river was SERIOUSLY contaminated and nothing was done about it really, no clean up, etc. These communities' main food source comes from the river, their water for drinking and all other activities comes from the river, and it has been that way for centuries. In the drilling process, the waste water that comes up from drilling is just being dumped into the river as well, exacerbating the contamination of wildlife and flora in their ecosystem.

Anyhow, that was quite the adventure. The next day, I did my first interview with a professor at the school that teaches bilingual teachers, and did it on camera, since he said he would be comfortable with it - i'm hoping to do a multimedia presentation for my presentation here at the end, or maybe use the videos for part of my thesis when i write my thesis for CLL next year (on this topic or a very similar one, I think). And it's really exciting to have made some contacts here that I can use in the future (like the guy I interviewed) for work here or elsewhere in Latin America.

Well, I think this is a long enough story by now, and hopefully I will write again sooner rather than later so that I can keep these shorter.

Love you all and I hope everyone is good and safe, etc. with all that is going on in the world.

Peace