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hi, everybody.
Today itīs one month since I came to Lima. Though a lot of things have happened, and it feels as if Iīve been here for much longer, I still havenīt seen a lot of Lima. I basically know my neighborhoud, and have seen some of the neighbourhoods south and north of barranco. in the south - chorillos - I do my shopping, and in the north - Miraflores - I do interviews. The pilot research was finished yesterday, and I did my first analysis. It all went well, and as far as I can see, we have some questions we can use. It was very exciting to check if the questions weīve been developing during the past months really work, and itīs a great relief to see that some scales were doing really well. Iīm still waiting for reply of my statistics professor, letīs see what he thinks of it.
When I thought that with the end of the pilot, the stress would diminish, I was mistaken. The following stage of our investigation has planned 45 interviews during only 10 days. And we are only 2,5 people (2 during 2 weeks, and 1 is there for only 5 days). This means 6 interviews every day, at least. I really hope our schedule will not continue like this in the other cities, but Iīm afraid it will. This new phase is also really challanging for me, since until now, I could hide behind my methodology-role, because I was mainly in charge of improving the questionnaire. But now I have to help calling people, arranging meetings, not monday, but today, talking to people to get phone numbers, to get information about projects, what they are doing and with whom. This is really different, and asks a lot of social sensitivity: a real good training for me, to get rid of my terrible directness here in Peru.
Today is saturday, so I can go exploring Lima. There surely is enough to do around here; I think today Iīll go see some ruins calles īpachacamac' about 40 minutes off lima. Itīs only a pitty I have no-one to share this experience with, and I wish one of you guys were around to keep me company. So keep writing to me, even though it might take me a week to respond, I love to get some news from you guys!
Have a good one, susanne. hi, dear people.
because various of you reacted to my mails saying that they were immensly glad for me being in peru, but what the hell i was doing there? i will tell you.
iīm still studying psychology and a minor of developmental studies in amsterdam. this 5-months trip to peru is recognized as the practical part of my psychology degree as a research-traineeship. at the same time i will use the results as my finalizing paper for my development minor.
this research is done in a team of six people. our boss is a professor at the institute for development studies and the faculty of social geology, michaela hordijk. then there is urias, a geology student, writing his thesis about our investigation. and three peruvian students, who will earn credits and some money with this project.
preperation for this investigation started practically in august last year. michaela coordinates and organizes. iīm in charge of the statistical and methodolgical part and will do the interviews with the other four students. we will compare two types of alliances: one is a network, called forum cities for life. the others are no members. all of these alliances consist of different types of organizations (civial society organizations, non-governmental organizations, private business, lokal government) and seek to accomplish some common goal, which is mainly linked with the public sector. the foro-members mainly try to improve the environment.
we will investigate various factors, and how they are linked with the efficiency and goal achievement of those alliances. we will also investigate if the foro-members are more succesful than the non-foro members.
the investigation will probably be finalized in midst of april. just yesterday i heard that i will probably stay in lima until 14th of feburary, then start the investigation in caja marca, which is the city the furthest up north, then go south to trujillo, and end in chimbote. i hope to be in chimbote end of march, because the 27th my beloved daan will land in lima, and i hope to pick him up there. while he can use my last busy weeks to go see machu picchu, we will spend the last month together. i donīt know where we will go yet, except that we will go to la paz, to see my friends there.
i hope now you know, what this is all about. hope you all are fine, and iīm glad to get so many mails from you!
lots of love, susanne.
| hi, everybody.
for the moment iīll keep anoying you guys with daily e-mails. but donīt worry, within five days i have to leave this house, where i have a flatline connection and two computers!
yesterday i went to the beach. the beach in barranco, the neighbourhoud where iīm staying. by the way, i discovered, that barranco is not outside lima, but it is just lima. itīs a little confusing, because it seems like you cannot cross through lima within one day! so i feel like iīm living outside lima, even more so because barranco used to be an automonous village, which grew into lima. anyway, seemingly iīm right in the middle of it. the same confusion grabs me when iīm standing on the plaza los armas, the center-center of lima. you wanna go like: so, where are these 12 million? seen from this perspective, it just seems some normal town. probably because there are no high buildings in lima down town. that makes it a need experience.
but i went to the beach. on the beach, there were a lot of people. a lot of brown people. i must admit, i felt a little embarassed to peel my cheese-white fatty body out of my clothes and to move this cheesy matter into the sunny-brown peruvian bathing crowd. so i splashed right into it, until there was only my head sticking out of the water. i can tell you: itīs a pleasant experience. and while swimming there in the sea, with the view of lima along the cliffy coastline, i still had the fear that within seconds i would wake up to discover i had fallen asleep on my bicycle and had fallen into a gracht and was now looking at the snowy amsterdam skyline, ready to being fished out by the water police. but no, iīm still here, at 7:00 (iīve been e-mailing since an hour or so - damn jet-lag), waiting for the stores to open, so i can get some breakfast.
i must say, i havenīt actively been trying to fight my jet-lag. as soon as i feel tired, i just go to sleep. so i went to sleep at 4 pm the day before yesterday, and at eight pm yesterday. iīm slowly improving. but today is monday, and apart from the fact that iīm planning to go to the beach today again (thought i feel a little sting when i think of all these museums and old culture i probably should be anxious to see) iīm strongly determined to take life seriously today, go to bed at a normal time, and to start reading some articles. (way to go, susanne!)
keep you updated. love, susanne. | i went to the center of lima, and it didnīt feel that dangerous at all. donīt worry, i will still be careful. what certainly helped was that i was with lucho yesterday, who also forbid me to go to certain areas and who a couple of times told me to turn into another street, because he felt like we wouldnīt be safe there. these were mainly crowded streets, were you can find pickpockets, but no armed robberies, or anything like it. he also didnīt want us to cross a bridge right off the plaza los armas, were he said a poorer part of lima center began. this feels strange to me, since in la paz i was used to going to even the most remote places, and looking everybody straight into the eye. but iīll take things slowly; now iīll start exploring the local supermarket (metro), which looks like a gigantic american mall! i think, iīll be save there.
love, susanne.
hi, everybody.
i arrived at lima, peru yesterday at 6.30 pm local time. i was exhausted, and i slept for 12 hours.
two nights before i left we had had a new years eve party, which at the same time was my good-buy party. THANK YOU, KRAMER-FAMILY FOR THIS GREAT PARTY!
me and a couple of friends went home at about 3.00 pm! then i slept a couple of hours, interrupted by people who wanted to pick up things from the party, or who wanted to say goodbuy. at about eight, daan got up, and we spent some time talking, and packing up my stuff. then we went back to sleep, and at 4.00 am we got up and went to the airport. dana and yvonne were there to say good buy. (thank you guys) i didnīt even cry that much, guess i had already done enough of that. on the plane i slept through breakfast, which i didnīt mind that much at the time. only later, when waiting for lunch, which was served at about 15.00 oīclock, i wished i had been awake. this situation worsened, when i realized that the flight crew didnīt seem to take into account, that we were crossing time zones, and skipping 6 hours, during which we could have perfectly well had some dinner. when i told a stewardess that i was almost starving, she gave me some nuts, which kept me alive until dinner, which was served about one hour before landing, which was at about 12 oīclock at night european time! at 6.35 pm local time i landed in peru.
roberto, who is a friend of my teacher Michaela, picked me up from the airport and brought me to michaelaīs house, where i can stay for a couple of days, until michaela gets here. itīs a beautiful house in a nice, safe neighbourhoud outside lima. i was welcomed by michaelaīs roommate, lucho, a guy of about 30 years, really nice, who made me some papaya-juice (yeah!), and who started to explain to me, how to get to lima down town, and where NOT to get off in lima. iīm really curious about going down town!
when i landed, i already realized, that i had definitely brought the wrong type of clothes. of course i had expected it to be much warmer here than in amsterdam, but still, i took my winter jacket and shoes, and no shorts. now iīm glad that lima is constantly covered by a thick layer of mist, so that the sun does not shine. anyhow, its quite warm, and the first thing iīll have to do is to buy some shoes. until now, i like the climate. from my room i can hear strange birds, and some type of frog-sound. luckily the people here have the same way to communicate as in bolivia, which makes things much easier for me. still, i have to stop comparing everything with bolivia, because it really is very different. people here have a much higher standard of living and education. i have to watch out not to generalize the things i know about bolivia too much.
iīm really curious about how everything works here, what type of food they eat, etc. iīll let you know more, soon. love, susanne.
it would be great if you could send me an (empty) e-mail, so that i can save your adress in my new adress book. hope to mail to you, susanne.
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