This past weekend I was in Arequipa for a monthly meeting with our coordinators and the other volunteers, and we had an opportunity to go to a bullfight in Characato, just outside the city.  It was of the Arequipena style, with no matador, spears, whips, blood, or dead toros.  The bulls came into the ring, their owners were not allowed to touch them during the fight, and if they felt the urge to battle the other bull, they turned head to head until one of them had enough, and then he ran away.  Once, a bull entered the ring, saw the other bull panting and pawing the ground and said, "Forget this", turned, and ran away without a fight.  He lost. 

Projects are coming along well - This week's accomplishment was to plant a 'biohuerto', or garden, in the technical institute in town.  The students are mostly 18-20 and are invited to study here with free room and board, only paying a minimal fee for classes.  All of these students are from the sierra, the mountains a bit farther inland from me.  Some are single mothers without many other options, the others are kids who don't have the resources to be able to study in a university, and this is an amazing opportunity for them to be able to learn more skills and perhaps fulfill some of the goals they would otherwise be unable to meet.  We planted cabbage, swiss chard, onion, beets, and broccoli.  I hope some of the veggies actually grow . . . the kids can then use them to augment their lunches with more vegetables, or to sell and be able to buy more seeds to improve the garden.  We also did a lesson on SODIS, the solar water disinfection method, and it they are going to adapt this method, for which they only need plastic bottles and the sun, to have safe drinking water for lunch, rather than boiling the 10-15 liters of water every day.  

Things to look forward to:  

-  Rob's wedding in August.  I'm really excited to see my family and the friends who are able to make it out, as well as all of the family friends at the wedding.  It's gonna be great.

-  Saturday is Emily's birthday, so we are going to celebrate in her community . . . I'm thinking of combining it with a 4th of July celebration and dressing up like an American flag.  We'll see what I can pull off.