Carnaval

Things in Peru are not all work and no play.  Actually, judging by how much I love my work down here, I would say it is mostly all play. This past weekend was particularly fun.  Let me start by saying that in the month of February, Carnaval is celebrated in Peru.  This meant that the scariest sight in Chimbote was a group of kids with buckets and water balloons.  It is fairly common for people to get hit by water balloons or have buckets of water dumped on them from second floor windows by complete strangers.  Gringos make a great target.  So most of my month of February was spent peeking around street corners or high-tailing it in the other direction to avoid being hit.  Thankfully in Chimbote, only water is used.  Some cities throw paint, flour or talcum powder on innocent passersby.  The city of Cajamarca has a reputation of having one of the wildest Carnaval celebrations in all of Peru.  Friday night I went to sleep in Chimbote and woke up Saturday morning in Cajamarca.  I met up with some friends in Cajamarca and we walked to the plaza to get painted.  Innocently thinking that we would get some face painting, I was very surprised when the first handful of paint was chucked at me.  Within a matter of an hour, we were covered head to toe in paint.  Not wanting to feel left out, we bought our own bucket of paint and left our mark on everyone else (especially those who lacked any color).  The day was spent walking around the streets of Cajamarca, throwing water balloons, splattering paint on perfect strangers, banging on buckets, singing songs about Carnaval and dancing.  It took three days to get all the paint out of my hair and I am still finding spots of paint on my skin.  Not a bad way to ring in the season of Lent.

A little taste of Carnaval