Life in Lima

Well it has certainly been a large changing living here in Lima, everything is faster, noisier, lots of traffic, contamination, filth and people are not so kindly as they were in the countryside. The days at work here require punctuality and having to work on the computer all day long. There are constant deadlines and upcoming events. But so far I think I a fairing pretty well, I found a cute apartment that is nearby a bunch of parks and on the bus lines to get to work. I have been editing and reviewing grants that will soon be funded, read through and given advice to volunteers on their work progress, done phone interviews, and a constant flow of developing materials for trainings that will be held next month. It is a lot of emails, answering questions, providing resources, getting people in touch with the right people, and making critiques. All around I feel confident in my abilities and am doing a pretty good job. Then I also have to work 2 days a week in a district that has 1 million people high rates of HIV, Tuberculosis, Anemia, teen pregnancy, domestic violence, etc. My work there I feel is more useful because if I succeed with only 1% of the population I have the opportunity to affect 10,000 people. Anyways, I work as a consultant for the in charges of all the health posts and centers on health promotion. It entails me going to meetings, evaluating their policies and promotion programs or techniques and giving suggestions on how to change their formats and trainings to be more effective. I am very hopeful with the work because I am working at an administrative and management level of the health system and whatever suggestions I have made thus far have been ready accepted and implemented. So basically up until now my whole life is work long hours, coming home fairly brain dead and exhausted but feeling still satisfied with what I am doing because I sincerely believe it is changing a much larger percentage of people's lives. The work that I do with the volunteers allows me to influence and improve the work that they are doing and that means that I have influence over up to 60 communities and in terms of the other job I am doing well that is the largest district in all of latin america so I would say things are definitely stepping up. I feel happy with the relationship so far with my boss in the office I can tell that she purposefully gives me certain responsibilities as a means to develop me further as a professional. My social life is slowly developing itself yet there is little time that I can or want to dedicate to going out I hope to find some cultural events to attend. Though on the weekends my roommate and I have made it to the beach every week as a means to sunbathe and relax and read books. And soon we will be headed to celebrate carnaval in a different department called Huancavelica. It seems so weird to me that within an hour you can be in a place of such dire poverty and an hour in the other direction you are in million dollar apartment facilities. Or in the beach towns it is a million dollar home on one side of the highway and a shanty house on the other side of the highway. It is so frustrating to see this inequality I cannot imagine how it makes those people that are living in poverty feel. Anywho, seems like it will be a year of personal and more so professional development there are many trips and vacations and concerts planned for the future. These first months I think have just been a big adapting phase. But a good news was I received a phone call from my old town and they are continuing this year the nutrition project I designed and implemented last year so there is still hope that the southern part of my old district will recover all the malnourished kids. I am so proud. Things I have to say are going really well and challenging without a doubt but so worth while. Hope all is well.