UnCulture Shock

I'm surprised by the presence of familiar things I didn't expect to find. Like a Payless Shoe Source in the Sagafalabella mall. And a Bata. And a food court with Pizza Hut and KFC. How KFC can make a go of it in the land of pollo a la braza is anyone's guess, but there you have it.

All of Joffre's children's programs are here - albeit dubbed in Spanish - and one can watch whatever lousy American programming one can imagine, usually in English with Spanish subtitles. Desperate Housewives, Medium, Scrubs, ER, CSI, you name it. They even have popular sitcoms on in the afternoons. It's hard to feel too culture shocked when That '70s Show is a remote-click away. Heck, they even have CNN and BBC, without even bothering with subtitles.

And, as if to make me feel especially at home, I woke up this morning with about ten itchy mosquito bites on my legs. It was worth it to have spent a few hours lounging in the shade on the lawn yesterday while Joffre played with the sprinkler. Strangely, Alec went to sleep and actually napped on a towel on the lawn for about 45 minutes, and he doesn't have any bites, so maybe I was bitten not while outside, but by a little bloodsucker who crept into the bedroom in the night.

My First Brush With Peruvian Machismo
It's unfair of me, but I sort of never thought Peruvians would have much in the way of Latin machismo. When I think Peru, I think Andean peoples first, Spanish second. Where I might have gotten the notion that the Andeans weren't macho, I can't imagine. At any rate, after the Camera Theft Incident, the company decided nobody who wasn't cleared by them should be coming onto the property. This meant putting the roof repairs on hold. Not surprisingly, the message did not make it to the repairmen, who rang the bell yesterday morning at 7:05. I told them there had been some problems and no more work was to be done here till we had moved. They left. At nine am, the architect turned up, all oily smiles and strong cologne, and condescendingly asked me what I intended to do about the roof, if his men weren't going to repair it. I repeated to him that there had been some problems on the Friday (I didn't say what), and gave him the number of the people from Aaron's company to deal with them. And he went away. However, at one pm he turned up again, this time with his oily smiles barely concealing an accusatory demeanor, and started politely demanding that I explain when exactly I thought his men had stolen my camera (the company had filled him in on the details). He tried to logic and argue his way into proving that it couldn't possibly have been one of his long-standing and trusted employees, asked how I could accuse such a trustworthy and honest company like his own, went so far as to try and blame our beloved Nina, who wasn't even here that day, and generally indicating that the implication of theft on the part of someone in his employ had deeply wounded his honour. I talked over him calmly for a minute or two, explaining that there were more than ten people in the house on Friday and none of them were being allowed back in, and that in any case this was to do with the company and not me. When it became clear that he was too busy pleading his case to listen to me (and, I'm quite sure, he felt so superior as to not need to listen to the likes of me), I excused myself and called our company contact, who assured me that she had told him to only go through the company and not deal with me anymore. I put her on the phone with him, and after a brief conversation, he hung up, told me he was sorry for our loss, shook my hand, and got into his car. The bulky individual who had been standing silently behind him the whole time also shook my hand, and they departed.

Maybe it's a cultural thing, but I just don't trust a smiley, smooth-talking guy who comes to talk to a housewife, at home by herself with two small kids, with a bodyguard/thug retainer.

I'm going to greatly enjoy prefunctorily turning away the carpet-baggers and ne'er-do-wells who will inevitably be ringing our bell at the new house.