Welcome!

Hello and welcome to my blog!
What began as a way to keep friends and family up to date as I served with JVC for two years in Peru has transformed into a tool with which I can process my experience of being a foreigner living abroad. It is an opportunity to honor the small differences in daily life and create a space for me to explore my discomfort with the bigger challenges I discover when culture clashes come knocking.

Many of the experiences I write about might seem trivial to the average local. Why write about bus fairs and the local market? I'm sure you would never have found me writing about the strangeness of combination gas station-restaurants in the rural US. or our habit of only singing the national anthem at sporting events. But here I am, an American citizen abroad, taking delight in the differences I find before me. 

This blog is my perspective and my own personal experience. It is not a representation nor a summary of Peruvian culture. Peru is home to over 3,000 species of potato (as any taxi driver worth his salt will inform you when you first arrive). It is a country with three distinct regions selva, sierra and costa. The diversity of people, wildlife and landscapes is breathtaking. My journey has taken place in one small town in the south of Peru, a drop in the ocean of possible experiences. I hope that everything you read here is taken with a grain of salt. It's one gal's personal perspective and her quirky observations all wrapped up in one; a window into my life and into the día a día of a gringa trying to learn the ropes of surviving and thriving abroad.

Here you'll find posts reflecting on my experience of living abroad, some poetry (I make no promises about my writing skills), and other tidbits about the Jesuit experience that shape and change my world and might even transform yours.

 Hope you enjoy!

 Paz,
Camila xoxox

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