Improved Gossip

I went to talk to a friend about these rapes since I am still freaked out. She a lawyer and works in the municipality to offer free legal services to women and children, working mostly on domestic violence and child support. She told me that there have been two rapes locally in the last month, but only one by a mototaxi driver. That case did happen more or less as I was told that it happened. The legal stuff went somewhat better than I previously thought, she pressed charges and he was convicted and sent to jail. He was incarcerated for just a few weeks and is now back home driving his moto. The second rape was of a woman in her home by her drunken former partner. She didn't press charges.

In other lighter news, this week I’m off to Cañete, a town in the southern coast that was devastated by the earthquake. We’re working with CARE Peru on a project to construct latrines and promote hand washing.

The other novelty of late is rain. It is rainy season. It theoretically rains from late December until early April here, but last year in “rainy season” it rained 3 times for about 10 minutes each time. This year it has rained maybe 8 or 10 times and a couple of nights it was all night long. This is causing calamity. Rio Piura, usually a sad trickle looks like the Mississippi. The bridge over Rio Piura, the bridge that I cross to get into the city is shaking laterally and is about ready to crumble and there is a crowd of people gathered at each bank to watch the show. Hopefully that will stop soon while the bridge is still standing and I can still get to the city.

And finally, it was Rinconada's 43rd Anniversary on Tuesday. The fun part of the 43rd Anniversary Celebration was after the very long ceremony in which the recently, apparently incorrectly elected Señorita Rinconada Llicuar fainted due to heat stroke everyone in town hung out in the plaza, danced cumbia and drank chicha. In an unfortunate last minute turn of events I helped to judge the beauty pageant in which Srta. Rinconada was elected. The 3rd judge on the panel didn’t show up and when Martin asked I just couldn’t say no. I of course didn’t know which girl was “supposed” to win and really, how do you judge a beauty pageant anyway? Now there’s this group of snot-nosed twenty-somethings who are not speaking to me because the judges (i.e. I) picked the wrong girl. Oh how I hate beauty pageants. They’re really not good for us ladies. I mean I can’t lie. I wish that I didn’t like watching them, but I do. It’s the clothes or something? In this pageant 45 of the 50 possible points came from 3 categories: dress, spontaneity and grace, and general beauty. The other five possible points came from verbal answers to two questions about local culture and politics… Ug.