Firsts

On this first day of the first month of a new year, it seems appropriate to take a moment to reflect on all of the firsts I've experienced since coming to Peru.

Since September 12, 2008:

I've had my first bite of goat, beef heart, cow stomach, black sea scallop, granadilla, maracuya, aji, rocoto, Sublime, and ceviche.

I rode in my first combi, mototaxi, bus-cama, and car trunk (sans seats).

I had my first experience in black market clothing design.

I heard my first Grupo 5 song (and have heard at least five a day since then).

I was "semi-violently robbed" for the first time.

I accepted my first "paying" job for the US government.

I took my first sip of SODIS water.

I went skinny-dipping for the first time.

I went to my first Latin American baptism, Peruvian birthday party, Chosica anniversary, Andean horse race, and Tumbes fair.

I spent my first Christmas away from home.

In order to continue this tradition of stretching my boundaries and trying new things, I brought in the New Year with two more firsts: My first New Year's in Peru, and also my first quinceñeras.

I'll start with the New Year. As much as I felt I'd rather spend Christmas in the US than here, the opposite is true of New Year's Eve. Here is a recipe for a New Year's Party in Tumbes, Peru:

Ingredients:

Yellow underwear

Yellow balloons and streamers

Beer

The biggest loudspeakers you can find

More beer

Cumbia music

A life size paper-mache doll stuffed with newspaper and fireworks.

More fireworks.

Directions:

1. Set temperature to around 95 degrees.
2. Don yellow underwear. It will bring you luck in the New Year, and if you end up passed out in the street drunk passerbys might have a chance to, umm, check.
3. Hang yellow balloons and streamers everywhere; all around where you'll have the party, all across the streets, off light posts. Turn the town into a sea of yellow.
4. Set up speakers, and at dusk, start blasting cumbia at maximum volume. No worries if you only have a few songs; it is perfectly acceptable to blast the same five songs for at least 12 hours straight. Make sure your sound system can school your neighbor's.
5. Start drinking.
6. When you get bored of drinking, set off fireworks.
7. Drink more.
8. Give the fireworks to kids.
9. Drink more.
10. At exactly midnight, set the doll on fire in the street.
11. Run away.
12. Dodge fireworks shooting at random from the burning doll.
13. Hug and kiss everyone you see and wish them a "Feliz Año."
14. Go back to drinking.

Note: The burning doll is not an effigy, despite its appearance, but is rather a symbolic burning of the old year.