Visit to Urpichallay and new-found appreciation of the “Peruvian Papa”

Feliz Dia de la Madre!  It’s Sunday and I just returned from a few days in Huaraz to visit the girls volunteering at Urpichallay (www.urpichallay.org) and it was a wonderful and enriching experience.

Toni and I arrived to Huaraz early on Thursday (Toni finally made it to her project site!) and we jumped right into joining the group and participating in the projects.

While the girls spent time at one of the local schools, I was able to have a new-found appreciation for the Peruvian potatoe.  A member of Urpichallay, Maritza, took me to see the local “cosecha de papa” (potatoe harvest) up in the mountains.  After a 40 min ride up the mountain and a 2-3 hour hike through mountain trails, we finally arrived to Que Que Pampa and the family of which we were going to be documenting and helping.  They were just finishing half of their days work so they invited us to a lunch of potatoe, aji (a spicey peruvian style salsa made from the aji pepper), and an orange refreshment.

After a short break everyone went back to work harvesting and I even got my hands dirty partaking in the day’s work.

After about 3-4 hours of grueling work, it was time for us to leave.  With a giant smile on her face, Reina graciously gave us a gift of potatoes from the harvest, as is the tradition when you help with the harvest for us to take back to our homes.  Urpichallay documented the 23 different varieties that had been harvested of “papa nativa” that day at the field.

It was definitely a wonderful learning experience.  I am always learning something new and experiencing a whole new aspect every time I visit one of these organizations of the social entrepreneurs.  That’s one thing that amazes me always; no matter how much I think I know, I always learn of a new aspect or project they are involved in.  It’s difficult to describe these projects and organizations 1-dimensionally in black and white since, in fact, they function on a complex, multi-dimensional level with components and projects that complement each other and the social benefit they are producing.

The next few days were definitely also exciting and eventful, but I’ll let the girls tell you about it…

Next stop is visiting the group in Ica with Tierra de Ninos!