Culture Shock in Peru

Since I left the United States, I am going through culture shock for the first time here in Perú. I knew I would like Mexico. I knew about their customs, traditions, food, language (slang), and people. Now, I’m in a new place with different things and it’s an adjustment to say the least. The only Spanish-speaking people I’ve ever been around have been Mexican. It’s a different way to interact with people.
First of all, I want to say that I like my house here a lot better than the one in Mexico. I feel more at home and not like I’m living in a hotel. I live with a woman named Austry who is in her 50s and works as a publicist in a casino. She has five brothers; three live in California, one lives with her, and the other lives in Lima. I know she doesn’t have children and I don’t think she’s ever been married.
It was my thought that in Latin American countries it was uncommon for a woman to be single her whole life. In Mexico that’s really strange. Austry’s live-in brother has been divorced 2 or 3 times. This is very uncommon.
In my Spanish conversation classes we were talking about differences from the United States and Peru. Family was a topic. A long time ago it was common that families had 6, 7, or 8 kids (just like the U.S. and farm families), but it is so expensive to privately educate children that now it’s more common to have 1 or 2. This goes for skilled, educated, upper-class families. The families who are not skilled or educated and are of a lower class do not have the luxury of privately educating their children. One month of a private school here can cost up to $400 USD per child. Point being, families are smaller. It is also common for children to live near their parents their whole lives (not next town over, but next door or same house) because one child always has to stay back and take care of the parents. I think about my parents and right now in their old ages and who’s taking care of them with me here, Paul in Carbondale, and Vincent in Grinnell. I imagine they’re getting along just fine. (I hope they’re still recycling, I was pretty persistent about that!)
The food is very different from Mexico and the U.S. The staple foods here are chicken, rice, and potatoes. I think that’s all I have had since I’ve been here. In Mexico they eat more beef than chicken. I’m pretty sure I’ve eaten chicken at every meal. The other day I had a traditional dish called Ahi de Gallina and it was potatoes with chicken and creamy gravy on top with a side of rice. That is very heavy for my stomach to digest. I told Austry that eating both potatoes and rice in the same meal was really heavy in my stomach. She told me she didn’t believe me and kept on with her business and the next day we had a different type of chicken, but it had rice and potatoes.
It’s very common for people to drink yogurt here. I haven’t found any yogurt that I can eat with a spoon. So it’s a little awkward to eat fruit and yogurt. The taste is also a bit different, but I’m adjusting. I eat it almost every day.
Milk is different from the U.S. to Latin America. It’s super pasteurized. It sits in these cartons on shelves until you buy it. It doesn’t have to be refrigerated until you open it. Milk is something that I can’t wait to drink again. I look forward to 3 p.m. on December 23 when I can sit down at my kitchen table and eat a bowl of cereal with really cold milk.
Since Jessie is allergic to gluten and can’t eat anything with wheat, oats, barley, or rye we had a difficult time explaining to our host mothers why she could eat potatoes. Here in Peru they think that potatoes are pure flour where the people in the United States don’t believe that. I haven’t really looked much into that, but it was an interesting explanation for people who are stuck in their ways.
Another strange thing I had to explain was HIV/AIDS. Here they think that HIV/AIDS is a type of cancer where as we have a different way of thinking. I think Peruvian’s thoughts about cancer extend to any type of grave illness and our version of cancer is something that’s hereditary or just a mutation in the body whereas you obtain HIV/AIDS through sexual intercourse, exchange of any bodily fluid, intravenous drug use, to name a few.
I’m really enjoying my classes. I’m taking a Spanish class and it’s from 9:30 to noon everyday. The time goes by so quickly. My other class is international negotiations. It can be a little boring because sometimes I get lost. The class is mostly in Spanish and there are so many new terms that it’s hard to keep my mind focused.
I am adjusting. When I finally get adjusted, I will probably be on my way to Argentina.