Here In Huaticocha, a small river, between two small concrete walls, runs through our backyard. The river seperates the dining area and clothes washing area from the clothes line and bano #2.
Late Thursday afternoon and all through Thursday night,monsoon like rain pounded on our small house, somewhat cleaning out whatever is in the river. Friday afternoon, a lady came and washed her clothes. When she rinsed her clothes, all of the water and soap goes down a pipe and into the river.
After washing some clothes, late Friday afternoon, I crossed the river to hang them up to dry. Everyone on our team does their best to not fall into the river. Guess what I did? How it happened, I don't have a clue. One minute I'm walking back from the clothes line, watching where I step, and the next minute, I'm on the ground, scraped up, with my foot in the river!
The front view
After sitting up, I pulled my foot out of the river and was disgusted at what I saw. My foot was covered in this nasty, brown stuff. Can you guess what is was? If you guessed poop, you're correct. Bano #2 is where you go #2 and that also flushes into the river. Once I cleaned my foot off, I hobbled upstairs, to get some bandaids and something to clean my cuts. I found my teamate, Sam, and she and I went to the bench at the front of the store to clean them up.
When we got to the front of the store, we saw the Jungle Boys playing and Ivan watching something on the tv. When he saw my cuts, he went and got the two things he uses for all cuts. The first is a lime. I knew what he was going to do with the lime and I started to protest. I have no tolerence for pain. He cut the lime in half and began to squeeze the juice onto my cuts. I screamed in pain. Sam also screamed in pain, but only because I was sqeezing her hand! All the Jungle boys, Sam, Glenn and Jaime, started laughing hysterically because of the facial expressions I was making.
The side view
The second thing he brought out was what they call, Monkey Blood. It's this dark brown stuff that helps the cut form a scab. As he poured it on my leg, it looked like I had just come home from war. And so, I owe all of my cuts and the minor swelling near my knee, to the small river that runs through our backyard!
