Christmas in Peru - Chiclayo with Juan's Family -

The morning after our midnight arrival from the missionary zone activity in Barranca, we left Huaraz at 8:30 on the one hour flight to Lima. In Peru, all roads, and flights, lead to Lima. There are virtually no direct flights between major cities, all pass through Lima. Juan, our trainer and coworker in the archives, had invited us to spend Christmas with his family in Chiclayo which is on the coast. We spent the day in the Lima airport until our 7:00 flight to Chiclayo, which took an hour and 20 minutes.

Killing time at the Lima airport. 4d was the name of the restaurant.  We used the time to finish and send our Christmas letter.

Juan met us at the airport and took us to our hotel, a nice 4 star Ramada. I (Elder O) got up early Christmas eve morning and walked down to the main plaza.  I (Sis. O) slept in an extra hour. Sounds perfectly normal, right?

The cathedral on the main plaza was quite different in style.

 

The main plaza was more of a park and this nativity was featured--one of the nicer ones we've seen.

The huge Christmas tree was impressive.

Chiclayo is the 4th largest city in Peru with a population of 780,000. It dates from pre-colonial times and is located about 6 miles inland from the ocean. This beautiful building on the plaza houses city government offices.

Juan took us to his home, a modest two story in a growing residential area. He and Jasmin have four children. They immediately got us into the holiday spirit with some reindeer horns and a Rudolf nose. Pictured are Israel (11), Amiraly (8), and Fernanda (5).

Fernanda and Lidia (11 months).

Fernanda liked her picture taken.

About 1:00 we sat down to what we thought would be lunch but it was a large bowl of tasty wheat and chicken soup made by Jasmin. It turned out to be just an appetizer, as we left shortly thereafter and went to a seafood restaurant for lunch.

This was a full course meal. Tony had cebiche, the raw fish marinated with lemon and other spices. What he thought was a thin slice of tomato turned out to be a very hot pepper, which he didn't realize until he had the whole piece in his mouth. Needless to say, it took most of his lemonade to put out the fire!

We returned to the house and visited with Juan's family. In the early evening, the missionaries and some members came by and sang Christmas carols.

A 6'5" U.S. Elder and his short Hispanic companion. In the house, they asked us and the U.S. Elder to sing Jingle Bells in English, which we did.

The sister missionaries.  They all came in to visit and Jasmin served everyone a slice of panetón (see picture below).

About 10:00 p.m. we gathered with the family and enjoyed a dinner of turkey, stuffing (that Marilyn had made), empanadas, a canned peach, panetón and some almonds. Jasmin prepared the turkey by covering it with some red spices and butter and then cut a pineapple and put slices around the pan and added orange juice. They had made an appointment with the local bakery to cook it, but it took about an hour longer than planned. It was very good and moist.

Juan had eaten the stuffing at the Thanksgiving dinner and wanted me to show Jasmin how to make that and a chocolate cake.  However, since there was only one baking dish, I didn't really bake the stuffing long enough and it wasn't as good as before.  The cake turned out OK but we didn't eat any.  They shared it with their other relatives.  

It was actually the first time Jasmin had used her oven.  She had been using it for storage--a common practice here.  Delicious home made hot chocolate was the drink. This was our fourth meal that day and we were stuffed! The children finished their meal quickly and opened their presents--they just couldn't wait any longer--while we finished dinner.  Each child received two presents. We brought them two small boxes of Legos from Lima and they quickly built a fire station and ambulance. We also brought a coloring book, colored pencils, a story book and a chess set.

Panetón with hot chocolate is the traditional midnight dessert on Christmas Eve. It is similar to our fruit cake but much lighter.

We got to bed about midnight back at the hotel. Christmas Day we went to the beach with Juan and his family, another tradition of many families who live on the coast. More on this in the next blog.