new president and peruvian attitudes

A while back I told about the first phase of the presidential elections in Peru.  That day something interesting happened.  The three 'safe' middle-ground candidates knocked each other out of the race by dividing up the conservative voters.  So by default the two candidates to move on to the next round were Keiko and Ollanta, the very two that the majority were afraid of.  This Peruvian author who won a Nobel prize and now has an opinion on everything said that if they were the two to move on to round 2, it would be like choosing between terminal cancer and AIDS.  It's funny how helpless 'democracy' is to do something as simple as put someone in power that the majority want.

Well, Ollanta won.  I must admit I was really surprised.  So many people were against him I didn't consider the possibility.  Let me just say now I'm not going to get used to his name.  I feel like I'm saying O'Tire.

A new mystery:  There is an unaccountable Peruvian optimism.  I don't know where it comes from or why.  As I've been going in service these weeks these are some of the answers I'm receiving to questions I'm asking... and not just once either.

Me: Do you think that one day humans will be able to eliminate poverty?
Yes!  Why not?  It's what we all want.

Me: Do you think that in 10 years things will be better or worse?
Better!

Me: The candidates are making a lot of promises.  Do you think that whoever enters into office will fulfill their promises?
Yes!

So far I have 2 guesses for the optimism: 1) Life was so rough in Peru what with terrorism and all that now life seems pretty good, and with the economic boom besides, they think it's really on an upswing.  2) Since the mine came to Cajamarca and there's a bit of money to go around, they've forgotten how rough other parts of Peru still have it.   It's just surprising compared to the responses I always got in the United States... How ironic that the countries that are the envy of the developing countries have the most pessimistic people.

My eyes are getting really sleepy and brain is going into that gear of thinking weird stuff and then thinking I've figured everything out and then forgetting what I figured out.  So this would be a good time to stop.

In the meantime here is an awesome picture that I did not take of the baptismal candidates at our special assembly day saying "SI!" to the two questions.



And this is a picture of us with some of our friends from our congregation.  We love and appreciate them so much.