The death of a duck

After a meeting at the local Health Center this morning, I decided to go visit the man who is my ¨Community Contact Experience.¨ The CCE is basically a project where I am supposed to befriend someone in the community and talk about the environment. So I chose this man who lives across the train tracks from me. I`ll call him Petey, which is a close English translation of his actual nickname. My host mom introduced us because I was initially looking for someone with a garden. She thought he had one, but it turns out that his garden consists of one coffee tree, one palm tree, one avocado tree, one mango tree, and one of other things. Beyond this ¨singular¨ garden live ducks, chicks, hens and fighting roosters he raises for sale. Retired from working the mines of Ica, Petey is short and very animated. When he tells stories, which he loves to do, he extends his short arms above his head as if he were making snow angels from his chair, and his potbelly juts out into his dirty t-shirt. I don`t think his legs reach the floor. His wife is taller and with a plump freckled face, plump arms and short, curly hair. They are extremely welcoming and friendly people.

After Petey`s wife sat me down this morning in the kitchen, she immediately insisted that I eat the fish sitting on the table. I told her I had just eaten breakfast, which was true. But she insisted, so I obliged, which is the polite thing to do. As I ate my cold fish and ignored the flies on Petey`s face and the thoughts of how those same flies were probably sucking at my fish earlier on, Petey told me all about Ica and how beautiful it is. He proceeded to tell me about his grandson who lives in the most beautiful house in Ica on the third floor. He said that there were two pumas who used to live on the second story. I think I missed an important part of this story but as I understand it, it was a zoo complete with these pumas, bears, jaguars, parrots, snakes and other wild creatures. Maybe he was talking about a zoo in Ica. But that`s what I understood. Then he told me about how someone is a doctor and that the doctor went to the library in Ica, which is even better than the National Library of Lima, and because he didn`t want to spend any money to borrow the books, read every single one of the books about medicine in 24 hours. After these stories, he showed me a Peruvian gourmet cookbook with recipes that use Pisco. Pisco is a grape-based ¨wine¨ that is recognized as a wonderful alcoholic beverage internationally. Peruvians are very proud of their pisco. He asked if I`d tried it, and I said I just tasted it a little. He disappeared and reappeared with a bottle of fancy-looking pisco that came in a wooden case, and a shot glass. Feeling bad that I`m drinking their expensive-looking pisco when they are not the most well-off folks, I took a sip and realized that it`s more like vodka. As Petey continued chatting about some amazing fact from that crazy cache of a brain of his, I thought that maybe the burning feeling in my throat and stomach would burn away all the bad germs that I probably ingested through the cold fish. Trying to maintain my poise and not make a face at the fire-like pisco, I told Petey and his wife that yesterday I tried some manjar blanco (which is similar to smooth caramel) that used pisco in it. ¨You like manjar blanco?¨ ¨Sí, it`s very rich and I like it a LOT.¨ Without a word, Petey disappeared again and reappeared with two chocolate candies with pecans and manjar blanco inside wrapped in festive paper. As I ate one of these yummy things, Petey again disappeared and reappeared this time with two little tubs of manjar blanco and two spoons. One was strawberry-flavored and the other used chirimoya, another fruit. I happily tasted each, realizing it makes a wonderful pisco chaser, and watched him diasappear and reappear with an even bigger tub of manjar blanco. They were from Cajamarca, a department in the Northern Sierra known for manjar blaco, apparently. For some reason, that prompted him to tell me that now he was going to show me how to kill a duck. After verifying that I didn`t misinterpret what I just heard, I followed Petey through his little garden and helped him bag two big ducks. I carried one in a rice bag. The duck was merciful and didn`t flap around, except once. Inside the kitchen, Petey ordered me to sit in this chair. He ran around his house looking for the death tools. I watched two little kittens stare at the rice bags. I looked at the cutting board and knife on the table next to me. I hoped my pisco wouldn`t reappear like Petey. I thought about how Peace Corps told me to embrace stepping out of my comfort zone and other crap. Finally, Petey reappeared a final time. He unbagged my duck and plopped it on the kitchen table, not next to me. The duck made little gasping noises. I thought ducks quack. His wife came and blocked my view of the neck. I decided I didn`t need to readjust my view. She held the duck down. With slow, patient movements back and forth, Petey slit its neck over the kitchen sink. The duck shuddered as it fought, died and relaxed into a final resting state. Petey`s wife left. I watched Petey drain the blood out of the headless duck`s neck. It`s big duck head laid on the table next to it. And that was my morning.