I went to Peru over Thanksgiving break from Nov. 21-29. The country is beautiful, with mountains that make the Sandias look like speed bumps. The problem is, Peru suffers from some of the worst poverty in South America. Below are a few descriptions of some of the scenes and characters I encountered while in the country. Check out DailyLobo.com for my full travel excerpts.
Nov. 22: Baby alpaca. Every hat, every scarf, every ski mask is made of baby alpaca. Even the things clearly made out of cotton are made out of baby alpaca. Street vendors swarm the Plaza de Armas in Cusco, telling tourists “¡Mira! Amigo is baby alpaca!”
I’ve come to Peru to visit my mother, who just finished a stint as a volunteer in Cusco. She’s a registered nurse and came to Peru to work in health education, teaching the basics of medical care to people from small villages. She’s volunteering through a church, and the working conditions for volunteers are horrific.
Nov. 22: Two old soldiers in the Lima airport, one Peruvian and one an American Vietnam vet, insist that I must try Ayahuasca. Ayahuasca is a very powerful hallucinogen, which is legal in Peru, renowned for giving users the feeling that they have spoken to God. “It’s not recreational,” the soldiers tell me. The Peruvian recounts a long story about his experience, wherein he met the “serpent mother,” a giant anaconda, who points out a woman in the jungle that the soldier will marry. “I have been married to her for 15 years now,” he said. I tell the soldiers I’m probably not going to take the drug. Before he leaves, the American turns to me and said “Well, anyway, you should try San Pedro then. Now that’s recreational.”
Nov. 22: My mom warns me that the Cusco cab drivers will actively try to run you over, and a few times, I experience this phenomenon first hand. There are almost no designated street crossings in the city, so getting to the other side involves waiting for a break in traffic and then running like hell. Stray dogs roam the city, and a cab driver tells us that they are very careful for the dogs, because it’s bad luck to run one over. My aunt Jayne, also along for the ride, remarks that it’s strange: “The cab drivers avoid the dogs, but they’ll run the people down in the street.”
Nov. 23: My mom tells me about a study conducted by the organization she was working with, regarding the rate of domestic violence in Peru. They interviewed more than 200 women, and their results were grim: roughly 70 percent of women interviewed have suffered abuse. There’s a saying the men in Peru use: “If I don’t beat you, it means I don’t love you.”
Nov. 23: Sorojchi, an over-the-counter medication for altitude sickness, is prominently advertised all over Peru. My mom tells me it consists mostly of caffeine and aspirin. Apparently, it works on the principle that altitude sickness usually goes away after a couple days.
Nov. 23: My mom and my aunt refuse to believe that this is a true story: a week before I arrive in Peru, reports surface of fat thieves. There’s a gang in Peru that’s been murdering people and taking their fat. At least two men are arrested, found with jars of human fat. Apparently, they’ve been selling the fat to European companies, where it’s processed into high-end soap. The men claim they can sell each jar for $60,000 in U.S. money.
Good thing I’m skinny.
Nov. 24: 4:30 a.m., I get up, catch a train and ride to Machu Picchu. By the time we get there, every bone in my body hurts. At first, I think it’s from simple exhaustion, but it gets worse. Headache, fatigue, nausea, dizziness: classic symptoms of altitude sickness. So I spend most of my time at Machu Picchu sleeping in a dark corner of the ruins.
Nov. 25: Besides a national bus line, Peru has local buses running between cities. A local bus is basically an old vehicle, usually a van of some kind, that someone bought and charges a few soles (about three soles to the dollar) for a ride. We take one from Urubamba to Cusco that apparently used to be a school bus. A kid who can’t be older than 13 helps people with their luggage. When the bus stops, he jumps off, grabs someone’s luggage and throws it in the baggage compartment under the bus. As soon as the baggage is in, the bus starts to move again, and the kid has to run after it and jump on the moving bus. How many kids in Peru do this work? How often do they fall off and get crushed under the wheels?
Nov. 25: Machu Picchu, although the largest, is hardly the only example of Incan ruins in Peru. In fact, they’re everywhere. Every town we visit seems to have ruins within a half-hour drive. These are on a hill known as Cerro Bandolista on the edge of the town of Ollantaytambo. The ruins were used as a defensive position by the Incas during a Spanish assault.
Nov. 26: “Trip your nuts off in the Amazon!” A white guy on the street is handing out fliers for some sort of drug-tourism adventure excursion. My mom stops to talk to him for a minute, and he asks her “Where are you from?” “New Mexico.” “Really?” he said, “Me too!” “Oh, what part of New Mexico are you from?” “Taos!” Oh. Of course.
Nov. 26: Someone taught the kids in Cusco a simple phrase in English. The kids come up to tourists, selling random trinkets, and when they learn you’re American, they demonstrate their proficiency in the English language with “America! Capitol, Washington! President, Obama! Washington good! Obama good! George Bush bad!”
Nov. 26: I buy a hat from a little girl selling things on the street in Cusco, and even though I just bought something from her, she continues trying to sell me stuff. I tell her in Spanish “Ay, little girl, you have a lot of ambition.” She said, no, no, not me — there’s another little girl who really has to sell, because her mother and father are dead.
Nov. 26: A popular shirt sold in Peru proclaims “La hoja de coca no es droga,” or “The coca leaf is not a drug.” This is more or less true. Coca leaf is legal and sold widely in Peru, and Maté de Coca, coca tea, is offered free at several of the hotels we stayed at. I find it to be less psychoactive than a cup of coffee.
Nov. 26: The Peruvian natives, the Quechua, live for the most part in poverty, leading to some strange career choices. There are natives that wander the streets of Cusco with llamas in tow, soliciting soles from tourists in exchange for a photo of the llama.
Nov. 27: In Lima, I see the most disturbing depiction of Jesus I’ve ever encountered. He’s covered in blood, gaping holes in his hands, feet and side. I take one look and turn away in disgust. Two little girls, maybe 6 or 7 years old, enter the church and kneel before the bloody, disgusting savior to pray. When they leave, I light a candle and whisper “Please, Lord, find these girls a better God to worship.”
Nov. 28: I overhear an Australian guy in my hostel say “No country in the world has a navy strong enough to launch a serious attack on Australia.” I jump in with, “We could always just nuke you, though. Go America!” He looked at me for a second and said, “How are you going to enter a conversation like that?”
Correction: Contrary to how it was presented in the print edition, this piece is a column.
