Posted by 013105
Though I could have slept for miles, I forced myself out of bed at 9am to give me a little extra time to Custom-ise my baggage and make myself all tickety-boo for my flight home, which had two connections through the US. I won’t say I used a fine-toothed comb but I did the best I could under the circumstances. I gave away what remained of my hiking llipta and my paper sack of coca leaves and, well, I burned the rest. Two of them actually, with coffee.
After a shower found my new Alaskan friends and said goodbye, paid my bill for the previous night of partying (at ninety-five soles – around $35CDN – it was by far the most expensive night of the trip), and bid farewell to my favourite little oasis town of Huacachina by way of a three-sole three-wheeled taxi to Ica.
I bought a cheap bag of Ritz crackers con queso at a supermarket stand and sat on a bench at the bus depot, munching on my budget breakfast and taking stock of my situation. I had a Canadian ten dollar bill (which was useless here, as none of the banks or exchange places dealt with Canadian currency), I had $10US, and I had 12.8 soles. I already had a bus ticket to Lima but I still had to eat – the crackers were almost gone already – I’d need water, and I had to make my way to the airport ahead of my 1am flight.
When I boarded the bus to Lima there were only two other tourists on board and whattya know, they were sitting in my spot. They were a French couple and the girl and I had been assigned to the very same seat. While this might have proved bothersome it turned out being quite fortuitous. Her boyfriend was fluent in Spanish and he got things straightened out with the driver, who seated me in the row behind them. When a gentleman later pointed out that I was in his seat the boyfriend did some translating and got that straightened too, and when I got up to move the man insisted I stay and sit next to him. Soon he and the French guy were lost in a lively conversation, snippets of which were translated into French and sometimes into English too, though infrequency.
Spending two weeks in Peru had brushed up the Spanish I’d gleaned in the introductory course I’d taken back in my university days, and though my comprehension was getting pretty good it still took a lot of effort to follow a conversation. Before too long I lulled out of trying to follow along and concentrated instead on my financial dilemma.
I didn’t have enough money to take a taxi to the airport, and I sure didn’t know how to get there by bus. Lima was a big, traffic-y city, and I didn’t even know where in the vast metropolis the airport even was, let alone how to get there. Eventually the old man, who reminded me very much of my late grandfather, let the conversation lag and settled back into his seat. He offered me an apple and I stumbled through the little conversational Spanish I could muster. I attempted to ask him if he could tell me how to get to the airport by bus and how much it would cost. He said it would be just one-and-a-half soles – which was great – but I couldn’t understand enough to confidently get to the airport, that was for certain.
Spanish grandpa leaned forward to speak with the French guy again and it was only then that he discovered that the three of us weren’t travelling together. He must have thought I was quite rude! He assumed that I was French also, and there I had been staring out the window, not reacting at all when their earlier conversation was being translated back and forth in French.
Through interpretation I was able to tell him that I couldn’t afford a taxi to the airport and that I needed to figure out how to get there by bus. He laughed, explaining that years before he had experienced the same difficulty at the end of a trip to Barcelona. Turns out his house was near the airport. He said that we could go to his place where we could have a coffee and he could drop off his bags, and afterwards he would take me to the airport himself. And that’s just what we did.
And so instead of being rife with worry, the remainder of the bus ride to Lima was quite enjoyable. As we pulled into the city my newly relaxed state made it was easy to convince myself that I could have found my way to the airport on my own after all, but even still I was relieved that I didn’t have to be the worried tourist who asks a million times, “¿El aeropuerto, si?” and was constantly looking around half-panicked.
When we arrived at Victor’s modest home he proudly showed me around, pointing out each piece of furniture and (I believe) explaining where he got it and explaining in detail the occupants of the family portraits that hung alongside several gaudy pictures of the Virgin Mary. At 70, Victor is an avid gardener, and he seemed proudest when we toured the impressive garden in his tiny concrete-fenced backyard. Then we sat at his kitchen table and had coffee and smoked cigarettes as we worked our way through enormous pieces of the dry, dense cake Victor had just bought in Nazca.
After an a couple of hours of slight but enlightening communication we were ready to head to the bus stop. Along the way we zig-zagged through Victor’s neighbourhood, the highlight of which was a brand new park. It was little more than clump of grass surrounding a rather garish fountain, but Victor seemed very excited about the fountain. He slowly walked me around it, pointing out every single feature, ornament, and pained motif that decorated it. Curiously, the fountain’s centrepiece was a ballerina who had her knickers blatantly showing, and despite our basic linguistic common ground when Victor concluded his detailed description of the references and meanings held within his proud little fountain I remained utterly clueless about pretty much all of it, especially that ballerina.
Next we walked through the market, where every vendor was Victor’s friend. After introducing me to every shopkeep in the neighbourhood we eventually made it to the bus stop, and rather than merely putting me on the bus and pointing me in the right direction Victor escorted me all the way to the airport, right up to the “passengers only” gate, where he hugged me like he was seeing off an old friend, or perhaps a grandson.
I can’t tell you what a great surprise it was to have had a genuine interaction with a real Peruvian just as I was departing the country, and a great interaction it was, too. One of the disadvantages to spending such a short time in a country is you tend to pack in the activities and don’t necessarily end up spending a lot of time with the people that make the country what it is. Thanks, Victor.
Good thing I drank all my taxi money away. Lesson learned.
And so it was that with a mere five hours of sleep under my belt since I’d woken in a soggy tent near the end of a punishing four-day mountain trek I plunked my happy butt in that airplane seat and drank my way to Houston – where an extremely surly security official got a stern talking to from his supervisor after he tried to tell me that my walking stick/cane/trusted friend was actually a weapon (“I BEG your pardon!?!?”) – and then on to Newark (“Is it too early to order a rye and coke?” No sir, right away sir…). By the time I boarded my final connection to Ottawa the llipta had finally worked its way through my body so I gave up on the drinking and instead slept like the snoring dead.
All in all Peru made for a fantastic destination for a short-ish, low-budget/high-fun vacation, and I would recommend it to anybody. Astoundingly, I spent just $600US over the eighteen days (not counting airfare), which is pretty astounding when you consider that includes flying over the Nazca lines in a private plane over the Nazca lines and the fee for doing the Inca Trail. I hit every highlight I wanted to see while constantly riding the line between partying like a drunken sailor and slum-touring. I spent a lot of time and effort finding the cheapest rooms possible, always rode the economy bus, usually ordered the cheapest thing on the menu, and spent basically nothing on souvenirs, but I took every tour I wanted to take (plus a few I wasn’t expecting), I saw the inside of a lot of bars, and I even splurged for a few yummy meals here and there.
Overall, I think I saw the hell out of Peru, and I really dug it. I think you would probably have a good time too.
Todd Man Out 