breath taking
gosh, words cant do this past week justice, but i feel like i need to write about it anyway because wow...
okay, it just took me over an hour to write this entry and its really more for me than anyone else, but feel free to skim through it, you'll get really bored if you try to endure the whole thing.
left sunday morning for peru, watched a really stupid movie on the plane "13 going on 30" --don't ever watch it. we sat by some really funny british guys though, they had something to say about everything, they were much more entertaining than the movie. when we got to Lima we were escorted by armed guards to a restaurant next to ancient Aztec territory. then we headed back to the airport, took a flight to Arequipa (smaller town in peru). this is where one of my dad's mine's is, so we know people that live there, and we hung out with the Davenports for the week. Katie's 18 and Alex is 16, i knew them a really long time ago, like when i was 7. Katie took the whole week away from school to hang out with us and alex only hung out with us mon and tues and then didnt go to Cusco with us.
monday morning katie and i had to tag along with our moms to do the shopping thing. both of us despise shopping so half the time we'd just sit in a cafe and talk while they did their stuff. we learned really quickly that each little shop sells just about the EXACT same thing. i fed pigeons out of my hand in plaza de armas! we ate lunch at this little restaurant that katie claimed had the best chicken sandwiches ever, they were pretty good. after lunch we went on a tour of the local convent. it was so incredible. its still a convent today, they've just expanded it from what it was in the 1800s, so the girls that live there now arent allowed into the tourist parts until after it closes like around 6, so we didnt get to see any nuns or novices while we were in the actual convent. i videotaped a lot of the convent though because the architecture and the history and the stories are really cool. anyway, it was really peaceful, i loved it.
then we went back to our friends house and sat around at their awesome outdoor bar just talking and stuff. katie, alex, and i decided that we were going to go drive go-karts to get away from the rents. we went to the first place and it was closed, went to the second place and it was closed too, so we gave up that idea and went to a bar and played drinking games and drank their local beer "arequipeña". then we had to head over to a restaurant to have dinner with my mom and their parents. i ate OSTRICH, well we all did, but it was a first for me. it was really cool, they bring it out on this really hot black brick and you cook it yourself, it was actually really really good. after dinner katie and alex took me to meet some of their local peruvian friends. they introduced me to the most disgusting alcohol ever, its called Triple X and its like a soda with alcohol, i hated it...needless to say i didnt drink it. so yeah, hungout with them for a little bit then went back to katie's house to watch a night at the roxbury and fell asleep over there.
tuesday morning we had breakfast at this place that has like a zoo in the back and we got to play with all these fun animals: giant turtles, alpacas, llamas, vecuñas, ostrich, horses, and sheep. then katie and i went to see "Juanita" while the moms went shopping again. Juanita is this mummy they found a few years ago on the top of "Misty" which is the largest volcano in Arequipa (they have like 5 in total). quick story behind the mummy, the Incas used to believe that the volcanoes (and mountains) were gods and that when they angered the gods (when the volcanoes erupted) they needed to make sacrifices to the gods so they'd sacrifice young women. it was really awesome though because the mummy was found in perfect condition, along with 4 others who werent as preserved as she was. but she still has her skin and her hair and her teeth and her eyelashes and everything, it was pretty cool.
then we quickly got to the airport and headed to Cusco, Peru. that afternoon we had to go shopping...again. we had dinner at such a goofy restaurant. there was live "entertainment" people were dancing and playing flutes and stuff, it was weird.
wednesday morning we had to wake up at 4:45 and be at the train station an hour later to ride it for 3 and a half hours up to Aguas Calientes, a little town at the bottom of the mountain where MachuPicchu is. from there we had to get on this tour type bus and ride it for about half an hour up the windy road to the actual MachuPicchu. This place was absolutely incredible...its so amazing that an entire civilization was created and destroyed up there and the intriquete-ness of it all is just unbelievable for having been created 500 years ago. i saw a couple of kids from school there, small world. i played with the llamas too. i got a lot of pictures and video from there, its a really awesome place. while there, everybody got eaten alive by bugs. i didnt think i was doing too bad and then i got in the bus to go back down and i looked at my legs and they were covered with at least 100 bites, not exaggerating. they didnt itch at first, but the next morning it was terrible...to a point of bleeding and burning and blah, it was bad. they're still bad, i have to go to the doctor, just to make sure i dont have some deadly disease or something.
katie and i played with some little kids back down in Aguas Calientes, they were playing hide and go seek so we'd cheat for both sides heh. the standard of living in all of peru is so terrible. it was awful, its really hard to picture unless you've seen something like it before. every house is made of clay, some have straw roofs, some have tile roofs. they all wear clothing that they make themselves or within their families. they dont bathe more than once every other week. they have huge calusses on their fingers from weaving and on their feet from rarely wearing shoes. they have scabs on their cheeks from the constant sunburn. the whole family knows how to sell everything they make and they don't like to give up on tourists, they bug you and bug you and bug you. one of the days katie and i were sitting on the steps of a giant Spanish church (all of the churches are absolutely beautiful) and a mom came up with her child and her child sat behind a post and played hide-and-go-seek with us and we didnt realize that the child was preparing to beg for money. we were told that the parents get their children to do this, make the tourists play with them and then feel bad and give them money when they beg for it. its so sad. everywhere you go, constant begging for money.
back on track...the train ride to and from MachuPicchu was awesome. we went from being in the absolute most desolate desert setting you could imagine into a tropical jungle (near the amazon river) such different scenery, it was beautiful.
when we got back that night we went out to dinner at a really nice restaurant, and then decided to check out the Cusco nightlife. we said goodbye to our moms and they decided to go to their own bars and somehow (after we went to a few to check them out) we ended up at the same bar. by this time our moms were already a little tipsy and came in, bought us drinks and got drunk with us. it was soooo weird, but really fun. yeah i think thats the first time my mom's seen me drunk, perhaps a once-in-a-lifetime thing. we stayed out with our moms until 4 a.m. is that not weird? i had an entire conversation for like 30 minutes ALL in spanish, it was awesome!
yesterday morning we went to all of these tourist type things. only got a few hours of sleep and then we had to ride in this awful van on these curvy roads (my excuse for throwing up a few times that morning) we went to this weaving place, and its like a family and they have their weaving business set up in their backyard, and you just go in and watch them make everything and they will talk to you (those that speak spanish...some speak the native Incan language) we watched them make the dyes for the thread and spin the thread and all the steps of weaving, it was actually really cool.
then we went to this awesome restaurant on the river. and then headed to the "P'saq market" on the way there the FUCKING DRIVER RAN OVER A DOG. i heard the scream though and i honestly thought it was a child, so i turned around to look and i saw the poor dog twitching on the road, it was terrible. it really got to me too, im not exactly sure why, i know it was a stray dog, but it really shook me up. Katie and i of course got sick of shopping at this market place so we went and sat in the van and watched Spiderman 2 on her dvd player. i told myself i'd never watch that movie (dont understand what the big deal is about it) but it was all she had brought that day, so yeah we just watched it and it was pretty bad i thought, but it gave us something to do. on the way back from there we stopped at another weaving place and i got to pet the animals and feed a vecuña from my hands. then we watched some more weaving, but in a different type of setting. we drove past a bunch of ruins and took a few pictures of "Saqsayhuaman" (pronounced Saxy Woman) went out to dinner again and then went to one bar, had a drink, then the parents left and katie and i stayed out a little bit longer, made some friends and then went back to the hotel. woke up early this morning and had a long trip back home. i FINALLY got to see Eternal Sunshing of the Spotless Mind on the plane. the movie was awesome, i highly recommend it, its got a great plot and the direction was done really well and the acting was quite impressive, good stuff.
the week was awesome, katie and i got really close so that was cool, and the culture was absolutely breath taking. after going to peru, i wouldnt say that i like chile anymore but i really really appreciate what i have even here. its a completely different lifestyle, and how blessed i am to get to experience both. im really glad that we didnt move to peru though, as much fun as it was, i dont think i'd enjoy having armed guards at my doors 24 hours a day, and having to be taken around with an armed driver all the time and all of that stuff, thats not freedom enough for me. it was amazing though...all of it.
okay, it just took me over an hour to write this entry and its really more for me than anyone else, but feel free to skim through it, you'll get really bored if you try to endure the whole thing.
left sunday morning for peru, watched a really stupid movie on the plane "13 going on 30" --don't ever watch it. we sat by some really funny british guys though, they had something to say about everything, they were much more entertaining than the movie. when we got to Lima we were escorted by armed guards to a restaurant next to ancient Aztec territory. then we headed back to the airport, took a flight to Arequipa (smaller town in peru). this is where one of my dad's mine's is, so we know people that live there, and we hung out with the Davenports for the week. Katie's 18 and Alex is 16, i knew them a really long time ago, like when i was 7. Katie took the whole week away from school to hang out with us and alex only hung out with us mon and tues and then didnt go to Cusco with us.
monday morning katie and i had to tag along with our moms to do the shopping thing. both of us despise shopping so half the time we'd just sit in a cafe and talk while they did their stuff. we learned really quickly that each little shop sells just about the EXACT same thing. i fed pigeons out of my hand in plaza de armas! we ate lunch at this little restaurant that katie claimed had the best chicken sandwiches ever, they were pretty good. after lunch we went on a tour of the local convent. it was so incredible. its still a convent today, they've just expanded it from what it was in the 1800s, so the girls that live there now arent allowed into the tourist parts until after it closes like around 6, so we didnt get to see any nuns or novices while we were in the actual convent. i videotaped a lot of the convent though because the architecture and the history and the stories are really cool. anyway, it was really peaceful, i loved it.
then we went back to our friends house and sat around at their awesome outdoor bar just talking and stuff. katie, alex, and i decided that we were going to go drive go-karts to get away from the rents. we went to the first place and it was closed, went to the second place and it was closed too, so we gave up that idea and went to a bar and played drinking games and drank their local beer "arequipeña". then we had to head over to a restaurant to have dinner with my mom and their parents. i ate OSTRICH, well we all did, but it was a first for me. it was really cool, they bring it out on this really hot black brick and you cook it yourself, it was actually really really good. after dinner katie and alex took me to meet some of their local peruvian friends. they introduced me to the most disgusting alcohol ever, its called Triple X and its like a soda with alcohol, i hated it...needless to say i didnt drink it. so yeah, hungout with them for a little bit then went back to katie's house to watch a night at the roxbury and fell asleep over there.
tuesday morning we had breakfast at this place that has like a zoo in the back and we got to play with all these fun animals: giant turtles, alpacas, llamas, vecuñas, ostrich, horses, and sheep. then katie and i went to see "Juanita" while the moms went shopping again. Juanita is this mummy they found a few years ago on the top of "Misty" which is the largest volcano in Arequipa (they have like 5 in total). quick story behind the mummy, the Incas used to believe that the volcanoes (and mountains) were gods and that when they angered the gods (when the volcanoes erupted) they needed to make sacrifices to the gods so they'd sacrifice young women. it was really awesome though because the mummy was found in perfect condition, along with 4 others who werent as preserved as she was. but she still has her skin and her hair and her teeth and her eyelashes and everything, it was pretty cool.
then we quickly got to the airport and headed to Cusco, Peru. that afternoon we had to go shopping...again. we had dinner at such a goofy restaurant. there was live "entertainment" people were dancing and playing flutes and stuff, it was weird.
wednesday morning we had to wake up at 4:45 and be at the train station an hour later to ride it for 3 and a half hours up to Aguas Calientes, a little town at the bottom of the mountain where MachuPicchu is. from there we had to get on this tour type bus and ride it for about half an hour up the windy road to the actual MachuPicchu. This place was absolutely incredible...its so amazing that an entire civilization was created and destroyed up there and the intriquete-ness of it all is just unbelievable for having been created 500 years ago. i saw a couple of kids from school there, small world. i played with the llamas too. i got a lot of pictures and video from there, its a really awesome place. while there, everybody got eaten alive by bugs. i didnt think i was doing too bad and then i got in the bus to go back down and i looked at my legs and they were covered with at least 100 bites, not exaggerating. they didnt itch at first, but the next morning it was terrible...to a point of bleeding and burning and blah, it was bad. they're still bad, i have to go to the doctor, just to make sure i dont have some deadly disease or something.
katie and i played with some little kids back down in Aguas Calientes, they were playing hide and go seek so we'd cheat for both sides heh. the standard of living in all of peru is so terrible. it was awful, its really hard to picture unless you've seen something like it before. every house is made of clay, some have straw roofs, some have tile roofs. they all wear clothing that they make themselves or within their families. they dont bathe more than once every other week. they have huge calusses on their fingers from weaving and on their feet from rarely wearing shoes. they have scabs on their cheeks from the constant sunburn. the whole family knows how to sell everything they make and they don't like to give up on tourists, they bug you and bug you and bug you. one of the days katie and i were sitting on the steps of a giant Spanish church (all of the churches are absolutely beautiful) and a mom came up with her child and her child sat behind a post and played hide-and-go-seek with us and we didnt realize that the child was preparing to beg for money. we were told that the parents get their children to do this, make the tourists play with them and then feel bad and give them money when they beg for it. its so sad. everywhere you go, constant begging for money.
back on track...the train ride to and from MachuPicchu was awesome. we went from being in the absolute most desolate desert setting you could imagine into a tropical jungle (near the amazon river) such different scenery, it was beautiful.
when we got back that night we went out to dinner at a really nice restaurant, and then decided to check out the Cusco nightlife. we said goodbye to our moms and they decided to go to their own bars and somehow (after we went to a few to check them out) we ended up at the same bar. by this time our moms were already a little tipsy and came in, bought us drinks and got drunk with us. it was soooo weird, but really fun. yeah i think thats the first time my mom's seen me drunk, perhaps a once-in-a-lifetime thing. we stayed out with our moms until 4 a.m. is that not weird? i had an entire conversation for like 30 minutes ALL in spanish, it was awesome!
yesterday morning we went to all of these tourist type things. only got a few hours of sleep and then we had to ride in this awful van on these curvy roads (my excuse for throwing up a few times that morning) we went to this weaving place, and its like a family and they have their weaving business set up in their backyard, and you just go in and watch them make everything and they will talk to you (those that speak spanish...some speak the native Incan language) we watched them make the dyes for the thread and spin the thread and all the steps of weaving, it was actually really cool.
then we went to this awesome restaurant on the river. and then headed to the "P'saq market" on the way there the FUCKING DRIVER RAN OVER A DOG. i heard the scream though and i honestly thought it was a child, so i turned around to look and i saw the poor dog twitching on the road, it was terrible. it really got to me too, im not exactly sure why, i know it was a stray dog, but it really shook me up. Katie and i of course got sick of shopping at this market place so we went and sat in the van and watched Spiderman 2 on her dvd player. i told myself i'd never watch that movie (dont understand what the big deal is about it) but it was all she had brought that day, so yeah we just watched it and it was pretty bad i thought, but it gave us something to do. on the way back from there we stopped at another weaving place and i got to pet the animals and feed a vecuña from my hands. then we watched some more weaving, but in a different type of setting. we drove past a bunch of ruins and took a few pictures of "Saqsayhuaman" (pronounced Saxy Woman) went out to dinner again and then went to one bar, had a drink, then the parents left and katie and i stayed out a little bit longer, made some friends and then went back to the hotel. woke up early this morning and had a long trip back home. i FINALLY got to see Eternal Sunshing of the Spotless Mind on the plane. the movie was awesome, i highly recommend it, its got a great plot and the direction was done really well and the acting was quite impressive, good stuff.
the week was awesome, katie and i got really close so that was cool, and the culture was absolutely breath taking. after going to peru, i wouldnt say that i like chile anymore but i really really appreciate what i have even here. its a completely different lifestyle, and how blessed i am to get to experience both. im really glad that we didnt move to peru though, as much fun as it was, i dont think i'd enjoy having armed guards at my doors 24 hours a day, and having to be taken around with an armed driver all the time and all of that stuff, thats not freedom enough for me. it was amazing though...all of it.