Dispatch Number 92 -Errant Thoughts: Peru
This Dispatch is a break from the Two Years summary and pauses from that series after Panama, Dispatch Number 90. It will restart shortly with Colombia. In the meantime, here are some shorter pieces.
Don't Walk
The pedestrian has no rights in Latin America. Crossing streets safely involves running.
Ambulance
I wasn't there, but Scott was when she burned her face in a minor gas explosion. Calling an ambulance is a normal reaction. Not in Lima, Peru, a megalopolis of seven million people, to get an ambulance you must have connections or credit established with the service before they will even pick you up. The majority, hop in taxis to get the injured to a hospital. They are cash & carry societies, and most have very little of it.
Later, I had selfish visions of getting crashed-out on some road desperately needing an ambulance, when none would come.
Call a taxi!, I yelled. Unless I was knocked out, in that case, black-headed vultures would be circling soon.
Cities Begin to Repeat Themselves
After you have traveled a long time, places repeat themselves, they begin to look the same. Definition of a long time is never thinking you could quit the job and really leave it all behind. The beaches, plazas and stores are the same in every city. Pots and pans on offer are the same in each shop, and the once curious open-air markets become as predictable as the white-tiled meat counters that have more flies than customers. Restaurants become a dull drumbeat of repetition. It's when you notice your curiosity wane, the signs are there, its time to go home.
Local sights follow patterns, too. Such as a spot, near town that suffered flood or landslide, an act of nature portrayed as a religious event, another proof of Christs miracles, especially if there was a miraculous survivor. Most townships have these quasi-religious sites used to prove their relevance. Waterfalls dot much of the landscape in Latin America and most serve beer at the bottom. Or the miradors, lookouts that hold the viewer in repeated awe; without guard-railings or signs telling you what to do. Freedom. Eventually, these places begin to feel the same, no matter the country.
When you have a domestic life of routine, these places and activities are fresh and appealing. And now, after three years on the road, find myself on the other side: domestic life looks very appealing, the very domestic life that had me fleeing it's confinement a few years earlier. The wanderlust candle dims and loses some of its intensity. I need shelter to stoke its flame again. A routine of stable home and community looks good. I want things that I have gone without, normal things like the same bed, same people, same woman, same foods, same bicycle, same newsstand and a neighborhood I'm recognized in.
It matters little which side you stand on, the life of a domestic or the life of a nomad, everything we do and everywhere we go, repeats itself.
Are the Drivers Really That Bad?
Drivers in Peru are woefully in over their heads when they get on a autopista, freeway where speeds of 100km/h (60+ mph) are possible for long stretches. Speed kills Peruvians. In a single days drive covering 225kilometers (140 miles) I saw two roll-over accidents on an empty highway. Latin Americans, including Peruvians travel in groups, so most wrecks include family and friends.
This section of the Pan American Highway, south of Lima is first rate, free of interferences and built to European standards, well engineered with excellent visibility and wide shoulders. Yet, somehow, they manage to crash out all by themselves on this empty highway.
How to Break Inertia
It started two and half years ago with, Just see if you can get to Patagonia, the bottom of the world, in a 25 year old truck.
Last Word
It hit me today, after a conversation with a local man. I don't like hearing my own voice, I like hearing my own opinions!
Always
the important
thing
is
the obvious
thing
that
nobody
is
saying
-Charles Bukowski
thing
is
the obvious
thing
that
nobody
is
saying
-Charles Bukowski
Whistle While You Work
Small town Peru. These towns have men, junior police, who walk the streets at night to ward off intruders and would-be thieves by blowing athletic whistles throughout the night walking from neighborhood to neighborhood from sundown to dawn, peeping their whistles, every half-minute or so. No gun, no radio, no car, just a plastic whistle.
Fair to assume any half-brained thief would never get caught by a patrolman, cause they'd always hear them coming. When living in Huaraz, Peru I spent months trying to figure out why someone would blow a whistle all-night each time they passed my intersection.
Old Man
Central plaza. Tarma sits low in the saddle of a jagged valley high up in the Andes. It's a sunny Sunday morning and all the benches are occupied, an old man shuffles by, frail and stiff, he passes the plaza with steady steps scratching the concrete as he moves across the plaza. Slowly and patiently he passes. Back in his day, this walk was known as his constitutional.
He passes, and I ask myself, Where will I be doing that? Will I sit on the wall with the other old men watching the world go by, where dreams are already memories?
David
Avila Beach, California
