So as I probably told a few of you: I was invited by NC State to return to Cusco to help with the Summer Study Abroad Program that they have here in Peru. Besides the whole “free vacation” aspect of it, I was really looking forward to seeing my professors Kay and Leo along with their daughter Isabel, and the Program director Carlos again. Not to mention the whole “YAY there’s gringos!” aspect of it.
But the trip started out with a visit to the rest of my host family in Lima (the sons and daughters of my host mom here in Nanchoc) to stop in and bring a few presents from the farm—namely a turkey and some tamale-like things called humitas. I was super excited to see the whole host family. I got to spend some time with my host niece Luciana, my host sister Consuelo and her husband Miguel, along with my two really cool host brothers Juan and Albert. I felt really bad that I kicked the boys out of their room, and had them both sharing a twin sized mattress on the floor…but they’re Peruvian gentlemen and gave me the real bed to sleep in. How sweet. Their mama raised them good.
I went with Consuelo to Ripely (think the world’s largest Macy’s…or maybe it’s not that big, it was just big for me) to buy a present for her husband. This is a 6 story mall--like straight out of New York or something. Needless to say after spending the past 9 months living in the not-so-city parts of Peru, the shiny, loud, and bustling Ripely was more than this Peace Corps Volunteer could take. I will admit it. I had a mini panic attack. There were probably over 2,000 people in this place, American music; it felt like a Macy’s...just WAY bigger than any store I’ve ever been in in my entire life. I mean, I thought since Chiclayo is a rather large city I wasn’t going to have the shock of going back to Lima…WRONG. Oh well, I survived, just left with a racing heart and sweaty palms. Oh yeah, Consuelo found a button up shirt for her husband too. I don’t think she noticed the gringa was nearly ready to pass out from the stress.
But later that day I met up with the NCSU crew at a VERY (and I mean VERY) nice hotel in Lima. Now I’m 100% sure it’s the same hotel that I stayed in when I went on this trip in 2006—I’m also 100% sure that they’ve added a ton of upgrades since I was there. I’ve never stayed in a bed so big before in my life. I actually called my friend Erica (the only other Peru-12er that’s near me) to brag about the bed size. Seeing as how we usually share a double bed when ever we’re both in Chiclayo (hey it’s the cheapest option…and we make next to nothing) the concept of not kicking each other at night was intriguing. So I enjoyed the king bed all to my lonesome—because its way nicer than my hay mattress here in Nanchoc. But just like last time, bright and early in the am we left the shiny pretty hotel and went on a plane to Cusco.
Now here’s where if I believed in omens, I would have turned around and gone back to Nanchoc. But I don’t, so I stuck around…my bad. We were broken up into 2 buses, the first 2 early flights on one bus, and the later flight on the smaller one. I stayed behind on the small bus (there had been a few forgotten passports that we were waiting for) and got a phone call: “Jenny, you’re on the first flight! It leaves in an hour.” Yeah, I freaked out a lil. I’m now in the late bus, leaving for Cusco soon…yikes. Thanks to the rather Peruvian like driving of our bus driver we managed to do the hour long bus ride to the airport in less than 35 minutes—way to go short dude! And I made it on the flight (thanks to the flight getting delayed by bad weather). I rested into my seat in the aisle. I am not a huge fan of flying…and when I do fly, I like the aisle. In a very Schwartz-family like feeling: If I’m going to die I wanna see it happen! I was nervous until the plane finally made it above all the foul weather of Lima and I saw the Andes below the wings.
By 10 I was on the ground in Cusco waiting patiently with a group of 15ish students for the other 2 planes. 11:00, nothing. We had taken over a corner of the airport that was largely unused. Only largely unused due to the rotating “Authentic Andean Band” playing at whatever baggage claim opened next. I have issues calling them authentic due to the cell phones nicer than mine they were all using and the laptop one had in his bag. 12:00, nothing. Half of the students had taken to napping on the floor propped up against their luggage, the other half alternated between going in search of food and listening to iPods. 1:00, I finally called Carlos to see where they all were. The other flights had gotten delayed, there should (should) be another group arriving in the next 10 minutes, and we were to go find the bus driver in the parking lot and head to the hotel. At this point I’m extremely happy that my Spanish is a hell of a lot better than in my first trip to Peru. I was able to track down our bus driver (and even got to explain that he could stop talking English at a 3 year old level because I speak Spanish!) and we made it to the hotel. The last group of students (and the 3 other adults on the group) arrived about 2 hours later. We were all tired, but we made it!
The next few days were nothing but a blur of traveling and site seeing. We went to Pisac (both the name of ruins and the name of the town we were staying in) to do a hike to some ruins, and shop in the big weekend market they have there ever Sunday. At the Pisac hike we had the first few cases of altitude sickness set in, but fortunately nothing too bad. We also had one slight…we’ll call it a traffic accident. We had told the students that lunch was to be in a café in the main plaza, and that it was first come first serve for eating. Now when we said that, we meant that the students could take their time looking in the market before eating if they so choose, or go directly to eating…well the hungry Wolfpack took that as a “THEN LET’S RUN TO TOWN TO GO EAT FIRST!” So needless to say when you have around 50 18-22 year olds running down a mountain with varying fitness levels, there’s going to be a few problems. We had 2 girls fall down, one scrapped her knees up pretty bad. Thankfully the domino effect of the falling stopped at 2 and we weren’t patching up 100 knees after lunch.
The rest of the Pisac portion of the trip included visiting salt mines and a pottery workshop. I remembered the salt mine hike to be the hardest of the trip last time I had gone. Not because of the distance or because it was that hard of a hike (don’t get me wrong I remember it being mostly uphill) but because we did it RIGHT after lunch. And after eating the LAST thing you want to do is hiking up a mountain…usually. But this year the program had decided to cut the hiking part of the salt mines and we just took the bus ride up. Now it could be because life here in Peru has taught me a few things, or it could just be because I’d been there before. But the road to the salt mines, which if you ask Kay is the SCARIEST road in all of Peru, wasn’t as bad as everyone made it out to be. Yeah we were in a rather large bus, and the road is tiny. My mom would hate it because there’s not a single guard rail the entire way up, and the bus was going fast. But my time here in Peru has taught me something: for the most part, the bus drivers know their stuff. They could parallel park that thing in the middle of the NC State campus if we asked them to. And I know a few good ol boys with big ol trucks who can’t even say that.
After the Pisac weekend we went back to Cusco, and did all the good sites: Saqsayhuaman, Tipon, Pakuapukara, Tambomachay, Moray, and a few museums. Now I could go into detail, but honestly to anyone who’s not there or to hasn’t read at least a little bit on the sites, there (unfortunately) all going to sound the same to you. I will say that Saqsayhuaman is the site with the HUGE rocks piled up in giant terraces. It’s probably one of my favorite days of the trip, not just because I love Incan architecture--the rocks are all so perfectly carved that you can’t fit a knife blade between them—but because we do horseback riding that day. I remember being a little nervous the last time I went, a friend had told me he’d take me riding before so I could look like I knew what I was doing…that didn’t happen. So a combination of it was my first time on a horse (in the 2006 trip) and my horse’s name was Rebel, we’ll just say I was happy it was over with quickly last trip. This time was different. I’m now an expert donkey rider, so the transition to a horse wasn’t too incredibly hard, it was aided by the fact that my hose was nicer and seemed to know the trail like the back of his hoof.
Then of course there’s the Inca Trail! The highlight of my first trip to Peru. The Inca Trail’s what made me decide to do the Outdoor Leadership minor at State. The idea that people’s jobs are to guide beautiful hikes was fascinating (even though I knew that I’d never do it for a living—don’t worry mom). The hike this time was just as beautiful. The mountains were just as tall. The only difference I noticed: The Nevadas, the ice capped mountains we can see for most of the trail, had an obvious lack of ice on their slopes. I recall the entire mountain being snow capped and white, this time, they looked more brown than white. Less snow capped and more snow speckled. I tried to pretend like it was just in my head. But when I got back to site, I looked at an old picture from the first trip, and one from this time. Global Warming’s real dad. I got photo evidence.
On a slightly cooler note: In my first trip we say people making adobe bricks to build their house, and on this trip I saw their completed house. Also, I had taken a picture of a little boy washing his hands in a irrigation ditch in my first trip, and I saw his again this trip. Lauren S, you’ll be happy to know I gave him a candy again…I’m sure if he’d of remembered me he’d be wanting a Pringle.
The trail went reasonably well. We had a few girls who were struggling along the way. Every year we tell the students how hard the trail’s going to be, but the returned students seem to forget how much they complained on the trail and how hard it actually was. Every year when the returned students come to talk to the newbies the, “Oh my God it was the hardest thing I’ve ever done! I hated day 2! God I’ll never do it again!” turns magically into “It was the most amazing this I’ve ever done, I’d recommend that everyone does it. It really wasn’t that hard.” Now don’t get me wrong. I agree. The Inca trail is one of the most amazing things I’ve ever done in my life. I loved every minute of it. I loved every blister I got the first time and the second time. But I love hiking, I love being outside, and I love being away from the city. That could not be said for every student that’s ever done an NCSU Peru Study Abroad.
There was a fair share of whining and grumpiness throughout the trip, a few medical scares (we had a few people faint on me during day 2—the hardest day of the trip) but everyone seemed to make it to the end genuinely happy that they came on the trail and glad that they finished. I also had at least one, “Goddamnit I’ll never do that again!” but that’s to be expected I guess.
We had planned to spend 2 days in Aguas calientes, the town below Machu Picchu—but transportation strikes that have been going on around the country seemed to not like that plan. We had to squish the 2 days into one afternoon. All of the tired and unshowered Wolfpack had around 5 hours to take in Machu Picchu before we left on a train—the last trail out of Augas Calientes before the strike started. We all sat, tired, dirty, and hungry in the train station for a good 3 hours waiting to hear if the train could leave or not. Some people had come in early (yeah the strikes are “planned” here) and blocked the tracks before they were supposed to, so we were waiting for the tracks to get cleared. By 11 finally we boarded the train. After a long train ride, and a long bus ride, we finally were back in the hotel in Cusco by 3am.
I’d like to say that I managed to sleep in, but I’ve gotten used to taking up by 6am at the latest, so me making it to 8 seemed like a blessing. I showered (I figured there was no point in doing to when we arrived, there were 40 something other girls wanting the hot water, I was already dirty…what’s another few hours right?) and then went to eat breakfast and heard the news. Due to the strike, we were on lockdown in the hotel. No leaving until 1. So at that point I tried to go back to bed, failed, and called my mom and dad from my cell phone to catch up.
The trip went by in a blur-- honestly the 2 weeks went by so fast. When I left the group I was happy that I had gone with them, but I was homesick--and strangely not homesick for Durham, North Carolina. I missed Nanchoc, Cajamarca. I’ve developed some great friendships here, and I missed my friends, my work…and I never thought I’d say this about my hay mattress…but I missed by bed. Not for its comfort, because we all know (I’m sure I’ve complained about it outside of this blog entry) but more for the sleeping in a familiar environment. I don’t sleep well in new places, so Cusco was a time of not very rewarding sleep. Now that I’m back in site, it feels good to realize that everyone here missed me. When I walk the streets and run into someone I haven’t seen since I got back I get the familiar, “My oh my, where have you been missy!” and then get to tell stories of all my new friends from NCSU and our adventures in Cusco, and explain that I’m sorry and I couldn’t bring everyone back something because I’m a broke Volunteer and Cusco’s an expensive city.
All in all I’ve decided a few things: I’m really glad I got to go with another group of NCSUers. I love my University, and I love the students with all my heart. I believe that the Study Abroad program was one of the most rewarding experiences in my life, and probably if I hadn’t gone in 2006, I wouldn’t of had the nerve to click the SUMBIT button at the bottom of the Peace Corps Online Application. But I also know that I will never leave my site for 2 weeks again. The vacation was nice and deserved…but it’s too long to be away from my new home and my work that I love.
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