Lima to Huaraz

Has it already been a week in this country? Or should I say has it only been a week? At once it seems like I just got here and also like I´ve been here forever. The concept of time loses all meaning here. Which is just what I needed from my trip...

The above picture is really the only interesting thing I could find in Lima. Yeah, not the most exciting city. Traffic in the big cities are controlled by the police in major intersections. Pedestrians seem like an after thought-no traffic lights for them and the police completely ignores them. You just kind of have to watch the traffic and jump out on the street when you see an opportunity.

I´m travelling with an Israeli girl named Rikki and as she doesn´t speak any Spanish, I´ve become the translator with my pigeon Spanish. I must say though, the first day in Peru made me really proud of myself. It turns out I can understand a whole lot of Spanish and speak enough to get by. Within a few hours of landing I figured out that ¨cuadras¨ are blocks and the address Av. San Juan 2576 means that the place you are looking for is in the 25th block. It may not be much of an achievement if you´re used to this kind of city planning, but I´m not, so let me enjoy my little achievement please. Thank you.

We managed somehow to walk all around Lima and even got on a little ´collectivo´ which is sort of a minibus they stuff as much as they can. More on that when I write about Huaraz and the north. The first collectivo (above) we got on was quite an experience as the guy who hangs out the door and yells the destination to people waiting outside (the picture should be quite familiar to the Turks among you) took quite a fancy to us. He kept muttering all sorts of praises and salacious remarks in Spanish, most of which I didn´t get (probably better that way) and told us when we got off ¨Goodbye babies¨. It was quite hilarious.

Long story short, 1 day after we got to Lima, we made our way to Huaraz, which is the central location in the north where all the beautiful treks are run from. I was a little shocked to see this at the bus terminal:

Horrible picture, but if you look closely you will see the book ¨El Castillo Blanco¨, ie the White Castle, by Orhan Pamuk, the recent Nobel prize winner for literature. Who would have thought...

Having thus been shocked, we got on our 8 hour bus drive to Huaraz which was quite interesting. Vendors kept getting on, selling all sorts of stuff, like blocks of cheese, pastries, corn on the cob (they´re giant and they´re called choclitos, we have to buy some and cook for ourselves) empanadas etc. They would get on and only get off at the next stop. The toilets didn´t work, the movie shown was ridiculously loud, but the scenery was just beautiful. We drove through giant walls of sand on both sides of the bus.

Well I´m being thrown out of the Internet cafe, so will have to continue another time...