Greetings from sixteen thousand feet lower. I wish I were writing this from the beach, but it didn’t exactly work out that way.
So to be true to the title of this post, this week was great, and it was also difficult. The difficulties were more in work and in meeting new people. The great things? I started reading Harry Potter in Spanish, and I went to Lima. Since this week was quite similar to last week, I’ll just summarize by saying that the challenges at work are ongoing and interesting in that there doesn’t seem to be one way to solve them.
Friday evening I flew to Lima to meet a friend I had met online through the World Blind Union. She and I had arranged for her friend to pick me up from the airport and drop me off at my hostel. She had said something about me paying him for picking me up, but I didn’t question it like I should have because I just thought that that’s how you showed your friend gratitude for doing you a favor here in Peru. This is not the case.
When he picked me up from the airport, he dropped me off at the hostel, but then he proceeded to stay with me until I was in my room after eating a good dinner of chicharrón de calamar and patacones amazónicas. He charged me a hundred soles, where a taxi ride to the airport on Sunday afternoon cost me only sixty. And he didn’t eat with me, only sat and watched.
The next day, he; my friend, Angela; and I went and ate some good ceviche at this restaurant near the sea in the district of Barranco. Then we went to the Bridge of Sighs, where you get a good ocean breeze. Then we walked around the plaza of Barranco for a while before he took me back to the hostel and charged me eighty soles. Some friend. He didn’t charge Angela, so I don’t know why he styled himself as a service. I don’t know what exactly he was about. All I knew was that I had kind of felt misled.
That night I went to eat some good food and watch a live performance of Afro-Peruvian music. I admit, there’s still a bit of a language barrier with me, and people in Lima speak so much faster than people in Cuzco, so I had a hard time following along. By the end, I had enjoyed the energetic performance but was ready to go back to the hostel and party at the bar, meet some new people. However, when I went to get on the dance floor, someone, maybe a bouncer, thought I needed to dance in the corner away from everybody lest I hit them with my cane. I didn’t do a good job explaining myself to her, and I left, discouraged and dejected.
The next day I just hung out and walked around myself. I hung out at this park with a bunch of statues, which I unfortunately never appreciated until long after the fact when someone who had Google-Earthed it told me about it. Then I ate at this restaurant that was across the street from the park that was recommended to me by some locals. It was great! Peruvian food has never disappointed! After that I walked to Playa Malecón and just hung out there for a half hour before getting an Uber to my hostel to pick up my stuff and then to the airport. I had slept in Miraflores, and I loved that district! I wasn’t going to be charged again for something I could do without Eduardo, Angela’s friend. That evening I returned home and prepared for the next week.
I’m glad I went because I learned more about what is ideal for me when I travel and about what to do and what not to do next time I stay over in another city.
Traveling in Peru 