A friend from Key West texted me last night and set me to thinking about how far I have come from normal. Going to work at dusk used to be normal and spending the night trying to stay awake or listening to people in agony used to be normal, and he said I seemed more relaxed now. Yes I guess I am. The stress of answering 911 only becomes apparent from a distance. It used to be normal. Going for a walk in a totally alien environment, at dusk is normal now.
I got distracted trying to decide if this picture was worth keeping with all its technical imperfections and by the time I decided it was she had disappeared.
The Catholic side of the Plaza de Armas, the main square of Arequipa was saying the rosary last evening, in Latin, a formula I haven’t heard since I was an altar boy in the sixties. Across the square the evangelicals represented not by the hierarchy, but by a loudly praying indigenous woman backed by a band, was praying through a microphone.
The daily struggle continued between the cacophony of competing ideologies.
I noticed in the Uber driver’s resume he claimed to speak Italian. I had ordered a car a couple of days ago to go I can’t remember where, and he listed Italian as one of his skills. I decided to ignore that as I get bored trying to explain my mixed up ancestry but he picked me out of the tourist line up instantly when I greeted him in my tainted Spanish. I had to admit I was Italian, once upon a time anyway.
But you know what? It was a memorable conversation, happily about him, not me. Emigrating from Italy to the United States is a biography backed by stereotype and it’s my shorthand, fall back explanation for why I speak Spanish (mangled) with an Italian accent. His story was much more interesting to me.
He had lived in Milan for five years with his Italian girlfriend making good money in the usual technological field which is work I don’t understand. He got tired of it though and I think the relationship went south too, because he didn’t mention her as he spoke of how happy he was to have chosen to return to Arequipa. The weather is nicer and he likes his family and friends even though the cost of living is higher he said.
I asked him about that. He insisted he made better money in Arequipa I guess by driving Uber part time for extra cash on top of his tech work but he pays more here than in Italy for groceries and other daily expenses. He seemed genuine, but I’ve always thought of Italy as unconscionably expensive. And yet for this young man living in Peru costs him more but it’s worth it.
And so it goes, another completely unexpected view of life in Peru. On Monday, tomorrow, I’m going to the transmission shop as I’ve been invited to watch my transmission start the process of reassembly. Exciting yes but I want to make sure I have enough cash to pay for the work. We’ve given him $1500 so far for the parts but I’m assuming he’ll want Soles for his labor so I collect some at the ATM from time to time.
The little man in the machine pays out $190 in Soles (“so-lays” which means “suns”) and charges $5 to give me 700 Soles in blue 100 and pink 50 denominations. You have to break them down to buy things on the street. An empanada seller with $1.25 empanadas can’t easily change a $13 (50 Soles) bill. That’s the other Peruvian economy, that of the poor.
On a whim I bought a book for my Kindle yesterday. $10 or 35 Soles, a day’s hard earned wages. It’s the story of the aftermath of the Battle of Waterloo an offbeat subject I’ve never seen addressed. It is totally irrelevant to my current situation and is a mark of my retired gringo privilege.
Saturday was flag day in Peru. They mark the final defeat in the War of the Pacific in 1879. Peru and Bolivia wanted to snatch Chilean mines in the Atacama desert but Chile fought back and thrashed Bolivia into retreating and losing their access to the sea at Antofagasta and what was then the major port of Cobija.
The cities of Iquique (“ee-key-kay”) and Arica were Peruvian but the Chileans marched up with 5500 seasoned soldiers and killed 500 of the 1500 defenders and captured the city. Thus the border you see today where Peru ends just south of Tacna.
Its all very heroic melodramatic stuff of which legends are made and of which young pupils are instilled, and the country gets a day off.
Rusty doesn’t like to walk much around the city so he stays in the van when I make my sorties from the compound. I meandered down the hill to the river and went to the supermarket, just two blocks from Las Mercedes. PlazaVea is a modern national chain with all the usual stuff, not one of the indigenous street markets we’ve wandered in the Andes.
It’s getting quite cold at night as winter sets in. The days are sunny and dry with warm sunshine and no variation.
It gets dark at 5:30 on Central Time here.
Past the skatepark carrying my groceries.
Home sweet home; you buzz and they open. If you want to leave you pull the blue cord which rings a bell.
The empty campground. We are parked beyond the bathrooms out of sight.
Rusty in near darkness eating dinner wondering where Layne is and waiting to see what happens.
