Peru is in a terrible mess with 50,000 miners on strike, roadblocks closing highways down and travelers trapped sleeping in their cars and trucks, out of food and water unable to move according to reports in the papers.
Herman the manager walked us to the gate and told us about the national strike adding that a truck driver got killed overnight when he got run down by accident in the dark. That was the first we heard of the national strike as you wouldn’t know anything was wrong in town, stores are open and we had a bang up lunch in a steakhouse.
We talked over our predicament at lunch but our plans for some beach time seem to be scotched. Long distance buses aren’t running and the capital Lima is said to be running low on fuel and food. Arequipa is apparently cut off by land, all approach roads are closed. And we’re in the middle of it all. The absurdity is painful.
At the Cusco airport as I waited to come home Monday night my flight was repeatedly delayed but I saw tons of flights to Lima on the departure board. It was seven flights to Lima to one repeatedly denied flight to Arequipa.
What I realized yesterday was that flying was the only way to get to the capital as all roads are closed so they were laying on a flight every twenty minutes to get travelers home from Cusco. Indeed my flight to Arequipa at ten o’clock at night was packed.
The reason for the strike is about mining. Miners working illegal mines want their jobs to be made legal and above board but the government is getting pressure from the mining corporations to not give in as they don’t want the competition. I read a comment from a lawmaker in Congress that he wanted to reduce the president’s pay to three bucks a day (10 soles) as he said that’s all she’s worth. Her party got rid of her predecessor in a corruption scandal and she was vice president but the entire country hates her now with an approval rating of two percent. She’s deployed police and the military to suppress protestors and is rated as the world’s least popular leader. You read that right: 2% of voters support Dina Boluarte:
The strike started a week ago around Lima and now we’re all going to enjoy the fruits of this chaos. It’s been a while since we got stuck in all the strikes in Central America and to find ourselves back stuck in one spot is deeply annoying.
Oh and in an unrelated note Arequipa is filling up with trash, and a lovely sight it is, isn’t it?
We stopped by a tailor to have some clothes repaired and while chatting I asked him what was up and he said the trash collectors thought this was a good time to ask for a raise as the city prepares to celebrate its birthday August 15th.
We have to leave Peru by August 14th at the very latest so we’ll miss the party but there are lots of flags for sale to start the celebrations amid the trash collectors’ strike.
You can imagine how all this is affecting morale but we are safe and comfortable enough until we can move again and that’s what really matters.
It’s all part of the joy of travel.
I was really looking forward to road testing our transmission but I’m trying not to get annoyed about all this. It’s just one more country giving us a special welcome.
