On any trip it seems that so much happens every day and my default is always to be part of what's happening rather than stepping back and writing about it, good thing I never choose to try to make a living as a writer. Anyway, I left off as the five of us, David's Father and stepmother, his brother Ali, David and I were waiting at the Andahuaylas airport for the plane to Lima on the 17th of December. It is now more than a month later and I'm finally getting time, I hope, to update this blog. This month has been challenging, interesting and exciting with times of boredom, tension and fear, mostly on the bus rides, in other words just another month of life. Thank goodness that pictures are now dated so I have at least some clue of what happened when.
We had had such a great time in Huinchos that no one really wanted to say a final goodby, and, so, saying goodby went on till the very last moment, when we just HAD to go through security and board the plane. The flight back to Lima was blessedly shorter than the bus ride up to Andahuaylas had been and it gave us an very different view of the Andes, and explained a lot about why the bus ride had taken so long. There are virtually no east-west valleys and so the only way across by land is up one mountain and down the other side, repeated endlessly.
Upon arrival in Lima we were picked up by an extended family member with a car. It was a packed ride back to Huaycan with all of us and baggage but we made it, arriving tired and happy to reunite with the rest of the family at the house. The next two days we spent mostly at the house doing laundry and settling back into a routine.
That didn't last long however, in the morning of Friday the 20th two other cousins of David's, who lived in another part of Lima, called Sirco, stopped to meet and visit with David, and before the visit was over we had agreed to go back with them to Sirco for the afternoon to meet the rest of their families. Ali, whose cousins they also were, was assigned to go with us to be sure we could find our way back. It took several bus transfers and about three hours to get to their neighborhood, but we arrived safely and began to meet their families. It soon became obvious that we would not get back that evening, they were cooking and it was already late. After some hesitation they asked if we would stay the night and we agreed. It was a relief to me as I was already to tired for another three hour bus trip back. So the dinner became a party, complete with beer, dancing and lots of conversation that lasted into the night. We were led back to another relatives house where we slept the night and were fed breakfast in the morning before heading back to Huaycan. We would probably have stayed longer but I was scheduled to meet Lizzie, my friend from NYC, at the airport late that night and her boyfriend Jerry the next night. So I had to get back to the house, change and head into the hostel in Lima where we would all stay when they arrived.
It was a quick turn around at the house, I took as shower, packed a bag, ate lunch and was back on a series of buses, this time with Raul as my guide, in about two hours. Somehow we got on a bus that took the long way and it seemed to take forever to reach central Lima, but we finally got there about 5 PM, at which point poor Raul had to get back on a bus and head back to Huaycan while all I had to do was walk the few blocks from the bus to the hostel. After I got to the hostel and checked in, I connected to their wifi to see if I had any important email, and it was a good thing I did. Lizzie's plane had been so delayed that they put her on the same flight the next day, so I didn't have to go to the airport that night. I realized that I would have a full day to rest up, so I ate an early dinner and went to bed with nothing to do until late the next evening.
The next day was as laid back a day as I'd had since first arriving in Peru, I slept in, ate leisurely, took a walk and a nap before taking a taxi to the airport that evening. The arrivals area of the international airport in Lima was a bit more chaotic than usual as the arrivals board which announced the scheduled arrival of the planes was not working, so there was no way of telling if the plane you were waiting for had arrived and you had missed the person you were looking for or if the plane had been delayed. Lizzie, who was to be the first to arrive, was on a flight that was about 2 hours late, but I didn't know that and was a bit worried that I had missed her but I still needed to be there to meet Jerry who was scheduled to arrive just after midnight. So, I tried not to worry and just kept looking at people as they emerged from customs. Finally, about 1 AM I saw Lizzie emerge, she explained that her plane was very late and that Jerry would be out in minutes, she had run into him going through customs. Soon we were in a cab back to the hostel, to check them in and get some sleep. At this point I was not the only one who was tired.
The next day was Monday, December 23 and I had promised to spend Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with David's family. At first we had hoped that we would be able to have Jerry and Lizzie there as well but it turned out that there would be over twenty relatives for Christmas Eve at their small house so there was no room for them. Instead they ended up staying at a Carmelite Monastery in the Miraflores district of Lima. This happened because a college friend of Jerry's had entered the Carmelite Seminary in the US and when he heard we were going to be in Lima made arrangements with the priests there for us to stay. So the next afternoon we took a cab to Miraflores and moved into the monastery. That evening we had a pleasant walk around Miraflores, an upscale residential and business district of Lima, and then dinner at a small Italian restaurant. We walked back to the monastery after dinner and retired for the night. I got up early the next day, Christmas Eve, and took a series of buses back to Huaycan to be with David's family. I later learned from Jerry and Lizzie that they met several very friendly, but busy, it being Christmas, priests that day who showed them around a bit, answered their questions and arranged for them to visit one of their parishes in the slums. When I next saw them, apologizing for having abandoned them, they said that they had had a wonderful holiday
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