Day 13: Voy a tener uno de todo, por favor.

Our Friday the 13th in Lima started out with a bit of a headache.  After schlepping all of our luggage from the Best Western to the Radisson, Nick left for a meeting and Susan and I waited for the person to come take us to customs to ship our samples.  Firstly, the person was 45 minutes late.  Secondly, traffic in Lima is horrendous and it took 45 minutes to get to the airport.  Long story short, the process was uncomplicated, but involved a lot of signing and waiting and driving and grumpiness from me (I hate traffic so much – even if I’m not driving).

After returning from customs, Susan and I semi-checked in at the Radisson.  My room was ready, but hers and Nick’s wasn’t ready yet.  So we decided to go to lunch at a restaurant near the Radisson.  We went to Alfresco and it was absolutely divine.  Every dish they brought out of the kitchen was exquisite.  Everything smelled amazing and looked beautiful.  Susan had a sea bass dish with a tarragon cream sauce and vegetables.  I had tuna medallions in a coconut almost-curry sauce with mushrooms and asparagus.  Absolutely delicious.

After lunch, we finished checking in at the Radisson.  I have never been so excited for a hotel before.  The room is fairly simple in terms of furniture, art, etc.  But the bathroom is huge, the bed is comfortable, and I have a view of the ocean from my window.  This is a great way to spend my last night in Lima.

Because lunch at Alfresco was so incredible, we took Nick there for dinner.  Nick and I split a “From the Grill” appetizer, which consisted of octopus, squid, tuna, salmon, shrimp, mussels, and scallops served with chimichurri and spicy yellow sauces.  Nick ordered the same dish Susan had for lunch, and I went with a grilled salmon over mushroom and spinach ravioli infused with lavender.  Hello, amazing.  Melt-in-your-mouth delicious.  We finished up the meal with the dessert sampler, which had five small tastings of different desserts they offered.  My favorite was the suspiro de limeña, a rich caramel, creamy pudding/custard-like dessert.  I’m definitely going to be making that at home.  Mmmmm.

So this is my last real night in Lima.  Which means I have to pack.  But also means that in about 25 hours, I’ll be on a plane back to the good ol’ U.S. of A.  Bittersweet, it is…

Day 12: I'm in love with baby alpaca.

Today was fairly low key.  We ran some errands, found some Tupperware to ship our samples in, and did some exploring.  Nick had a few meetings, so Susan and I ventured around Miraflores a bit.  We had lunch at this nice little café, where I had yet another sandwich.  The highlight of the meal was the apple crumble I had for dessert.  Very refreshing and not overly sweet – exactly what I needed to cheer up from a dreary day.

After lunch, Susan and I walked along the coast.  I use the term coast lightly, because the water was a very, very steep drop below us.  We walked along the park that’s at the top of what I’ll call a mountain.  There’s a mall built into the side of the mall with a lot of stores and some restaurants that overlook the ocean.  We mostly scoped out the alpaca and llama stores, but ultimately left the mall without purchasing anything.  After a bit more walking, we ended up at Sol Alpaca.  I ended up purchasing four skeins of 100% baby alpaca yarn to knit myself a scarf.  Alpaca is incredibly soft, but baby alpaca feels like heaven.  It’s incredibly warm and fuzzy, and I can’t wait to wrap myself in a scarf when North Carolina eventually has temperatures below 90 degrees.

After some paperwork and other errands in the afternoon, Nick, Susan, and I enjoyed happy hour at one of the restaurants overlooking the ocean.  After great conversation and icy cold beers, we walked for what seemed like forever and finally found a restaurant we could all agree on.  No one had sandwiches, which is always a plus.

Tomorrow will be another day of battling customs, but it’s all for the good of the people of Huancavelica.  We also get to check in at the Radisson and say farewell to the not-so-Best Western we’ve been staying in for the last two days.

Day 11: Dear Lima, I hate your stinkin' guts.

Well, I was not incorrect about the predicted adventure from Ayacucho to Lima.  The drive itself was fine until we got to Lima.  The trip took about nine hours, with one major stop along the way to make some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches about three hours outside of Lima.  We also stopped for gas, where a bunch of little boys ran over to our car, where they proceeded to sing, dance, and play “drums” (cardboard boxes) for us.

Lima traffic is the most awful traffic I have ever seen in my life.  I’m pretty sure I had a dozen mini heart attacks with the number of times cars almost slammed into us.  It’s definitely a scary experience, and I will never in my life drive in Lima.

We knew when we left Ayacucho without a hotel reservation in Lima it was going to be a challenge.  I don’t think any of us knew how big of a challenge it was going to be.  We spent over three hours, going to more than 30 hotels (I’m not joking), and only found three vacancies with enough space for the three of us.  A little before 10pm, we settled on a Best Western (which isn’t terrible, but is definitely far from great) and called off the search.  We’re still trying to figure out what to do about tomorrow night (and hoping that the Radisson has a cancellation) so it should be interesting tomorrow as well.

Day 10: Taking some time as a tourist.

Today was a fun day.  We did some satellite sampling throughout Ayacucho, although no one was interested in letting us into their homes to sample for control homes.  It seemed to work out alright though – we took some soil samples and adobe samples from the homes.  Driving through Ayacucho was interesting because there’s a lot of construction and rebuilding going on.  The people in Ayacucho are really trying to improve their neighborhoods by building new homes, paving streets, and making the streets more aesthetically pleasing.

After the sampling was finished, we drove to the Wari ruins, near Quinua, which is about an hour from Ayacucho.  The Wari were a dominant civilization beginning in about 500 A.D. through 700 A.D., began a decline around 800 A.D. and had abandoned their empire by 900 A.D.  The Wari empire covered a majority of the coastal area in present-day Peru.  The Wari ruins in Quinua are the best preserved ruins from the civilization.  The walls they build are wider than my wingspan.  The living quarters, sacrificial table, and tombs are all very well preserved, as is the rest of the site.  My pictures kind of speak for themselves.  It is incredible how well preserved the places and things from thousands of years ago actually are.

After we left the Wari ruins, we went to the site of the Battle of Ayacucho, the place where the final battle that ultimately gained Peru independence from the Spanish took place.  There is an obelisk commemorating the battle, with a poor excuse for a museum inside.  You can also climb up and out onto a ledge and overlook the battlefield, but considering how rickety the ladder was and my fear of heights, I chose to skip that part of the journey.

After returning from Quinua (without having been stopped and searched by the drug police patrolling traffic from the jungle), we had some lunch at Via Via Café, did a bit of walking and shopping, had a few drinks overlooking the plaza, then had dinner at Via Via as well.  After dinner, I finally got my chocolate ice cream cone, and man, did it taste like heaven!  Tomorrow we head to Lima, which, to say it will be an adventure is a gross understatement.

Day 9: The long road to Ayacucho.

Today was fairly uneventful compared to the last few days.  We ate our last breakfast at Hotel Presidente, said our goodbyes to Ruben, and loaded up the car to head to Ayacucho.  The drive was similar to the route we took to get to Huancavelica from Paracas and there wasn’t too much to see early in the drive – lots of brown, lots of mountains, fairly typical of our trip.  Once we were at a much higher elevation, we saw the lagoons, which were the bluest of any blue water I have ever seen in my life.  There was a lot of ice in the little side streams along the side of the road.  We also saw Huallata, or Andean Geese, which are pretty interesting birds, as they mate for life.  If one of them dies, the other dies.

Our decent from high elevation to Ayacucho was pretty much the same as the rest of our drive.  I actually fell asleep for about an hour.  But we made it to Ayacucho in a little over five hours and checked into Hotel Santa Rosa.  Hotel Santa Rosa has a gorgeous plaza in the center with tons of plants growing in pots all over the place.  The rooms are standard, nothing to really write home about, but still a nice hotel.

We walked around the plaza a bit, then we went to Via Via Café and had some cervezas while overlooking the plaza.  After we wrapped up our happy hour, we found Pizzeria Italia and had some delicious, oven-fired pizza for dinner.

All-in-all, a fairly uneventful day.  Tomorrow we’re doing some control sampling in Ayacucho and will hopefully find some time to do some touristy things.

Day 8: I've left my tears on the mercury trail.

Today was a fun, but indescribably disgusting, sampling day.  We were able to sleep in a bit today before we packed up and hit the road, but trust me, we all needed the sleep after five intense sampling days.  So we picked Ruben up at his house, and headed to the river.  We stopped in the middle of the river, where I was the lucky team member to wash a t-shirt in the river.  Allow me to pause here and inform you that Huancavelica does not have a sewage treatment plant.  Everything flows directly into the river.  The hospital waste, especially, since it is discharged directly from the hospital into the river, right around the middle of town where I was wrist deep in the nastiest water I’ve ever seen.

Then we headed upstream to a fairly less populated area for more sampling and more t-shirt washing.  Not quite as bad, but the water was absolutely frigid.  Downstream, on the other hand, was the absolute worst.  It was smelly and gross and cold and disgusting and there aren’t enough negative words in any language to describe it.  My gag reflex has been hyperactive in the last six days here – and I don’t even have a weak stomach.

After the nasty sampling job was done, we drove up and up and up and up and up and up and up and up and up and up and up and up to the Santa Barbara mine.  You have to look at my pictures to understand my description here.  The small “town” area, if you will, around the mine is smaller than a quarter of a Walmart parking lot.  The mine entrance is smaller than an average garage door.  This area was responsible for the lives of countless miners, refiners, and residents of Huancavelica for hundreds of years.  Hundreds of years.  Standing on that ground literally brought tears to my eyes.  I keep saying I can’t put my experiences into words but I honestly can’t – especially not this one.  The emotions I felt standing at that mining site were fully unexpected and ranged from anger to sadness to guilt to anger again.

After the Santa Barbara mine, we drove Colonial Road a bit and then came back to town.  Nick, Ruben, and I went to the market, which was really like a flea market, but ended up buying a few things.  The evening was spent packing up samples, eating our last meal at El Hotel Presidente, and packing my suitcase.  Tomorrow we’re heading to Ayacucho to do some control sampling.  Adios Huancavelica!

Day 7: And just like that, we were done.

Today was our fourth and final community in the study.  We arrived at our location with plenty of time to setup before people arrived at the meeting, only to realize that no one was showing up (except one woman).  So, Nick, Susan, Ruben, Javier, John, Kety, their daughter, and myself packed up our equipment and sandwiches and started going door-to-door to recruit participants.  We managed to find our way into 15 homes, distributing our sandwiches to our would-have-been community meeting attendees.

The sampling itself seems to be less interesting to write about each day, since it’s exactly the same.  So I’ll write about some other interesting things instead.  We met a little boy named Jason, who walked into the area were sampling, pulled out his mathematics books, and started studying all by himself.  Absolutely adorable kid, and he was so motivated all by himself.  We saw the thermal baths in Huancavelica, just full of people – seems like an interesting experience but you couldn’t pay me to do that here.

Oh – another heartbreaking story I didn’t personally hear because I was inside filtering air, but I was told about it later.  In one home, the daughter was taking care of her mother, who was disabled and unable to walk.  The woman had lived there for what seemed like forever.  She was talking with Ruben and Javier and telling them her story (much like every other resident we met in Huancavelica) and she told them that her son was killed by the Shining Path when they came through terrorizing the city.  Can you imagine your life being so miserable: living in a less than desirable home and community, having to be carried around by your daughter, and having had a son killed by a terrorist group?  I was told she started to cry when she told her story, and honestly, who wouldn’t cry with her?

When we finished our last home of the study (insert hooray! here), we walked to where there was an old oven that had been reconstructed a few times.  Holy cow is really the only reaction I can give.  These things are massive stone structures, well engineered, high on the hillside – built hundreds of years ago.  I’ve modeled these sources for months now, and to see one in person was amazing.

Before dinner as a team, Ruben gave us each a book about archeology in Peru, in which he has written about Huancavelica.  John and Kety made Nick, Susan, and I each a mask with different personalities – handmade and hand painted and they are absolutely wonderful gifts.  These gestures were completely unexpected and very much appreciated.

And that was our last day of sampling homes in Huancavelica.  I’m so sad to be leaving these people and to not have answers for them right now or to have any way to help them improve their quality of life.  Someday I’ll be back and I’ll have an answer and I’ll have a way to make the difference in their life that they so desperately need.

Day 6: And then, the lamb peed on the floor...

Another long day has come and gone here in Huancavelica.  Our day started off with an interesting community meeting.  We showed up to by far the best community center we’ve been to and set everything up and no one showed up.  So after waiting for a while and trying to recruit people off the street, we decided to go door to door and find participants.  Just a side note: in Huancavelica, the women are the dominant person in the households, making the decisions, since they take care of the homes and children and spend a majority of their time in the homes.  In today’s community, there were many women who were hired to work in the construction of water and drainage for a project occurring in the neighborhood.  Because it was a Friday and they had to work, we believe we lost a lot of participants there.

About halfway through sampling our first home, we were informed that we had about a dozen people waiting for us in the community center.  So we finished the home and headed back for take two of community presentation number three.  The turnout the second time around was much better: 28 adults, 12 children, a dog, and two lambs.  Yes, I said lambs.  The dog in attendance was the keeper of the lambs and herded them around and kept them out of trouble.  Towards the end of the meeting, as one of the lambs returned from outside, it decided to pop a squat and pee on the floor.  Susan and I had to do all we could not to laugh too hard during the meeting.

We recruited many participants for our study and were able to sample all 15 homes today, although the process took a bit longer than yesterday.  The community had many, many interesting animals we saw today: cats, dogs, lambs, sheep, chickens, roosters, ducks, rabbits, pretty much anything that can fit in a house was there.  One woman was ready to give me her puppy because it was adorable and I enjoyed it so much, and I think she was only half kidding in her offer for me to take it.

It’s not getting easier to walk into the homes of people here and see how they live and hear their stories.  It’s absolutely heartbreaking the way these people live.  They are the nicest people in the world (at least to us) and they have absolutely nothing.  They’re embarrassed to let us into their kitchens and bedrooms to take samples, but there is not a chance in the world that someone could judge these people.  They do the best they can with what they have, right down to keeping every single scrap of food (I can’t count the number of bones in kitchens and vegetable and fruit peels fed to animals).  I’m not sure how I’m going to readjust to the consumerist, selfish, judgmental American lifestyle when I get back.  I can already see myself getting on people’s nerves with my references to Peru when they buy a $6 Frappuccino or $80 pair of tennis shoes, or when they throw away leftover food just because they don’t want to eat the same thing tomorrow or when they take for granted the ability to use a toilet, take a shower, and have running water.

Tomorrow is our last big sampling day in Huancavelica, as Sunday is only a half day of sampling thus far (assuming we stay motivated and finish the entire community tomorrow).  Fifteen homes in one day is definitely rough, especially without a bathroom to use, but it’s worth it because, in all honesty, how can you say no to people who are begging you to come test their homes?

To correct an earlier post: I did not, in fact, stand face-to-face with the Santa Barbara Hill, although I swear someone had told me that’s where we were.  We’ll be checking out the mine on Sunday and doing some sampling, so I’ll repost exactly what I said before when I actually experience that.

Day 5: The most productive day in the history of productivity.

Today we held our second community meeting.  The turn out was incredible – more than 30 adults showed up.  People were extremely interested and it was very easy to recruit the 15 households we needed.  We finished up the second community meeting much earlier than the first and began sampling pretty early in the day.  We’ve all hit a pretty good groove for our individual roles in the sampling protocol so we can do a house in 15 to 20 minutes, unless the homeowners have a lot of questions or make a lot of conversation – but that’s part of the process.

The day went by pretty quickly.  By lunch time we had already completed 9 homes, so we scarfed down some granola bars while climbing the hills and made it through all 15 houses by early afternoon.  The homes were fairly close to one another in this community, so we didn’t spend as much time walking between households.  We weren’t chased by any dogs today, mostly because Nick asked the participants at the community meeting to ensure their dogs wouldn’t eat us when we went to their houses.

The hills upon which these homes are built are incredibly steep.  It was difficult hiking, not really walking, with unstable footing and high altitude making it even more challenging.  We were pretty much climbing the foot of the mountain.  The people who live in the homes bound up and down the hills with absolutely no fear, hardly even looking where they are going.

The most touching, tragic moment of the day was at one of our last houses.  As we were taking our samples from a house high on the hillside, the woman began to tell us how every time it rains, the water from the mountain side runs down into their homes (and we could clearly see the evidence of worn away dirt and rock).  She then told us that there have been many landslides, the worst of which was this past January.  She pulled out photos of the damage, and there was a boulder the size of her home that had crashed through her home, causing indescribable amounts of damage.  Susan later told me that the woman had said she was afraid to sleep on night that it rains, in case another boulder slides down the hillside and into her home.  The photograph was enough to bring anyone to tears.  These people already live lives that are miserable compared to anywhere else in the world I have ever been, and they have an added fear of giant boulders crushing them and their homes in their sleep.  It’s absolutely heartbreaking.

Other highlights of my day that made me smile included: French toast at breakfast, a girl in one of the homes giving Susan and I each a rose, visiting a daycare full of adorable children, and the joy on the faces of the children to whom we gave our leftover biscuits from breakfast.  Tomorrow we’re off to the third community and I absolutely cannot wait.

Day 4: Attack dogs, river mud, Santa Barbara Hill, oh my!

I didn’t get a chance to post an entry yesterday because it was a long, but extremely productive day.

Our day started out back in Ascención, finishing up the last seven homes in that community.  We started trekking around the neighborhood, going door to door to recruit people, since some of the folks who had signed up the previous day weren’t home (it was the Founder’s Day holiday after all).  The houses were much smaller than the previous day, with all five of us barely being about to squeeze into the room to take our samples.  The most memorable of these small rooms was probably about halfway through the day and the room itself was only about 5 and a half feet high, with the door way being even less than that (I hit my head three times – which never happens to someone my height in the States when you walk out of a room).  We saw plenty of chickens, cats, and of course dogs throughout the day.  At one point, as we were walking to a home up never-ending hills, we were surrounded by dogs at all points of exit from the T in the street.  Luckily, the Peruvian woman who owned the home we were trying to get to was our shield from the barking, growling attack dogs.  I’m starting to think I should have splurged on the Rabies series before I left…

After a delicious and much-earned lunch, we set out to sample along a transect in Huancavelica.  We took a lot of soil samples, and one sediment sample so far, which was the most interesting of all of them.  Susan and I, with Nick, Ruben, and Javier’s help, climbed down a pile of garbage (I’m not kidding, wait until you see the picture) to a shit-of-all-types river bank, put on our gloves, and got into that smelly sediment for the good of science.  We both nearly threw up from the smell.  I keep saying I wish I could bottle up smells and bring them home for people, but that one I would only keep as a memory of that experience.  In the same journey, I stood face-to-face with the Santa Barbara Hill, where the mercury was mined (although, I was on the non-mining side of the hill) in the colonial period, and the pictures don’t even come close to capturing the steepness of the mountain.  What an unbelievable moment – to finally see the place that was the very beginning of our research 400 years ago.

Today is our second community meeting, then we’re going to head straight into sampling as quickly as possible.  Many, many more homes to go!

Day 3: When life gives you lemons, you better be damn happy you at least have lemons.

Today was the first day on the ground in Huancavelica.  We held our first community meeting this morning, and the work it took for that to be successful can only be described as a learning process.  We arrived at the location a bit after 9:00am and we had a projector waiting for us.  The only problem was that there was no where to project and no power supply.  So luckily, Ruben, our organizer, recruited some buddies and they worked on the electrical situation (which can only politely be described as the worst fire hazard I have ever seen) while Susan and I hung some sheets of paper on a brick wall to project the presentation on.  The turn out was surprising – 21 adults, 12 children, a dog, a cat, and a chicken.  Yes, animals attended too.  Mercury affects every species, after all.  Nick gave a wonderful presentation to the community, and the people asked extremely intelligent questions about the mercury in the community and its effects.  We quickly and easily recruited our first 15 homes in the community and, to our surprise, began sampling as soon as the sandwiches and drinks were gone.

I won’t talk about each individual house or family, as that could take days to type and far too many entries to capture in a respectable way.  The homes, in general, have a main plaza that ranges in size from an average living room to an entry hallway, with rooms and sometimes even more than one household off the main plaza.  Generally, the main plaza has no roof and is fairly exposed to the elements.  The rooms range from one small room that serves as a bedroom, kitchen, and living room all in one to separate rooms with different purposes.  The homes typically have dirt floors and walls, although some floors have been covered with wood and some walls have been plastered and painted.  Children, dogs, chickens, cats, and cuy (which are pretty much guinea pigs) roam together in the house.  Meats hang in open areas to be dried.  Pretty much everything a family needs happens in the home.  There are no closed windows and the doors are often boards or metal in a door-like shape and there’s no heating in the homes.

Our sampling team was pretty efficient in collecting samples.  Nick was in charge of the Jerome, then helped Ruben and Javier collect adobe and soil samples.  I was responsible for the particulate air filters and Susan collected dust samples.  The families asked a lot of questions and offered a lot of information to us that will be helpful in relating concentrations to exposure.  We completed eight homes today and would have probably been able to complete two additional homes had it not started to rain.

After the rain started, we headed back to the hotel, bought some bottled water, had a drink or two, set up for tomorrow’s expedition, and had dinner in front of the fireplace in the lobby of the hotel.  Tomorrow is Founder’s Day in Huancavelica, so we aren’t having a community meeting but we’re finishing up our sampling in Ascención, then doing some satellite samples.

Today really put my life into perspective.  I am eternally grateful for everything I have and will never again in my life complain about any “awful” thing that happens to me.  I’m truly blessed, as is every other person in my life.  Once you see my pictures, you’ll understand what I mean, but only in part – to truly grasp the reality of Huancavelicans, you have to see it for yourself.  These are the most positive, welcoming, friendly people I have ever met in my life and they have next to nothing.  Just know that when you lay down in your bed tonight, or crank up your air conditioning, or turn on your television, or get into your car – do not ever take it for granted.  Not even for a second. 

Day 2: Cómo se dice "Never a Dull Moment"

Today was muy interestante.  We started our journey towards Huancavelica around 7:30am and stopped less than an hour later to have the muffler soldered.  The “auto shop” had a pit dug into the ground that you drove your car over and then the mechanic climbed into the pit and soldered our muffler.  In the 30 or so odd minutes we spent standing on the side of the road under gray clouds, we saw some random chickens, a few motor bike taxis, and countless trucks honking at us as we took pictures.

Once we were on the road again, we stopped about 30 minutes later at Tambo Colorado, an Incan ruin site.  It was absolutely breathtaking, with the fog lifting from the mountains in the distance and admiring architecture from hundreds of years ago.  The adobe bricks were well crafted and stunning, and the paint they used (which I’m convinced was derived from cinnabar, although I suppressed my urge to vandalize Peruvian history and scrape some off for analysis) was still obvious today.  It was a true labyrinth and I’ll be the first to admit I lost my way more than once.  But being that Nick, Susan, Javier, and I were the only ones there, it wasn’t much of a problem.

Back on the road again…we saw llamas and alpacas wandering the countryside.  They’re absolutely gorgeous animals, but stubborn as all hell when you try to get them to move out of the road.  Ichu was growing like crazy everywhere you turned and it was hard to imagine that smelting operations had once eliminated it from every surface.  We stopped at a small roadside store to buy bread for our tuna/peanut butter sandwiches and I had a glimpse at a rural Peruvian home as I attempted to use the bathroom, but quickly realized the smell was far too overbearing and the skill required was beyond my capabilities.  So we set off with our bread for lunch and to feed the stray dogs.

About four hours outside of Huancavelica, Javier, in a not-so-calm voice, informed us we had a flat tire.  Not only did we have a flat tire, we had a tire that had blown out in seven, yes seven, different places.  After some scuffling with the tire, a slight amount of shivering, and lots of dust, we all said prayers that the weak-looking front tire didn’t blow out on us and that we found a place to inflate the slightly flat tire we had just put on (which, by the way, we did, and had time to feed a lonesome stray dog a piece of bread).

About 30 minutes outside of Huancavelica, the snow that Nick promised we wouldn’t see started to fall.  It was cold, wet, and hail-like.  Not at all my ideal weather for August.  But in the snow, we saw more alpacas and llamas, and a fox, who was gorgeous and also enjoyed our bread.  We drove the remaining 55 kilometers on the one lane, drop to your death road without any further problems and arrived in Huancavelica a little tired but mostly alright.

When we pulled into town, there was a band playing on the main plaza (which is right across the street from our hotel) and a massive amount of construction occurring.  Not only was the band playing then, but there’s still music now, and apparently it’s a talent show as a part of the Huancavelica founding celebration and it will continue until 1:00am, and there’s more to come tomorrow (oh, goody).  Dinner at the “steak house” wasn’t that bad.  La crema de espárragos sopa es muy delicioso.  And the fact that my dinner cost about $2, minus a beer, didn’t hurt either.

The town itself is gorgeous and the people are fairly friendly.  It’s really cold.  I’m wearing long underwear, a sweatshirt, and sweat pants (thanks, Jeff!) and I’m still freezing.  I’m going to put my earplugs in and try to get some sleep.  Tomorrow is our first community meeting and sampling day and I’m excited and can’t wait to see how it goes.  More detail on Huancavelica will come tomorrow when I’m not so sleepy and I have a day with minimal travel.  Adiós amigos!

Day 1: The Day That Lasted Forever.

After 27 hours of travel, I have finally (and safely) made it from Pittsburgh International Airport to Paracas, Peru.  My time in the airport in Pittsburgh was uneventful, as I had hoped for.  Upon arriving at JFK in New York, I found out that Pittsburgh had printed an incorrect boarding pass and that I would have to wait in line at the yet-to-open LAN ticket counter, behind a line of people that I’m pretty sure were cussing in Spanish.  Luckily, I had a nine hour layover and wasn’t in much of a hurry.  I perused the endless duty free shops at the airport, managing to hold onto all of my money, minus a bottle of Tanqueray and an $8 Sam Adams Summer Ale.  When the plane was finally about to board at 11:45pm, I was dreading the thought of a seven hour flight on a chilly plane, but quickly drifted to sleep and only woke up before the most stressful part of my journey began.

My flight landed in Lima 40 minutes early, which I assumed would be plenty of time to collect my absurd amount of luggage and filter through customs.  I was told by many people that the button at customs typically turns green and rarely turns red and you usually don’t have any problems.  Not only did I see all five people in front of me get a red light, but those people giving advice weren’t carrying an odd-looking mercury vapor analyzer case among their luggage.  I was (un)lucky enough to get a red light, have all four bags scanned, and spent the first hour of my time in Peru explaining that I was lending this gawky yellow piece of equipment to a colleague to collect air samples in Huancavelica.  (Remember, the only Spanish I know well is how to ask for a bathroom, order a drink, and how to sing “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall.”)

After a nice chunk of change in a refundable deposit and a very frustrating Google search with the customs lady, I was free to find my driver.  Poor guy had been at the airport since 6:30am, and I didn’t make it through customs until close to 7:45am.  Jorge was the best darn driver anyone could have asked for though.  He drove me from Lima to Paracas, a four hour drive along the coast, and pointed out endless places of interest.  Lima is an interesting, and rather scary, place – houses are dilapidated, people are roaming the streets without looking for cars first, and no one can drive like a normal person (North Carolina is going to look like a driver’s ed class compared to today).  The coast in Lima is amazing – there is a lot of construction to make beaches by removing the pebbles and replacing it with sand and make it a more park-like atmosphere.  It sort of reminded me of the areas I visited in La Jolla in California in March, but closer to the water.  There was a gray cloud over the entire city and it reminded me very much of February in Pittsburgh.

Further along the drive, I watched broken house after broken house roll by my window as Jorge explained to me that these were areas that were affected by the 7.8 earthquake that hit in 2007.  What remained of the houses looked like if the wind blew the wrong way they would just crumble.  People were still living in and near them.  Laundry was hung on lines on the roofs.  Stray dogs poked in the trash for scraps of food.  People gathered in the streets around food carts, bundled up to shield them from the chilly breeze and drizzling rain.  I don’t know why it always takes a foreign country to remind me how truly blessed I am in life.

I also learned that a majority of the drive looked like massive deserts (think: Middle East sand dunes) because there were only seven rivers along the coast.  The areas around those rivers were abundant in agriculture: oranges, tangerines, avocados, maize, asparagus, and a lot of other things that Jorge mentioned and I can’t spell but I plan to find and try before I leave.  The small produce stands along the roads screamed my name, but I was much too tired to barter in Spanish.

After four hours with Jorge as a wonderful guide to eastern Peru, I made it to the Doubletree in Paracas.  I expected a standard hotel, considering the surrounding area we drove through was much like the other neighborhoods we had seen along the way.  Boy, was I wrong.  As soon as the bellhop led me out of the lobby towards my room, I knew I was in for a treat.  There’s a giant pool that all of the rooms face, with a pool bar on one side.  And if you’re lucky enough (like me) you have an ocean front view.  My bedroom and patio both face the ocean, where there’s a slight breeze, warmth from the sun, and the perfect view of sailboats, pelicans, and mountains in the distance.  Paracas is truly a gorgeous little town on the coast of Peru, and is an ideal destination for some relaxation.

I've already taken a bunch of pictures, which I'll post on Facebook.  Nick and Susan should be here in a few hours and tomorrow I think we’re making the trek to Huancavelica.  Hotel Presidente, here I come!