Crazy times!!

What probably hasn’t even caused a ripple back home has brought this nation to a complete standstill. The main road between Lima and Huancayo has been blocked for the last two weeks by angry farmers that are protesting to the Governments selling of Peruvian land to Chile. This means that the usual bus trip (taking 6-7 hours) has been extended to over 17 hours in some cases as only trickles of traffic are allowed through. As well as this, today has unofficially been declared a public holiday by all workers in a strike against the Government that is doing nothing about minimum wages, and increasing cost of living. This means no cars on the roads, though if caught driving, be expectant to see rocks hurled in your direction. No shops are open (officially), but some are still doing business under the table. Because no buses or taxis are around, it is nearly impossible to make it to the orphanage today, in what is normally a 20-minute trip across town by car, so they told me not to bother going in today.

The glacier was amazing. We left at 6am on Saturday morning, and got taken to the drop off point by around 7:30, ordered some lunch, and then set off on the hike. Imagine how difficult exercise is at 3200m in Huancayo. Now add another 2000m on top of that. Yup, almost died. We had to break the trek into about 94 sections, as our group stopped in what seemed like every hundred metres or so. But the view? Priceless. Photos don’t do justice. About half way up the glacier we were given a plastic bag, and allowed to slide down a couple of hundred metres. Me and my naivety didn’t expect the ‘snow’ to hurt if you fell off. It probably wouldn’t of if it were snow. Let me tell you…ICE HURTS!. I decided to push the limits are started at a near vertical point to maximize speed, and certainly paid the price for it when I came off the bag and got my own personal henna tattoo in the form of ice rash down my forearm.

On Sunday we went to a football game, finally! Lima vs Huancayo in what I understand as the national league…sort of. The standard of the game, not fantastic, but enjoyable nonetheless. The attitude of the players, nothing short of the stereotypical pre-Madonnas that South America is known for. The atmosphere, ish. Because there was only 10,000 in the crowd, it wasn’t amazing. Sadly, the game got out of hand, and quite dangerous. Team Lima took a 20 minute half time so when they walked out of the tunnel, they were met with an angry crowd that decided to show their disgust with the throwing of fruit, and rocks. This continued throughout the 2nd half with fans bombarding the away bench with anything they could lay their hands on. The worst part? Our seats were right in front of their dugout, so we were directly in the firing line. When a rock missed one of the girls heads by a matter of inches we decided to leave. It was 0-0 at that stage, though I don’t know how it finished.

The new orphanage is a joy. The kids are lovely, and I played with them for hours on my first couple of days. Volleyball with the girls, and who would of thought, football with the boys. This was in between shelling beans for 3 hours each day for what becomes lunch the following day. Construction was meant to start today, but with the strike, I will start tomorrow hopefully. Turns out I will be rebuilding the food storage areas. The food stored? Guinea Pig.

Safety is now a serious concern within the house. One volunteer was beaten last week, and has been sent back to Lima because the hospital here cannot treat his fractured skull. Our homestay Dad had an attempted mugging a couple of days ago, and though he is a trained Karate instructor and fought them off, he broke his hand in the process. On top of this, a group of us were at the out the other night, and 4 girls decided to walk home…and although nothing serious happened, there were chased by a drunkard. Needless to say, times here are getting a little dodgy, and appropriate steps have been implemented to ensure our safety…curfews, no solo journeys, etc.

I forgot to mention last time about the dogs. They are everywhere. Literally every street you turn down you are guaranteed to see a couple of stray ‘perros’ walking around. I think nothing of it now, but I remember when I first got here I was amazed. Rarely do people have pets here, because its hard enough to make enough money to get by as it is.

Interesting times ahead I am sure. A group of us are trekking into the Amazon this weekend for 3 days. I mainly want to be able to claim that I have been into the jungle, because I don’t know if I will make it down to Machu Piccu on this trip, and all other tourism is days on a bus away.

Thanks for the read. Hope you are enjoying the posts as much as I am enjoying writing them. I should probably get outside and work on my tan now, or roll in some dirt. People still stare and call me gringo, so I gotta do something about that…kind of like growing a beard so you don’t get ID’d getting into a pub I guess.

Random way to finish, anyways…