Oy! Peru! - June 28th, 2008

Howdyhowdy,

Just a quick note from Puno, a few hours across the Peruvian-Bolivian border. I had to make a day trip to refresh my thirty day visa for Bolivia, and sigh had to do it this way. Man Peru is expensive, or rather, I guess compared to Bolivia. But when I hear people at the market paying one dollar for five bananas, I tell you that is ´effin ridiculous expensive.

Now last night I managed to find myself swept up in the tides of South America, and stayed up past midnight to boot. I´ve been organizing a trip to a farm very very much in the middle of nowhere through my contact, Claudia, for a while. And finally last night we managed to meet up in El Alto, and then I managed to wrangle myself an invitation to her cousin´s graduation fiesta.

I cannot explain how very much I have been trying to attend a typical Bolivia fiesta. I didn´t have my camera, and wouldn´t have used it anyways, so I´ll try some imagery.

It works like this, imagine a rented hall, varying in quality, with several hundred very large bottles of Huari beer piled on tables sorrounded by dozens of family members. Picture all the teenage girls in club clothes, the men in suits, and of course, all the women in the standard Aymara apparel, but the flashier fiesta version, and everyone covered in white confetti.

Now there is a big space in the middle for dancing, and somewhere a DJ with the standard play list of traditional Bolivian dances. I haven´t mentioned this before, but if you go to a bumping club in most places in Bolivia, you´re going to be in for watching every single person partner up, and form giant lines facing each other, where upon everyone proceeds to dance the correct dance for the song playing. Whether it´s wacas or tomas, it´s insane to see teenagers dancing all night long to traditional, indigenous dances. I don´t mean to push the point, but it´s enthralling and a huge indicator of how powerful the culture still is.

Okay, so, moving on, don´t forget that every first sip of your drinks you need to pour a little out for Pachamama, the earth goddess, so the lino floor of the dance hall is just soaked. And so the scene is set for the standard Bolivian mass-drunkeness, something Jess and I had seen spilled into the streets often before, but had never been in on from the start. If you will please, imagine the lovely lady above, maybe twenty years older, drunk out of her mind like a fourteen year old girl and having the time of her life.

So the night grows on, the comradery between the family and the surprise gringo grows, jealous tensions flare a little at the end as some girls play who´s my man, and eventually I get the hang of the 3/3 beat and learn a few dances pretty well. I can´t say thanks to Claudia enough for such a wild and original night, her family is frankly incredible, and her mother can dance me under the table any day.

Well, I gotta go do something cheap, I might be going to the farm a week earlier than expected, this Wednesday. Oh, in case you´re wondering the farm is a three day trip into the Amazon, somewhere like here:

Hasta pronto,

Ñick