This morning at 9 AM I met up with Rebecca, Lauren, and McClain in the Parque de la Amistad in Santa Ursula to go take advantage of the tourist tickets we bought and go see some ruins in and around Cusco. Long day! We didn’t get back until four! So we took the Leones combi right into the center and when we got out I noticed that the doors to the cathedrals were open for the very first time that I’ve been in Cusco. We got closer to look inside and heard beautiful singing. I love choral music so I really wanted to go inside. However, there was a man at the door doing, basically, racial profiling. He only let in Peruvian looking people and prohibited any white people from entering. I found this annoying since I just wanted to appreciate the singing, but in a way it makes sense. The main industry here is tourism and it is, afterall, a working church. I’d be annoyed if I were a Peruvian going to my weekly mass and a bazillion white tourists were being loud and taking photos during the mass. So I was annoyed, but I understood. From there we headed up on our steep hike, about half an hour or so, up to Sacsaywaman. I have to give a presentation about this site later this week, so I can update you all on it later on, although I’ll probably get most of my information from Wikipedia. Anyway, the interesting thing, I think, about this particular Incan site is that the walls are formed in the shape of teeth. Cusco was originally constructed in the form of a puma and Sacsaywaman formed the teeth of the puma. Those Incans were pretty spectacular architects and stone masons. All their walls are built at an angle and the doors are trapezoidal shapes to resist seismic activity. So cool. That’s why they’re still around! However large it might still seem, my Peru book says that what remains is only 20 % of the original structure.
When we were there we met a Johnny Depp-esque fellow and he, obviously an American who knew no Spanish, seized the opportunity to talk to us. He was loaded down with sound equipment and we learned that he was there with an NBC show as of now called “Legend Quest,” and that he had been traveling around Europe, South America, and Northern Africa fro two months with the cast and crew of this show. He seemed a bit jaded. However, he said that he’d majored in English at UPenn, gone on to be a lawyer for four years and hated it, moved to Los Angeles and became a sound guy. His next job is to film Roseanne Barr for ten weeks in Hawaii. Evidently she bought a Macadamia nut farm. So odd!
We found some big rock slides and I slide down one right into a large mud puddle. Urgh. From there we walked to Q’enqo, then took a bus to Puka Pukara and Tambomachay. Puka Pukara was like a customs stop before entering Cusco, which was considered very sacred. This guy offered to be our guide at Puka Pukara, and though he told us some interesting facts (Quechua speakers call Spanish Alqosimi, or dog's language), he kept asking us if we had cell phones and if we should get together. We passed on that idea. Tambomachay was just a bunch of fountains, although according to the creepy guide the Inca class used Tambomachay as a fountain of youth and only they could bathe there. Before getting to the fountains you had to pass through a gauntlet of really aggressive vendors. On the way home we found the most useful bus in all of Peru, went to El Molino to buy some movies, then went home to rest.
Tonight my host dad and I took Sebas on a walk around Santa Ursula. Wow! Parents must spend all of their time worrying! I nearly had a heart attack about five time in the course of an hour walking with him!
xoxo,
Claire
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