As usual, a few miscellaneous notes before I get into the titular topic...
Travel fashion: I left my black cashmere cardigan in Juan's car at Cali airport (Juan had generously offered to give me a ride), so I was without one of my three long-sleeve layers for several days in Lima. In fact, I don't think I mentioned this before, but I wore the same tank top + thermal shirt combo EVERY DAY there, until the last full day, when I bought a black poncho sweater thing. So between the black poncho and the Peruvian hat I bought right before the Rainbow Mountain hike, my wardrobe is slowly morphing to a more South American style, and I am pretty into it.
Spanish update: I am now at 44% fluency according to Duolingo. I am going to try to get to 100% by the end of my travels in Bolivia (the third and final Spanish-speaking country on the itinerary). However, I'm pretty sure that 100% fluency in Duolingo only realistically represents about 30% conversational fluency. Maintaining the progress that I've made so far once I leave Spanish-speaking places and return home is something I'm a bit concerned about. I know I can always try to incorporate daily Duolingo refreshers into my routine, but without needing Spanish on a regular basis, I just know that motivation is likely to fade. Ideally, I could use it at my new job (whatever that may be), but if not, I may just have to keep scheduling extended travel adventures to Spanish-speaking places (domestic and international) to hold onto some of it.
Casa Concha museum: This museum is dedicated specifically to the history of and scientific research focused on Machu Picchu, so I figured it was a must-see before next weekend, when I'll be going to Machu Picchu myself. I took notes throughout the museum, but I'm going to hold onto that information until the MP blog post after I visit the site, because I am a very experienced and organized blogger now!
Cusco: I am really glad that my energy has been restored since those first few days in Cusco, because I love this place. It is so much fun to walk around in! There's always something going on at the main plaza, which is only a block away. My stupid phone can't take that many photos but it is such a lovely city -- cobblestone streets everywhere, and stairways leading up to hidden streets full of more restaurants, shops, travel agencies, etc, and llamas all over. They're basically like squirrels in the PNW, but even more common. Dogs wander around, very well behaved. I asked Di (my AirBNB host) if they were mostly strays or if they belonged to people, and she said most have owners who just let them out into the city for the day. I love it.
Sacsayhuaman: Sacsayhuaman (pronounced much like "sexy woman") is a site of ruins within walking distance, and Di recommended it. I got there, and the ticket was 70 soles (~$23 USD), or 40 soles for students. However, my international student card proved no good again, because the discount only applies to students 25 years old and younger. So I said FINE- I don't need your Sacsayhuaman; i've got all the sexy woman I need right here! *gestures to self*
Fortunately, I was able to catch a glimpse of the ruins on my way up to the Cristo Blanco. Pretty cool, but nothing is going to compare to Machu Picchu so I figure I'll just save my money.
Cristo Blanco: Another tourist attraction very near to Sacsayhuaman is the "White Christ," or Cristo Blanco (and it is free!), so I did that instead. It's basically an enormous white statue of Jesus on a hill overlooking the city. Here are some photos from the top:
And a few from the walk back down:
Julie
My sister, Therese, has a client whose niece, Julie, is working in Peru right now through a special global health program offered through her employer, Merck Pharmaceuticals, and she helped put me in touch with her. On Friday morning, I had breakfast with Julie and her coworker Patricia, and even though the "your aunt is a client of my sister's at a gym in Spokane" connection was a bit of a stretch as a reason to meet somebody, it didn't seem to matter at all -- Julie was incredibly warm and friendly, and eager to provide any travel advice that I might want. Their project is focused on improving cervical cancer screening access to women who live in the highlands of Cusco, since Cusco has one of the highest rates of cervical cancer in the world. This is due to the fact that women living in the super-rural highland communities simply can't get to clinics easily for preventive services, so they aren't able to catch cervical cancer before it gets so bad that they start experiencing symptoms, at which point, it is often already at Stage Four.
In any case, it was great to connect with a fellow MPH and start to think a bit about what my own career may look like once I get back. Julie mentioned that one of their group's primary suggestions to the clinics here will be to establish a volunteer program, which would require a bilingual full-time volunteer coordinator.... and to let her know if I would be interested. I am still pretty set on finding employment in the PNW somewhere, but if the rest of you know any recent college graduates who would be interested in living and working in Cusco, learning Spanish, and improving health services for the rural highland communities, let me know!
Renaldo
I met Renaldo when walking through San Blas neighborhood. He was sitting on the side of the street and said, "buenas tardes" and I said "buenas tardes" -- a common interaction that doesn't often lead to anything more -- but then he stood to introduce himself and asked if I wanted to stay for a bit and talk. Why not?
He was staying at the hostel right across the street, and invited me to join him for some tea. This tea was prepared by pouring hot water over some twigs, so I had no idea what it would taste like, but it turned out to be quite minty!
So we drank hot twig water at his hostel for a few minutes before some of his room mates showed up. There were three of them, and they had all recently completed a yoga teacher training together. One woman was from Seattle (recently moved to NYC), the man was from Australia, and the other woman was from Tanzania (she was convinced that she and I had met before, but the only place we could figure it might have happened would have been in San Francisco, and I don't recall meeting anyone like her there... I think maybe I just have a familiar-looking face?)
Renaldo had a bag of Huachuma (also known as "San Pedro," derived from the San Pedro cactus). The three other travelers bought some from him, which they planned to take at some point on their hike to Machu Picchu. The huachuma was in powder form, and Renaldo told them to put two spoonfuls into a glass of non-acidic juice for one dose (they had bought enough for two doses each). From what I can gather, huachuma is a bit like ayahuasca in the sense that it is meant to be taken with intentions for spiritual enlightenment, but the effects last longer (up to 14 hours), and the primary effect is slightly different. Whereas ayahuasca often produces visions, huachuma is not so much a hallucinogenic; rather, it slows or stops your normal stream of thought, which allows people to reconnect to their spirituality and to nature. Here's a brief description of what it's like to be on huachuma from a website I found:
Things appear different in the new worlds travelled. Colours and light radiate differently and seem unreal, often appearing more like an energy, rather than a tangible entity. Users also report meeting up with deceased family members from the past who offer them guidance and take the time to talk about the memories long since forgotten, but there really are no bounds to what each individual could discover for themselves in the moments of alone time during the journey.
I don't think I'll be trying this one (I think three ayahuasca ceremonies will probably be sufficient to satisfy my curiosity about spiritually-oriented drugs from the Amazon and Andes), but I hope the others enjoy their experiences with huachuma!
At one point, the woman from Tanzania pulled out a small bottle of perfumed oil and let us all put some on our hands. I followed Renaldo's lead, who rubbed the oil into his hands and then held his hands up to his face, smelled the perfume and moved his hands around his head. I learned a moment later that the perfume was meant to be aura-cleansing, so that explained why everyone moved their hands around their heads while they smelled the oil.
Travelers really do tend to be mega hippies, but I'm not judging one bit. I like it. I've always been drawn to spiritual practices and when people talk about the healing properties of some smell or food or plant or even certain movements (like yoga, tai chi, etc.), I hear truth in what they're saying. Pretty much anytime someone wants to convince me that everything is connected and energy is a force that guides everything and we can harness it in particular ways for better health and happiness, I am completely open to it, because I already believe all those things to a certain extent. I love when science can contribute information to explain how it all actually works, but honestly, scientific evidence isn't entirely necessary before I can get on board with the nature-spirituality-connection stuff.
Which leads me to Jasmine.
Jasmine
I had lunch today at a vegan restaurant that Di recommended to me my first day in Cusco. I sat at a communal table, across from a young blonde woman with a septum piercing and tattoos on both arms. We mostly ignored each other (she had a book, I did what I could on my phone with no wifi). Once we got our food, though, we started talking. I learned that she was from Spain, and had been traveling for about a year (mostly in South America) with someone who started out as her boyfriend, then they broke up and continued traveling as friends, but they'd recently gone their separate ways. She is an actual vegan (I was just going to Green Point for a "pure" meal prior to the volcanic water purge day tomorrow), and had a lot of interesting things to say about illness (esp. cancer), food, and energy. For example, she told me about someone who, when asked why she wouldn't eat meat, said, "the last couple hours of that animal's life were lived in fear, and so that meat is full of fear, and I don't want it in my body."
Wow -- there's probably some truth in that regarding the hormones that flood an animal's system when they realize they're about to be butchered. I don't think there's anything wrong with eating meat per se, but the meat industry is problematic on a lot of levels, and I wonder about how my own long-term health could be improved by cutting WAY back on meat. I don't think I'll ever cut it out entirely (I want to be able to have a good steak on special occasions, for sure), but perhaps I can develop a vegetarian diet for my day-to-day meals.... perhaps.
Jasmine also said that all humans develop cancer (actual tumors, not just cancerous cells) somewhere between 8 to 10 times in their lives, but their bodies are just able to regain energetic balance and heal themselves so the cancer never gets detected, and never needs to be treated. She even argued that people are often over-treated for cancer that might otherwise heal itself, simply because they underwent a screening during a time when there was a tumor present. I mean... that's a big "might" in terms of one's body taking care of a tumor on its own, but I see what she's saying. Elaborating on these ideas, she also mentioned that vegans heal these tumors faster than those who eat meat, because of the impact of meat on a person's energetic flow and balance (related to the chemicals and "fear" in meat, I assume). After her time in Cusco, she's going to study biomagnetism, or "meridian therapy," at a place called Kauna.
So that was Part One of our conversation. Part Two went in a very different direction.
She asked about the US presidential election, and I said I hadn't met anyone in my travels so far who supported Trump...and then she said that she did. This kinda blew my mind -- I really wasn't expecting this vegan traveler hippie woman to be right-leaning, but as we talked more, it started to make sense. Basically, her rationale was this:
1. Clinton has ties to the Middle East that provide incentive for continued war there, and it's devastating the world. Trump might stop it; Clinton will not. I made a note, and intend to look further into these ties and whether continued war is truly the implication...
2. Government has gotten too big and we need to start depending less on it, and creating sustainable communities for ourselves, living off the land. I have mixed thoughts/feelings about this, since I still retain faith in the government to provide necessary and valuable services, but I also do like the idea of people becoming more self-sustaining and forming more intimate communities where people take care of each other rather than depending on large-scale government systems to take care of basic needs.
3. The US owes so much money, and it doesn't make sense when we could be producing so much more and "watering our own lawn," as she put it. She thinks Trump would negotiate better trade deals so that jobs would come back to the U.S. and we would stop importing so much in comparison to what we export, whereas Hillary will be too concerned with maintaining good diplomatic relations with other countries to negotiate trade policies that are better for the country. I don't really know enough about this one to comment, but it seems to be an issue of negotiating in our own self-interest vs. negotiating with the entire global economy in mind, and I honestly don't know which is the better way to go.
4. Clinton worships the devil. (At this point, Jasmine started losing some credibility with me, but I suppose anything is possible?) My response to this was that, even if this is true and Clinton is involved in devil worship, she will want her presidential legacy to be about the things she's campaigning for: debt-free college education, guaranteed paid family/maternity leave and other measures to improve work/life balance for families, getting the uber-wealthy to pay their fair share of taxes, investing in K-12 education, etc. I guess on some level I don't really care if she worships the devil as long as it doesn't interfere with her job. I'm also pretty sure she doesn't worship the devil.
5. The media is stacked against Trump. This is probably true. But then the question I wonder about is why? Is the implication that they are being paid by Clinton or Clinton supporters to make Trump look stupid for her benefit or do they just know that doing so will make for higher ratings?
So that was my lighthearted afternoon chat with a fellow traveler. I hope that my outlining this political conversation hasn't been off-putting to any of you; I know how difficult it is to talk about disagreements with political views without taking things personally, and that's why it's so hard to do it without getting emotional and/or defensive. At the end of the day most of us value and want the same things (autonomy, inner peace, connection, freedom, safety, health), and I want to be the type of person who is able to see the validity and common ground in the viewpoint of someone who disagrees with me. And on that note, please enjoy this delightful video by Kid President about how to disagree with people, which I saw on Facebook today:
Tomorrow will be my last day in Cusco. I will get up around 9:00 and meet the Etnikas Inca Medicine Healing Clinic people at 10:00am, and then they'll take us to a place to drink volcanic water, the mineral makeup of which will induce bodily "purification" through the purging of bodily waste, so.... that should be fun. I think afterward I'll treat myself to a massage so that my body is happy with me again before I come back to the house and start packing up for the actual retreat, which starts Monday.
I'm not sure if Etnikas has wifi, but I hope they do! If not, I'll be sure to call to let someone know I'm fine and safe the day after each ayahuasca ceremony (the ceremonies are on Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday). And of course, I will be blogging all about it :)