Something Unexpected

If the children I've seen playing in the street are any indication, badminton is popular in Beijing. I don't know why I find it surprising - maybe because I always imagined that the only people who play badminton have names like Percy or Cecil, and grew up attending posh schools in England set on large Victorian estates with extensive lawns, and wear bright white shoes with socks up to their knees when playing.

Then again, my mind should be a bit more open after Peru. I certainly didn't expect to come across kids playing impromptu matches of volleyball way up in small mountain towns. But it turns out the sport is all the rage there.

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Side note: I haven't been able to access my blog for most of the past couple weeks due to reasons unknown to me (China's censorship at work?), hence the silence. This and some subsequent posts should have been up here a while ago.

Third Time's a Charm

It became clear last night that my continuing lack of appetite and energy was not a holdover effect from the latest bout of fun with high altitude. After several trips to the bathroom produced unfortunate results, I realised my body had entered a competition to get sick as many times as possible on this vacation without first asking me what I thought of the idea.

So today, heading past living phone boxes - men and women charging by the minute to use the cellphones chained to their wrists - I went to the hospital to find out why my stomach was making life difficult. Tacna, being the southernmost city in Peru, is where "Chileans come for cheap medical and dental treatment," Anne's guide book informed me. "Perfect," I thought, "there's sure to be lots of high quality medical care available." I was happily ignorant that most of this was bound to be found in private clinics, rather than the general hospital I went to.

It's not easy for me to understand rapid Spanish, even less so when the goal is decoding a hospital bureaucracy where the first step is knowing to flag down a busy nurse who gives you a piece of paper to hand to a cashier in a separate part of the building, a place I discovered after stopping at 3 separate desks along the way.

However, as if someone on high was mocking me, one of the few words I did understand was "muestra". Knowing that "mostrar" means "to show", "muestra" struck fear into my heart. Sure enough, after a consultation with my dictionary, the English word "sample" materialised before my eyes. They needed me to collect a sample of what was causing my stomach so much difficulty, one of the least appealing things you can ask someone in a bad mood cause by lack of food to do. A mood enhanced after waiting outside the closed door of the testing lab, only to see a doctor open the door and walk in, revealing a lab technician behind the desk happily ignoring my repeated knocks.

I spent many subsequent hours bouncing between the consultation office, testing lab, cashier, and hospital pharmacy, where you must buy the relevant supplies and medication for the medical staff to administer you with. I also visited several pharmacies out front of the hospital, because obviously the hospital pharmacy itself shouldn't be expected to stock something so esoteric as a syringe.

Seeing my sour expression, the lady across the counter in one nearby pharmacy decided what I needed was cheering up, so she happily returned my syringe prescription with a needle, the size of which is commonly found in children's nightmares. I lugged it back to the hospital and gave it to a nurse who filled it with the medical fluids I had purchased and proceeded to inject me with it.

Over the course of the 5 or so minutes it took to expel the liquid into my arm, she told me how she hoped to visit the US one day, and how the US embassy had refused her visa request on a previous attempt. I listened sympathetically, while simultaneously hoping she wouldn't break the needle in anger at my country's refusal to let her in its borders.

I left the hospital with pills to take for 5 days, and a large drink meant to replenish lost vitamins and minerals. It tastes like a cross between liquorice and Gatorade, and I've taken to calling it "devil's brew".

The injection must have done some good as I have already regained the ability to eat more than a few bites of food, the disappearance of which handily undid in several days what took many months of sweat and toil in the gym to gain.

I topped the day off with a 1-2 knockout that started with a celebratory trip to the hairdresser's. I was asked to pick my haircut out of a magazine showing a multitude of hairstyles for men, all with so much oil they could have been sponsored by the Bush administration. As usual, my hair came out looking nothing like any of them, and for once I was glad.

I concluded with a wash at the hostel. The shower stall was the latest in a long line of whose designers omitted any kind of shelf, thereby assuming the washer possesses the abilities of a master circus juggler. As always, I opted to store soap and razor outside on the sink, in the process making the floor soaking wet. It's a technique guaranteed to make yourself known, if not popular, amongst fellow patrons. Other entries in this category include donning a dress for a pub quiz in the first year of university and clapping loudly at what I mistakenly thought was the end of a live classical concert.

Now feeling better, tomorrow's plan is to cross the border to Chile in the morning. Then I'll prepare to traverse the northern region, alternately described to me as containing "nothing", "desert", and "absolutely nothing".

Earthquake

I was sitting at a cafe this morning, waiting for my breakfast of scrambled eggs to arrive, when I heard screams, the ground started wobbling, and plaster dust started falling from the walls. Earthquakes are a startling experience. I heard later this one was a 5.something on the Richter scale.

(I know, 4 posts in a day is a bit of an overload. Unfortunately that's the price you pay for subscribing to what is not only my communication with the world while travelling, but my diary too.)

Update: A news piece on the Spanish web informed me it was a 5.8, with the epicentre being a bit south of Arequipa.

A Change of Plans

Two days ago Anne and I spent 7 hours on a bus getting to Lake Titicaca. At 3,800m, it's the highest navigable lake in the world. If that's ringing alarm bells, there's a good reason for it. Yes, I got altitude sickness. And I did what I do best in that situation. Spent the night throwing up.

We took the first bus out the next morning, back to Arequipa and a comfortable 2,300m altitude. I'm not sure what caused the problems at Titicaca as I haven't had problems since the Cotopaxi adventure, even in places where others have had headaches. But for now we've decided to leave the mysteries of altitude sickness for others to explore. We're crossing Bolivia off the agenda since most of the places we planned to visit are higher than 4,000m. Tomorrow we had south and into Chile.

Elections

Elections in Peru were held yesterday, and just like in Ecuador they were preceded by weeks of parades in the streets and cars driving around blaring music at incomprehensibly distorted levels out of megaphones. I can't say I'm sorry the noisy shows are over.

I read a little about the results of the US elections, but didn't see the electronic voting machine problems being mentioned. When it's possible to vote multiple times on some machines by using post-it notes, or by holding down a yellow button on the back of other machines, the situation is serious. That's just the tip of the iceberg, as electronic voting machines are susceptible to problems at every stage of their use - from set up, to people casting multiple votes, to results being indetectably modified by viruses, to being unable to verify if votes were correctly recorded. Despite being happy with the election results, I think the lack of attention given to this issue is a shame.

This article summarises the results of two independent studies commissioned by the board of elections after e-voting machines used in Ohio earlier this year caused problems. The same machines that were used in many places in the mid-terms. The results are fairly devestating.

This article talks about some of the gathering evidence of voting problems in the mid-term elections. The author ends by stating:

On election day, a major piece of the mystery of "how did we let things get this bad?" became very clear to me. People that used the touchscreen voting machines, including my wife, who'd read my report and was duly skeptical of the DREs, raved about the experience. The touchscreen machines make fantastic demo units that really sell you on the idea of e-voting. So it's no wonder that states and counties across the country went gaga over these machines and just opened up their wallets when a vendor rep showed them a product demo.

[...]

DREs are awfully pleasant to use, in spite of the fact that they're not worth much as actual voting machines. Ultimately, the story of the triumph of the touchscreen DRE is really a story of the triumph of style over substance [...].

The most basic requirement for a voting machine is that it should be able to accurately record votes. The ones currently in widespread use can't do that. What does an election mean when the voting machines can't record votes accurately?

Inca Ruins

From Machu Picchu

Anne and I reached Machu Picchu at the end of last week after a 4 day biking/hiking trip. It's a beautiful place, in large part due to its surroundings. And although it's impressive, I think a lot of the hype is due to the mythology surrounding it. What was it used for? Why did the Incans build a retreat in the mountains? How could it have been lost - to the rest of the world, if not locals - for 400 years? But in the end, villages on terraced mountainsides exist worldwide, and the stonework is far from the most impressive that the Incans constructed (more on that later).

I actually found Huayna Picchu the more worthwhile part of the trip. It's a set of terraces and temples built on a nearby peak - an optional 1 hour climb that starts from within the grounds of Machu Picchu. The structure is so steep that when descending the shallow stairs you have to lean against them to stop from falling. How the Incas ever managed to construct the buildings on that peak I don't know.

It's unfortunate that Peru has a monopoly on Machu Picchu sites worldwide because they price it accordingly. Want to hike the 4 day Inca trail? You're looking at $300/person. Maybe you just want to see Machu Picchu. Train + entrance runs around $90/person. Our trek was somewhere between those numbers. I'm glad to have been, but the cost makes a return visit highly unlikely.

During the hike Anne and I were attacked by mosquitoes which left the itchiest bites (warning - ugly foot picture) I've ever had. I've often wondered in summertime if wiping out mosquitoes would damage some part of the world's ecosystem, or simply provide a huge relief to humanity in general, and me in particular.

After returning to Cusco, Anne and I visited Sacsayhuamán, Q'enqo, and Pukapukara, all sites within 15 minutes drive of Cusco. Out of all the sites I saw, Sacsayhuamán is easily the most impressive. It's an amazing example of the expertise Incans had with stone. Constructed out of enormous blocks, fit perfectly together, no one today yet understands how the Incas worked the stone. And with evidence suggesting they didn't use the wheel, nobody has a compelling suggestion of how they moved the huge pieces either. It's incomprehensible to me how a stone like this ever could have been shifted without the use of modern machinery.

Now I Can Ride a Bike

From Cusco

Other countries require months of classes, practice and a license. Peru requires $25 and a face. That's how I learnt to ride a motorbike. I spent 4 hours terrorising the roads and dirt tracks around Cusco today. Beautiful scenery and great fun. And now, if I ever find myself on the set of an action movie, I can jump on a bike and make a high-speed getaway with screeching tires. I'm adding "motorbiking" to my list of half-skills, which also currently includes horseback riding and singing.


Oh, and when I'm wearing it, the colour of the helmet is officially known as "danger yellow".

Painful Steps

From Colca Canyon

I'm walking with slightly achy legs from yesterday's final day of a 3-day hike in Colca Canyon. The "Canyon" is more of a cross between a valley and a canyon, but suffice it to say it's steep. And deep - about 3200m, versus 1600m for the Grand Canyon. The first day was the toughest - we descended 1.4km in altitude and followed that by a 400m climb. By the end of the day we didn't have the energy to eat dinner, just crawl into our tent and sleep.

The hike took us through some small villages where the only access is by foot or donkey on steep rocky paths. One of the more amazing parts of the hike was being passed by locals literally jogging down these paths in nothing more than sandals. Even without a backpack there's no way my legs would be strong enough, nor my feet accurate enough, to do that.


The second day ended in Oasis, a small tourist spot where entrepreneurs set up channels fed by nearby waterfalls to irrigate grass and fill swimming pools. No need for chlorine - with an unlimited supply of water they could empty, clean, and refill the pools every day.

The last day was a nearly 4 hour straight climb, ascending approximately 1km in the hot sun. The 7 hour bus ride back to Arequipa was uneventful, though for some reason it was missing a salesman, an inseparable part of most bus journeys (along with reggaeton music and Shakira's "Hips Don't Lie" - a song I can't wait to never hear again). They stand at the front in the aisle and talk for 20 minutes, extolling the virtues of the fantastic product they're selling. Then they hand out samples to everyone on the bus, finish with a round-up of all the benefits, and see if anyone is interested in buying. At first, I was baffled as to what they could talk about for so long. Now, with limited Spanish, I know that most of the time they have in their hand seeds of an amazing medicinal plant that can reduce ulcers improve your sight help aching joints stop runny noses soothe sore throats cure cancer! Although one man managed to talk for 20 minutes about the Jolly Rancher sweets he was selling.

Joking aside, it seems like a tough job and has raised questions, like who decides which salesman gets to take which bus? Do they have to pay fare? After riding for half an hour, how do they get back home?

Tonight we'll take an overnight bus to Cusco. It used to be a central Incan city - I hear now it's gringo central. Machu Picchu and other Incan ruins are next on the agenda.

Southern Peru

(Forgot to post this after writing it a week ago.)

I hadn't expected much from Peru. Before going all I heard was horror stories from other travellers about the dire state of the economy, the corruption, and the danger of getting mugged on the street or threatened in a taxi. Luckily for me, so far so good.

Anne and I decided to bypass Lima completely. Our overnight bus arrived at 11am, and we caught a 5pm bus south to Arequipa. Sometimes it pays not to be overly suspicious and hostile of strangers, which was proved when we met a very friendly Peruvian in our stopover time. Anne and I ended up spending a pleasant few hours practising our Spanish and walking around Lima with him.

As far as Lima itself, it seems to have some nice areas but my 5 hour impression doesn't make me regret bypassing it. Arequipa itself has a very nice center, equally as nice to walk around as Cuenca.t was the deepest).

Into Peru

From Peru

Last Friday I finished my 4 weeks of language school. I am supposedly at an intermediate Spanish level now, but locals would probably argue with that. Have successfully crossed the border into Peru and spent a couple days at the beach in Mancora. Tried surfing for the first time, but didn't get too far. Though I did manage to hit my funny bone hard enough that it bruised. Such is the price of this tough life.

In an hour will be catching a bus to Lima, and then on to either Cusco or Arequipa, depending which route works out best. It's a long way. 16 hours for the first bus. 18 or 22 hours for the next one, depending where we go. I'm not looking forward to it, but it's a lot cheaper than a flight.

3 minutes left on this computer, so I have to head out. Next entry will either be from Colca Canyon or Machu Picchu.