Natalia and the Snow Storm

In approximately 16 hours and 19 minutes It will be my 12th day away from Cuzco on what can most accurately be described as one of the bumpiest, most exciting and generally most rewarding excursions of my life. Just about 12 days ago the entire SIT group packed up their hiking backpacks and hit the road out of Cuzco and towards the worlds highest lake, in terms of elevation, Lake Titicaca. 6 hours of driving through potholes, jolting up and down and trying to hold onto to the breakfast in one's stomach put us in Puno, the small city which rests directly on the edge of Lake Titicaca. Puno is one of Peru's poorest towns so before even getting a chance to bask in its beauty we were shocked into reality when the directors on the trip warned us to be extra careful because there was a good chance one of us would get mugged. With that happy thought resonating in our heads we all made our way out into the city center to find some lunch, being sure to keep our hands tightly wrapped around our wallets. All the meat I had been eating in the last month made me crave some vegetables, a salad, a veggie wrap, anything that did not used to roll around and play in the grass. Thank god I managed to find a sandwich shop that served a veggie sandwich, as I bit in to the generally tasteless vegetables I remembered what my host parents had told me back in Cuzco before I left, "Casey, no comes las verduras mientras en Puno..." taking into account tone and general attitude on this statement it can be roughly translated to, "Casey, my god! never ever ever eat any type of green non-meat substance while in Puno!!!"

That being said, I spent a large chunk of the next three hour boat ride dreading the possibility of returning my lettuce lunch to Lake Titicaca. The three hours on a small motor boat took us from Puno to the man-made reed islands and then onto Taquille, an indigenous island in the middle of Lake Titicaca where we would be staying the night with an indigenous family. The reed islands honestly were a little too much of a tourist trap. It quickly became clear that these people were playing up their culture to make money off of us and that some of the inhabitants had houses on the mainland and simply "worked" on the man-made islands during the day. The construction of the islands was fascinating but when 7 different brightly dressed women tried to sell me exactly the same generic flute I quickly became uninterested. The rest of the way to Taquille was tranquil, soothing and put me right to sleep. When we docked on the mainland of the island we were met by a handful of indigenous men, fathers all looking to retrieve their student for the night. All of our names were rattled off and one by one students began to depart for their homestays up a cliff side, lead by strong, hardened men. When my name was called I quickly scanned the remaining fathers expecting one to step out and lead me up into the hills but no one did. Then, from behind one of then tough old men stepped a tiny little girl who approached me, told me I was to go with her and began to walk off. This girls name was Natalia and she was a 14 y/o inhabitant of the island, she had been sent to come get me and I could not help but feel a bit cheated, I quickly learned otherwise.  Natalia was great, she was funny, friendly and extremely sharp for being only 14, she toured me around the island all day, instructing me on what I could do, constantly repeating the phrase "puedas caminar", "you can walk around", when I would simply be standing in one place waiting for instructions. Contrary to my initial thought of her being the wife of some sketchy older man, she lived with her mother and grandma in a gorgeous lake side house which meant I spent a lot of time looking out onto the lake as well as being fed a lot and babied by these older indigenous women...it was fantastic. At dinner that night I returned from the plaza without Natalia because, due to the language difficulties, I had interpreted her words as I should return home when I was done taking pictures versus her actual comment that I should wait around for her to go sell some corn. Once back at the house I sat down to eat, began to eat my first bowl of soup and was just about finished when Natalia arrived back and exclaimed with a smile "You escaped the Plaza!" I smiled said "Si, lo siento" and then asked her what that sound was coming from a cardboard box on the floor which had been rattling all if dinner. She responded by saying that it was their two hens who they locked in a box for the night, jokingly I stated that it was scaring me and in response to the gringo being scared of some hens she nearly spit her soup back into her bowl with laughter. I've almost never been so willing to be made fun of, I simply could not be mad at this girl for laughing at me, impossible.

The next morning after a night of Coca Leaf fortune telling and fire dancing with other indigenous families, we all left Taquille and headed back towards Puno, I of course slept the whole way. Once back in Puno all the students hit the computer, grabbed some snacks and geared up for a 6.5 hour drive to Chivay, the city which would act as a gateway to our next rural homestays in Colca Canyon. Within 3 hours of the trip the bus slowed down and pulled to a stop. I, not paying any attention to where we were assumed we were making another bathroom stop and since the last one had been so fun, all the guys took the opportunity to pee off of an enormous cliff, I didn't mind stopping again. When I lifted my head though we were stopped in a line of traffic, in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by the white stuff which I just could not comprehend. Snow was all over the ground, we were so high in the mountains that we had hit a snow and hail storm and since most Peruvian drivers were not used to this type of weather, silly people, we were jammed up in a traffic jam. For the next 3 hours we sat in the snow, threw snowballs, and ran up and down the snowy roads. It was refreshing, fun and cold, exactly the kind of stuff I was missing from home/Wooster. By the time the bus got moving again I was soaked from head to toe, smiling and curled up bare foot on my bus seat watching The Departed. Peru could not have been more like the U.S. at that point in time...perfection!