1.) 14.07.08 Trip to Peru

..Lima, I am travelling since 31 hours. One more hour to wait till my last flight from Lima to Iquitos is leaving. Didn´t spend the night in a hostel as planned, because my first flight from Raleigh to Atlanta was delayed for 8 hours- ground stop because of bad weather in Atlanta. So I missed my connection flight and got on a late night flight to Lima. Slept for about 3 hours and had some time (another 8 hours) to ckeck out Lima.

That was way different to what I thought it would be- when you image search google for Lima it comes up with some amazing looking pictures of white beaches with palm trees and fancy looking colonial style houses. The reality is quite different. Lima is poor. Much poorer than I ever imagined. The cars and houses are falling apart, everything is covered in a thick black layer of dust (partly from the smog) which looks like ashes from a vulcano. The sky is so clouded with smoke, dust and fog that it always seems like dusk or dawn.

In a cab you really wonder whether all the parts, which are sometimes held in place by sticky tape or nails, will actually reach the destination. I am picturing those glued together wrecks to fall apart in the middle of the road an me and the cab driver sitting there like kids playing riding a car. - Fun.
Luckily that doesn´t happen and I reach the city center with lots of ´drive-by-images´: women sell homemade bakeries from baskets they carry around with baby bound to their bellies, dogs look more dead then alive, little boys cleaning shoes in the streets and shooting at people with paper bullets through blow guns, 3 or more cars driving in one lane (i didn´t think it was possible..).
Thwhole city stinks of the car fumes -pretty sure they are not using any filters here.women are absolutely stunning and sublime, men are not, houses are made from multiple materials, starting with concrete that´spatched up with corrugated sheets of metal and bits of wood and cardboard.
Looks like all the houses lost their 2nd or third floor in a hurricane, because they are missing the roofs and steel poles are sticking out of the concrete.
The black dust covers not only buildings and cars but also the people, who are all in a very good mood, smiling at me, laughin and waving. ´gringa, Rica, te quiro´are comments i get walking in the street - pretty wired when people stare at you and tell you they love you although you haven´t had a shower in 40 hours and hardly any sleep. I don´t feel too cute, but aparently I am different and some people stare at me as if they´ve never seen a white person. I feel the difference not only from my skin color, but also my clothes. I am wearing my scabbiest hiking clothes and still feel way posh. It doesn´t help that i am carrying a 10.000 Dollar camera around with me.
I still take pictures untill a police man stops me and says I can´t walk any further. ´Roba´-I will get robbed f I walk on. I consider ignoring him, because it looks pretty interesting and I like forbidden things, but he is very consistent and won´t let me walk ahead. I give in, not having the strenght to fight him or any burglars for that matter.

I return to the airport and am looking forward to finally meeting Eduardo (my contact from the organistation I will be working for) and seeing the jungle..

Please excuse any spelling or other mistakes, it is freakin hot in this internet joint and my brain is not working too well after 3 days of diarrhea. - read about that fun part of my trip soon..