Peru
Seeing "The Motorcycle Diaries" reminded me much of my own trips inside my country. I did not travel for months like el Che, but I saw many of the things he saw. I got to do several 2-week trips whenever I had vacations in medical school. And most of the times I travelled with a friend, as Che did. I had very little money and I got to experience hospitality. People there will never let you leave a place without eating. They do not ask for money. They are poor, but do not hesitate in giving their own bread for the visitor. As a person born in the capital city, I got to respect the people who lived in the mountains. The impossible geography made me understand how difficult communications can be. Roads are built every year, but the mudslides destroy them in the following rainy season. Deep canyons, 6000 m (20000 feet) mountains, vast plateaus, no oxygen.
Furthermore, millenia of history watch you as you visit the Inca roads, the old temples and fortresses. Machu Picchu is just fantastic, but it is not the only one. The country is just an open book.
While I travelled, the Shining Path guerrilla was terrorising the people. I saw abandoned fields, abandoned towns and lots of fear. I had to speak in English with my friend so that people do not understand what we were talking about.
I will soon go back to visit my country again. I know that I am just visiting...
posted by Doctor Marco at 21:43
2 Comments:
Hi, Aphrodite. Let me explain you. People in the buses, who were talking a lot when we left Lima, as we approached the town of Ayacucho, were silent. I could sense tension in the air. Just in that trip, the bus was raided 8 times. The police and the army would enter the bus at gun point, they would order all males in the bus to step out, to form a line and to give them their national ID cards. They would take the ID's and come back after 10 minutes and give them back after all males would tell them the 8 digit ID number off by heart. At one point in the trip, we stopped in a police station. It was midnight, the altitude of the place was 4700 metres above sea level (15500 feet), the temperature was -10 Celsius (about 14 F). They did the same thing with the ID cards, but this time, they told us that the bus could not move because there was combat 2 or 3 from the place. I saw the local people, used to altitude, starting to vomit in plastic bags. It was cold, I asked an Indian lady to lend me a bit of her blanket to cover my legs. I remember may nails looking blue from hypoxia. A policeman, who was travelling with us, who was very talkative at the start of the trip was silent, I could tell he was afraid, but no one said a word. I was not only observing, I formed the line when I was ordered and gave my ID card when I they told me to. I saw and suffered in my vacations what those people had to suffer every day of their lives.
azize delam,I wish to visit ur country one day!
boos
Post a Comment
<< Home