Graduation to Expert Level Bus Traveler

I now consider myself to be an expert bus traveler.  I passed my final exam last week when I made the trip from Santa Cruz, Bolivia to Piura, Peru exclusively by bus.  It was a doozie.  I calculated over 72 hours of bus time in five days.  As crazy as it may sound, I've met people who have done more (like a trip from Bogotá Colombia to Lima in 3 days straight, or a Lima to Buenos Aires trip).  Thats why I'm only an expert bus traveler, not professional yet.  I honestly hope to never get to the professional level.
But in order to get to the expert level there are more qualifications required than pure quantity or "seat time."  The quality of the bus experience is a crucial element in the advancement of bus expertise.  During my journey I had plenty of quality moments, but I would like to dedicate this post to one leg in particular.

I arrived in Puno, Peru at about 7:00 P.M.  My destination for that night was Arequipa, which was 3 hours away in Combi (minivan) or 6 hours by bus.  I had two friends waiting for my arrival in Arequipa, and I was looking forward to getting some rest at their place after the previous night's 18 hour overnight bus.  The terminal for the Combis was close to where I got dropped off, so I ignored the bike-taxi's offer to take me there and enjoyed stretching my legs and walking for a change.  I stroll around the corned and see a combi loading up its last passenger.  "Para Arequipa?" I ask.  Yes it was heading there, but it was full.  I would have to wait till the next one.  That was fine because I wanted to use the restroom and get some water anyway.  So I waited.  And waited.  After 15 minutes of waiting I started asking around about when the next combi would come.  Peruvians love to give you an answer even if they don't know the right one, so its kind of a game asking questions down here.  I try to feel out who is the most knowledgable and do what they say.  The final answer I got was that the last combi had left just a few minutes ago, I would have to take the 6 hour bus.

I get on and it isn't one of the luxury buses but I'm happy to have a row all to myself.  I take a quick nap and we arrive in Juliaca to pick up more passengers.  The crowd tonight consists of me, the odd ball out, and a healthy dose of Spanish-only-speaking peruvians and the bi-lingual serranos, or indigenous people native to the Titicaca area.  The serranas, or mamitas (indigenous ladies) may look cute for pictures but I know that underneath their black bowler hats, braided hair, and puffy skirts lies a sleeping dragon that no one in their right mind would intentionally disturb.  Actually, sleeping dragon is probably an incorrect depiction, the dragon is awake and ready to strike at any moment.  The bus starts to pull away as two mamitas start arguing up front and I sit back into my seat and get ready for the ride.
The chofer starts another random asian kung-fu movie dubbed in spanish.  I try to look at the title - "----- Man II"  I can't decipher the first word but whatever movie it is, they made two of them.  I start to recognize the characters and then realize that I've seen this one before!  They showed it on some other bus in some other city.  Then it hits me, I've been on so many bus rides that they have ran out of asian movies and have started to repeat.

We are traveling at about 13,000 feet so I start to get a bit of a headache from the altitude.  I rummage through my backpack for my bag of coca leaves, and.. whats this..?  I find a leftover mandarin orange from lunch!  Its like christmas.  I take it and the coca leaves out of my backpack and peel the orange and eat it, seeds and all because I have a belief that the seeds will kill whatever parasites I may have.  I finish my orange and resume my search for coca leaves.  Its not in my backpack pocket anymore.  Where did I put it..? Could I have left it on my seat?  I look in the crack between the seat and the wall and see the bag down there.  Score! I found them.  I pull out the back and instead of being my coca leaves its some leftover who-knows-what from who-knows-when.  Disgusted I shove it back in its cavern and in a germ induced frenzy I squeeze about half a bottle of hand sanitizer into my palm and it overflows, cleaning at least some part of the floor.  I look under my seat and find the coca leaves next to my backpack.  The bag is tied shut so I'm still fine.

I look back up at the movie and its now reaching its climax.  The final fight has started but the disk starts skipping.  I hear groans from the people around me. About 3 minutes away from the final climactic moment the disc stops.  Everyone is disappointed but amidst the complaints I smile.  I already know how it ends.  Instead of staring at the screen hoping it comes back on I look out the window and see thousands of stars.  The night is clear and the only lights come from our headlights, so the sky looks amazing.  The stars look brighter here, maybe because I'm closer to them.

At some point on the rumbling road I drift off to sleep.  In my semi-unconscious state I feel the mamita next to me lean in to snuggle.  She is fast asleep but I quickly readjust my position to avoid the unwanted peruvian attention.  Wait, wait a second.  Did I hear someone peeing?  And no, its not coming from the bathroom, rather its a few rows in front of me on the right.  No, it can't be someone peeing, it has lasted too long now.  I'm slightly comforted that it wasn't pee, but also slightly disturbed that I think so lowly of this bus that my first association with that noise was pee.

I relax into the journey and look at the stars.  Thats when I smell something burning.  A lady in the back starts yelling "Smoke, Smoke!" She wakes up everybody on the bus.  "Tell the drive the wheel is burning," she yells.  The smell gets worse and she starts coughing like Ben Stiller in Zoolander. (cough cough "I've got the black lung, Pop" cough cough)  Finally someone opens a window and the lady in back, in order to get the driver's attention, starts banging on the wall until everyone yells at her to stop.  She does it a couple more times for good measure.  By that point I'm laughing, and I'm probably the only one who thinks this is funny.  My six hour bus ride, full of trash, serranos, angry passengers, smoke, beautiful landscapes, and asian movies is so perfectly Peruvian that I can't help but laugh.

Combi ride to Puno, where I would then take the Bus to Arequipa

The Daily Grind

Its a bit of a different feel working in South America rather than just traveling through here, or working in some office somewhere.  While the "work" I'm doing is mainly just volunteer work, to me at times it still feels like a stressful job, although a different type of stress that a clock-in clock-out type of job.  I don't really have a boss that gets mad at me if I mess things up.  Thats a plus.  I also get to see interesting things, like the guy who stuck a screwdriver blade up his nose on a bus in Lima in order to get us to buy chocolate.  He was an ex-con who is trying to turn his life around by selling chocolate instead of robbing people.  I bought the chocolate.   But the downside of working down here is if I mess things up then I have to deal with the consequences, which may mean a long bus ride somewhere or quite a few apologies.  For example, one day while I was in Lima I got a phone call from a district president in the North of Peru who said that he was running late to the chapel and was wondering how long we would be there.  "Be there for what?" I thought.  Then I realized that instead of the 29th of June, like we had originally planned, he had told all of the Moms to bring their children to the chapels the 29th of May for the evaluation, and I was no where nearby.  In that situation the only thing to be done is apologize and hope he lets us work with him in June.  

As a whole the work has been enjoyable.  I'm helping start nutrition projects for Liahona Children's Foundation all throughout western South America, which sounds a lot harder than it really is.  In reality the whole process is pretty simple.  I, or someone with the foundation, calls a stake president (ecclesiastical leader) and asks if we can weigh and measure the children in that area to see if there are any that are malnourished.  We set a date, and we show up on that date to weigh and measure the children.  After that the ones who are below the World Health Organization standards for height and weight receive nutritional supplements each month through a local coordinator that we choose during the nutrition evaluation.  

For such a straightforward approach things sure can get complicated.  Not including those who cancel, or change dates for the evaluation, the majority of the issues arise when there has been a lack or communication to the community about the project.  Lots of times people think that American doctors are coming to give free medical services to everybody.  More than once have I had someone angry with me because I wasn't a doctor.  In those situations I usually recommend one of my mom's natural remedies or "witchcraft" cures and see what people's reactions are.  My favorite is the mom's who are worried about a child with a cough or runny nose.  I always recommend a lemon and honey tea, but I tell them to put a few chile peppers in it, and see what it does.  They never believe me, but that is my homemade remedy that I've sworn by for years.  Its probably good that I'm not a doctor.  

Anyways, another problem that seems to happen in the evaluations is that no one shows up.  For me this is the one that hurts the most.  Recently we screened two towns in the northern Bolivia/Brasil border.  Both have districts, which is a smaller version of an LDS stake.  In one evaluation we had about 30 kids show up, and 3 entered the program, one of whom was on the verge of death.  In the other area, which is less than an hour away, over 115 kids showed up and more than 50 entered the program.  The reason it hurts when no one shows up is because I'm guessing that there are malnourished children in both towns, but we can only help those who show up to get help.  

A lot of people think that giving handouts is the worst way to help people.  In all honesty what we do is basically give handouts to mom's so that they have something to feed their starving child.  In the states we can't really understand the situation of the people here.  We think "Get a job" or "learn how to eat healthier" or "I'll give you a loan so you can get yourself out of the situation you're in."  While in some cases these philosophies might be true, its a little hard to tell someone to get a job when there are no jobs to be had.  And its hard to give a loan when there is no market for them to sell their goods.  And its hard to tell someone to eat healthy when they don't have anything to eat.  We Americans have a hard time fathoming someone not having anything to eat.  But sadly, its a reality.  Some children eat one meal a day, if they even eat a meal, and their bodies visibly suffer.  One of the children that entered the program from the town where only 3 entered was so malnourished that I knew from just looking at him that he would enter the program.  We use three standards in order to tell if someone is malnourished; height for age, weight for age, and BMI.  He was extremely low in all three.  He looked a year or two younger than his age and rather than a smiling, or crying baby, (both of which signify life), he looked like a limp shell of a human being with barely enough energy to care that there were strange people measuring him.  

Seedy Hotels and Floating Islands

In all honesty I wasn't planning on writing tonight, but I'm stuck in my hotel room wide awake waiting to skype someone about stuff with the foundation.  What else was I supposed to do?  I'm surprised that the internet is working so well.  I guess thats as good a reason as any to take advantage of the time I have and write a little bit.
Today I got to see the floating Islands on lake Titicaca.  I found out that they pronounce the c's like the h in hanukah.  Its a throaty sound.  Titicaca means grey puma or stone puma, depending on the local dialect.  Pumas were a big deal for the ancient inhabitants of Peru.  Maybe thats why BYU has so many study abroads and internships in Peru, because we have the same mascot.

The islands were incredible.  They each last 50-100 years but require constant maintenance.  Each island is about 9 feet thick with floating chunks of root comprising the base, and reeds stacked on top to keep everyone dry.  I asked a girl if they ever fall in the water.  She laughed and said they did, but they all know how to swim so its fine.

The reason I'm in Puno is to rescreen a stake that is already participating in the nutrition program.  We did that yesterday.  The town we went to is on the Bolivia-Peru border and is called Yunguyo.  Everyone in the town has rosy cheeks because its so cold, and most of the women wear typical clothes.  We screened a few kids, in reality not too many showed up.  But there was one girl who entered the program and was severely malnourished according to the measurements.  I saw how low she was and it was a real blow.  Some of these kids don't have much to eat, and what they do have isn't very healthy or nutritious.  They like to eat this thing here called Chuño, which is basically mashed potatoes (feet are used to mash them) made into a ball and left out to dry.  Then when they want to eat they boil and rehydrate the black potato ball and voilà.  As bad as that sounds it actually tastes pretty good.  The thing that I don't like is chuños cousin (I forgot the name), which undergoes the same process but is left in a river for a while.  It ends up transparent and has a taste like the fat left on the pot after you cook a roast.
Well I've digressed.  Before coming here to the land of Chuño I was in Cusco for a week or so.  I saw Machu Picchu, hiked Machu Picchu Mountain and saw a chinchilla in its natural habitat.  However I think my highlight of the stay in Cusco was riding horses above the city to a few Inca ruins.  We hopped on the horses and rode to famous sights, and some sights that we had never heard of.  One had a sacrificial table deep inside a rock.  Another was a labyrinth of caves and tunnels called Area X.  The views were incredible, with vast plains looking over Cusco valley.  On the way back we were late to the last site, so we galloped across the plains and made it just in time to see it before it closed.  Well almost in time.  We got kicked out after 10 minutes but at least we saw a little.

Thats all I'm going to write for right now.  Hopefully later I'll write more, probably when I'm in another seedy hotel with surprisingly good internet.

Peru again?

Right now its about 9:30 pm and I have a flight tomorrow morning at 6 AM, which means I have to get up at 3 to get to the airport on time.  I should be packing seeing as my clothes are sprawling across the couch and my air mattress that has been my home for the last few nights, but instead I choose to write my first blog post of my new adventures in Peru.  Why did it take me so long to write my first post?  Lets just say that I've regretfully become a bit jaded, and frankly haven't felt the desire to broadcast my life on the world wide web.  But tonight is the night that I finally got the upper hand...

It all started on my plane flight from DFW to Lima.  I'm working with Liahona Children's Foundation again, but this time there are BYU interns that are also helping with the projects.  I'm in sort of a accessory position to the interns because I know the area and the foundation, so I help them with their respective projects.  But I digress, It all started on the flight.  After we board the plane we were told that the fuel gage wasn't working properly, so we would need to wait to take another plane.  That was all fine and dandy, I actually enjoyed the chance to eat some decent Texas BBQ.  But that also meant that we would arrive in Lima around 4:00 AM, and we had to work the next afternoon.

Thats how it started.  The following events included my debit card being eaten by the ATM machine with no possible way to get it back, almost following through a tin roof (that one was my fault for sure), missing busses because of schedules and not booking in advance, missing a screening entirely (that happened today, but is a story for another time), having my passport stolen, and sitting through endless hours of Lima traffic just hoping to get somewhere eventually.

My list is not exhaustive, but in all honesty none of the individual events really were that big of a mental/psychological blow.  Most of the time it didn't really effect me that much.  But I think a combination of the stress of setting up screenings, taking care of interns, and all of these events was creating somewhat of a dark cloud hovering over me.  Not the good kind that keeps Moses from sweating too much in the desert, but the gloomy one that looks like its always going to rain.  But tonight the tables have turned.

The last couple of nights I have been sleeping on my air mattress on the floor of a lady in Lima's living room.  I prefer to be here than in the cramped bedroom of the interns, but there is this pestering clock that every hour on the hour plays a song then chimes bells for the number of hours that were completed.  Its not the classy grandfather clocks, but rather a cheap K-Mart throwaway that has shrieking speakers and a song that is longer than anyone would care to listen to.  The last few nights the clock woke me up every hour.  Needless to say I don't appreciate Latin home decorations.  Well, as I was packing up my stuff the clock did its thing again.  My frustration plumed and I decided to take a look at the thing.  I had never examined it before, but upon casual examination I noticed how easy it would be to take a battery out, thus putting the clock out of its misery until its owner noticed that the time was no longer accurate.  By the time she noticed that I would be hundreds of miles away.  My plan was flawless.
I looked around, and finding no one in sight I lowered the clock and tried to dislodge a battery just enough to stop the current.  I ended up pulling the battery all the way out and it fell to the floor.  For a moment I considered picking it up and trying to lodge it back into the clock in order to hide any evidence that it had been tampered with.  Then I realized that I really didn't care if they knew that I tampered with it.  I left the battery where it was and hung the clock back up, feeling for the first time in a month that I had come out on top, I was a champion.