Day Eight

An introspective day for me. I went to the French Hospital with the regular crew, plus Dave and Emily, who arrived yesterday. It's becoming a routine for me, jackhammering the floor and sanding the walls, the work I do is focused on cement, either breaking it into bits or wearing it smooth. I spent a lot of my tim thinking of abstract notions, like why I came here and where I'm going afterwards, in both the short and long term.

I was thinking today about how people travel so they can learn more about themselves, or at least I think I do. I read the idea in a book by Michael Crighton: you remove yourself from your regular surroundings, and all you're left with is you, the person having the experience; when you travel, you see how you behave when your surroundings are always changing, when the only constant is you, so you learn about yourself.

There are a lot of things around here with English writing on them, even though not many people in Pisco speak English. At lunch today the glasses they gave us had 'Made in China,' stamped on the bottom. It's comforting, in a way, to see labeling in my native language, because I know I understand it, I don't have to read it through two or three times to make sure I understand it.

It's been a week now, I arrived here one week ago today. I caught myself missing snow today for the first time in I don't know how long. I was reading A Wild Sheep Chase, I've only got 45 pages left, and the protagonist is in this remote house in a field in the mountains as it starts to snow, and I thought of our little house in Vermont. It's the first time I can ever remember sitting in the tropics and thinking longingly of New England. I usually think of myself as someone who tolerates winter until Spring comes along, but I know now, for the record, that while I love summer, I love winter too. I love snow. That's something about myself I learned through traveling today.

I saw a man near the hospital today wearing a Dead Kennedys T-shirt. It had a crossed out swastika on it, and said "Nazi punks, Fuck off!" I wonder if the guy wearing it understood what it said. I think probably yes, but many of the people who see him on the street do not.

I was reminded talking with Bryan and Killian tonight that not all of Peru is like this. We were talking about the folks in PSF who have gotten typhoid or parasites (there are a lot of them), and someone remarked that it wasn't surprising since we were living in "a festering bowl of disease." That's an uncharitable way of putting it, but he's got a point. When I said that, as this is my first time in Peru and I came straight to Pisco, this is my only impression of Peru, Evan said that there are many other Perus to see, in the forests and the mountains and all the other places that aren't here, between the desert and the sea.

Like I said, an introspective day on my part. On another note, my debit card has been lost/stolen and as a result I'm having the bank FedEx a new one down here. In the meantime, I'm being thrifty with the money I have, just under 100 soles. It should last until the card gets here (I hope).

Also, I actually bothered to read the shower instructions in the bathroom for the first time today, and so I had my first warm shower since arriving in Peru this evening. It was lovely.

I'm on the dinner cooking crew tomorrow, so I won't be going to the French Hospital, making dinner will be my job, along with a few other people, and I hear it really does take all day.

I'll tell you all about it tomorrow.