Lima

Arrived in Lima yesterday from Cusco. Its a city of 8 million, one of the largest desert cities, although I dont quite understand how this is a desert right next to the Pacific Ocean. I am staying in Miraflores, which is the ONLY district in Limas 25-50 or so districts (people have given me different estimates) that anyone has reccomended within Peru or without. The parque kennedy square is littered with american fast food restaurants, pizza hut, macdonalds, KFC (where I posted up for dunch) in addition to malls, joyerias, and decently large crowds of people. I hired the hostels airport pickup service (US $15) to get to my hostel safely as friends had warned me of taxi scams and the general unsafeness of the 20 km between the airport and the affluent beachside district of Miraflores. At the airport the taxi driver picked up another passenger, which was unexpected, apparantly he knew her from before, an elderly Korean woman who spoke fluent spanish, japanese, among other languages. She mentioned that she had lived in New Jersey, but now lived in Chile and was visiting friends in Lima, her children had also entered the diaspora to other spanish speaking countries for school and work. mundo pequeno. After having some difficulty negotiating a few speed bumps (es. rompe muelle) we dropped her off and the drive and I had some conversations about expressiones idomaticas e.g. black sheep.

The hostel is like a fortress or barracks, thick concrete walls with barbed wire on top, sparse, but ample common areas, two tvs with lots of pirated dvds, table tennis, kitchen, etc. my room is one of three new portables constructed from wood slats, good construction, but not well sound proofed so I mustve woke up 6 or 7 times last nite from the sounds of big rigs rolling down the road, cars honking (remember that developing world honking etiquette is quite different from the US, I dont know about europe yet). In cusco it was dogs barking and bombas por la virgen carmen that woke me up every morning, here its sheer traffic.

Last nite after two Francas, a new Peruvian light light pale ale I hadnt seen on my travels till now, we went bowling at larcomar with some guys from the hostel. Well first we went to a bowling alley near the miraflores central square which was really an oversized pool hall with mini bolwing lanes of which only 2 were fully functional... we decided to head to the swankier larcomar mall on the coast and ecnountered lots of revelers and the first movie theater Ive seen so far in latin america, larcomar is a spitting image of an american mall, something like 3rd street promenade in santa monica. of course the bowling alley was black lit for cosmic bowl and the food was overpriced, so I went hungry.

The franca beers are large at a whopping 700 ml and only cost 3 soles each at the hostel! thats just a shade over a dollar for each beer... which opens up a new topic of culture and costs of different lodging options in Peru, maybe Ill devote a few lines to how I think it adds up in a subsequent post

hasta manana