Kris & Chris & The World

Yuspagarasunki! Thank you very much in the language of the Incas

PERU | Monday, 16 April 2007 | Views [437]


	Firstly I have finally been stuck by my first bought of sickness and thankfully its only a bad cold, but am off to bed soon as my nose and throat are on fire. Actually most people in the group are sick and we are blaming the inca trail. Just got back to Puno today after a homestay on an island called Amantani in Lake Titicaca. Where the inhabitants language is that of the ancient Inca´s - Quechua! Lake Titcaca is huge when you are in the middle its like and ocean and borders on Bolivia´- the Peruvians say they have the better half! On the way out there we stopped at another island where the inhabitants lifestyle focusses around knitting, and that it the job of the men, the textile were amazing, didnt buy anything....surprise surprise! They have all different hats for your marital status and if a man wants to marry a women first he has to knit his hat and then she pours water in it and if it doesnt seep through quickly she will accept him and if not sends him on his way to knit another hat!!! Next it was off to the island to met our new host familia! ·Which was scary considering we dont really speak spanish let alone Quechua. Our mum was called Lidia (weird) and lived with her parents, 2 daughters and husband. There housing is quite basic and they have an out door loo that you manually flush with a bucket of water. It was quite uncomfortable at first as they put you in your room and then leave you there! we didnt really know what to do and they have no electricity so we couldnt see where to go. After a while Lidia came back and offerd us some amazingly well knitted hats to wear and took us up to the local soccor pitch where we all met up again and had a game, which considering the altitdue was quite hard ....cant breath! Afterwards it was back to the house for dinner. which was in a mud motar brick kitchen with a stone fire oven thing, so smoke billowing out all over the place. They had a simple table for us (like a coffee table) and they sat on the floor which was dirt. but the food they made was delicious. A corn soup and then rice with vegetables. I don´t know how they did it with such simple ingredients. It was quite hard to communicate, but the lovely granddad kept explaining things in Quechua and Spanish and we did manage to get along quite well and understand each other. after dinner there was awkward silence, so i got out my little photo albumn (thanks MeganO!) and showed them picutres of the family and friends. But it was Sam who they seemed to like looking at the most!!! it was really cool to show them my friends and we understood each other really well at that point. Afterwards it was time for a feista! They dress you up in the traditional clothing take you down to the local hall and basically make you dance crazy dances where you run around the room holding hands and trying to make other people fall down. It was great fun. Chris and I danced with our host mum who was so small she didn´t even come up to my chin. In the morning we had a breakfast of pancakes...odd but yum and said goodbye and headed to the Uros Islands. Which are basically floating islands made of reeds, it is the weirdest place we have been. Everything is made of reeds, the houses and the boats. Now they have solar panels but apparently fires used to be quite a problem...OBVIOUSLY!!! We went for a ride in one of the boats and Chris and I had a go at paddling and it was pretty good. the strangest thing is that they move the islands, if they dont like their neighbours they just move. And also they eat part of the reeds, tried it and it was actually quite nice. Tomorrow we have another all day bus journey through to La Paz, so its goodbye Peru. And I am a little sad about it, I have really loved Peru for all its contrasts, but mostly for the colour and the vibrancy. And the textiles....but I can only buy so much!