Yes, its not only men who cannot help acting on Impulse, as the advert says. The day after my Cusco studies finished, I headed off to the airport with my rucksack. Although I´d deliberately kept my Cusco purchases to a minimum, I still found it hard to fit everything in it so it was with a heavy heart and an even heavier rucksack that I set off to explore the capital.
Lima came as a total shock to the system - the sheer size and volume of it after Cusco. Also, my "luxury" hotel turned out to be a little less swish than I´d imagined, although it did offer cable TV and a superior receptionist who looked down her finely chiselled nose at me as I hefted my rather scruffy-looking rucksack into her reception area.
After two days of exploring the amazing museums in the capital, my plan had been to head north, but that is when I had my "Impulse" moment. The idea of me acting on impulse seems rather strange, given that I usually have everything packed and organized at least a week before I travel, but this time I suddenly started to question the whole point of my trip. OK, I want to see a little more of the world, but not in a "ticking things off on a list" way. Weighing up the prospect of two weeks in the north or another two weeks in Cusco with my friends, the Cusco option won, so I rushed down to the hotel reception. Thankfully, little Miss Snooty had been replaced by a far more approachable colleague and he kindly booked me onto a flight to Cusco bright and early the next morning.
I must admit, when I landed in Cusco at 7am, I did start to wonder what my reception might be. Thankfully, the reaction was one of delight not horror and I have to say that I have not regretted my decision for a single second. Even Cusco seems different now that I am not bound by the routine of my lessons and fitting in around the family I was living with.
The first thing we did was take off to the Sacred Valley to stay with a friend of El Ultimo Inka (I presume he is the last-but-one Inka, although I couldn´t swear to it). He has a lovely house just outside a little village called Huaran, but we opted to camp in the grounds of this house, next to a stream and at the foot of a mountain, which like every mountain I have seen here so far you are told looks like a puma/condor/Inka profile... (select any one of the above). We spent two lovely days there, exploring some of the less visited ruins and enjoying the beauty of the Sacred Valley. I am convinced that the natural beauty of the place would attract people, even without the bonus of all the ruins, but all this yomping up hills at altitude is making me seriously reconsider my smoking habit. We did not go totally "back to nature", as we had all the mod-cons of the house at our disposal, including a temperamental wood-burning stove which was more demanding of attention than a pop diva on tour.
I think the best thing about this week has been the spontaneity of it - walking down a street and stumbling across an amazing fiesta outside a church where people from the mountains were thanking the virgin for their many blessings after a five-day trek across the mountains by donning long robes and multi-coloured balaclavas, then cracking whips with great enthusiasm but little accuracy while a band beat out a rhythm on enormous drums and the spectators nursed their enormous beers and looked on in a slightly bemused fashion. I´m afraid I cannot offer any blindingly incisive explanation as to what this all signified, but it was exuberant and colourful and, for that reason, uplifting.
Then there was the football match. Cusco´s team is called Cienciano and on Sunday it took on the team above it in the league - Universidad de San Martin. This was a crucial match because a victory for Universidad would clinch the championship for them. For this reason, quite a crowd headed for the stadium on Sunday afternoon. As I have been told repeatedly since coming to Peru, Cienciano were champions of South America two years ago and, after that glorious event, the capacity of the existing stadium was increased dramatically. Still, it is a long way from the super-stadiums of Europe. There was a gloriously relaxed feeling as families swarmed in to secure seats, walking past a dazzling array of tempting snacks, which included the ubiquitous guinea-pig. No ban on smoking in the stands here and no visiting fans either - just a sea of Cienciano red. To our left, an impressive team of cheerleaders shook their red pom-poms with gusto and kept up their energy levels throughout the whole match.
As with every football match the world over, you had the usual "armchair" experts offering their opinions, there was a suitably mad South American goalkeeper who kept rushing out of his area to try and get involved in the game and demonstrate his football skills, then of course the insults hurled at the referee. In this case though, every single rude word was loudly parotted by a little five-year-old sitting directly behind me. His piping voice prompted only smiles, although as it became clear that Cienciano was doomed, some of the language did become rather choice and I could feel my lips pursing with disapproval. A 2-1 defeat for Cienciano saw the visitors celebrating on the pitch in front of the silently indifferent Cusco crowd, but just before the final whistle, my favourite moment came when Cienciano had a free kick just outside the opposition´s area. The crowd were going wild as it was a chance to at least equalize, but one Universidad player was deliberately time-wasting and the referee was doing nothing. The Cienciano captain, who was standing at the halfway line, watched all this with growing impatience and incredulity then suddenly hared up the pitch and punched the time-waster with great force. He got a red card and the biggest round of applause of the afternoon from the Cusco crowd.
I am sure that once my trip is over, it is going to be little things like this which I remember so I am very happy with my decision to spend longer in Cusco. I am also hoping that I have just uncovered a new and more spontaneous Ann, but the jury is still out on that as I can feel myself starting to grow apprehensive about the next leg of my journey - to Argentina and Uruguay - where I won´t know anyone and I am assured by every Peruvian I talk to, "they don´t speak proper Spanish."
