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Published: September 23rd 2006
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In Peru just about everybody parades at least once a year. The police, teachers, printers, travel agents, cobblers, street lighting repairers, morticians, manicurists & other obscure professions all take part in processions. Today it was our turn as we were working for the Institute Nacional de Cultura & all the INC employees from the Cusco region were parading up the Avenida El Sol.
I had been told to meet on the steps of the Palacio de Justicia at 10am but everyone else was told something else. While I was waiting hundreds of people walked by wearing ponchos, masks, suits or costumes nearing those seen at a carnival. One group in masks who walked past me shouted 'Hey gringo, Ollanta'. Ollanta being the narrowly defeated presidential candidate who was anti-tourist. I don't think they would have said anything had it not been for their anonymity behind the masks.
After a while Sandra from Sacsayhuamán turned up & was expecting Walter & the rest to be with me, but I was on my own waiting for an hour & a half until they turned up. They had been at Beneccio's shop getting kitted out in ponchos & had brought mine along with them.
I had a choice of two, one which barely covered my shoulders so I picked the other. There were two chullos to choose from, however, both were too small & perched precariously on top of my head. Walter gave me his own hat which fitted & didn't make me look such an idiot. As we stood in front of the Palacio de Justicia we got out our flag to have our picture taken behind it. Not only was Walter taking our picture but passing tourists were also snapping away at the thirty or so of us all ponchoed up. We tried charging a sol for each picture but the tourists just laughed. Chino the head archaeologist from Sacsayhuamán was there in his tiny poncho & he wanted to swap ponchos with me. He put mine on & was swamped with it trailing on the floor & when I put on his it nearly didn't pass my ears. From then on Chino became known as my child & everyone wanted Chino to sit on my shoulders for the parade.
The next thing to do was join the procession. We had to wait until our number was called but noone was sure
how long it would take. First we tried standing on the road but noone was moving anywhere. A supply of rum & coke turned up & we started passing round a cup which warmed us up in the unusually cloudy Cusco weather. The supply of booze was coming from Chino's hump, whenever a new bottle was needed Chino would flip over his poncho to reveal a rucksack full of drink & turn himself into a human bar. We thought we may be moving so we moved back onto the pavement to advance a little, but is was a false alarm & now we were out of the crowd & didn't have a clue what was going on. It had started to rain so we all hid under the flag drinking beer that we got from passing vendors. The rain stopped & we moved onto the periphery of the procession as it started going past. Lots of the parading groups were dancing, accompanied by bands & fireworks. There were groups of men dressed up as hideously ugly women, but I couldn't quite work out which profession they belonged to, maybe it was drag artists. Other groups wore huge headdresses made of
feathers & stopped every twenty metres to do what looked like a war dance. Finally we saw the banner for INC Sacsayhuamán & joined the procession, we walked slowly up Avenida El Sol past crowds of people lining the street. At the top near Plaza de Armas we hijacked a passing band to play behind us. This resulted in us creating a dance of our own where we linked hands & encircled those at the front holding the flag. Sometimes we would unexpectedly change directions leaving those in the middle (usually me) stretched until nearly torn in two. In front of the cathedral a huge stage had been set up & an announcer was calling out the names of the passing groups. When we passed & heard our name we let out a great cheer & waved at the tv cameras who were broadcasting the procession live across Peru. We continued on dancing around the Plaza on the wet cobblestones, amazingly not slipping over in front of the crowds. When we reached the end we were exhausted & starving as it was now past two. We dropped our ponchos off & Walter put us in a cab to go to
the chinese restaurant where the rest of the
TAPA lot would be. Walter didn't actually tell us the name of the restaurant or exactly where it was & the taxi driver wasn't too sure what Walter had told him either. So we ended up walking up & down the road looking for chinese restaurants that were full of gringos. After some investigation we found the location of three restaurants & the third was the right one. We nearly phoned the emergency
TAPA number we had been given knowing that all the office staff would be in the restaurant & wouldn't be there to answer the normal phone. Everyone else had eaten & we stuffed ourselves on the leftovers as it was now three thirty by the time we had found the restaurant.
The bootleg market Molinos provided some entertainment after lunch as we perused DVD titles such as 'Jesus Christ Vampire Killer' & the blockbuster 'John Paul II'.
Back in Pisac we relaxed in Ulrike's watching 'Bad Boys' until we were chucked out just before the end & we moved onto Carlito's for cuba libres until midnight.
Drink of the Day: Cuba Libre
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