The Final Blog?

Now that we’re back home in California and I’ve had a moment to reflect on our experiences, I felt that a some type of concluding commentary was called for. I guess the first question is: was the trip a success? Definitely. Cusco turned out to be an excellent choice. The scenery, the people, the architecture, the Incan ruins, the infrastructure, even the food all contributed to make this a wonderful place for us to stay for an extended period of time. We also made a number of friends which greatly furthered our ability to get to know the city from a perspective not shared by most tourists.

Was the time spent productive? Incredibly. Not only did we all learn a lot more Spanish, which has obvious practical applications, but both I and the kids learned about another culture, an experience that not only expands our knowledge of the world but, I hope, will help them to better understand and empathize with the situation of others. In my opinion there is no higher calling than the expansion of our boundaries. Some may say (and some have said) that I have a problem with boundaries but I think the problem is the boundaries. I want to take advantage of the opportunities we are offered and not forgo the opportunity to live life to the fullest.

Was the trip too expensive? Actually, as Mary keeps reminding me since our return, we were much cheaper to support in Peru than back home. Obviously, not everyone has the money or the time to leave town for months at a time but for others it is simply a matter of choices. The personal is the ideological and there’s a tradeoff between expanding your horizons and controlling your life and that of others. I always find myself driven toward the expansion of knowledge, of experience, of love, of laughter, of life. That’s why I feel that travel and education are the only two real reasons for going in debt. Is that new car or flat-panel television or ATV really going to enhance your life or provide enlightenment or, conversely, does the acquisition of yet more material items simply weigh you down? Those things will be either forgotten or left on the mental insignificance pile in the long run while living life directly, gaining experiences and sharing experiences with friends and family all contribute to who we are. I'm a believer in karma which, at a very basic level, simply means that you are what you do. If you sit around watching TV and eating junk food every evening, then that is, literally, who you are and what you do. Similarly, if you are always expanding your horizons, learning new things, reading good literature then that, correspondingly, is who you are. Our horizons have been expanded as a result of this trip.; Zak has spent 1.7% of his life in Peru; does that make him 1.7% culturally peruvian? I’ve spent .3% of my life in Peru and Maya has, to date, spent a full 3% of her time on this planet (at least in this lifetime) living as a Peruvian which, from the perspective of this social scientist, with a bent toward nurture over nature, makes her the most "Peruvian" of the three.

Of course, if one's horizon is going to be expanded, one has to be aware of whats going on. That’s why this blog has been such a valuable tool for me. Socrates once noted that an unexamined life is not worth living and while I think he may not give proper importance to the more basic and visceral pleasures of life, I think that, to a large extent, he is right. These missives have helped me to organize my thoughts and reflect on our experiences and how our boundaries have been expanded.

Will return to the Peruvian Andes? Indubitably. One reason is that in addition to the intrinsic beauty of the place, this area is one of the best adventure-travel destinations I know of. Not only is their world-class white-water rafting, there are an incredible network of mountain-bike trails, incredible hiking, mountains that inspire summit fever just by looking at them and, in addition to the mountaineering, the place is ripe for the development of some sublime rock climbing in superb settings all without the crowds and kitsch of similar "resort" towns in the U.S. While there are plenty of tourists in Cusco, particularly in their winter, by eschewing the familiar and seeking out the novel, there are many places to go to get off the beaten path. Then there’s the aesthetics. The place just has a good vibe. While in Peru, I was able, to a large degree, to escape the crass commercialism and chain-store consumerism with which we are constantly assaulted in the U.S. I’ve come to believe that the only unequivocal truth worth following is not religious or political (which is quite a statement from a political scientist) but the aesthetic. It's the attention to natural, architectural, and human beauty, at a more tranquil pace, that contributes to a much greater aesthetic appreciation of life.

Is this really the final blog? Probably not. We’ll probably continue to post various experiences of the Braunwarth family as our lives continue down their winding paths. Feliz Viajes!

Louie the Wonder Llama

What would a trip to Peru be like without a few words on that most wonderful of cameloids, the llama. No horse by committee here, the llama needs no excuses. They’ve got a level of charm suitable to their disposition and just the right amount of fluffy fur for their size which, like Goldilocks, is neither too big nor too small. Llamas, in short, are cuddly and stately, furry and hip. Llamas are wooly but fashionably so; not so much cute as charismatic and cool; Jack Kerouac crossed with a koala to the advantage of each.

Llamas are willing to leave the fast pace vibrancy of the lower elevations to those who can’t handle the laid-back groove of the Andean Tropics. Llamas prefer the alta plana, high above the tree line, drinking the cool sweet water of the glacier runoff above the herd, before it’s sullied on it’s long descent to the Amazon. Only a cretin would accuse a llama of being standoffish. Llamas just have that laid-back groove. Like birds of prey, llamas know the score and behave accordingly; they are the ultimate high altitude hipsters. Llamas, no doubt, prefer the funk-jazz of the '60s – Miles Davis, Chet Baker, Grant Green – to the '80s American pop so oddly but widely popular in the bars and restaurants of Cusco. While llamas don’t have the chops for the sax or the digits for the keyboard, they do hum, I’ve heard them. (Perhaps they’re all potential Bessie Smith’s but just don’t know the words?). I have also heard them scream which can be a bit disconcerting when you're all alone at 13,000' on the alta plana and miles from the trailhead. Don't get me wrong, llamas don’t squeal like pre-pubescent girls when confronted with attractive boys, crashing waves, horses, or any other large thing they are fascinated by but over which they have little direct control, the scream of the wild and wily llama is kind of a cross between the shriek of a horror movie B-actress who's about to be skewered by her misogynistic stalker and theeerie sound of a loon on a lonely North Woods lake (waterfowl with chain saws?). Llamas are charismatic; they’re intelligent and curious, not skittish and flighty. One can’t imagine a llama yapping like a high-strung over-bred Shi Tzu who pees on the floor every time the doorbell rings assuming, of course, that llamas had doorbells.

As far as appearance goes, they exhibit a variety derived from a common mold: shaggier or scoobier, darker or lighter, solid or spotted. Although taste is an individual matter, I’m certain you would agree that the spotted ones are the most attractive. At times, older Quechuan women will doll up one of the more eye-catching llamas – I particularly like the red-tasseled yarn earings – and bring them into town for the amusement (and tips) of shutter-bug tourists. Rather than being degraded by their plight, like the burros in Tijuana painted in stripes so as to resemble zebras, the llamas, while looking slightly out of place outside of their natural environment, adopt the attitude that such crass commercialism is simply beneath them. Rather than balk or otherwise comment on their position, they simply ignore their indignities rather than acknowledge them and give them a reality of their own. It's sort of like how once you answer to the nickname, you’re stuck with it; llamas are just too smart to play that game

Theirs is not just form, but also function. They can haul loads of up to 100 pounds, their fur makes beautiful textiles, their dried dung can be used for fuel, they don’t degrade the plants and soils like the newer European imports, and they’re quite tasty! The llama is closely related to the Alpaca, which is slightly furrier on the hoof and more flavorful on the plate, and more distantly related the long-necked vicuna whose fur is even softer fur and more valuable as they are less prone to domestication.

Then there’s the spit issue. As civilized people, and thanks to the ability to simply flush away any evidence to the contrary, we humans like to pretend we’re not really animals and we certainly, therefore, don’t spit. We’ve come to think of spitting on each other as degrading and much more likely to escalate a conflict rather than settle one but llamas harbor no similar misconceptions and, consequently, have settled on spitting as a reasonable, if not noble, way to settle a conflict. Hey, spit happens and it sure beats our more “civilized” ways of dealing with those we dislike such as torture, imprisonment, beating, gunplay, and nuclear warfare. To be fair, we were warned (while Zak was trying to sneak up on one) that, if threatened, a llama may respond by jumping on you. So, taking a page from the G.W. Bush playbook, Zak and I figured that, if given the opportunity, we would engage in a pre-emptive strike and jump on them before they could jump on us; alas we were never given the opportunity to put our plan into action.

For more information, follow the link below:

http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/llama.php

Going to the Dogs

There are lots of dogs in Cusco and, perhaps not inconsequentially, not a lot of cats although I did spy at least two pet monkeys. Most dogs are nominally owned, or at least have developed a relationship with a human where one provides protection in exchange for scraps of food, but then most dogs also spend much of their time running in packs with their buddies. It is neither uncommon to see dogs lazing about on the streets nor to see them trotting off somewhere as though they didn’t want to be late for an important social engagement. My father tells me that this was the case in the small Minnesota town in which he was raised in the mid-twentieth century and was a generally accepted part of life. Now, however, we’ve grown used to dogs being restrained and, for the most part, quiet. Such is not the case in Cusco and the slumber of both my mother and my wife were quite troubled by the barking and fighting and romancing of dogs in the night. Given both their propensity and lack of discretion in the area of romance (one can learn a lot from dogs – just sink your teeth into that ear and don’t let go, no matter what) I found the sheer variety of recognizable breeds to be of some surprise. After a few generations, one would expect a trend toward commonality. For instance, in Baja, Mexico, where there is also little attention given to vaccination or spaying and neutering, there is, not surprisingly, a strong genetic tendency toward long, yellow, short dogs. However in Peru there seems to be more interest in breeding and purchasing specific breeds of dogs. While we were in Peru, our neighbor bought the schnauzer you see in the picture above. In another picture you can see a tattoo parlor owner (dressed in black) displaying his hairless something or another (dog, of course); a breed that also seemed quite popular. I was attacked by what looked like a full-breed rottweiler and other breeds abound.