Peru - Tuesday 27 October 1998
Sleep in!!! Well... until quarter past 7. Actually, we do nothing at all in Puno; we leave immediately. Patricia says there's nothing to do here, but I wouldn't mind spending a day looking around.
We take a boat out onto Lake Titicaca. The weather is beautiful. Our new guide, Alexandro, speaks poor English, and often it's about nothing. It's a shame because, in my opinion, this is an intriguing environment. The inhabitants of Taquile Island try to remain as independent as possible from Peru. They have their own rules and norms and have lived without money for a long time. However, that is evidently disappearing now.
We make a stop at an artificial island that floats on reeds. The Uros Indians have lived like this for centuries. They constantly have to raise their island because it rots away at the bottom. Little of their old culture remains; it's clearly been completely ruined by tourism.
How different Taquile Island is. We don't stay in a hotel but in a renovated house of an ordinary family. The houses here are simple and hand-built from clay. We have lunch at a small local restaurant. Delicious! The menu is a bit different from the rest of Peru once again.
After the (late) lunch, we finally have some time to ourselves. On the 'terrace' in front of the restaurant, we write our own camp song to sing for Patricia on the morning of our departure from Puno. Or no, tomorrow night at the colorful evening. For this, we expand a song that we've already started singing in the jungle. There, it started with "Jungle" to the music of "Fire" by Bruce Springsteen. "Romeo and Juliet" became "Joanne and Juan"...
The end of our vacation is approaching quickly now...
The sunset is supposed to be beautiful here. We all go to the east side of the island (our 'hotel' is in the middle). It has become quite cloudy in the meantime, but there are few clouds near the horizon. Our guide, Alexandro, says it's a perfect place to meditate, but I don't feel anything. I guess not enough concentration...
Dinner consists of the apparently standard menu here: soup, omelet, or fish with vegetables. Yet, it's quite tasty. After dinner, we play some cards, chat, and drink beer.
The boss's little daughter finds the tourists in the house very exciting. She comes to sit with us. Joanne already speaks quite a bit of Spanish, so she takes care of her. She particularly enjoys laying out our card game in order and reading the numbers. However, she doesn't understand the jack, queen, king, and ace...
The people of Taquile aren't very musically talented. During lunch, we were treated to a performance by two children who weren't very good (but you can accept that), in the evening, a band with three pan flutes and a drum makes an attempt. The band leader is rather shy and doesn't draw the attention of the card players - who continue to chat quietly. The music they make is - putting it nicely - quite abstract. Very different from what we've heard so far in the rest of the country.
It doesn't really become very enjoyable. Everyone is either thinking about the jungle, the Inca Trail, or practically being back home.
Early to bed, it's cold and dark.
