Saturday, January 21, 2006
Hello again to people who may for some reason still be checking this blog regularly. I apologize to anyone who was expecting play-by-play tropical reporting, but you have to remember that this thing is being run by laziness, embodied and molded into human form. A lot has happened since Christmas, most of it random and disjunct, so I will follow no real format throughout the rest of this post. First up is something that I really should have mentioned back when I posted pictures of that red-headed frog (except I forgot). That is, how they get cars across rivers here in Peru when the boat is too small to drive into. Words can describe, but only pictures can convey the utter ridiculousness of what was trying to be done. At first, I was thinking to myself that
this boat has to be bigger than it appears and that the car would be neatly driven 
within the confines of the gunwales of the boat. The notion of putting the car on top of the gunwales didn't even occur to me as a possible course of action until I saw a troop of confident Peruvians attempting just that. After some heaving, pushing, and lifting (not to mention balancing), the car was a-float on a boat, teetering its way across the river. The best part is, on the other side, the bank is steeper, so getting out is
even harder. Basically, the idea was this: Drive the car off the boat into the water. With an idea like that, you can at least admire its straightforwardness and neglect of general physics. So this is what transpired upon the dismount. First, the balance was skewed way to the nose-side, which caused the boat to tip like crazy and thus get thrust back towards the center of the river. By the time the car drove off the boat, it had worked its way back to deeper water, and the angle of plunge was so steep that the car basically did a nosedive into the mud. After some Peruvian brute force, the car was miraculously cast up onto the river bank.
this boat has to be bigger than it appears and that the car would be neatly driven 
within the confines of the gunwales of the boat. The notion of putting the car on top of the gunwales didn't even occur to me as a possible course of action until I saw a troop of confident Peruvians attempting just that. After some heaving, pushing, and lifting (not to mention balancing), the car was a-float on a boat, teetering its way across the river. The best part is, on the other side, the bank is steeper, so getting out is
even harder. Basically, the idea was this: Drive the car off the boat into the water. With an idea like that, you can at least admire its straightforwardness and neglect of general physics. So this is what transpired upon the dismount. First, the balance was skewed way to the nose-side, which caused the boat to tip like crazy and thus get thrust back towards the center of the river. By the time the car drove off the boat, it had worked its way back to deeper water, and the angle of plunge was so steep that the car basically did a nosedive into the mud. After some Peruvian brute force, the car was miraculously cast up onto the river bank.Ben and Amanda came over. We got around to some cool places, but one of the more interesting things was New Year's Eve in Tarapoto, Peru. If someone was to have me describe what sort of behavior the apocalypse would induce, I would probably describe exactly what we saw this night. First, the party gets started with some 'harmless' firework play, which involves children, mostly ages 4-7, running around with packs of fireworks and throwing them everywhere, including inside your house. We went to a party for midnight, and it was interesting because the live band did the countdown. The funny part was that it was about 6 minutes before actual midnight, and not only that, the count backwards from ten was syncronized with the beat of the music, which resulted in each count being more like two seconds. But with Peruvians as relaxed (or oblivious) as they are about time, no one seemed to notice. On the way back to my house is
when all the cool stuff started to happen. Apparently, one of the traditions is to construct a dummy, clothe it with your clothes from the past year, and torch it in the middle of the city streets. So basically every street in sight was lined with burning dummies and crazed Peruvians dancing around their effigies. It was around this time that Amanda claimed to have seen a 6 year old drinking beer - other confirmed sightings were 10 year olds driving motorcycles, 70 year old women dancing like they have ants in their pants, etc.
Unfortunately I got Ben addicted to cecina during his stay here. Cecina is a dried, smoked, and salted lean pork that is frickin awesome, so shut up. We somehow managed to eat it I think every day that they were here. We went up to the city of Moyobamba for no real reason, but mostly our concern up there was whether or not cecina was available. They did have some sort of dream-like fruit juice called camu-camu which I remember wasn't that good, but for some reason can't stop thinking about. At any rate, there isn't a whole ton of stuff to do in Moyobamba, so we asked around and got word of some hot springs nearby. Promising. Unfortunately it was January 1st, so I think every inhabitant of Moyobamba was looking for something to do. With their options limited, the obvious result was that they all wound up in these 'hot springs'. A one sol entry fee got you into the Peruvian equivalent of a water park, not some pristine hole in the woods we were hoping for. After deciding not to swim in the algae-green pool (which was filled to the gills with people), we checked out the hot springs, which were basically cement pits, containing tepid water, lots of people, and high potential for flesh eating bacteria. Passed. Next day we decided to climb a mountain we dubbed as the 'meatball' for its somewhat bolar stature. I must have touched some crazy plant because I got a rash like crazy and my face swelled up like a tomato for several days. And the hotel we stayed at had a coconut tree with a huge coconut that me and Ben manhandled open despite our lack of coco-tools (i.e. machete). Thus explaining the photograph of a triumphant Ben with a knife in a defeated coconut.
when all the cool stuff started to happen. Apparently, one of the traditions is to construct a dummy, clothe it with your clothes from the past year, and torch it in the middle of the city streets. So basically every street in sight was lined with burning dummies and crazed Peruvians dancing around their effigies. It was around this time that Amanda claimed to have seen a 6 year old drinking beer - other confirmed sightings were 10 year olds driving motorcycles, 70 year old women dancing like they have ants in their pants, etc.Unfortunately I got Ben addicted to cecina during his stay here. Cecina is a dried, smoked, and salted lean pork that is frickin awesome, so shut up. We somehow managed to eat it I think every day that they were here. We went up to the city of Moyobamba for no real reason, but mostly our concern up there was whether or not cecina was available. They did have some sort of dream-like fruit juice called camu-camu which I remember wasn't that good, but for some reason can't stop thinking about. At any rate, there isn't a whole ton of stuff to do in Moyobamba, so we asked around and got word of some hot springs nearby. Promising. Unfortunately it was January 1st, so I think every inhabitant of Moyobamba was looking for something to do. With their options limited, the obvious result was that they all wound up in these 'hot springs'. A one sol entry fee got you into the Peruvian equivalent of a water park, not some pristine hole in the woods we were hoping for. After deciding not to swim in the algae-green pool (which was filled to the gills with people), we checked out the hot springs, which were basically cement pits, containing tepid water, lots of people, and high potential for flesh eating bacteria. Passed. Next day we decided to climb a mountain we dubbed as the 'meatball' for its somewhat bolar stature. I must have touched some crazy plant because I got a rash like crazy and my face swelled up like a tomato for several days. And the hotel we stayed at had a coconut tree with a huge coconut that me and Ben manhandled open despite our lack of coco-tools (i.e. machete). Thus explaining the photograph of a triumphant Ben with a knife in a defeated coconut.
Back in Tarapoto we were faced with extreme heat. Wanted to go swimming, but where? We saw how green Peruvian pools can be. And all the good waterfalls are being used by multitudes of appreciative Peruvians. Then I thought of my huge orange trash can. The idea began to take shape. Fill the trash can with water... get in! Drink a coconut while in the trash can! Its ideas like this that end wars. So we sharpened the machete, plucked some cocos (shirts off of course, island-boy style), and dipped our abdomens in my huge orange bucket.
Last, but not least, we made some chocolate. Thus I present you the Twomey Extra-Gritty Dark. Not to brag, but it was righteous.
-Evan
p.s. Just got a gigantic sack of cacao fruit, more than I wanted (haha yeah right). If anyone is interested in getting a Twomey Extra-Gritty Dark, I might be able to work something out with customs.
# posted by Evan Twomey : 2:46 PM
