The Polenta Files

Where's polenta?

We are at at Turtle Camp! Based in La Coronilla, Uruguay. Lots of fun, and hopefully plenty of turtle photos to follow. We actually caught some yesterday for ID tagging. I named mine Kylie. Uruguay is awesome, the beaches look like Australia, making me very homesick. There is no ozone here and you get fried to a crispy potato chip in about 10 seconds. All the grrl biologists and biology students wear skimpy bikinis when working on the coast, and tan through their 50+ sunscreen. The town is too small to appear on most tourist maps but it has two (count em) internet cafes. Gotta run now and go and monitor the behaviour of Chelonious mydas in a tank for 2 hours. Hola tortuga.

Machu Picchu

Pictures of our hike to Machu Picchu can be seen in the Perú photo album. Skip ahead to here if you've already been following the pics.

Run for your life

Just back from Machu Picchu and the Inca trail and still recovering from too many steps, gringos and pisco.

First things first, Machu Picchu is awesome (I'll post some pics in a day or two). It's pretty clear that the Incas were on the cusp of becoming a major industrialised society, I don't buy much of the gringo friendly bullshit explanations given by the tour guides. These people were building the foundations of an empire and had a far deeper understanding of the natural sciences than they are given credit for. If the Spanish hadn't arrived so soon, who knows what could have happened??? Much of the explanations are wrapped up in "spirituality" and religious connotations, which the bangle wearing backpackers just lap it up but I think it's deeper than that.

Secondly, the 2 day Inca trail is a softcock gringo trap that isn't worth the effort. Sure you get to see some nice sights and all, but you end up walking down lots of recently made steps and along asphalt roads that have sweet fuck all to do with the Incas. Either do the four day hike or forget it. Machu Picchu is rapidly turning into a Peruvian Disneyland with plans to install escalators and lifts for the fat gringos who don't like to walk anywhere. So if you're pressed for time and really want to see the ruins, I would suggest just catching the train. Do this and walk up and back to avoid the bus service which, in addition to being owned by Gringos are:

A pack of child exploiting pricks! In addition to charging an arm and a leg (reaping massive profits off their monopoly) they run a little scam which not only exploits children but puts them in real and serious danger as well. What happens is that as the bus winds its way down to the town of Aguas Calientes a child, dressed in Inca costume appears at the side of the road shouting "Goodbye". A couple of turns later and the same child (or one dressed exactly the same), does the same. The children, in pairs, run down the stairs at breakneck speed to pull of this lamearse stunt all the way to the bottom, whereupon narrowly escaping being run over by other buses, boards the one he has been following and passes the hat around. To myopic gringo eyes, it looks like plain old harmless childhood shenanigans and they dole out big bucks to the exhausted child. To the observant though, the whole thing is a scam run either by the bus company or its employees. The children are ferried back to the top of the mountain by returning buses. When the bus arrives at the town, the young boy gets off and gives all the proceeds to some bus company dude. How much the kiddies make is irrelevant, what they're doing, either by force or will (if it can be said that an 8 year can make such choices) is reprehensible. Walking down the stairs is punishing enough, let alone running. These kids will be cripples by the time they're 30. It's also heinously dangerous, I wonder how many injuries they've already sustained tumbling down the stairs or being hit by buses. Now I'm no prude, but surely this thing is against the law?!? Isn't this CHILD EXPLOITATION? Of course, while idiot gringos, easily entertained by such silliness, continue to dole out the dollars it will continue.

And my final point, if I wanted to speak to Gringos, I would have gone to the United States. Why do they have to talk so loud about so little. Really, the US of A has become the new Rome, the elite ruling class have become so soft and stupid that it is only a matter of time before their indentured slaves realise this and one night they all rise up and slit their throats while they sleep.

Can't happen fast enough for me.

Amyway, we're off again, next stop Nazca to see the lines. I still think they were landing strips for Aliens...

Pictures, words, stuff - y'know!?!

Stacks of pictures from Argentina, Bolivia and Peru. Check 'em out.

Guns Germs and Steel

Hey if you've missed the first 2 episodes of this amazing documentary, featuring the book's author, Jared Diamond, there's still time to catch the third. We spent a couple of hours yesterday at the site Saqsaywaman, a gigantic fortress/fortification/town water supply/public assembly space/tunnel network .. over looking the town of Cuzco, Peru. The Incas laid siege to a lone garrison of Spanish soldiers here. It was the final battle to turn back the conquistadors and they lost. But the town and surrounding hills are completely shaped by Inca (and Wari..pre-Inca) constructions from around 1200. Massive engineering works, protected water supplies, un-erodable terracing for crops, astronomical calendars, anti-seismic construction. We just were left with out chins on the floor, wishing that they had damn well won. And then we exchanged some gold for the trinkets and beads offered by road-side traders.

Arise the Sun

We managed to watch the sunrise on the rocky shore of Lake Titicaca on the first day of 2006. The very long day before featured a phantom bus service from La Paz, an efficient team of Italian exchange students, a drink with Brazilian lawyers, DIY fireworks on the lakeshore, drinking local firewater, and finally finding the beach party at the hippy hostel here in Copacobana. Biz and I huddled in the cold morning drizzle to catch the first rays as the Lake gave birth to the sun. At 6 am we watched the sky turn from very dark grey to light grey, without even a hint of red or gold and the Isla Del Sol become completely obscured by mist. Then we went back to Hostal Wara in town to sleep in the store room. Before we laid down our weary heads the housekeeper came in for fresh sheets on her rounds. There really were no rooms at the inn last night.