Yoknapatawpha Macondo Cañete

Merry Christmas

2005-12-26T20:03:00.000-08:00

I hope everyone had a good Christmas and is not boring or working himself to death over the break. I have a fan club. That is all.

Happy Advent

2005-12-19T20:43:00.000-08:00

Contrary to popular belief, I have not moved to Satipo to grow coca and father dozens of half-breed children with a harem of jungle tribeswomen. I am still in San Luis de Cañete, super-civilized, awaiting Christmas the middle-class way. To everyone still at TAC, even the insipid ones (and you know who you are), merry Christmas. My family already knows I love them (I hope). It's summer here and I like it.

2005-11-28T12:53:00.000-08:00

I'm back from Cusco. It's been a fine week, with travel, conversation, ruins, art, 24-hour bus rides, and even some real-life soap-drama. God bless. I'm going to a wake. Pray for the lady. This last bit has nothing to do with the foregoing.

I'm in

2005-11-14T17:01:00.000-08:00

La Paz

2005-11-10T18:20:00.000-08:00

Just in case anyone is wondering, and no one is (except my mother, God bless her), I am in the sort-of capital of Bolivia, in the rain, and something like happy. People speak with bad accents here, but are not unfriendly.

Oh, and Bolivia, a country without a seacost, has a navy. I think it's out of pure aestheticism, and I love it.

I'm in Puno . . .

2005-11-07T15:52:00.001-08:00

by the shores of Lake Titicaca, the highest navigable body of water in the world. God willing, tomorrow I'll be in Bolivia.

El Señor de los Milagros

2005-10-27T10:42:00.000-07:00

October is a very significant month for Peru. Known as the mes morado or violet month, lent was observed at this time until 1983. It is still a season of processions, above all the processions of El Señor de los Milagros, or Lord of Miracles. This devotion began with a crucifixion scene painted by an Anglolan slave on the wall of his hut. After an earthquake in the seventeenth century, the wall was nearly the only thing left standing in the area. Since then, the processions of the Lord of Miracles have taken place every October. In belated homage, I offer a selection from everyone's favorite Afro-Peruvian poet, Nicomedes Santa Cruz:

PASO A NUESTRO AMO Y SEÑOR18/10/1957
Paso a Nuestro Amo y Señor
andas, lienzo y candelabros.
Paso a Nuestro Salvador
el Señor de los Milagros.
La calle es un río humano
por cuyo cauce, la gente
muy acompasadamente
camina desde temprano.
“Avancen, avancen hermanos,
no estorben al cargador...”
grita el Capataz Mayor
que las cuadrillas comanda.
“Paso, que vienen las andas,
paso a Nuestro Amo y Señor...”

Por las calles se desborda
aquel torrente morado;
gimen los pies maltratados,
la Fe permanece sorda.
La multitud que lo aborda
da marco al rey de los cuadros:
Caídas y descalabros
en aquella mar mulata,
y cual velero de plata
andas, lienzo y candelabros.

Una señora morena
le ofrece todos sus hijos;
una ciega de ojos fijos
pídele Luz Nazarena;
azota una Magdalena
su vil cuerpo pecador.
Al paso del Redentor
doblan triste las campanas
“Avancen, avancen hermanas,
paso a Nuestro Salvador...”

Sobre el lienzo de Jesús
la tarde pinta una sombra.
Sobre las frentes se nombra
señal de la Santa Cruz...
Bajo un cirio –santa luz-
a Ti, Señor, me consagro,
y de tus perfiles magros
venga a nos tu Redención
que nunca negó perdón
el Señor de los Milagros.

My Lucky Jim Life, Part II

2005-10-18T16:21:00.000-07:00

The party lasted until 4. Somewhere along the line I received a souvenir shot glass with the initials of the bride and groom. I intend to make good use of it. The next day, the bride's brother informed me with a smirk that I had been flirting with his sister (not the bride; another one). This explained how someone's email address ended up written on my hand. I am also told that I danced quite a lot, rather out of my character. It was a fine party, although I suppose I am not quite used to pisco.

My Lucky Jim Life, Part I

2005-10-10T19:19:00.000-07:00

Dear readers,

My blog´s dormition has not been due to lack of news--quite the contrary. This past weekend had something of embarras de richesse about it.

I was awakened at 7 am Saturday by the ineffable P. Thomas, who seems to have been given the grace of trilocation. He had an engineer with him. It seems that there is a very large construction project in progress near Chincha, south of here. They are building a terminal to export natural gas. The whole thing, or a significant portion thereof, seems to be under American direction. The chap I met works for a Peruvian construction firm contracted to build a road for the terminal. However, his boss being a gringo and his company´s (lengthy) contract being in English (or something like it, i.e. legalese), he was in dire need of someone more or less bilingual. On this front, more to come.

An hour later, the very same P. Thomas told me I was going to a wedding. A local gentleman´s daughter was getting married, and to a gringo. To trump that, he was not just any gringo, but a Tennessean, resident in Knoxville, and a graduate of UT. The bride spoke very good English, having lived and worked in the U.S. However, she could not act as interpreter for the groom´s family, being somewhat busy, as brides are wont on their wedding-days.

I spent all day with a horde of people I had never met, mostly interpreting the conversation of the two fathers, two men very much alike in most things apart from language. This is to say that they were both good ol´ boys, who were extremely content to talk about fishing and barbecue.

I went, of course, to the wedding itself, which took place at the shrine two steps from my house, and I was invited to the reception. I spent most of the evening charming (at least I think so) the goom´s sister with my raconteur routine. In fact, to my recollection I became more charming with every sip of pisco. I was wildly charming before the night was over. The Waugh and Wilde quotes flew, although I did not do my Anthony Blanche impressions, probably to my credit. Keep in mind, dear readers, that I have not had an opportunity like this since my college graduation in May.

All of a sudden I feel tired like Descartes. Stay tuned, and God bless.

Santa Barbara, and Huancavelica from El Mirador

2005-09-24T14:12:00.000-07:00

Mina de la Muerte II

2005-09-24T14:07:00.000-07:00

Mina de la Muerte I

2005-09-24T14:01:00.000-07:00

The Ichu Valley and Huancavelica

2005-09-24T13:47:00.000-07:00

El Tren Macho: Huancayo to Huancavelica

2005-09-24T13:41:00.000-07:00

Strike!

2005-09-23T10:21:00.000-07:00

We left Cañete a day earlier than planned, as there were rumors of a national transport strike. The rumors were true. At one o´clock Monday morning we were stopped on the outskirts of Huancayo. Mercifully, we had an alert and diplomatic local for a driver, who got us through the blockade on back roads.

Huancayo was very tranquilo owing to the strike. However, this made it impossible to see what we wanted in the Mantaro valley. After a rather boring day and a half in the city, we took the only available transport out--train. This was fantastic--seven hours of gorgeous Andean countryside to the smaller, cleaner and friendlier city of Huancavelica.

Almost the first people I spoke to were some of the strikers, very friendly fellows who gave me the welcome news that, here at least, the strike was about to end.

Huancavelica began as a colonial mining town. It has seven (or eight, depending on whom one asks) baroque churches, all worth visiting. Quechua is still spoken on the streets.

We hiked up to the old Santa Barbara mercury mines, known as the mina de la muerte from the number of native workers who died of mercury poisoning there in the sixteenth century. It is a ghost town now, with roofless stone houses, an ancient church, and cows and llamas grazing among the ruins. A welcome silence reigned. The mine is much higher than Huancavelica. I would wager something above 4000m. From Santa Barbara one can see peaks too high for vegetation.

On the way back down it began to rain. This was the first rain I had seen in four months.

Sadly, we do not have time to see Ayacucho, so we are returning to Cañete tonight.

Adventure in the Andes

2005-09-09T19:02:00.000-07:00

Monday I am splitting for the Sierra Central--Ayacucho, Huancavelica, Huancayo, Jauja, and maybe more. I hope to return with more pictures and some artesanía.

In other news, my friends Lupus Ferox and Toque are coming in November. It´s final. They will be here ten days, in which time we can get into all manner of mischief.

land mines, Chile, Gustave Eiffel

2005-09-06T18:16:00.000-07:00

It was midmorning when we passed the Peruvian immigration checkpoint, in the desert halfway between Tacna and Arica. Just over the frontier, with nothing in sight but sand and ocean in the distance were little signs reading CAMPO MINADO. Every now and then one needs not only a passport, but a military safe-conduct as well, to cross the border.

In Arica (which, incidentally, rhymes with "marica," or queer) I was chatting with some Peruvians in the colectivo company office. On mentioning that I live in Cañete, they busted out laughing, and said "Oh! Where they eat cats!" This is, or at least was, the truth. Now only a few of the old timers still do it, and only on feast days. San Benito de Palermo is coming up, so I might just get to partake. Did I mention they also eat guinea pigs?

Back in Peru I took advantage of the opportunity to see the cathedral and ornamental fountain in the plaza de armas, both designed by Gustave Eiffel, as in the tower in France.

In blog news, I have started a photo blog, more to be able to delete things on my camera´s memory card than to share, but in any case it´s called Sulacoritaville. It´s rather thrown together right now. I may or may not organize it a bit in the future.

learning from experience

2005-08-30T11:14:00.000-07:00

I´ll let my friend Tom Lehrer say it for me.

"In that moment of truth, I suddenly knew
That someone had stolen my wallet."

Yes, that´s right, ah wuz robbed, or rather pickpocketed, in the crowd watching the school parade for Cañete´s 449th anniversary. It´s not really that bad, however. I only had about $12 in local currency in it, and I don´t carry my passport or check card on my person, mercifully. It was a relatively cheap lesson on why not to carry things in my back pocket.

More pictures to come

HELP

2005-08-25T19:25:00.000-07:00

I have a problem, and I hope one of my readers can help me.

I am going to Chile next week, to get a new stamp in my passport when I re-enter Peru. (It´s the easiest way. Trust me.) However, I would like to see some of the country, and not spend all my time hanging around the frontier. While thinking about this, I remembered that I know a Chilean lady, sort of.

In my last semester at TAC there was a Chilean university professor, of sociology I think, who visited the campus for something like 24 hours. She didn´t speak any English, but we talked for a couple of hours after supper. She said that when I came to South America I ought to swing by, and that she and her husband would be happy to put me up for a few nights.

Here´s the kicker: I have lost all her contact information. Therefore, my question is, does anybody remember a Chilean professor named Veronica (I think) who visited TAC in the spring semester of this year? If so, does anybody know how to get in touch?

Thank you.

Fiesta!

2005-08-23T13:42:00.000-07:00

Parades, beauty queens, a giant plate of chicken and rice--it must be the Festival de Cañete. The big day for the province is next Tuesday, but for me it´s Saturday--the XXXV Festival Nacional de Arte Negro, with the usual Afro-Peruvian mix of festejo, landó, and alcatraz, but with an emphasis this year on the guajaja, new to me.

Oh, and I forgot to mention the Concurso de Pisco.

Funny how things don't change . . .

2005-08-17T19:35:00.000-07:00

Parece que los gitanos y gitanas solamente nacieron en el mundo para ser ladrones: nacen de padres ladrones, críanse con ladrones, estudian para ladrones y, finalmente, salen con ser ladrones corrientes y molientes a todo ruedo; y la gana del hurtar y el hurtar son en ellos como acidentes inseparables, que no se quitan sino con la muerte.

--Cervantes, La gitanilla

I offer the above quotation in honor of this año cervantino, the 400th anniversary of the publication of the first part of Don Quijote, and also in honor of the people of that nation I see every now and then in my province, begging and reading palms.

In other news, I may be going to see a beauty pageant. The selection of beauty queens is a big deal in these parts, with the most of the province showing up, mostly to drink, dance and throw bottles. This year's Señorita Cañete contest also kicks off the week of the Festival de Cañete, leading up to the anniversary of the town's foundation on August 30. Cheers

Photo Update

2005-08-15T13:14:00.000-07:00

Dear readers,

I know that you--good, postmodern, illiterate fellow Americans--are bored stiff with my lovely but unadorned prose. Therefore, I humbly submit for your consideration a small potpourri of photographs from the last few weeks.

This first, a picture of my recently graduated friend Zoila and some of her family, was taken in the Municipalidad de Miraflores.

This next was taken at one of the venues of the after-party: La Casa Vieja, also in Miraflores. At s/.30, the cover was steep, but drinks were free.

Here we have Zoila with her friend Cecilia at the aptly-named Bierhaus, in Barranco.

Here is a picture of your beloved blogger, in his dago suit. I do not know why I look cheery. I have a hangover, after going to bed at 6 and waking up at 11.

This last has absolutely nothing to do with the above. It is a picture of the tomb of Sarah Ellen Roberts, reputed vampiress of Pisco. Notice the "Died . . . at best." Local artisan´s mistake? I think not.

Be well, and do good work.

Sophomore Year Redux

2005-08-11T19:15:00.000-07:00

As some of my readers may remember, Neoteronous and I spent many evenings of our second year at the lovely Theosophical-Arcadian Conundrum translating the ineffably unmemorable Martin of Denmark for our classmates.

An hour ago, I had a taste of déja-vù. Passing the seminary gate I stopped to chat with the seminarian stuck with porter duty for the evening. He was reading . . . the Summa! I, being a TACer and hotshot Latinist, was soon translating (into Spanish this time) an article of the secunda secundae, complete with my very own improvised commentary tying it all back to the Ethics. I got through the objections and respondeo before I got bored.

I knew my education was good for something.

Pisco

2005-08-04T17:17:00.000-07:00

There is only one word to describe Pisco: sepulchral.

Living in the winter garúa of Lima and environs and unaccustomed to the midafternoon sun, I walked down Avenida San Martín from the Plaza de Armas to the waterfront, or what was left of it. A hundred years ago, Pisco was one of Peru´s busiest ports, exporting cotton, mineral ore and, yes, guano. Then the bottom fell out of the birdshit market and, little by little, the ocean moved a quarter mile away, making most of the great wharf an outsized beach boardwalk.

The lower end of the street is lined with colonial and early republican houses. Most probably saw the landing of San Martín himself and his army of liberation. Most of them are still painted creole yellows and blues. However, with no one about under the unblinking sun, they take on the aspect of tombs.

By the wharf, there are some newer buildings, from the turn of the last century, that don´t wear their age very well. One of them, an abandoned wreck with two Victorian towers, used to be the customs house. Another, still bearing "Gran Hotel" in weathered stucco over the door, is missing its back wall and half its roof, exposing the laundry of its latest, perhaps last, residents to wind and sun.

On my way back up Avenida San Martín I caught a whiff of death. It smells like fish meal.

Appropriately, one of the liveliest places in town is the cemetery. Two blocks inland from the Plaza de Armas, it is always busy, since death in no way absolves one of familial obligations. There are cheerful people here, down to visit relatives, and the stalls of the flower sellers outside the gate give the place a festive air.

I do not have any family buried in Pisco, but I was still looking for a grave. Among the Spanish families and the occasional clan of Chinamen, there is a solitary Englishwoman, known only as Sarah Ellen. She didn´t die in Pisco, but was brought here some years afterward. The locals say that she was a vampire, so feared by her own people that her corpse was shipped overseas. Now she is a Pisco celebrity. Judging by the notes of thanks at her grave, she apparently has her own cult too. No one, at least not here, knows her real story.

I admired for a minute, and left to catch my bus, back across the desert to the Blessed Valley.

Felices Fiestas Patrias

2005-07-28T15:30:00.000-07:00

Today, the Republic of Peru turned 184 years old. That´s right, its Fiestas Patrias, not one but two days, or rather four counting the weekend, of bands, parades, dances, fireworks and pisco sours. Say a prayer to Santa Rosa and San Martín, as well as Santo Toribio and San Francisco Solano.

I include a few pictures of a town I like to think of as "Sulacoritaville," Cerro Azul, onetime coasting-steamer stop, now a fishing-village-cum-nascent-surfer-mecca.

my life in images

2005-07-27T13:10:00.000-07:00

The church is the parroquia of San Luis, the other building used to be a plantation warehouse (now it´s a chapel), and the people are some of my students.

Drama in Real Life

2005-07-27T11:52:00.000-07:00

If you have an taste for the cinematic and are competent in Spanish, you ought to read this: http://www.larepublica.com.pe/noticia_pasada_cs.jsp?pIdNoticia=46845&pId=20&pFechaInicio=2005-07-26

If you have the former but lack the latter, it goes something like this: eight men successfully robbed a casino in Lima. After dealing with the casino security and disabling the alarm system, they stole not only 100,000 soles, but also the security cameras and the computer holding all the videos. All this in under ten minutes.

more pictures

2005-07-25T13:39:00.000-07:00

Since I can post them, why not?

. . . worth a thousand words

2005-07-25T13:36:00.000-07:00

La Sierra

2005-07-25T13:17:00.000-07:00

"Go to the mountains," a dear friend of mine wrote. Therefore I could not pass up the opportunity to accompany some of my students to the village of Aquicha, near the town of Yauyos in the high Andes. My students are avid folklorists, and in fact are writing their thesis at the Instituto Pedagógico on the teaching of folk dancing. They wanted to go to the fiest patronal of Aquicha to watch and dance. I was happy to tag along.

The town is 3250m above sea level. We rode a bus on dirt and gravel roads for six hours, and then hiked for another three. In two days we walked about twenty miles, none of it level. The fiesta began with the ritual slaughter of a cow and the incessant handing out of glasses of chicha, fermented corn liquor. The the band came. The whole town, plus visitors from as far away as Lima (mostly relatives or former residents), went dancing through the streets, followed by the band. Sadly, my students and I had to be back in Cañete the next day, but the party would go on for another three.

As promised . . .

2005-07-21T19:23:00.000-07:00

I offer a brief review of my night in the fair city of Lima.

2 discotheques, one including free bar with cover

my first pisco sour, followed by many more of the same

to bed at 6.30 am

to rise at 1 pm

I am still a wallflower

That is all.

Stay Tuned . . .

2005-07-18T10:33:00.000-07:00

. . . and read my next post, about a night on the town with the gilded youth of Lima.

The City of the Kings, continued

2005-07-14T17:44:00.000-07:00

While my first goal was to get clothes, the ambience of old Lima is irresistible to him who has eyes to see past the present. I fancy I have such eyes, and I could not but step into the church of La Merced to oberserve and to venerate. The patroness, Our Lady of Mercy or La Merced, stands high above the main altar, her arms stretched out in front of her, and wearing the red and white sash of Peruvian presidents and military marshalls. She is, in fact, a military marshall.

One day in September 24, 1823, the liberators of Peru appointed her Grand Marshall of its armies. She has held this post ever since. Consequently her church has not only a religious but a patriotic significance. It is, as most of the ancient Lima churches are, magnificently baroque, or rather churrigueresque, dark and yet richly colored. It is well used, especially the corner that contains the cross of venerable Padre Urraca, the much-kissed relic of a holy priest of the seventeenth century.

A block from Jirón de la Unión stands the church of San Agustín, again baroque. The Augustinians and Mercedarians are two of the oldest orders in the country, a Mercedarian having been present with the conquistadores. Sadly, the facade was being cleaned and the church was closed when I walked by. I can, however, relate a curious and diverting chapter of its history, thanks to the antiquarian genius of Don Ricardo Palma.

In 1656 a good-for-nothing Lima lad named Jorge Escoiquiz got himself, after being kicked out of the Augustinian novitiate, the the position of chief bellringer of San Agustín. One of the priests was fond of him. He had very few duties, since he had two slaves as assistants, but he was supposed to make sure that the bells were rung whenever the viceroy, the Count of Alba de Liste, passes by the church in his carriage. The viceroy was in fact the only person allowed to have a carriage in Lima at the time. However, Jorge and his slave boys were off on a lark, probably drunk, one day, and the His Excellency passed without his customary peal.

His indignation at the omission was aggravated by the fact that he was continually having disputes with the Church and the Inquisition and had acquired the nickname in town of " the heretic viceroy." (He wasn´t actually, dear homeschooled readers.) He was quick to take it as an intentional slight, and he immediately complained. The upshot was that the young campanero was flogged.

Jorge, however, soon had his revenge. Fama volat, saith Vergil, and this was very true in viceregal Lima. It was more or less known that the viceroy, a ladies´ man, was having an affair with an aristocratic woman of the city. It just so happened that he made it to his assignations on foot, wrapped in a cape to hide his identity, and that his route passed by the church of San Agustín. The bellringer was privy to this tidbit. Therefore, one night between midnight and one o´clock, the citizens of Lima were awakened by a full peal of the great bells of San Agustín. The next day, Jorge was summoned to the viceroy´s palace. His Excellency was, to say the least, not amused. However, when he learned that the bellringer knew not only the general rumors of his nocturnal life, but also the identity of the lady in question, he quickly changed his demeanor. The meeting ended with the viceroy asking Jorge what he could do for him. So it came to pass that, a few months later, Jorge Escoiquiz took the habit for a second time, and in 1660 celebrated his first Mass.

Now, as I promised, a description of my suit: two piece, somewhere between brown and gray. I also got a more or less champagne-colored shirt and more or less gold-colored tie. In future posts, this will be referred to as my dago suit.

That is all, for now.

The City of the Kings

2005-07-13T19:14:00.000-07:00

"You smoky smoke sniffy sniffy," said the dreadlocked pusher as I ambled up Jirón de la Unión between Plaza San Martín and the Plaza de Armas. I looked at my shoes, shook my head, and kept walking.

I was in Lima on a mission. I had to find a suit. I was invited to a college graduation and the attendant party in the rather tony suburb of Miraflores. However, I brought only three changes of clothes, and nothing approaching formal. "My" province of Cañete is poor enough, and close enough to the capital, that anyone looking for decent kit simply endures the two hour bus ride, complete with dubbed Rob Schneider movies, to be dropped in the barrio of La Victoria, whence he either makes for the compact baroque center or for the high rises and malls of the richer suburbs.

Getting up at five in the morning, hopping the wall of the seminary because of a locked gate and feeling like an undergraduate, I made the 6.30 San Vicente departure of Soyuz. Soyuz, named after the old Soviet space program in a time of collectivist enthusiasm, is today a very efficient bus company serving the coastal cities between Lima and Ica. On arrival at the Avenida Mexico station in La Victoria, I opted for the old city, as I was slightly more familiar with it and surer of finding something cheap. Besides, it is the most beautiful quarter of Lima, at least to my taste. It is an amalgam of crumbling colonial mansions with lovely courtyards hidden from the street; seventeenth-century churches, also crumbling but still gorgeous; shops, restaurants, and markets of all descriptions, legal and not; and the inevitably pretentious government buildings, fronted by monuments to myriad generalisimos and grand marshalls of the nineteenth century. It feels more European than American, especially after seeing mile after mile of outlying neighborhoods, uniformly drab and modern, in a third world way. Lima is like Los Angeles, only with a chunk of Florence at its center.

. . .

Further adventures--including but not limited to a visit to the permanent Grand Marshall of the armies of Perú, the tale of the rascally bell ringer, and a description of my new suit--to follow in my next post.

A Social Life

2005-07-12T07:49:00.000-07:00

Saturday, after walking miles and miles in a dustbin of a valley near Cerro Azul, I ended up in nearby San Luis, invited to a birthday party. The grandmother of a friend had just turned 80, and most of her family showed up, including her eight children, about thirty of her grandchildren and a handful of great-grandchildren. There must have been at least sixty people in all. I had to run and borrow a suit, plus a pair of shoes two sizes too small, from someone I barely know. I stood around with the young people drinking wine and pisco, and I danced with some of the old folks (and only the old folks, on account of my shoes), until about 12.30, when the party was really only beginning. I, however, had to be up in the morning, so I slouched off into the outer darkness, somewhat lit, to hail a cab. I found out later that the party didn´t end until eight in the morning.

Happy Birthday Rock and Roll

2005-07-05T08:42:00.000-07:00

On this day in 1954, Elvis recorded "That´s All Right" at Sun Studios in my fair city of Memphis, Tennessee.

In other news, the bishop´s handwriting is indecipherable.

Processions and San Josemaría

2005-06-28T18:45:00.000-07:00

Sunday I saw three processions, one in San Luis and two in San Vicente. The first, in honor of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, was a rather small, mid-day affair, with an amateur band of five or six to accompany. All religious processions have slow, usually mournful music. In the midafternoon I saw a funeral cortege arriving at the San Vicente cathedral, this time with the Orquesta Municipal de Cerro Azul, a bigger ensemble with uniforms. In each there was a girl throwing flower petals. Carrying statues in processions is a great honor, and a fine art. It seems like a dance, with the half-dozen men bearing the statue´s platform on their shoulders unable to see each other´s feet, or their own, and therefore taking a slow and regular pace--step, drag, half-step--to the music. Seeing them turn corners, and even reverse themselves, was one of the more impressive things I have seen here.

The third procession was for the feast of Saint Josemaría Escrivá, the founder of Opus Dei canonized in 2002, and the patron of the Prelature of Yauyos, Cañete, and Huarochirí, my host and part-time employer. This was by far the largest, since it began following a well attended mass celebrated by the bishop at the "Santuario Madre del Amor Hermoso," a lovely marian shrine on the grounds of the seminary where I live. There were fireworks, and Cerro Azul band accompanied.

Although I am two days late, I offer some quotes from Camino (The Way in English), by S. Josemaría, in honor of his day:

"Don´t put up with those mass-produced statues for public devotion. I prefer a rough, wrought-iron figure of Christ to those colored, plaster statues that look as if they were made of sugar candy."

"There is no excuse for those who could be scholars and are not."

"An hour of study, for the modern apostle, is an hour of prayer."

A new title and sundry

2005-06-23T19:38:00.000-07:00

As you can see, this blog has a new title, which includes references you ought to know, as well as my present location.

I met a weird gringo at the post office today. His name is Daniel Smith. He is an oldster from Kansas City who apparently decided to retire here. There was a certain gravelly drawl to his Spanish that made me look at him quizzical-like. He noticed and promptly asked me what state I was from. Apparently, he strongly dislikes Kansas City (!) and thinks that San Vicente is much better. Maybe it is, I said, but surely K. C. is better than Lima. He wouldn´t budge, and claimed that the City of the Kings, with its eight millions inhabitants, slums, pickpockets and drug addicts was more livable. I didn´t quite follow, but, then again, I´m not old.

This meeting reminded me that, though I am an expat, the good ol´ U. S. A. is still there, and I still have a certain patriotic duty. This brings me to the question of the week: what should I do to celebrate the Fourth of July?

Beer

2005-06-21T19:10:00.000-07:00

I forgot to mention in my last post that I have now had the three great national beers of Peru--Cerveza Cristal, Pilsen Callao, and Cerveza Cusqueña. If you come here, drink Cusqueña--it is the only dark beer in the country and more than halfway decent. Cristal is something like the Mexican Cerveza Pacífico, and Pilsen, in spite of its name, is somewhere between Michelob and piss. All three are owned by a company called (oddly enough) Backus and Johnston.

Odds and Ends

2005-06-21T18:57:00.000-07:00

I am beginning to learn creole slang. A coin of 50 céntimos is called a china, and when a man is in jail, he is said to be en Canadá. Nobody says dinero here; it´s plata, or silver. Both mariposa (butterfly) and raro (rare) mean faggot, more or less. I´m somewhere between Snatch and Treasure Island . . .

. . .

1 ticket on LAN Chile, Miami to Lima--$560

Taxi and bus fare to San Vicente de Cañete--$10

Telling a bunch of students who just love the música romantica that Celine Dion is a sucia francocanadiense (dirty Quebecker)--priceless

Race and Identity

2005-06-19T13:16:00.000-07:00

Does the title sound pretentious enough? José Ortega y Gasset once said that Late Latin was like "chipped and battered coins that have seen the insides of all the hovels of the Mediterranean." If you spend enough time jingling those coins, whether in denominations of Martin of Denmark or of modern Latin American academic writing, you run the risk of becoming a pedant, or at least sounding like one.

But I digress, or rather I never started.

I am not very used to being a racial minority. When I was younger I was certainly more aware of my whiteness in downtown Memphis than elsewhere, but most of my life was spent more or less oblivious to race. Now I am in a country whose population is made up several rather different ethnic groups, and all possible mixed combinations. This has made me rather more conscious of that ephemeral thing that people call race or blood. I offer a few observations

There are, to begin with the familiar, whites, be they the descendants of the conquistadors or children of Croat refugees. Next come the Indians, or rather indigenous peoples of several kinds, most of whom associate themselves with the Incas. There are also many black people on the coast of Peru, as you already know if you have been reading my blog. Finally, there was a large Asian migration to Peru in the nineteenth century, much as there was in California.

However, these groups and peoples did not, as they have largely done in the United States, remain separate. Here on the coast, for example, there are many people who are of mixed indigenous and black ancestry. There is a word for them, which I do not remember and which no one here uses anyway. Instead, people seem to adopt identities that are not borne out in their appearances. Thus there are many people here who proudly claim the name of negrito (everything is named diminutively, if possible, in Peru) and yet look almost exactly like like their Quechua-speaking cousins from Ayacucho, in the sierra. The same can be said of each group except the whites, who alone, it seems, like to pretend that racial identities are absolute.

I suppose there is something to "race," but it seems to me to be almost as up to the individual in question as it is inherited. I am reminded of a photograph I once saw of an old delta bluesman, Tommy Johnson (no relation to Robert--this one actually did sell his soul). He looked white, with straight hair and light skin. Yet somewhere he must have acquired that modicum of genetic material necessary to be considered--and to consider himself--"negro."

A Man After My Own Heart

2005-06-13T18:06:00.000-07:00

I spent another weekend accompanying my priest friend in the vicinity of San Luis. On Saturday night, the vigil of the feast of the Lord of Cachuy and a very important date hereabouts, I witnessed the festejo for the first time. For those of you unfamiliar with Afro-Peru, the festejo is a folk dance, done in pairs and accompanied by the cajón. The cajón is a wooden box and the typical percussion instrument of Afro-Peru. It developed four hundred years ago because the use of drums by slaves was forbidden. The player sits on his instrument and is able to produce a surprising variety of sound by slapping and rapping on the box. The dance itself is much more African than American. It brings to mind voodoo and things done in the dark. This is to say that it is extremely rhythmic and extremely suggestive. My priest friend was elsewhere. I glanced over my shoulder during the dance and saw the cupolas of the creole church, pinkish and crumbling. For a moment I imagined that I was in Haiti.

The next day I finally saw my friend in San Luis. She is one of the very small middle class of Peru, and is set to graduate from college in Lima next month with a degree in English, German, and business. She is a very intelligent and practical young lady. Her plan is to go to Germany, where her father lives, to perfect the language. She is also class president and has to give an address at graduation.

Sunday evening I went to the seven o'clock mass in Cerro Azul, beach-resort-cum-fishing-village a little ways north on the Panamericana. Once again I met up with P. Thomas and followed him while he visited birthday parties and sold hojitas. Hojitas, Hojas Dominicales or Sunday Leaves in full, are a little publication with the mass readings for that Sunday and a commentary. P. Thomas puts them together with the help of one of the Prelature's seminarians. Missalettes are unheard of in Peru, and hojitas go for 0,20/s, or about 6 U.S. cents. They are also an opportunity for P. Thomas to keep his frequently lax flock aware of the Church. He seeks out the backstreets, where the drunks play dominoes on the sidewalk. We went into one grog shop and the proprietor, who was more than a little tipsy, greeted my friend with a solemn "Pater Noster, Dominus tecum." Here, I thought, was a man after my own heart.

The National Drink

2005-06-10T09:30:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I finally gave in and tried the local alcoholic specialty, Pisco. It´s a kind of brandy, but rather stronger than usual, 100 proof or better, I think. The proprietress of the restaurant kept coming over and warning me to drink my shot slowly. Finally, she sat down and proceeded to give a lecture on the different species of the drink--which amount to strong, strongest, and only for use in cocktails. I still have to try the Pisco Sour.

Flag Day

2005-06-07T09:39:00.000-07:00

Today is dedicated to Peruvian flag. I´m in the provincial capital, San Vicente, and there are school parades, with bands and students and kids who look like the high school JROTC back home. I also noticed a banner over the door of the hospital informing all and sundry that May 31 was the Day of the Non-Smoker. Apparently, smoking in public places is illegal in Peru. At least it says so on the cigarette packs. However, I haven´t had any problems yet, and I do see other people smoking, though not many. Cigarettes are cheap, about $1.50 per pack for Luckies, but most of them (everything except Winstons, I think) are made in South America and taste like it. There´s even a knockoff brand with the same packaging style as Marlboro, only called Golden Beach. I also saw a tabloid with the headline, "Metrosexuals Piss Themselves Out of Fear."

Anoche en San Luis

2005-06-05T17:09:00.000-07:00

Six days out of the week, there are no flags on the poles in the plaza de armas, only a little black trash bag stuck on one of them. Right now there are two overlapping pick up soccer games going on in the paths between the acacias. The kids are using the benches as goals.

No one seems to know how old the church is. Padre Thomas tells me that the baptismal records go back to 1780, but those are only the ones still extant. The present building is of pink-beige stucco, with many chips and dents and score marks. It has two cupolas, which are asymetrical.

Everyone is paseando, just walking to socialize. People get enough exercise in their normal routine here to be able to dispense with abominations like jogging. They just spend their evenings going around the plaza de armas, very leisurely, and up and down the two main streets of the town, Calle Comercio and Calle San Francisco. These streets have other, official names, taken from dictators and generals of the nineteenth century, but nobody uses them. In the evenings many of the houses have loud marinera and salsa music coming out of them. I feel like I have one foot in Nostromo and the other in Our Man in Havana.

Black Magic

2005-06-04T14:14:00.000-07:00

I am blogging from an internet shack on a dirt street in the town of San Luis de Cañete, which bills itself as the ¨Cradle of the Black Art.¨ And it ain´t Wicca. It´s the sho´nuff, bona fide home of Afro-Peruvian music. If you don´t know what that is, then . . . read a book or something. Actually, Penguin (as in the publisher) has a cd anthology of this music on their Rough Guide imprint. Anyway, I just lost my priest friend and have to fend for myself for a few hours. I know one other person in this town, sort of, a college student I met last time by the name of Zoila. She speaks good English. Maybe I´ll go find her.

4 Days to Go

2005-05-27T14:32:00.000-07:00

In under a week I will be thick in the coastal fog a few miles south of Lima, the City of the Kings, the Capital of the Republic. This is, of course, why I have succumbed to the malign influence of my friend Neoteronous and started a blog. Please send complaints to him. I hope to make the format of my little bastard child somewhat more interesting and attractive in the next few days, so stay tuned.