My body gets me up at 6:45 a.m. since we've been leaving around 7:45 or 8 each day. Only today,
because I'm not going into the comunidades, I actually take a long, HOT shower (luxury) and don't rush nervously to gather and pack supplies and books.
I go downstairs and have some breakfast. They are leaving late (8:30 am) today for the one hour 40 minute ride into the remote village of Pampallacta (in Calca) and they delay to
take several group photos. This marks the end of our work week together, so everyone wants photos
of those who will be leaving this weekend. Nice to know we'll have a way to remember this incredible team of
So, I stroll around the grounds a little bit and now it's 11 a.m. I have checked in our really sick doc (my best friend here) after helping her upstairs and having mixed two bottles of powdered Gatorade into water for her.
She's on Cipro and a whole arsenal of necessary meds. As well, our protector and EcoHotel
owner/manager has been giving her herbal remedies "a la peruana." ¡La muy pobre! She truly is one of the "women who do too much." "Let's do some good," she says to the troops at times.
She also has an adorable sense of joy and humor.
My fingers are crossed for Machu Picchu. Can any of us still go?
I am writing this from my bed in the inn, looking up from time to time to gaze
at the Andes so close to my window that they go beyond the height and width of the window
frame --(or, is it, of course, that they are so gigantic) ... The range outside the side window is
farther off by a bit -- I can see some sky above it ... The sky here, by the way, is the bluest
blue, and clearest, crispest, purest blue that I have ever seen.
After a bit, I have soup with Doctora Kathy, la muy enferma, and leave for town with
Felipe (a worker in the estate) -- we take his Cuban-style 40 year old clunker of a VW Beetle into town to get cough drops for me, a jar of aguantamayo to bring back to the States, and two bottles of white Peruvian wine (no sulfites, just fresh, pure and lovely as my treat for tonight).
The team returns and I discover two more are down and returned early.
We have a group meeting to discuss ways to improve and what to discuss what
we have experienced this week.
Nobody has had time to prepare for our "Talent Show" (my idea at the beginning of
mission -- little did I know that we would be working hard and feeling exhausted). Someone
suggests that we can do one (corny and nerdy, of course, as I instructed), when we return to
the U.S. However, I explain that mine should be done there (my song exemplifies the symbols of the country a la americana), so ... I get up, and with my sore throat (perfect for what I am about to do) sing "Come Fly With Me, We'll Float Down to
Peru.." and do it with choreography (moves) a la Marilyn Monroe (I'm dressed in layers
of sweatshirts/jeans, etc. -- so it's pretty funny). They laugh.
A few of us have dinner and another doc starts getting sick -- the one who's to go to Machu Picchu with us tomorrow (!).
