Into the Andes

That last journal entry from the Amazon was absurdly long. Several times while typing it in, I wondered where I had found the strength to write such a long bit. Normally, the tendonitis in my hand stops me from going on at such length. From this point on, the entries are shorter. But, in my opinion, they also get more interesting. Making the transition from the Amazon to the Andes was one of the most bizarre experiences of my life. So, without further adieu...

17 August, Cajamarca

There was a flea in my bed at Hotel Maranon in Iquitos, and I was out of my mind for two nights & two days with the itching caused by the combination of the flea bites with the mosquito bites and the nasty black flies that bit me in the jungle. That's my basic explanation for not writing until tonight -- that and the fact that Kate and I shared a bottle of wine here in Cajamarca's thinner air and I didn't feel like writing.

So, as it seems customary for me to have some infirmity or other on *every* trip we take, I have sought out various cures for the bug bites. The mostquitos, the flies and the fleas had created the most damnable itching I've ever experienced in my life. Worse than any chicken pox or poison ivy I've ever had. Normally, I can restrain from scratching, but there was so much venom in my 143 (!!) bug bites that I could not resist it.

In Iquitos, I had gone to the farmacia twice looking for help. One gave me a cortizone cream mixed with antibiotics. It did not help very much. Another gave me -- woe is me! -- scabies medicine, which could also treat lice and other infestations. It also did not help. I found myself feeling sick to my stomach from Atahualpa's revenge, aching in my injured back *and* scratching myself like a flea-infested dog in the Lima airport. NOT happy.

So my first order of business upon waking my first day in Cajamarca was to ask the hotel staff to recommend a doctor in town at a private clinic. The manager was kind enough to offer me a ride to a private emergency clinic here in town -- we are staying a few miles out of the city center -- and to explain some little bit of my condition or needs to the front desk staff.

Only one woman spoke even the most broken English there, so I was on my own. (The hotel staff doesn't speak English, either.) The first thing they tried to diagnose me with was altitude sickness. I'm not sure why, especially after I said, Yo tengo muchas muchas picadores de mosquitos y mosca porque fue en la selval para una semana. Los hacenme loco y no puedo dormir porque yo siempre (and I mimmicked scratching, scratching.)"

UCM interrupts her own entry: So, I don't claim to have any fluency whatsoever in Spanish. I will put in brackets what it was I was trying to say. Please consider them to be translated with the following caveat: What I *think* I said was....

Thus: [I have many, many mosquito and fly bites because I was in the jungle for a week. The are making me crazy, and I can't sleep because I always (not knowing the word for itching, I just scratched myself).]

The woman with broken English said, "You are tired? Can't breathe good? It's the altitude."

No es la problema, I said. Es las picadores. [That's not the problem. It's the bites.]

"Is hard to go up stairs?" the woman asked.

Meanwhile, a nurse was taking my blood pressure over and over again -- like five, six, seven times -- because the cuff was not big enough. She got an astronomical reading -- 180/120 -- and I was thinking part of it was the altitude, the carziness of the bug bites and the PAIN of having my BP taken -- my armed squeezed like crazy! -- so many times.

After a few rounds of this, they walked me up three flights of stairs to the doctor's office. He also didn't speak English, but after he asked me about altitude sickness again -- it's not THAT high here -- I said, No, la problema esta de selva. Mira aqui. [No, the problem is the jungle. Look here.] And I pulled up my pant leg. The sight of 30 bites on the back of my calf cut through the communication barrier quickly. The doctor and the nurse both winced.

Then, the doctor started asking me about all the medications and vaccinations I'd had prior to going into the jungle. Then he took my BP himself -- 170/100 that time! -- and listened to my heart and my lungs and asked a lot of questions about my medical history. Finally, he said he should prescribe two injections of sme cortizone shot and some antihistamine pills. He also said I shouldn't eat any fish, shellfish or citrus for the next 15 days, but he did not explain why.

Anyway, long story short, I've had two shots in my butt, and I'm hardly itching at all anymore. Poor Kate, who refused to see the doctor, is still scratching herself crazy. All told, including consultation with the doctor and purchasing the medicine, it cost me 150 soles -- about $45 -- to get rid of the crazy-making itching. At the same time, my stomach is not bothering me and my back is doing a little better, so I am feeling more my normal self.

That's good, too, because Cajamarca is a cool city, and I am happy to be able to enjoy it. It is, in its current state, a Spanish colonial town built atop the foundation of an Incan city that was at the crossroads of four major trails (called Incan trails even though they predate the Incans) that connected Equador and Quito to Bolivia. The four major routes criss-crossed here. But the Caxamarca culture predates the Incans by more than two milleniums. We saw caveside tombs today that date to 1160 BC. The Incans weren't in power until at least 1200 AD, but maybe it was more like 1300.

The Spanish conquistadors must have found their way to this city via the trails. Even today, they are CLEARLY OBVIOUS in the hillsides above town, and they still criss-cross in the Plaza de Armas. Pretty cool.

It is here in Cajamarca that the Incan ruler Atahualpa was captured by a motley band of conquistadors, paid an absurd ransom of a room filled with gold -- a room that still exists here -- and was subsequently executed when the Spanish found out he'd sent word to his army to march on Cajamarca and free him. Then the Spaniards installed their own puppet Incan kind and marched on Cuzco, overthrowing this empire.

Today, the city is vibrant. The streets are *filled* with people all day long, save for siesta from 1 to 3 p.m. Evenings are bustling -- lots of commerce and strolling and eating going on here.

Its population is a curious mixture of campensino culture -- women with brightly covered woven wool shawls and stove-pipe-like hats made of some very high-quality straw or other material. They are living an agrarian life, and you see them all over the place carrying huge bundles of eucalyptus leaves (for mosquito repellant) or severed cows heads (horns still attached) on their backs. There are lots of pack animals -- I see mules all the time carrying LOADS of firewood, for example. We are pan-handled constantly. Being pretty much the only white people here, we stand out as rich gringas in a town with a fair amount of poverty.

At the same time, Cajamarca is thriving with modern industry and has the people that go with that, as well. There are rich American businessmen here running (exploiting!) the Yanacocha gold mine several miles north of town, and all the mining has brought something of a boomtown experience to the city. A guide we hired for the day -- a man named Nino -- said that Caja's population 12 years ago stood at about 75,000. Today, nearly 500,000 live here.

It seems like every other store near the Plaza de Armas (the heart of the city) is a cell phone shop. Lawyers and bankers, businessmen -- and *some* businesswomen -- flood the local restaurants at lunch. The streets are alive with children in crisp, neat school uniforms. Bands play music in the plaza. There are good restaurants and cafes and more taxis than one might reasonably expect to find in a town this size. The narrow streets are overwhelmed with them and with the large trucks going back and forth to the Yanacocha gold mine, which is today the third largest gold mine in the world.