wheels on the bus go round and round
Wow, I am sincerely tired. Peruvian buses are a fab adventure, let me tell you.
First, there´s the bus thing. Yachaywasi arranged for a private bus company to pick me up. The way it works is that people pre-pay a weekly fee and the driver for the route knows specifically who to pick up at pre-designated general points. Fine, right? Well, they gave me an incorrect description of the bus and the wrong time for arrival! It passes at 6:30ish, and I was waiting since 6. No more, too early. Besides that, I think the first day to take it (Wednesday) it never even came. I had to call Flora and we went to the site together via public buses/comvees. For those who don´t know,`public` here doesn´t mean it´s run by the city--there are companies that own a large number of buses with individual private owners (think like a chain of stores). Comvees are minivan-sized and function the same way, but are a bit more scummy. All buses/comvees have a guy who hangs out the side, opens the door for folks, collects the money, and shouts out (continuously) the destination. And there are tons and tons of them. And they all drive insanely. Our driver the other day got chewed out by the traffic police, he was so awful. :) And one comvee today that I took was missing the inside plastic part of the whole driver side, and where it met the floor at the bottom, there was about a 2 inch gap along the entire side through which that you could see the road beneath your feet.
Other types of transport? Mototaxis and regular taxis. Mototaxis are like chinese rickshaws with motorcycles instead of bikes attached to it, think of a cross btwn a golfcart and a scooter (aka tuktuks in Guatemala). And I´ve discovered that everone in Peru asks me the same questions: 1)what country are you from? 2) Do you like Peru? 3) How long are you staying here? 4) Have you been to X place? 5) What´s your name?
Same thing, every single time. It`s very formulaic small-talk. It´s like the stereotypical weather-and-local-sports-teams questions. Cracks me up, I´m not sure why. I was half tempted to beat the guy to the questions today--answer them right before he asked them, b/c really, I can tell it´s coming.
SO anyhow, from now on (with the right time) I have to leave the hostel at 6am to walk about 25plus blocks to the corner where this private bus picks me up at 6:30. It´s a bit dark and creepy at that time of the morning, but there are tons of people on their way to work so I guess it´s okay.
The bus is supposed to drop me off where there´s a turn off the asphalt to a dirt road through a mini shantytown to the site. Well, this being the first day finally on the private bus, the guy didn´t know exactly where I needed to go, and I was too sleepy to notice. So I went a bit too far and ended up at a zinc refinery. When we got there, I hadn´t realized I missed the drop, and the driver told me to get off the bus for that moment, that we had to wait. I thought maybe we were going to get back on in a bit, but then the chauffer strolled off. I was soooo confused. I finally went and asked a security guard where the hell was I and why on earth was I at the refinery! He told me the site was back aways, I was at the wrong place, but that I should wait. About 10 min later the driver came back (he had walked off to call his supervisor to ask what to do with me), we got back on the bus, and he took me a little ways down the road to take a mototaxi to the site. I asked 3 mototaxis beforeI could find a guy that actually knew where the site was, and the guy was astonished that I was standing at the entry to a refinery in the middle of nowhere by myself. Me too, buddy.
We´re still working out the bugs for the wall evalutions, so it´s been very slow. Add the fact that we leave at 2ish (3 of them are students, they´re still in classes until the 15th) means not much has been done at all. I get back via regular buses around 4ish, work for a couple more hours at Yachaywasi organizing things for the next day. Then I cook dinner, pack lunch, clean up stuff, shower, and basically collapse. *phew* Tomorrow and next week will be better. I´m definitely looking forward to the weekend.
And I have to admit, I am enjoying myself. For some reason, I find all these things to be strangely hilarious. It´s just so weird. *smile*
First, there´s the bus thing. Yachaywasi arranged for a private bus company to pick me up. The way it works is that people pre-pay a weekly fee and the driver for the route knows specifically who to pick up at pre-designated general points. Fine, right? Well, they gave me an incorrect description of the bus and the wrong time for arrival! It passes at 6:30ish, and I was waiting since 6. No more, too early. Besides that, I think the first day to take it (Wednesday) it never even came. I had to call Flora and we went to the site together via public buses/comvees. For those who don´t know,`public` here doesn´t mean it´s run by the city--there are companies that own a large number of buses with individual private owners (think like a chain of stores). Comvees are minivan-sized and function the same way, but are a bit more scummy. All buses/comvees have a guy who hangs out the side, opens the door for folks, collects the money, and shouts out (continuously) the destination. And there are tons and tons of them. And they all drive insanely. Our driver the other day got chewed out by the traffic police, he was so awful. :) And one comvee today that I took was missing the inside plastic part of the whole driver side, and where it met the floor at the bottom, there was about a 2 inch gap along the entire side through which that you could see the road beneath your feet.
Other types of transport? Mototaxis and regular taxis. Mototaxis are like chinese rickshaws with motorcycles instead of bikes attached to it, think of a cross btwn a golfcart and a scooter (aka tuktuks in Guatemala). And I´ve discovered that everone in Peru asks me the same questions: 1)what country are you from? 2) Do you like Peru? 3) How long are you staying here? 4) Have you been to X place? 5) What´s your name?
Same thing, every single time. It`s very formulaic small-talk. It´s like the stereotypical weather-and-local-sports-teams questions. Cracks me up, I´m not sure why. I was half tempted to beat the guy to the questions today--answer them right before he asked them, b/c really, I can tell it´s coming.
SO anyhow, from now on (with the right time) I have to leave the hostel at 6am to walk about 25plus blocks to the corner where this private bus picks me up at 6:30. It´s a bit dark and creepy at that time of the morning, but there are tons of people on their way to work so I guess it´s okay.
The bus is supposed to drop me off where there´s a turn off the asphalt to a dirt road through a mini shantytown to the site. Well, this being the first day finally on the private bus, the guy didn´t know exactly where I needed to go, and I was too sleepy to notice. So I went a bit too far and ended up at a zinc refinery. When we got there, I hadn´t realized I missed the drop, and the driver told me to get off the bus for that moment, that we had to wait. I thought maybe we were going to get back on in a bit, but then the chauffer strolled off. I was soooo confused. I finally went and asked a security guard where the hell was I and why on earth was I at the refinery! He told me the site was back aways, I was at the wrong place, but that I should wait. About 10 min later the driver came back (he had walked off to call his supervisor to ask what to do with me), we got back on the bus, and he took me a little ways down the road to take a mototaxi to the site. I asked 3 mototaxis beforeI could find a guy that actually knew where the site was, and the guy was astonished that I was standing at the entry to a refinery in the middle of nowhere by myself. Me too, buddy.
We´re still working out the bugs for the wall evalutions, so it´s been very slow. Add the fact that we leave at 2ish (3 of them are students, they´re still in classes until the 15th) means not much has been done at all. I get back via regular buses around 4ish, work for a couple more hours at Yachaywasi organizing things for the next day. Then I cook dinner, pack lunch, clean up stuff, shower, and basically collapse. *phew* Tomorrow and next week will be better. I´m definitely looking forward to the weekend.
And I have to admit, I am enjoying myself. For some reason, I find all these things to be strangely hilarious. It´s just so weird. *smile*
posted by archaesmd at 3:49 PM
1 Comments:
They are hilarious. You have me laughing. Such fun adventures.
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