andreaschrisdrewfreijaguyhalliejasonetc.

It's always grey in Lima and time slips away into those slits of vanishing sun and black nights.

Above the cliff face, down the coast, the cross of Baranco cuts the mist all the way to Miraflores and the Pacific slinks and laps, icily. It feels like a transient thing, sleepily nestled against that ocean waiting to find the heat. Waiting for the fog to lift and for summer to roll in from the water like a warm tongue. Waiting to leave and move up the coast where the sun burns endless.

It is beautiful, to be sure. The shiny concrete and well-dressed of Miraflores. All those bohemians and hipsters and sidewalk sellers in Baranco. Those buildings in Centro, wasted to the color of lime and bearing down the backs of highways, out of place. From that rooftop patio where the hours roll away, it is crisp and illuminated. Always now pushed into by a colourless sky and frozen by that Arctic wind bruising its way across the country.

People come from here or people go from here. There is no in between to speak of. Lima has words for few wanderers, but for those who hear it, it weaves a lush filigree. Sweet lines of moist air and passion pushed out on hot breath into pores. It permeates, for those that listen. Intoxicates.



I came to Lima. I stay in Lima.

Wrapped coolly in that lazy grey and cocooned in its quiet poetry. Nestled, as it were, like a transient waiting for the path to be illuminated. Waiting to leave while basking in the heat of distraction, created warmth. Feeling the Castellano float off lips, over hips into the break. Dancing under the black sky until the sun cuts briefly and the damp sends everyone to bed.

Those others that come and go, those beautiful soulmates, burrow into a lack I didn't know I had. In an exchange of all the carried things, we become each other. Become changed and well because of each other. Become ourselves in the reflection of a kindred. Paths wind like nerves, tendrils of dusty roadways through the body of a continent.

And in all directions, I bring them. The lack filled.

Here is the heartbreak of wandering: the dull ache of goodbye and the swell of being bettered by another.

Beautiful strangers/ Soulmates/ Satellites in the grey.

Linked to the experience of Lima and a life shortly shared.

Snugged into the neck of Lima, warm from the appertaining intoxication, distraction, I stay. A better person for those who passed through.

xo

apologies, and that hard road.

Let`s start with an apology.

Apologies.

In this reality, time gets away. But it is never wasted. It is spent in the best ways. It is spent at breakfast with kindred spirits from other countries. It is spent in colorful markets, chasing the beautiful local children and buying those llama sweaters. Spent on trails high up in the mountains, camping under stars, sitting in darkened ruins. It is spent touching ancient stone walls and speaking Castellano with that satellite operator who talked of the Incas, and how everything is energy. Who called me hermanita and gave me a hand carved wood whistle that I should play in happiness and sadness. It is used seeing the Southern Cross for the first time, hearing Quechuan. Or placed in those friends that touch a nerve and that you miss when they move on in a different direction. Those ones that take you to the fountain park and let you cry from exhaustion into your newfound tofu. Those ones that you climb a thousand steps with, up to Christo Blanco and back. The ones that you wander through libraries, neighborhoods with. Who stop and watch, just like you.

This time is not wasted. It is spent. In churches, museums, mountains, stars, ideas, languages, people. It is spent perfectly in experience. On the intangibles that weld to your fabric.

So, apologies.

I have been here. Collecting, remaking myself in those threads of happiness so elusive a life goes on.

the way to Machu Picchu, and that town called Cusco.

The Inca Trail climbs its way through the Sacred Valley, winding across high passes into the thin air of the clouds. Breathing is difficult. Coca candy is magic.

The porters rush past all morning, laden with our things, our campsites, our sustenance. They chew wads of coca leaves stuffed into cheeks, and their calves along with large Andean lungs, carry them on soft breaths. We breath fiercely, gasping, panting, and in endless awe of those that carry and run.

The climbs are steep. So high that they transcend the cloud bank and at night it seems that the stars could drop into palms. It is cold up in those Andes, in that Sacred Valley. Shivers in the dark inside sweaters and sleeping bags with the black sky blowing cool overhead.

In the day, the ups and downs make skin swell, skin pop. Joints expand to bear the downs and that old pain burrows into that hip joint, that angry nerve. But it is all forgotten, that sacred pain, stumbling in the dark to those majestic terraces, those 7 windows for the sky. The feeling of a secret, of the sweet undiscovered, erases all. Skin seems healed. Soul, well.

The way is hard. Harder than that walk last summer, maybe.

Machu Picchu feels small after all the steps of the trail. It is a mad dash to the Sun Gate at dawn and then a small sigh. There are people, everywhere, even so early. And the flood only grows throughout the day. Quiet is hard to find. It is beautiful, to be sure. As seen in a million photographs. And it is overwhelming in the shadow of so much exhaustion, appertaining pain.

It is the thing that you walk towards, but surely not the reason.

It is perfect for naps on the ground and proper toilets and imagining what it looked like consumed by jungle, before it was discovered and trampled. It is perfect. Perfection in stone.

that city called Cusco.

Cusco is all uphill. So many steps. So much shortness of breath in the altitude. It is imaginably difficult after the way to Machu Picchu. But it is stunning. All cobbled streets, steps. Tile roofs spreading like fire into the valley. Steeples, blanks in landscape that indicate town squares, fountains, centres.

In alleys old woman parade with llamas, baby lambs, offering photos for 1 sole a piece. Vendors approach offering massages for tired bones, and jewellery to remind of the pretty things. They are relentless, and shooed only by the admission of not carrying money. Maybe later, they all say.

The children are beautiful, hanging from their mothers backs in brightly colored slings. Dark eyes and honey skin and sweet wide smiles from behind all those wooly hats. They hold out tiny fingers to wave and coo in Spanish, and sometimes in Quechuan. They laugh, freely.

Cusco is weather. Hot in the sun. Freezing elsewhere. Frigid at night. There are rarely clouds here, only the sprawling blue of sky. There is nothing to keep the heat down. The llama sweater industry is booming.

Tonight I take a night bus to the West. To Arequipa, on my way back to Lima. They say it is (blessedly) flat there.

xo

dusk, idle bets.

An idle bet in that mountain town called Boquete, and direction changes.

I arrived in the blessed cool of nightime. Streets illuminated by the warmth of so many people in curb side cafes, laughing. I arrived to the Getsemeni with the sound of salsa breezing in my ear and the stars, clear up in the sky.

Cartagena is like a dream. Those delicious and infrequent dreams that take bits of memories from past loves and plaster them together with that sweet hue of fondness.

It feels like Paris, like Barcelona, like Santiago, like Montreal.

There is some kind of magic here, undoubtedly. Somewhere, buried in the mortar of the old city walls, the bricks of fossilized coral, the slow moving hands of the clock tower, the chipped yellow paint of so many buildings, or the flooded tunnels of the Castillo, there is some magic.

This city has a brightness, with so much yellow, orange. It makes the sun feel closer, like it could be touched only by running fingertips along those old walls of those old buildings.

Burning.

The city seers and laps steam into the Bay at midday. And when the rain comes, it comes hard, making swimming pools out of potholes, sidewalks.

In the evenings, the waning sun burns down the backs of buildings, alleyways, and turns everything golden for that small bit of time. It marks out small pathways for that dry lightning that billows to the sea every night in this season. Those white flashes casting strange shadows off the tips of roofs, down onto busy streets.

So the dusk burns down to fires in the sky and sultry struts through that old town, with vendors selling mangoes, and fried cornmeal and cheese cakes, and fresh fruit juices, beer. It vanishes to the bare bulbed delight of cabinas of book vendors and the smell of grilled meat, potatoe, the constant click of horses and carriages, and the warm tones of music always in the air.

An idle bet and I find Columbia.

san blas, translated.

I arrived to San Blas in the biggest storm. I was on a tiny boat crossing the water to that island called Diablo when the sky turned dark gray and the ocean got so angry. The waves stood up and went over the boat with so much fury. It was stunning, frightening.

I arrived drenched to the bone... papers, clothing, identity, self.

The islands of the Kuna Yala are beautiful, isolated. I could almost wrap my arms around them and carry them away. They are small, perfect, drowned into the ocean as they are. Yet, I walked around them and felt lost, after Bocas and so many people and...

The sand of Diablo was clean and white and burnt toes in the midday sun. The water was a blue that lives mostly in dreams. The sky was always clear, bright, except at noon when the rain came through, always. It hammered on the grass roofed huts and dripped dampness, down onto hammocks.

At night the leaves on the trees made the sound of raindrops and the sky blew the wind around the slats of those huts, and I dreamt of things that have passed and people I miss and...

I dreamt of speaking perfect Spanish, articulating all those things that need out, with that softness that flows the words off the tongue, loose. I dreamt of what I should have said, and I woke up wondering where to find all those words lurking around my subconsious. Words of perfect Spanish for...

I dreamt of goodbye. And missing things.

I bought a new camera in the city and I kept trying to take photos, to start the archive of experience over, but all I can remember is those pictures I took at the last goodbye, and how I wish I could get just those back.

Now.

I lost a bet and came to Columbia. Sweet Cartagena.

quelonios, unembittered.

(My favourite project, despite the thievery.)

Dirt constantly under finger nails from so much scratching, so much digging in the weeds. So much sand and salt expelling from pores, always. It`s hard to feel clean anywhere here, tangled up in the mangrove of wetlands. It`s sickly sticky, sour from the sweat. Try to clean it, wash it all away but it`s already permeated. Already a part of that intangible thing that will become the new you, somehow.

Tired, constantly, despite the hours upon hours of attempted sleep on those rough wooden slats and that slight piece of foam that presses into your one sore hip sharply. Struggling to stay asleep under that fallen mosquito net while the sea crashes deep just over yonder and small Spanish voices speak and poach turtle eggs down by the break.

It´s painfully beautiful on that island, lead to by endless water ways with uprooted trees guarding secrets and making cages for all the things that creep in the dark. Shades of every green shine in the sun and are dotted by the spiky red flower who`s name I never know. When there is red here, it is exquisite, intangled in all the green.

Here, the ocean moves pale grey in every direction and makes awkward swimming, standing. Everything about it is an opposite to it`s sweet sister down the coast that sways slowly with white sands and cristalline green waves.

At night the sea creatures crawl upon the sand like ancient things. Those leatherbacks, heaving and hawling all of themselves out of the surf to nest. They labour over the sand, digging into it for ages. Making it perfect. Making it sweet. And when the work is done, 100 eggs lay in the coolness below. Hoping for new life... on that island called Quelonios.

it`s tuesday somewhere.

Here is the part I`m at: the things that I have the hardest time forgetting always happen on idle Thursdays. Broken hearts, bad news, insolent dreams.

The days keep melting into each other in a very disconcerting way. Like just around the corner, time is going to bear it`s teeth and gnash at my burnt skin and that will be the end. I`ll be scarred by all those spent days.

I can`t keep track. That`s really the problem.

Right now, I`m going backwards in a thin attempt to remind myself why I want to continue going forward.

Costa Rica got to me. That`s the plain truth. Admist the tangles of mangroves and salty sea air, in the clear mountains, or in the dampness of those wetlands I could never quite find a connection. It felt edgy, in a way that made you keep your things close, or argue with taxi drivers trying to overcharge, negotiate the price of a mango, or talk back to those leering boys. It felt, exhausting. And in the end it doesn`t matter because if they want your stuff, they`ll go into your room and get it while you`re relocating a nest of turtle eggs at 3 a.m. on an idle Thursday, somewhere on that remote island called Quelonios.

And that`s how Costa Rica became erased. It vanished along with all those woven bracelets, and sweet shell pendants from Montezuma, and my favourite pen. It went along with my camera and wallet and 2gbs of memory and all those beautiful shots of friends and beaches and homes for the small time they were all mine.

All I can hope is that my stuff fed someone in need.(Though I doubt my favourite pen could buy a grain of sand.)

I`m still a little bitter.

Mostly because of the law of 3`s. Hopefully this is it. Either way, I`m outta stuff. Clearly. So I`m thinking of having a t-shirt made that says:¨No Tengo Nada¨, so the next guy is at least warned. Though I assume that would only attract more leers. Cultural differences abound..

(One day I`ll tell you about the day I wore my I heart Panama shirt.)

So.

Right now, I`m going backwards in a thin attempt to remind myself why I want to continue going forward. I came back to Bocas, to a family and friends and town that are familiar. To happy hour at Mondo Taitu and that electro 80´s night. To the Columbian vendors across from the Iguana that drink boxed wine with me and tell me how beautiful and safe their country is. To that special place with the hammocks and tents where so many hours have been spent and that I always carry in my heart.

And here, I`ve been stuck. In Bocas. Because that`s what happens here. People stay. The searing heat, and golden sun, and sweet air make everything slow, easy. Like being stuck in a vat of syrup. Delicious and hard to escape from.

But I know I have to move on. I have to find those other places where my spanish is more necessary. Where I can find those friends that moved on ages ago to places like Columbia, Peru. I need to pull at the thread and tear away...Panama City, going backwards. Mañana, talvez.

xoxo

dream in jungle.

I had a dream last night that I was looking at pictures of the Camino, but all the pictures were of things that never happened. Still, I looked at them with the same fondness, love.

(I know) I am haunted (here in this jungle).

Here in this jungle the sounds of geccos, of howler monkeys ring out at 5 a.m. and the wood smoke from the fire billows through the cabin. We crave coffee this early, this hot and the floor boards creak under blistered toes and the sand drips from pores all the way down the stairs.

The house sits back from the ocean, tucked into gardens and trees with so many white-faced monkeys swinging, babies clutched to backs, throwing mangoes at the tin roofs.

Head sits in elbow at 5 a.m. as the sun rises out in the distance and the barrel of the Pacific crashes on the Playa Grande just into the yonder. It smells of salt, and sweat, in that elbow.

At 8 a.m. it is hot. Bothered. And the work is tedious, difficult (sometimes), dirty (mostly). And the sweet pineapple compensates, when it can make its way to camp.... otherwise, the fire burns the rice and beans and we hunch tired over bowls, laughing.

Hammocks in the sand at the burning bits of the day. Those afternoons... Sweet breezes, where they can be found and that fresh water pool two beaches over. Homes for all those burning daydreams.

Then the sun sinks early and the guitar and woodsmoke and cards sift through the air until the candle light melts away.

Darkness, bed with clean skin and all that sand and dreams of all those lovely things that never happened.