Arequipa

I've started in Peru's second largest city, Arequipa, which is an hour and a half south of Lima, by plane.

When i arrived at the airport, I was greeted with this stunning landscape of snow covered mountains, spanning directly behind our tiny airplanes. A very beautiful and welcoming greeting.

The city is laid out in a very easily navigatable grid plan. Everything is within walking distance. The architecture is beautiful, and very much what you'd expect to see in South America. It dates back to the 1600s when the Europeans brought over their designers, influences, and most importantly, Christianity. So there is a very interesting mix of Incan and Jesus everywhere. Everything is very well preserved, but every now and then, and earthquake comes and ruins things, which then requires restoration, so im not sure how much of it is all still original.

Another interesting observation is that the architecture here reminds me a lot of morocco's. along the streets, all the buildings seem to have this uniform appearance, more like walls, that contain whatever lies behind them. And the houses or buildings are built like town houses, with beautiful rooftops and courtyards in the center with the rooms built around them. Just like in fes, a lot of these rooftops have solar panels on them. So here is another developing nation using clean energy-- and we complain it is too much of an expense for us.

My first impression of Peruvians is that they are so kind and friendly. They're really calm people who are very generous with their smiles. And it's the first time in a long time, that I'm visiting a place and no one is bothering me with the buy this, look at that, or hey baby wow, beautiful. It feels like I'm walking around in Europe. Peruvians are going about their daily lives, and don't really care that I'm a tourist walking around their streets.

Another thing I've noticed is that not only do they seem to love juice- for the obvious reason that the fruit here is fabulous, but they also seem to LOVE ice cream! It is sold everywhere and so many people are either sitting and enjoying some, or walking around with a cone. It is actually very romantic to me. Such a simple way to enjoy life. So I decided to go check it out and I found flavors that I never before knew existed. I must have tried about 10 of them because I literally had no idea what to choose. In the end, I went with cheese ice cream which is delicioussss. Tastes like a vanilla with some cinnamon and coconut almost; and another fruit that I forgot to write down the name of. Both great. I also tried these alfajores, these cookies sandwiched together with caramel. They're sold everywhere as well. From what I've read, arequipan food is very spicy, and my whole day today is about the food, and some sites...

I visited the Santa Catalina nunnery, a beautiful complex that housed nuns back around the 1600-1800s. Then I sat in the plaza de armas, which is more of a scene for the pigeons than humans, apparently. I guess this is the pigeon hang out where they all come to score a mate. I must have spent an hour watching all these male pigeons puffing up their feathers and running after the females to get their groove on, and I didn't see a single one score. That could be in part to blame by the children who enjoy running after them to watch them flutter and scatter about.

I found these beautiful Peruvian ladies selling hand made dolls and stuffed alpacas. just for the sake of talking to them and photographing them, I had to buy some.

Unfortunately, I forgot my camera cable, so when I update this blog, I won't have too many pictures until I get home and upload there. Sorry folks. In the meantime though: