Adios Cusco!

March 6th, 2009 by Gabrielle Armstrong

My last few days in Cusco seemed to fly by! I had promised 2 of my students (Julio and Lincol) I would let them take me on a tour of their University, which turns out has a Zoo! It was no London Zoo and most animal rights activists would probably be up in arms as its not the kindest looking place and they apparently keep the animals there for ‘research’. Nevertheless it was full with animals from the Peruvian Jungle and I finally got to see a Condor!

After, they took me to lunch in the University Comedor. Basically, it is what I would imagine prison food to be like; served in stainless steel pots and slopped out onto trays by rather grubby looking kitchen staff! Nevertheless, being a Gringa and having ‘connections’ I blagged a free lunch. Soup, Chifa stir fry, flan, an orange and of course mate de coca…what more do you expect for a pound a week!!? It was actually decent food, however the funniest thing about my dining experience was the rush-hour queue of about 250 starving students, which stretched around the entire outside of the building. Everyday without fail they all push and topple over like dominos, whilst everyone lucky enough to be inside bangs on the windows!

On my very last day, we had a party during the last class and one of the students, John had organised a cake. It had iced on it ‘We will miss you’ and then the names of all us volunteers! It was the fittest cake ever! Then after class, me and Patrick (fellow volunteer from Canada) went for drinks with a couple of students. They took us to a local disco called Las Vegas, which was absolutely hilarious! We were the only Gringos in there, dancing to a weird mix of tunes, from Cumbia and Salsa to Regetton then a strange version of scouse house! I was glad to hear that ‘Wooo Wooo’ had made its way over to Cusco!

It was a great night and end to my time in Cusco and Julio also gave me one of his paintings that he usually sells around the Plaza!!! By the time I was on the bus the next day heading to Copacabana, Bolivia I was pretty sad to leave!