Working with the Dueñas

As Jake tells me that he´s recently left a work exchange with a native family in the Peruvian jungle, my ears perk. Before making my mind and scribbling directions I don´t get many details, just the basics.

-All hand tools
-Dirt floors
-Native Quechua speakers
-Rare trips to town and,
-An abundance of home-grown food

This is the closest thing to native sustainability that i´ve personally encountered in S. American and its not minutes before i have my bag packed and am leaving the gringo ranch for the bus station.

I was shocked by the hospitality offered me by the Dueñas family as i arrived after a 3 hr walk up to their doorstep. Exhausted, I go to sit down on a bench and a blanket or sheepskin is thrown down to pad my tired ass somehow before my butt makes touchdown, as if they are anticipating my needs. Water is offered before i ask and food heaping in front of my face before i´ve even begun to digest the last meal.

ITs like going home and getting smothered by mom, sure you tire of it sooner or later, but for now as i long for home and familiar faces of holidays, i´ll baske in every moment of this home away from home-hospitality i can get.

Day:2
I don´t know why but i assumed the family all spoke spanish, but as i struggle and struggle to communicate i wonder how my language has gotten so poor. Then i realize most of the family has never been to school, never left this land except to sell fruit or cafe at the market. And as i sit around the dinner table listening i realize their not even mumbling spanish, but what i assume must be Quechua.

Yesterday i began work with the brothers, harvesting granadillas. A fruit similar to passion fruit. Today I discovered the origins of the game ¨pool.¨ With a long bamboo pole i take aim at a fruit and hope it falls into the satchel. For hours i reveled in the sport of the harvest. Then my arms started to feel tired, a few hours later they fucking burned. My back hoisting a sack full of fruit around all day began aching. And then i remembered that i did ask for this, i´m doing this for some reason, and i finish the day strong... until.

After harvesting the fruit we count it and box it in the upper fort. After the boxing they ask me to carry a box down the mountain. (40 minutes) Not carried on the head, or in a backpack but in a tarplike blanket tied around the neck. He tells me its only 25 kilos. I´m sure David is joking, but as i look into his face, i see no hint of comedy.

The first thing i notice is that its hard to breathe. About 10 minutes down the mountain i start to feel dizzy and realize i´m not getting enough oxygen. I pull of the trail and squat to rest, and i notice how my legs burn. I notice the red burn of the knot digging into my chest and i feel my collar bones ache, i wonder if they could re-break with the weight so strangely loaded onto them.

Now all you backpackers out there calculating how far you´ve walked with 25 kilos. Think again, this is not a cushy backpack with shoulder straps, waist strap, and chest strap. No this is a damn boyscout neckercheif cutting into your windpipe and tearing up your collarbones.

Near the bottom, i stumble and trip. The box came smashing down. I expected my brother to lash out and scream at the ruined fruit. Instead he frees the fruit from strangling me and helps me to my feet, then points to the rock i slipped on and explains in poor spanish that i have to watch out for moving rocks like this.

Leaving the Gringo Trail

A few years ago I asked my english teacher to help me with a short story i was working on. After reading my draft he mentioned several things, and most memorably he said ¨Instead of telling me, i want you to show me the story.¨

As a student of photography, i told him to give me a fucking camera. Well you get the idea, if a pictures worth a thousand words, then how many words will i need to replace the few pictures that illustrate so clearly whats going on?

My camera is long broken and gone and there is so much i want to show you. The next leg of my journey has so much character that you´ll just have to see it one day to believe it. I´ll tell or show you about it soon.

I´ve spent most of my life flying solo. You can imagine my surprise to feel something like lonliness creeping in. But after sending Angela and Ashley home in the same 24 hrs i went from being loved and relied on to being... just another sol gringo at the home away from home gringo ranch.

I found myself missing my traveling partner like crazy, we had some lousy times sure, but what a blast, thanks Ange, I love you. I´ll probably get in trouble for saying this but you are my most awsome sister. Char, Mel, i love you both in different ways.

While I was keeping my hands busy working at a habitat for humanity project I still found my thoughts drifting... home. I knew this was hazardous to my trip as fragile as it was at this point. The tourism part over and the education & laborous work phase just beggining. Without all the lustrous visuals of the gringo trail, its easy to give in to peer pressure and just... go home to a long embrace of loved ones, old and new.

But as I remember my life goals, I realize that the amazon, and macchu picchu, were just small fish in a big pond. I remember that I´ve really come to S. America to study sustainability and natural medicine. And thats why i´m so excited about my new work exchange i stumbled on.