Tag Archives: cusco

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FIRST, some follow-ups:
-like most (all) of my ideas, the inca wall puzzle does exist.
-bembo’s wouldn’t sell me a hat. my brother prob could have schmoozed his way into getting a hat….but the best i could get was a job application

TODAY, i walked all around cusco. it’s a cool little city….with tons of narrow winding stone passages. it’s a fun place to wander around for a day. humans are lazy, with differing consequences. on the plus side, cusco has a cool mix of incan, spanish and modern architecture (it’s easier to build on or around the old stuff). on the down side, people pee in many of the alleys so it smells.

FLAGS. tomorrow is peru’s independence day; apparently, it’s also national law that all buildings must display the peruvian flag. so the streets are filled with peruvian flags (which look surprisingly similar to canadian flags). I’m not sure which came first, but cusco’s flag is identical to the homosexual rainbow flag…coincidence?

THEATER. this evening, i checked out kusikay. it was actually surprisingly entertaining…full of acrobats, comedy, dancing, audience interaction….and no speaking. it wasn’t as polished as a similar program might be in san francisco, but it was still well done.

PICS:
+this is the second country (el salvador) where i’ve seen barbed wire placed at human level to protect a shitty little grass patch…seems dangerous and a waste of money to protect some dried up grass.
+another cool inca wall in the middle of the city.
+cuzco from above (taken from the ‘christ the redeemer’ statue, which is apparently not just limited to rio)
+a cool little [hippie] park in cuzco

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CUZCO! (…or is it cusco?)
today ushi (the sentra) and i finally made it to one of the two major destinations of the trip: cuzco! (the other destination is iguazu falls). the inca stonework really is quite amazing and it’s nice that, as far as i can tell, the knockoffs are pretty obvious…..so you can appreciate the originals even more.

driving into cuzco is a bit overwhelming. it’s a densely packed, stone filled little city. the central area is very easy to manage by foot…but a bit more difficult by car (at least at first). in most cities i follow the major flow of traffic…hoping it will lead me to a major destination (such as the central plaza). here, i followed cars so i could know which streets were passable for cars and which weren’t. like in parts of europe, many streets are barely wide enough for cars. after driving around peru, i think we need to invent a new mode of transportation…in some parts of nepal, they’re using ziplines instead of building costly roads…interesting idea.

SOUVENIRS
souvenirs in peru are, for the most part, very nice and very affordable. instead of the ‘i heart sf’ shirts, they sell intricately carved gourds and nice paintings. so what’s the downside? EVERYBODY sells the same stuff…so it loses it’s value. even in lima, they sell the same stuff. why do we need thousands of identical stores selling the exact same stuff at the exact same price? it’s really ashame — i’m ok buying mass-produced products (iphone, etc.), but mass-produced art work just doesn’t sound right. also…where are the inca wall puzzles? seems like a good souvenir idea, no? 3d or 2d puzzles which interlock like the walls…not like traditional puzzle pieces.
finally, at one of the artesanal markets (‘artesanal’ is used loosely), they had a cool visa card reader, which is shared by all the stands….not a bad idea.

BEMBO’S BURGERS
like in n’ out, bembo’s seems to have a passionate local (peruvian) following…and is better than mcdonalds…but is just another hamburger chain (like in n’ out). they wear these really dorky wool hats. well…that’s what i thought at first. then i saw some of their artwork on the wall, illustrating their hat in different styles (lichtensten, warhol, etc.). then i liked the hat. now i want to buy one. i guess advertising does work.