Can You Smell That?

Sunday, June 13

After being sick a good portion of the night, I started feeling decent Sunday morning. I forced myself to eat something for breakfast as I hadn’t really eaten in the past two days. We went to the Sunday morning market in Pisac. I didn’t have any desire to buy anything and I was still having trouble standing so I asked Rafo (our guide) where a church was because he mentioned that we could go to Mass if we wanted. Did I want to go to Mass? Please. As if that’s even a question. So we asked around for the capillita (little chapel) as the main church was under construction because it had been damaged by the mudslides. Chinh, Rafo, and I found the chapel and sheepishly walked in because we were pretty late. We lucked out because the whole chapel was filled with precious children because they were all preparing for their First Communion. I didn’t have my Spanish Mass read along book, but I still managed thanks to all those times I went to Spanish Mass at St. Joseph’s because I was too lazy to wake up for St. Thomas More. After church, Rafo asked the nuns if we could visit with the children so we walked with them to the convent and saw where they had their class. Boy, do I love Peruvian children, almost creepily so.

Chinh and I chillin with the kids

We wandered around the market a little bit more and then headed back to the bus to start driving to Ollantaytambo (and not a moment too soon as I was easily about to pass out. I told myself and everyone else that I was better, but looking back, I was still pretty sick).

When we arrived to Ollantaytambo, we had a nice little trek to our hotel once again. We walked along this water channel that smelled pretty awful, according to Kathryn. Kathryn has a very sensitive sense of smell. I cannot smell anything because I can’t even breathe I’ve been so congested. One of our favorite games is called, “Can you smell that?” It always, and I mean always, goes like this:

Kathryn: Oh god, can you smell that?!

Me: I can’t smell anything.

Kathryn: Oh ok, well it smells like [insert smell here].

Previous smells have included: dog shit, human feces, the zoo (or more specifically the pachyderms), the Medieval Fair, camp, urine, etc. If that doesn't make you want to come to Peru, I don't know what will.

Once we checked into our hotel, we had a little time to eat and then we were going to the ruins of Ollantaytambo. I was really impressed with the ruins. Much better than the huacas in Lima, which kind of resembled dirt mounds to me. I was even more impressed with our guide, Saúl. I don’t know what Carlitos is thinking when he keeps contracting these attractive guides. I might be a fan of Saul’s looks, but the information he tells us is a little lacking. He told us this whole story about Inca philosophy and beliefs, which turns out isn’t even true, just his interpretation. It sounded pretty good though. It convinced me at the time.

beautiful views

las ruinas

Oh hey Saul, lookin fly.

That night we watched a movie on Machu Picchu, which got me super excited! And then we all had dinner together. We went to this neat restaurant and they served us alpaca, which I really wanted to try, but was too sick to eat. :( Maybe that’s for the best though.

Sunday night also marked the first night that I got to room with Kathryn. We were both really excited about it, but it was a complete and utter disaster. Our room opens to the outside, and typical Americans we left our light on when we went to class. When I returned to the room, it was dark outside, and our glass door was coooooovered in moths and various other insects. I confronted my fears, opened the door, the bugs swarmed my face and then swarmed the light. Our ceiling was crawling with them. Now this won’t due at all. Being the problem solver that I am, I decided to turn off the main light, and turn on the bathroom light so they would migrate and they would be contained. So smart. The plan was a success in every sense, except that when we returned from dinner, we obviously couldn’t use our bathroom because it was swarming with bugs. Then, we discover that the door doesn’t even reach all the way to the ceiling and there’s a huge opening at the top so we can’t even contain them!! So Kathryn and I spent a few minutes sitting in the dark staring at each other so as to not attract any more bugs and devise a new plan. I couldn’t go to sleep without brushing my teeth so Kathryn and I armed ourselves with toothbrushes, toothpaste, and bottled water and braved the bathroom with the intent of brushing our teeth as quickly as humanly possible. It turned into a giggle fit and resulted in Kathryn spitting out all of her toothpaste on my face. The roommate situation was redeemed slightly with some good pillow talk though, and I'm always a sucker for pillow talk.