Here is a the on-line publication of A STORY I did a couple months ago for COSAS magazine about the Peruvian Basketball league. Its in Spanish but the story got a nice lay-out.
January 25, 2010
January 21, 2010
Lima, the new Paris…(?)
But with a slightly different kind of dog. And restaurant. I took this the other night after eating dinner in a slightly sketchy area adjacent to my hood. This place was one of the ubiquitous “pollerias” (place with chicken) that seem to be 4 to a block. This was a “la Brasa” which serves their birds spit roasted. For a large family you can get a whole chicken with the fixings for a good price. I had just finished a nice meal of 1/4 chicken piled upon a heaping of fresh-cut french fries and along side the strange salads they make here (bad lettuce, cucumbers, beets, a nice creamy dressing) washed down with an old school small glass bottle of Coke (a total of $3.65) and as I got up to leave was greeted by this scene. I was bitten by a beast of a dog in a church garden (does that mean I am a devil incarnate?) recently on vacation (actually behind the church in the photo from the last post in Chivay) and still have a bit of PTSD. Fucker ripped out a perfect hole in my favorite jeans and got me twice in the thigh (luckily had 3 rabies vaccinations for the work in the jungle). Anyway, this pit bull mutt was scabby, scarred and scary and blocking my path so I took pause. He actually ended up being pretty cute and was harmless. (It’s funny how dogs left to their own devices are pretty nice with people and the ones kept by people can turn menacing).
January 18, 2010
January 13, 2010
Ariticle I wrote on Peruvian website.
A Peruvian website for ex-pats asked to use my images from a shaman market I took a couple months ago and write a short article to go with it…
January 7, 2010
Ugly Cakes of the Amazon
The last time I was in the community I am working with in the southern Amazonian region of Peru, there was a ceremony for kids graduating from kindergarten. It was at this weird event (natives listening to french waltz, children dressed in western garb, baked goods!) that I was a witness to an array of jungle cakes the world has seldom seen. Either baked in one of the few mud ovens around the community or just sealed up in molds and cooked over heat on gas burners, the cakes were walked thru a heavy rain to the community building. These funky looking, nuclear colored American totems struck me as an interesting note showing the current waves of globalization washing over our shrinking world.
and here is a short video of the proceddings:
Images from my last and last jaunt to the jungle
The Andes out of the 8 seater plan I was lucky enough to take for the last two trips to the jungle forgoing the triathlon of nausea I was getting sick of.
The downside of flying to the amazon is being stuck at the base camp of the oil company we are being sponsored by. Its called Nuevo Mundo (New World) as is the community they rent the land from a 1/2 mile away. Fuckin missionaries. It’s tiny and ur confined to little aluminum boxes for rooms with bunk beds and not allowed to leave the little wood walkways. This is the runway.
I went to the disco in our community to get a light and was scarcely greeted in the dark by this monster. These two bar-backs did not know what lurked just above them nor would they of cared though this huge spider is quite poisonous. They most likely would have walked around and smacked it dead with their hand.
Anyone know the way to Pgirukotanwu Pwiyawaka?
On the last days of our trip the students took us fishing. We stopped by the farm of one of my students who had stopped attending class as he had to help out on the family farm. These shots are from that land which was unlike anything I had seen in the amazon; rolling hills, cows, lots of birds, tons of fruit trees and serious traditional living.
The ants are that big. The voracious insects are one thing I won’t miss about the jungle.
fucking Cameron. Though in defense of my student, who carved this on his handmade oar, his last name is Lima.
I walked up a ravine for about 45 minutes feeling like I was the first man to do so and that I would come upon a giant snake at any moment. No snakes but did see this butterfly with transparent wings.
This is the living room of the family whose upstairs we used for our tent city each month. Watching one of the daughters make a cake gave me another inkling about how I may have gotten sick. I also watched the adorable baby in the background (who we lovingly called the “gorda nina” or “fat baby”) be bathed in a bucket in the kitchen which then after our fish was dressed in before dinner.
I have been told from quite reliable sources that the reasons a lot of the kids had orangish-blond hair was a lack of nutrients in their diet but I am not sure how that would explain the eyes.
This woman is looking at a photo one of my students took of her working in traditional Amazonian ceramics. That was one of the topics a student choose as there are only 3 woman left in the community still practicing the craft and it surely will die out as the kids get more wooed by the likes of Hannah Montana and what not. Was a nice moment. Almost got a smile out of a community member which was quite a feat.
December 22, 2009
Bullfighting in all its strange glory.
Peru has one of the oldest bullfighting rings in the world. It dates back to the 1700’s. It was my first bullfight and was an intense experience. Hot, dusty, bloody & cruel but steeped in tradition with colorful pomp and circumstance, this spectacle is a cultural relativist’s dream debate. Is it a sport? Not sure. The world’s top matadors were there, mostly from Spain. It goes like this:
The bulls are ushered out to applause as they madly dash into the ring (one lucky one was disqualified after breaking off one of his horns after smashing into a wall). The other 5 where not so lucky. They start by fighting a number of different matadors or others, some on horseback. Colored spikes are thrown into the neck which helps to tire out the bull as he loses blood as well as correct any certain ticks he has while charging. After about 30 minutes when he is good and tired and in shock , the matador tries to deliver a long sword into a small spot on the bull’s neck where it can pass all the way into his heart. This never happened and a Peruvian assistant would have to deliver a series of knife blows to the head to finally kill the bull. When dead, they are dragged out of the ring by horses and then butchered immediately. Here is some more technical info.
Yes, it was cruel no doubt, but the life these 1000 lb. animals get is a hell of a lot better than the lives the animals we eat experience on the factory farms that 99% of our meat comes from. I wasn’t too impressed with the sporting aspects of it much as it seemed by the time the matador does his little dance the bull is so tired he is barely charging. Makes me wonder what the Peruvian cultural would be like if it hadn’t been squashed and stripped by the Spanish.
Inside the pharmacy next door to the bullfighting ring.
For the last couple years the event has been met with protests. Many countries in the world have already outlawed bullfighting.
This was inside the room where the horse trainers ready their steeds.
A matador leaving a small chapel in the arena after a prayer ceremony.
Two horse trainers.
A picadores.
Two Peruvian footmen/executioners.
People wave white flags to show they think it was a good fight and the matador deserves and ear or tail of the animal to put on his mantle.
This coup de grace didn’t go so well. Poor bugger took about 4 knife blows to the head shortly after.
December 17, 2009
December 4, 2009
Shamans and Gamarra.
The neighborhood of Gamarra is a bustling shopping and garment district on the outskirts of Lima. Besides hundreds of cheap clothing stores, black market brand rip-offs and fabric suppliers it also has a large number of vendors who have shaman supplies. Need a llama fetus? Got it. Leopard head? check. Or maybe you would rather have a live guinea pig dragged around your body then killed and dissected to show where your problems are located as naturally its location is mirrored in the little furry guys organs. VIDEO.
This is also one of the areas where one can procure a drink made of frogs. Its considered to have a number of medicinal attributes including the ability to help those ailing from the dastardly sufferings of impotence. I didn’t sample it as three months of parasites was enough for me but my fearful companion Fiorella (who at every turn said ” We can’t go there, we will be robbed” or “Watch your camera”), actually sampled it.
She was offered a taste by the chef and was too sweet to say no.
Her review. “It tasted like it was decomposing dead dog from the street..”.
Below is a short video of the little guys.
Using coca leaves, a shaman supply saleslady read Fiorella’s fortune. The news was good. On the table to the right are a bunch of llama fetuses and at center a jaguar head. Forgot to ask how much.
Nothing like askew cleavage and cocaine to get u going on a Sunday afternoon right? The bags are full of coca leaves. If you add 20 liters of GAS and an assortment of other nasty stuff u get the white stuff.
Shaman supply guy.
Clock supply guy.
Afro-Peruvian tarot card reader.
This 97-year-old woman from Huraz, a mountain town at the foot of the Cordillera Blanca’s (which I visited and blogged about months back) broke out in hysterics when Fiorella mentioned Pishtaco’s to which she referred to me as a “ufo”, a person from outer space…
December 3, 2009
Images from Central Lima
I made my first real photographic journey into Centro Lima last week and I just got the film back. Here are some favorites. Seems that the business district I wandered around was organized by what was for sale. The images of the people selling lighting equipment and amplification gizmos were taking in one building where there was upwards of 100 vendors, each selling specific technical pieces or fixing things and each confined to their own little space. This went on for at least 3 blocks. This was the same for party favors, pinatas, clothing makers, etc.., each with their own part of the city.
