Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

From Lima I wish you all a good holiday season.

I am finally feeling like I am on vacation as my mom and I have travelled to Arica and Lima post-Christmas and enjoyed the beach and the big city. Yesterday, while my mom was resting I just walked around a bit in Lima and all the people and life and energy reminded me how much I love big cities.

Of course, for all their good points, there are also the negatives. As we walked across the river from the center and into an area called Rimac, we were actually approached by a police officer who asked us if we were American and then told us that it was too dangerous to continue walking in that area and we should turn around. Imagine that happening in any American city! Then later, I took my mom back to the area that I had been walking around by myself because it was so full of energy and life (and good street food like choclo con queso - corn with cheese - and papa rellena - stuffed potato), and we suffered the consequences. As we were just walking down the street, someone came up from behind my mom and just grabbed her earings out of her ears and ran off with them. Not too much to do, and my mom handled it well, but it definitely clued us both in to the fact that we need to pay more attention.


We also walked around the center a lot, saw an interesting display of nacimientos in the national palace, bought a whole bunch of odds and ends as gifts for the states, and took a ride at night up to the giant cross on the sand dune right near the center. It was quite stunning to look out over all of Lima, and there was definitely a sense of peace and order on seeing it from so high up. But try to imagine a city of 9 million (bigger than New York), but not build vertically at all. Lima is just a sprawling, giant metropolis. And I think for that reason I really love it.

So, plans from here are to say goodbye to my mom tomorrow and fly back to Tacna to rest up before jumping in to Mes de Mision in Ite (if you can read Spanish: es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distrito_de_Ite). Hope everyone is enjoying the mid winter´s rest and the cold wintry weather!