Join Dan Cruickshank in a journey across Peru in which he discovers what he considers to be some of the world’s greatest treasures.
Category: "Life"
Walking in Lima
Walking is my favorite form of transportation in Lima and I do it just about every day without fail. The biggest downfall of walking is that, well, if you walk in Lima, you will eventually have to cross the street. And cars drive in the street. I’ve heard that in Lima, six people are run over and killed every day. Not just run over. Run over and killed. And, after living here for four months, it seems like an Act of God that the number is so low.
Tourism killing Tourism
Inca ruins, splendours from even-older cultures, Spanish colonial towns, pristine jungles and good food: Peru has much to offer the tourists who are flocking there in ever-greater numbers. But if it is not careful, its tourist industry risks becoming its own worst enemy.
Farmers strike
It has only been a few months since the last series of violent protests brought the country to a halt. This time, rather than being about teachers having to know how to read and write by law – something they are still complaining violates their human rights, farmers have been protesting, partly about their impending doom brought on by the Peru-USA free trade agreement.
People of Cajamarca
The people of Cajamarca are as distinctive as any in Peru, with an individual culture, customs and typical dress.
Photos at end.
In the gallery accompanying this blog I will show some of the photos I have taken of the people in this region, urban and rural, going about their daily business. You may notice a particular distinctive aspect of the dress – the famous Cajamarca hat.
Yanacocha mine in Cajamarca
While I was staying up in Cajamarca, located in Peru’s northern Andean mountains, I heard the word Yanacocha, a word that popped out in conversations from time to time. It’s not a Spanish word, but it has a playful sound and for some reason it seemed rather important to everyone in Cajamarca. Well, as it turns out, they were talking about the Minera Yanacocha (Yanacocha Mine), which is not only important to the folks of Cajamarca. Minera Yanacocha just happens to be the largest gold mine in South America!
Spectacled Bears
These small bears live throughout the forested Andean regions of South America. In Peru they are commonly associated with the northern regions, where dry sub-tropical and cloud forests are more prevalent, though they also still exist in the high-altitude cloud forests along the spine of the Andes. They feel at home in the canopies of trees, where they also find most their food sources.
Noche Buena and The Peruvian Christmas
Those of us from the Northern Hemisphere probably associate Christmas with pine trees, mistletoe and, oh yeah, cold weather. However, for those countries located below the equator, the holiday occurs right at the start of the summer season. Peru is one of the countries that have the luck to be able to celebrate this holiday in mild temperatures. The differences don’t stop there as much of the way in which Peruvians celebrate Christmas is unique, especially when it comes to what foods they eat.
Hans Heinrich Brüning
Hans Heinrich Brüning Brookstedt lives on through his museum in the town of Lambayeque in northern Peru. This Peruvian archaeologist of German origin, born in 1848, travelled to Peru in in 1875 to find work on the Pátamo estate.
US-Peru Free Trade Agreement Approved – My thoughts
It is extremely difficult to properly articulate an argument without others inferring, often incorrectly, what they think you mean and what they think you believe. More so with a subject as complex as the Free Trade Agreement between Peru and the United States, which overall, members of both Governments have shown themselves widely in favour of.
Wong
Wong is Peru’s largest supermarket chain who’s first store opened in 1952 as a small cornershop in Avenida Dos de Mayo. Erasmo Wong offered his customers something other cornershops didn’t; an unsurpassable service. If a customer entered his store and didn’t find what they wanted, Wong offered to get it for them as fast as possible and as frequently as they needed for the lowest price around.
Highway Robbery
I was travelling from Trujillo to Chiclayo recently on a bus operated by the company Emtrafesa when we encountered an accident on the pan-american highway, just inside Lambayeque. A truck carrying a cargo of Brahma beer had spilled its load. Crates of smashed bottles of beer blocked the road both ways while people stuck in the blocked traffic scurried about stealing what they could find.
